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nareik wrote:

 Future War Cultist wrote:

A whole load of elderly people left by themselves almost all the time for three months are going to get burgled. It's very sad.

Imagine being burgled and then killed by the infection the burglar leaves behind!

I didn’t say that.

But it’s a serious concern though.

Also, I’m happy to say that my old shop was way ahead of me with regards to care packages. But I was able to help out with addresses. The assisted lifts I remember from my time as a bin man and the people my mum helped when she worked in care. Point them in the right direction at least.

Not all good news though. My friend is now out of work.

 Argive wrote:


So what it boils down to is are we really saying the british /western public is so selfish they won't respect quarantie protocols and directives or are willing accept social responsibility?

Yes. Absolutely. People (myself included) have a phenomenal capacity for petty selfishness and it doesn't take all that many to pee in the proverbial soup.

 gorgon wrote:

MiguelFelstone wrote:
I kind of feel like an ass complaining about gaming when people losing their lives, jobs, businesses ect but i don't get out of the house often and i was really looking forward to this years escalation league. I've already bought the full army, and we had 4 more months to go

It's okay to be disappointed, so long as you keep it in perspective. My kids were poised to have really fun baseball seasons because reasons, and I'm sad they won't get the chance to have those experiences and memories. Public health is infinitely more important and if this saves lives it's worth it, but I'm still sad for them.

This. Absolutely this.

Me? I’m going to have to miss a Toy Dolls gig in April. The family holiday in May to where we used to caravan when I was a kid? Gone. Chances of my New York trip going ahead in late June? Quite possibly not going to happen.

These things disappointment me. Of course they do. It sucks.

But other than that? I’m actually OK. Working from home is to my benefit, and double win, my season ticket expires the end of this month. That’s potentially £520 back in my pocket, provided I’m working from home for at least two months (which seems entirely possible).

That there are others worse off is no reason for us not to be upset. Just keep things in perspective, and do whatever you can to assist others perhaps less fortunate.

I did a shop for my local Foodbank this morning, buying some essentials. Because I suspect when those on Zero Hour contracts aren’t getting hours, or the otherwise self employed and those who don’t get sick pay worth a damn? The Foodbanks (which are a national cause for shame as it is) are going to be busier than ever.

I’m a socialist, and currently financially in a very, very strong position. So I feel a moral obligation to do this. And no, you don’t need to be a fellow socialist to do this.

 Argive wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:

tneva82 wrote:


Simple math proves the wrong thoug and funny thing is even UK goverment realized that their herd immunity is going to lead to literally hundreds of thousands dead. The "just let it spread for herd immunity" approach would not keep rates lower than italy and since UK has even LESS intensive care room than italy per population it will obviously mean that unless rate is lower than italy(which it wouldn't have been) you get more, not less, patients on your lower amount of beds.

And simpe fact is for herd immunity you need 60% of population as bare minimum(preferably more) infected. Then even with very optimistic 0.5% mortality rate we get to 200k.

This is basic math and funny that is what was even given to boris & co initially but ignored...

Now at least they have woken up a bit and realized it won't work after all. But too late. But that's what you get when you ignore experts.
.

You are misreading this. Herd immunity is the answer, because claims of containment are going to fail and no matter our strategy, it will end with herd immunity. We will develop herd immunity is more honest than we are going to stop the virus.
This pandemic doesn't have neat easy correct answers, it is going to be messy, many will die. This will happen if you make media friendly actions of actions that the media dislike.
There are too many experts with an internet connection, Boris and Co chose which ones they are going to listen to, and they made their point clearly.

Had Johnson advocated total lockdown alternate experts would be saying herd immunity is the thing, lockdown wasnt going to work and it will cost 200k casualties before the mistake is rectified, and the press would lap it up. Whichever strategy was adopted, opposed strategy scientists would get air time. That is how press works, particularly in the UK.

You cant win the media war in a scenario where there isn't a single obvious solution, all you can do is make the best of bad choices to deal with the pandemic. Nobody knows what the right strategy is, but the health experts the government are following have espoused a sound plan, its logical and it makes sense. It has convinced me. Others may be convinced by alternate approaches, or just passed around between multiple negative articles in the press.

I gave a warning on page one or two of this thread, when this was just a China issue, that if it reached the west there would be too many opinions and action would be constrained by our natural liberties. An authoritarian society has the best chance of succeeding in a lockdown, and they can best ensure compliance. You really think you are going to seal France? There will be leakage, there will be outbreaks. Sorry lockdowns don't work in western culture, we are too used to our liberties, and our people are soft and easily scared.

