Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Bairnardo]

The health and wellbeing of the people in this country is absolutely of no interest to the govt. Leave aside all the rather over simplified "folk are fat" talk and just consider "health and wellbeing" On top of the obesity crisis, theres the state of the NHS, the state of mental healthcare provision and awareness, theres the employment laws increasingly designed to make people work more, for less leaving little time or money to do things that make them happy or keep them healthy, the fucked up welfare system resulting in generation by generation decline in health as we see kids growing up without ever having had a fighting chance of a happy and healthy existence, constantly shifting pension laws making a fruitful retirement a rapidly moving target for all of us.

That's before you get into provision of exercise facilities in the community, be it gyms or outdoor stuff.

This country is a fucking shambles on a health score, and the Tories and their attitude towards 99.99% of people who aren't daddy's boy Etonians are front and centre for the blame.

[Frankie S]

2 hours ago, Todd_is_God said:

The above from, say, April until September would be better than nothing, as long as daft shit like no music, no alcohol unless you are eating, and curfews aren't part of it.

No doubt whatever WM do will be too risky for NS, though, so we'll end up with some delayed, watered down version.

The recorded music ban (that only ever applied in Scotland) is one of the few restrictions that Scot Gov has lifted, after massive pushback from the hospitality industry. 

Music ban lifted

It was lifted in December, but no-one in the sector has had a chance to gain any benefit from it as we’ve all been shut since then. At least we’ll be able to make a passable attempt at having some atmosphere when we finally reopen, even though we already know from Sturgeon, Leitch et al’s comments that  social distancing and 6 from 2 will be with us for the foreseeable future. 

I had optimistically thought that we (those of us that run pubs / restaurants) would be able to reopen in April after the vulnerable (+health care workers) had been vaccinated, and before furlough ended, but the mood music from both WM and Scot Gov has been so overwhelmingly negative of late that we fully expect furlough to be pushed on (at least sector-specific for those business forced to stay shut) for a few months and for us not to be allowed to reopen until early summer, by which time vaccinations should have scaled up and deaths and hospitalisations scaled down sufficiently, allied to ever-improving treatments, and the virus’s natural summer downturn that we saw last year. It’s possible it might be late summer / early autumn though given the excessive caution likely to be deployed. 

Amongst the many reasons I’m getting increasingly less optimistic of any kind of return to normality (as opposed to Sturgeon’s ‘greater normality’) this year, is the persistent rumour (I have my ear to the grapevine on this, so it’s a bit more than a ‘rumour’ tbh) that Scot Gov has already advised the Edinburgh Fringe not to expect to be able to stage any indoor events this year, and that’s in August. The expectation is for the Fringe to be reduced to a limited number of outdoor, socially-distanced events, with alcohol either strictly limited or banned altogether (pop-up bars are a no no apparently - entirely consistent with Scot Gov’s Calvinist puritanical streak). A fairly dismal prospect, given we’ll be a full 18 months into this absolute shitstorm by then.

As someone who runs  live music venues, I know almost all tours are now being pushed back to 2022. Almost no-one in the sector expects normal indoor gigs to return this year, and everyone (bar seemingly Scot Gov) knows live music simply isn’t viable with social distancing. 

My expectation, sadly, is that pubs and restaurants will be operating with restrictions for the remainder of 2021, even after full vaccination (full in the sense of both doses - for those vaccines that require two shots - offered to all - those who refuse the vaccine shouldn’t be allowed to dictate government policy) of the adult population, and even after deaths and hospitalisations diminish to minimal levels. My gut feeling (hope I’m wrong) is that we’ll be operating with some restrictions (including 1m+ SD) until spring 2022, just in case. Irrespective of how low cases are in the summer and autumn, the media and the zero Covid nutters will prime us for a (however unlikely to materialise) huge upswing in the winter due to speculative super-powered vaccine-resistant new variants etc, even when the vaccines have been tweaked and boosters primed and ready to cope with known variants. 

Everyone with half a clue (including the likes of Whitty, Vallance and JVT, all of whom I’d trust for a realistic scientific assessment above the likes of Leitch, Sridhar etc.) knows that Covid won’t be completely eliminated - it will simply become an endemic seasonal virus with a lower CFR than the flu (the efficacy of existing Covid vaccines greatly exceeds that of the flu vaccines), which gives me some hope that WM at least won’t countenance restrictions being rolled on too far beyond their sell-by date, but things will doubtless move a bit slower in Scotland, as we know.

Edited February 12, 2021 by Frankie S

[Inanimate Carbon Rod]

Funny that the people who are seemingly not letting Todd forget a comment in August are the ones who seem happiest to forget the comments the government have been making all the way through this pandemic which have turned out to be wrong. 

