Monday 2 November 2020

Lockdown 2 - Lockdown's revenge

So that was all worth it then. According to the figures I saw yesterday from the Boffins we are in exactly the same place as early March. Back to square one, gone right down that snake to the beginning of the game. 

Which I have to say I find a little bit depressing if not unexpected. I also recall from March a chart which showed we would have repeated patterns of lockdowns until a vaccine was found, the virus mutated to a more mild form or herd immunity had built. 

So I fully expect this lockdown will drive the R<1 for a little bit, we will then be freed for Christmas which will start the spread again and so another lockdown, after a bit of dithering in Feb or March time. Hopefully by then, some sort of vaccine will be in the process of being rolled out and with the summer too, it maybe the worst is behind us then. 

In the meantime, somehow I have to control myself from the judgey environment this has created, as well as the mild physical threat. It seems to me plenty of people are ready to screech and report any minor misdemeanour (in their eyes), such as not wearing a mask in a field, meanwhile another section of crazies storms around without a mask shouting we are all lemmings or some such. What a time to be alive!

I'll get to a review of the economic impact of this later in the week, but it is not going to be pretty to say the least. Whilst I am quite an optimist on the virus being controlled, the economic damage we are taking makes me far more pessimistic. 

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

We could have staved it off longer were it not for university's reopening and, possibly, Eat Out to Help Out not having happened.

I mean, who knew large numbers of people moving between the regions would act as vectors? So trying to not bail out university's has, instead, meant bailing out everything else for at least 4 weeks, along with a lot of people wondering why they've shelled out 9k to be locked in a shoddily built box and fed brown ale butties at champagne prices.

And a few places I frequented/supported during August were not exactly 100% covid secure, reusing menus and condiments between tables without disinfecting. If that was representative across the nation...

So, this second wave is one of their own making.

Penseivat said...

In the meantime, China, as the (negligent or deliberate) instigators of the world wide infection, see it's GDP rise, millionaires become multi millionaires, and the military wing of the CCP slowly encroaching into the rest of the world while we are diseased, unemployed, and bankrupt.

Anonymous said...

Boris's position is a simple one. He is told by his SAGE advisors, who are the only people that he seems prepared to listen to, that unless there is an immediate lockdown some 4,000 people a day "could" be dying of Covid. The data and reasoning behind that figure has yet to be produced; indeed SAGE has thus far refused to release it.
But what is Boris to do? If he continued without a lockdown and deaths (from whatever cause, as they all seem to be lumped in together) continued to rise, he would be personally blamed for each and every one of them. The ghouls of the leftist media are ready and waiting. At the most recent press conference, Laura K. of the BBC asked Professor Whitty: "How many extra deaths have been caused by the delay in implementing a lockdown?"
You can write the rest of the script yourself.
And speaking of a script, right on cue a letter today in The Times urging the postponement of our final Brexit "because of the Covid crisis".
Interesting times...

DJK said...

The lesson of the first wave was that countries that locked down early and hard came out soonest with far fewer deaths and a smaller economic impact. But it seems that all over Europe complacency has set in, together with a reluctance to lock down again. Cases, hospitalizations and deaths are growing exponentially in most of Europe and have forced lockdowns in most countries. There are no good options here, and even doing nothing comes with a huge economic cost, together with the cost in lost lives.

E-K said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
E-K said...

Face it.

Britain is un-lock-down-able and we should just accept it. This is for all sorts of reasons, some of them good and some of them bad but the best reason is that we're not boring.

Boris risks making Britain boring.

No greater sin.

What next ? Shoot people so that they don't die of CV-19 ?

E-K said...

Anonymous at 2.58

"I mean, who knew large numbers of people moving between the regions would act as vectors"

I move around regions a lot. I have a pithy sense of humour and whinge a lot... I guess that's why they call me...

Vector Meldrew.

Anonymous said...

Never in the history of virology has the accepted wisdom been that you lockdown the healthy.

But because of scary pictures/propaganda coming out of China and the same shit modelling that comes from climate activists, we all seem to have fallen in love with the idea.

What amazes me is how many people who have lived their lives believing in the importance of individual liberty also have jumped on the lockdown and mask bandwagon.

We mock the Islamists that blow themselves up because they think they'll get 72 virgins, but we are blind to the fact that much of western society are now just as indoctrinated and brainwashed as them. The difference being many of them grew up under the influence - we converted in a matter of weeks.

Iran transformed quickly under the islamic revolution - the same is happening to the west under the safety revolution.
Face masks are here to stay, as they are now a sign of moral obedience to the new safety god that we must worship.

Every year I think I can't become more misanthropic, every year I'm proven my optimism was dumbfounded.

hovis said...

Anon 9.28pm +200 %

Boris is absolute scum, Hancock is worse. If you listen to Lord Sumption, they have taken a wrecking ball to the constitution deliberately bypassing the use of the Civil Contingencies Act (which is bad enough, but at least requires parliamentary renewal every 30 days.) The use of the Public Health Act is beyond lawful as is the mass applied psychology of the "nudge" unit - Biderman's Chart of Coercion anyone?

The idea that we "need" a lockdown is the biggest load of drivel I have ever seen, shroud waving bullshit from the weak minded and those with an agenda. This isn't even a pandemic anymore for gods sake.