Works pretty well so far in terms of slowing the spread and buying time to prepare in every other country that went the whole hog from the get-go in implementing "draconian" measures.
Poor leadership is poor leadership.

So what it boils down to is are we really saying the british /western public is so selfish they won't respect quarantie protocols and directives or are willing accept social responsibility?

UK rise infection rates is similar to that elsewhere in Europe outside Italy. There is little difference.
The wise go with what virologists and epidemiologists say, I do, hopefully so do you. The problem is various virologists and epidemiologists say different things and do not agree. We can make our own minds up as to which expert is more likely to be right, and can logically differ.
Now must compound this with media attention which highlights the path not taken. In the UK herd immunity is questioned, in Italy lockdown is questioned. In both countries the media is saying not enough is being done.
Nobody knows which is the best route forward, there are too many variables.
However flip flopping between contrary poliicies is likely to be the worse option.
Pick a sound contingency and stick with it.

 Sqorgar wrote:

 ChargerIIC wrote:
Hopefully they'll calm down. Local FLGS released an estimate of the cost (to their business) of the shelter in place. It's pretty scary. Wonder if this will be what finally kills off the FLGS business model

The corona panic was created by Amazon to get those last few retail stores to close. In the future, we will all work for and be consumers of Amazon. It will be our government, our employer, our family, and our god. The future isn't cyberpunk, it's idiocracy.

I'm kidding about Amazon being behind the panic, but there is no doubt that Amazon will be one of the few who actually escape this situation unharmed (in fact, they are doing record business right now). The devastation to the retail space will destroy many businesses, and likely many small towns. I feel like the hobby gaming market will be particularly effected, as a lot of businesses rely on FLGS selling their product. With low margins, how is a company barely scraping by going to survive having its primary mode of distribution, marketing, and support disappear for a month (or longer)?

They have actually cut off a lot of non-COVID-19 business so those smaller companies on the Amazon Network are also going to get killed.

So, my job - my building is now starting to encourage people to work from home. Turns out my department is considered critical, and we must have at least 2 people onsite 24 hours a day. My supervisor advised 1 of those people can be a supervisor.... but he's working from home, of course. So, as a technical lead.... I think I am here for the duration. Despite the fact, I want to reiterate, I work from home regularly and there is nothing I can only do here.

Sigh.

You guys should not trust science and scientists in general. They are known to be remarkably wrong and arrogant. Recently there was tests done for an entire village in Italy. Almost entire village was diagnosed as infected with corona virus despite none of them showing any symptoms. This only confirms that coronavirus is only dangerous for the weak and various numbers pulled by scientists are utter nonsense. One study finds 30% mortality rate, another 10% then it is 2% and then it is as low as 0.5%. In reality, nobody knows anything about this disease and anyone's guess at this time is as good as my.

In my country countless Lithuanians are stuck abroad. Here people have a lot of hatred for these people, because they did not listened recommendations to come back in time and now they are screaming for help. What is most concerning that these idiots are who will infect Lithuania. We have now 25 cases and all of them are from these morons coming from abroad. We had set up ships and trains to bring our people back home, but nobody is talking about the obvious how these dumb dumbs should be locked in prisons or other quarantine areas for 14 days before they prove they are not sick. Now these plaguebearers are coming back to our land to infect all of us.

Our government had proven competent enough in responding to crisis, but I'm deeply disappointed by their weak willed nature. People responsible for supplies should be checked for virus when entering country. Every ordinary person coming into our country should be immediately quarantined in prison or other detainment facilities if tests are in short supply. Otherwise, it is mandatory tests for everybody, depending on their reliability. Now due to these tourists and personal rights we are going to get uncontrolled spread of disease in our country. It will be tomorrow or at the end of the week. So far the only vectors of virus were all tourists and they are all isolated, but it is only the matter of time before virus starts spreading freely in our country.

We get it, you're an internet tough guy Ernestas, stop spreading false information that'll get people killed.

RiTides wrote:So what it boils down to is are we really saying the british /western public is so selfish they won't respect quarantie protocols and directives or are willing accept social responsibility?

Give it a couple weeks and we'll see. Italy is what, 7 days in? That's the longest quarantine outside of China, where it's somewhat easier to enforce it...

 Ernestas wrote:
You guys should not trust science and scientists in general. They are known to be remarkably wrong and arrogant.

Yeah, nobody should trust anyone who is specifically educated, trained, and experienced in a field of expertise, they're all arrogant and known to be remarkably wrong

Guess I'll get my next medical checkup done at the gas station and take my car in for servicing at the donut shop then.