[ayrmad]

5 hours ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

Hopefully. Something needs to be done, there’s far too many fat people in this country. My bird was saying at the hospital they have winches to lift fatties and also send folk to the zoo for scans. That’s a disgrace.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/6665529/obese-more-deadly-than-smoking/amp/

 

If only we had trim nurses to dish out advice about obesity, usually the cleaner that's skinny when I'm around Ayr hospital. 

[Aufc]

Dont want to take it off topic too much and i am probably at risk kf sounding like ayrmad

However the biggest problem with obesity in this country is that people dont want to offend by calling people fat when it is a simple fact. For most people, it is a case of eating less and moving more. They dont need a fancy gym or equipment but use it as an excuse. Almost everyone has access to the internet so there is no reason why they are unable to access information about being healthy. A lot of people who are overweight look for excuses as to why they are unable to lose weight. Yes the government could do more but it is not all of their responsibility.

People need to take ownership. You have popular magazines with obese woman on the front saying “this is beautiful”. Now i am not saying that the woman is ugly but the simple fact is she is unhealthy and promoting this to the nation makes it acceptable. It also works on the other side with models who are stick thin.

I say this as someone who used to be overweight. I also appreciate that some people have an issue with eating whereby it is not easy to just stop eating less. However it is too easy for some people to hide behind this.

[ayrmad]

4 minutes ago, Aufc said:

Dont want to take it off topic too much and i am probably at risk kf sounding like ayrmad

However the biggest problem with obesity in this country is that people dont want to offend by calling people fat when it is a simple fact. For most people, it is a case of eating less and moving more. They dont need a fancy gym or equipment but use it as an excuse. Almost everyone has access to the internet so there is no reason why they are unable to access information about being healthy. A lot of people who are overweight look for excuses as to why they are unable to lose weight. Yes the government could do more but it is not all of their responsibility.

People need to take ownership. You have popular magazines with obese woman on the front saying “this is beautiful”. Now i am not saying that the woman is ugly but the simple fact is she is unhealthy and promoting this to the nation makes it acceptable. It also works on the other side with models who are stick thin.

I say this as someone who used to be overweight. I also appreciate that some people have an issue with eating whereby it is not easy to just stop eating less. However it is too easy for some people to hide behind this.

Far more complex IMO. 

[Aufc]

Far more complex IMO. 

For some people it is. For a lot of people it really is as simple as eat less and move more

[Dons_1988]

14 minutes ago, Aufc said:

Dont want to take it off topic too much and i am probably at risk kf sounding like ayrmad

However the biggest problem with obesity in this country is that people dont want to offend by calling people fat when it is a simple fact. For most people, it is a case of eating less and moving more. They dont need a fancy gym or equipment but use it as an excuse. Almost everyone has access to the internet so there is no reason why they are unable to access information about being healthy. A lot of people who are overweight look for excuses as to why they are unable to lose weight. Yes the government could do more but it is not all of their responsibility.

People need to take ownership. You have popular magazines with obese woman on the front saying “this is beautiful”. Now i am not saying that the woman is ugly but the simple fact is she is unhealthy and promoting this to the nation makes it acceptable. It also works on the other side with models who are stick thin.

I say this as someone who used to be overweight. I also appreciate that some people have an issue with eating whereby it is not easy to just stop eating less. However it is too easy for some people to hide behind this.

I think this is true for a good number of people. I would say losing weight (for most) is really difficult but it's not complicated. It requires hard work, discipline, patience and as you say just a personal responsibility to do it. I think there's too much in the media that allows people to blame something else. There was someone on the radio yesterday saying she has put on weight this lockdown because it's cold and it's too easy to have biscuits with her tea. I'm afraid that's just your poor decision making.

I would re-iterate that it is really difficult, particularly in the first few weeks/months, and it's easy to sound dismissive, but I think more people could just make a strong choice to live their lives in a healthier way, one day at a time, and they'd see a massive difference.

[superbigal]

I note the English road map statement is due Monday 22nd February.
Allow me to predict Scotgov statement on Tuesday 16th to have some cock and bull excuse to kick roadmap out of lockdown down the road till the 23rd.
Hope I’m wrong and they actually take the bull by the horn, due to our infection rates, hospital admissions, deaths all being close to half of English rates.
Predictions anyone ?

[ayrmad]

1 minute ago, Aufc said:

 

For some people it is. For a lot of people it really is as simple as eat less and move more

 

And for a lot of people it isn't, I'll generalise, it is easier to keep trim if you work 9 to 5 than it is working into the wee small hours fir various reasons. 