I am not surprised at the faux conservatives and libertarians supinely clamouring for lockdown, disappointed yes, but not surprised. This is the "something must be done" crowd, who fail to ask why this virus is so special that it needs such treatment without looking at the harm done. Nor apparently can they count beyond "cases".

Covidianism is the new religious cult, XR didnt take off enough. But look at the clamour now, not only must you obey, but you must believe with your heart that a piece of cloth protects you from viruses, and everyone, yes everyone is diseased!

Graeme said...

"The lesson of the first wave was that countries that locked down early and hard came out soonest with far fewer deaths and a smaller economic impact."

Pull the other one

Anonymous said...


I would have thought the main lesson we had learned so far was that in most societies lockdowns merely postpone the inevitable and do so at great expense. A country like New Zealand may be an exception because it may be able to isolate itself for so long that visitors from elsewhere will no longer be carriers by the time it opens its borders. The cost is likely to be pretty heavy though.

Anonymous said...

Vector Meldrew ... a great name for Nigel Farage, E-K. Sums him and his party up

Anonymous said...

Perhaps we need a month for the US election result to be confirmed and a Hard Brexit won.

Why tie yourself to an EU deal when you can have competing offers on the table before the year end?

Don Cox said...

"Never in the history of virology has the accepted wisdom been that you lockdown the healthy."

One problem with this virus is that there's no easy way to distinguish between those who don't have it, those who have it but haven't yet developed the symptoms, and those who have very mild symptoms. This is why it has spread itself so efficiently.

In about five years, there will have been enough research done in various countries to get some idea of what strategy works best. That will help when the next pandemic, which is very likely to have a higher death rate, comes along.

Don Cox

CityUnslicker said...

These comments almost perfectly match my post - some very anti lockdown despite the deaths and some saying we should have lockdown sooner and harder.

Given this I expect the Government's popularity to enter a vertical decline shortly as you can't keep both sets of view-holders happy at once and the middle road annoys them both.

Don Cox said...

I would expect young people to be anti- lockdown and old people to be pro- lockdown.

Don Cox

Sebastian Weetabix said...

Where is the evidence that lockdown works? Or mask wearing is effective?

It seems to me that like all other respiratory viruses this is seasonal & goes up/down depending on our sun exposure & vitamin D levels. I do not believe any measure this government has taken has had any effect.

Oh, one exception to that: discharging untested old codgers back into care homes in March was absolutely the best way to kill off about 20,000 people unnecessarily. That scumbag Hancock should be prosecuted for that.

BlokeInBrum said...

As pandemics go, this is about as benign as could possibly be.
The average age of those dying from it is above that of the average life expectancy!
The young ( ie. anyone under 65 ) are almost totally unaffected by this unless they have significant other health issues.
Yet we are in the process of totally destroying our economy, our freedoms and our society in order to battle something that will barely even show up in the long term mortality statistics.

Elby the Beserk said...

Anonymous said...
Vector Meldrew ... a great name for Nigel Farage, E-K. Sums him and his party up

6:29 am
===============================

Yeah, pathetic man. All he's done is to bring about the most immense political change in the UK in my 69 years. Useless twat.

DJK said...

CU: You're right, it's all become very polarised. Worse than Brexit.

Charles Moore today makes the case that no elected politician could fail to lockdown, given the choices they are presented with. And I think that lockdown is the only available policy choice because people who have tested positive, or are identified as contacts of those who have tested positive, are failing to self-isolate. The result is that the virus numbers continue to grow and the economy tanks.

The far eastern countries which have surpressed the virus numbers *and* kept their economies open have done so by forcibly isolating covid infections and potential infections. See this thread on Vietnam, which isolates people up to five degrees of separation from known cases.
https://twitter.com/birdyword/status/1323088509855412224?s=21

Anonymous said...

Boris is damned if he does, damned if he doesn't - and the Globalist/Economist crowd have just recaptured Labour, with hopes that even at this late stage some kind of surrender to Brussels is possible.

What I do detest Boris for is the news that you can come and work in the UK if you earn £25k - which is median UK wage! At a time when unemployment is likely to rise significantly this is a massive betrayal of the people (especially former Labour) who voted for him.

I'm not as angry as I might be, because I never trusted him anyway. But those former Labour voters will be.


https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8874717/Boris-Johnson-scraps-target-lower-net-migration-tens-thousands.html

Anonymous said...

I expect massive electoral fraud in the US in favour of Biden, covered up by the same media who ignored the Biden laptop story (or even suppressed it like Twitter did). The Pennsylvania DA announced a Biden win there two days ago!

After all, if your opponent is Literally Hitler, aren't any and all means of stopping him morally justified?

No one will ask how it is that after four years of Literal Hitler the opposition to him is more emboldened than ever. I seem to recall that after four years of Actual Hitler the opposition were in jail or worse.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, it was Pennsylvania's Attorney General, not DA.

"If all the votes are added up in PA, Trump is going to lose."

https://twitter.com/JoshShapiroPA/status/1322640510637477889

jim said...

Well Boris, we know what to do, the problem is getting elected again afterwards.....

I reckon that with situations that are not amenable to analysis you can reckon 50% of people vote this way and 50% of people vote that way. With shades of opinion at the edges. Brexit and Covid are such situations, you can make a case either way. Snag is people tend to be a bit passionate about their particular guess.

As they say, opinions are like ar"seholes, everyone has one but you don't always want to see it.