Recently there was tests done for an entire village in Italy. Almost entire village was diagnosed as infected with corona virus despite none of them showing any symptoms. This only confirms that coronavirus is only dangerous for the weak and various numbers pulled by scientists are utter nonsense. One study finds 30% mortality rate, another 10% then it is 2% and then it is as low as 0.5%. In reality, nobody knows anything about this disease and anyone's guess at this time is as good as my.

A basic stats class would tell you that none of this is particularly outrageous or unexpected. Nobody is going by what any single study says, they're reading the aggregate trends and attempting to react in real time to an event that is outpacing their ability to measure and analyze it.

 Ernestas wrote:
You guys should not trust science and scientists in general. They are known to be remarkably wrong and arrogant. Recently there was tests done for an entire village in Italy. Almost entire village was diagnosed as infected with corona virus despite none of them showing any symptoms. This only confirms that coronavirus is only dangerous for the weak and various numbers pulled by scientists are utter nonsense. One study finds 30% mortality rate, another 10% then it is 2% and then it is as low as 0.5%. In reality, nobody knows anything about this disease and anyone's guess at this time is as good as my.
.

Back to the dark ages we go! It's all the cats faults! Kill them all.

Let's not get all political people. We've got to hang together or we will surely hang separately.

And check in on your neighbours. Polite knock, step or two back, friendly greeting. If they need owt from the shop, and you’re going anyway? Do your best to grabs the gubbins they need whilst you’re there,

If people would actually follow those studies, they would quickly find that all these studies and information being spread are wildly different from study to study. I looked at some articles to make my mind on virus and I couldn't get even most base facts straight. Following these professionals at this point is worse than reading Wikipedia.

So far the best coverage of this situation I had heard from North Korea's news agency...

Let's try to avoid toeing / crossing over the politics discussion line guys, so this useful thread can stay open.

Also, sometimes it's useful to just ignore / let a person be if it's not something you can tackle without getting into that territory.

Thanks all

Apologies.

 Ernestas wrote:


Our government had proven competent enough in responding to crisis, but I'm deeply disappointed by their weak willed nature. People responsible for supplies should be checked for virus when entering country. Every ordinary person coming into our country should be immediately quarantined in prison or other detainment facilities if tests are in short supply. Otherwise, it is mandatory tests for everybody, depending on their reliability. Now due to these tourists and personal rights we are going to get uncontrolled spread of disease in our country. It will be tomorrow or at the end of the week. So far the only vectors of virus were all tourists and they are all isolated, but it is only the matter of time before virus starts spreading freely in our country.

This might interest you about how prison might not be the best place, not just for prisoners but for containment as a system.

Well, that's it.. They've closed the gym on my unit. Might aswell just end it all now.

Jk, I'll have to get creative in my garden and find some heavy items to move around.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Well, that's it.. They've closed the gym on my unit. Might aswell just end it all now

I'm not saying that this corroborates the conspiracy theory that this was a biological agent intentionally released by China as a prelude to invading all freedom-loving people, but leaving our once-swole bodies to wither and atrophy doesn't disprove it, either.

Wake up, sheeple!

I've been told I'm working from home for the foreseeable future as of today, though with the freeways empty it was kinda nice commuting for once. Almost eerie.

Roberts84 wrote:
There is no freedom on this forum. Language filter, soft warnings over nonsense. It's just another nanny state. A day care center.

It's a private internet web forum devoted to plastic toy soldiers that happens to have an off-topic forum. I'm not sure what people would be expecting out of such, or why anyone would think that language filters, warnings, etc wouldn't be a routine part of that...

In the US there is currently talks about some kind of bailout for people being laid off, but it's still in the broadest of strokes and of course - side-stepping the specific politics of it - it's neither going as smoothly as it could be, or as fast as it could be. And, don't dare call it a baillout.

Generally speaking, I have no problem with a bailout when the problem isn't due to controllable factors. This isn't really different from recovering from a natural disaster, and we already expect assistance recovering from those. The avoidable bailouts - the financial ones for the banks that came with a moral hazard, that's a different situation for a different forum.

If you're (say) a bartender who can't work because the government ordered your establishment closed, the government should make you whole, regardless of what country you live in, I think. That's got to be pretty non-controversial.

 Ouze wrote:

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Well, that's it.. They've closed the gym on my unit. Might aswell just end it all now

I'm not saying that this corroborates the conspiracy theory that this was a biological agent intentionally released by China as a prelude to invading all freedom-loving people, but leaving our once-swole bodies to wither and atrophy doesn't disprove it, either.