[ayrmad]

3 minutes ago, superbigal said:

I note the English road map statement is due Monday 22nd February.
Allow me to predict Scotgov statement on Tuesday 16th to have some cock and bull excuse to kick roadmap out of lockdown down the road till the 23rd.
Hope I’m wrong and they actually take the bull by the horn, due to our infection rates, hospital admissions, deaths all being close to half of English rates.
Predictions anyone ?

I predict that the SG will be required to alter theirs if they announce it first, politics trumps everything when we're pitching Westminster against Holyrood. 

[Billy Jean King]

I know we've all had a joke about subservient British public etc but there is a definite rumbling of pushback to this building up.

Where ? Outside of this echo chamber every poll you see supports the measures hugely. Last weekend I read one where 45% want TIGHTENING of restrictions. I see no public wavering on these issues at all.

Even the local Facebook groups are full of 'get the borders shut' bar the odd poppy daft, are brave boiz types.

[Dons_1988]

8 minutes ago, superbigal said:

I note the English road map statement is due Monday 22nd February.
Allow me to predict Scotgov statement on Tuesday 16th to have some cock and bull excuse to kick roadmap out of lockdown down the road till the 23rd.
Hope I’m wrong and they actually take the bull by the horn, due to our infection rates, hospital admissions, deaths all being close to half of English rates.
Predictions anyone ?

They've already set 22nd as return for a lot of school pupils etc. I suspect they'll say we'll wait and see after a few weeks of schools being back.

[Aufc]

And for a lot of people it isn't, I'll generalise, it is easier to keep trim if you work 9 to 5 than it is working into the wee small hours fir various reasons. 

Possibly correct but, again, that is an easy excuse to make. It just requires some organisation and self-discipline

[EdinburghPar1975]

I reckon the SG will look to keep the restrictions longer with the hope that they can lift them more effectively and with less risk of having to re-impose again but they must be getting close to that point where the current level of restriction is not going to be accepted/ followed by the majority.

I do think that face masks in enclosed spaces and on transport will remain for the rest of the year and some steps like the sanitation stations in shops should be kept anyway.

Edited to add: I know the news picked up on it last night but the fact that Falkirk and Clackmannanshire are apparently around 40% up on their 7 day figures for cases wont help get things lifted either

Edited February 12, 2021 by EdinburghPar1975

[Billy Jean King]

They've already set 22nd as return for a lot of school pupils etc. I suspect they'll say we'll wait and see after a few weeks of schools being back.

That is already in the public domain. Was there ever a plan in Scotland to issue a roadmap for reopening at the review on the 16th ? I can't remember that being announced.

[ayrmad]

10 minutes ago, Aufc said:

 

Possibly correct but, again, that is an easy excuse to make. It just requires some organisation and self-discipline

 

It's not an excuse, the self-discipline required is far easier for those working 9 to 5.

And it is correct, no possibly about it, thankfully you're looking nowt like me this morning. 

Edited February 12, 2021 by ayrmad

[Billy Jean King]

Possibly correct but, again, that is an easy excuse to make. It just requires some organisation and self-discipline

Your talking shit. There are huge correlations with mental health and numerous other social and economic issues. The principal is very basic ie eat less exercise more but it's a massively complex issue beyond that. Anyone who thinks it's simply a matter of willpower is sadly lacking in knowledge of the subject

[Dons_1988]

Just now, ayrmad said:

It's not an excuse, the self-discipline required is far easier for those working 9 to 5.

The term excuse can sound dismissive, but it's kind of true.

I'd agree it's more difficult for those working awkward hours or have childcare burdens etc, but it is still within people's gift to carve out a routine and diet to be healthier.

[Boostin' Kev]

7 hours ago, Frankie S said:

Amongst the many reasons I’m getting increasingly less optimistic of any kind of return to normality (as opposed to Sturgeon’s ‘greater normality’) this year, is the persistent rumour (I have my ear to the grapevine on this, so it’s a bit more than a ‘rumour’ tbh) that Scot Gov has already advised the Edinburgh Fringe not to expect to be able to stage any indoor events this year, and that’s in August. The expectation is for the Fringe to be reduced to a limited number of outdoor, socially-distanced events, with alcohol either strictly limited or banned altogether (pop-up bars are a no no apparently - entirely consistent with Scot Gov’s Calvinist puritanical streak). A fairly dismal prospect, given we’ll be a full 18 months into this absolute shitstorm by then.

 

I'll be if we don't get a decent version of the Fringe this year.