Wake up, sheeple!

I don't mind the politics, its the mock cynicism that hurts.

I hope this doesn't class as political question as it not meant to offend or for discussion but in general where do countries in Europe and us get such colossal sums of money for there stimulus packages? Do they have it in banks or what? And if they borrow from whom?

One of the profs In the uk said a death toll off 20000 would basically a great result, i am struggling to get my head round that , I understand what is going on and 20000 is probably conservative but wow what horrific numbers , a tradegy indeed and that's just uk estimate.

Marxist artist wrote:
I hope this doesn't class as political question as it not meant to offend or for discussion but in general where do countries in Europe and us get such colossal sums of money for there stimulus packages? Do they have it in banks or what? And if they borrow from whom?

It's typically borrowed, usually in the form of bonds.

Marxist artist wrote:
One of the profs In the uk said a death toll off 20000 would basically a great result, i am struggling to get my head round that , I understand what is going on and 20000 is probably conservative but wow what horrific numbers , a tradegy indeed and that's just uk estimate.

In what context did he say that would basically be a great amount?

 Orlanth wrote:

 Argive wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:

tneva82 wrote:


Simple math proves the wrong thoug and funny thing is even UK goverment realized that their herd immunity is going to lead to literally hundreds of thousands dead. The "just let it spread for herd immunity" approach would not keep rates lower than italy and since UK has even LESS intensive care room than italy per population it will obviously mean that unless rate is lower than italy(which it wouldn't have been) you get more, not less, patients on your lower amount of beds.

And simpe fact is for herd immunity you need 60% of population as bare minimum(preferably more) infected. Then even with very optimistic 0.5% mortality rate we get to 200k.

This is basic math and funny that is what was even given to boris & co initially but ignored...

Now at least they have woken up a bit and realized it won't work after all. But too late. But that's what you get when you ignore experts.
.

You are misreading this. Herd immunity is the answer, because claims of containment are going to fail and no matter our strategy, it will end with herd immunity. We will develop herd immunity is more honest than we are going to stop the virus.
This pandemic doesn't have neat easy correct answers, it is going to be messy, many will die. This will happen if you make media friendly actions of actions that the media dislike.
There are too many experts with an internet connection, Boris and Co chose which ones they are going to listen to, and they made their point clearly.

Had Johnson advocated total lockdown alternate experts would be saying herd immunity is the thing, lockdown wasnt going to work and it will cost 200k casualties before the mistake is rectified, and the press would lap it up. Whichever strategy was adopted, opposed strategy scientists would get air time. That is how press works, particularly in the UK.

You cant win the media war in a scenario where there isn't a single obvious solution, all you can do is make the best of bad choices to deal with the pandemic. Nobody knows what the right strategy is, but the health experts the government are following have espoused a sound plan, its logical and it makes sense. It has convinced me. Others may be convinced by alternate approaches, or just passed around between multiple negative articles in the press.

I gave a warning on page one or two of this thread, when this was just a China issue, that if it reached the west there would be too many opinions and action would be constrained by our natural liberties. An authoritarian society has the best chance of succeeding in a lockdown, and they can best ensure compliance. You really think you are going to seal France? There will be leakage, there will be outbreaks. Sorry lockdowns don't work in western culture, we are too used to our liberties, and our people are soft and easily scared.

Works pretty well so far in terms of slowing the spread and buying time to prepare in every other country that went the whole hog from the get-go in implementing "draconian" measures.
Poor leadership is poor leadership.

So what it boils down to is are we really saying the british /western public is so selfish they won't respect quarantie protocols and directives or are willing accept social responsibility?

UK rise infection rates is similar to that elsewhere in Europe outside Italy. There is little difference.
The wise go with what virologists and epidemiologists say, I do, hopefully so do you. The problem is various virologists and epidemiologists say different things and do not agree. We can make our own minds up as to which expert is more likely to be right, and can logically differ.
Now must compound this with media attention which highlights the path not taken. In the UK herd immunity is questioned, in Italy lockdown is questioned. In both countries the media is saying not enough is being done.
Nobody knows which is the best route forward, there are too many variables.
However flip flopping between contrary poliicies is likely to be the worse option.
Pick a sound contingency and stick with it.

https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-reports/20200316-sitrep-56-covid-19.pdf?sfvrsn=9fda7db2_6

The WHO index begs to differ... All the countries that went on an immediate lockdown are faring much much better in terms of daily new cases by a 4-5 times.
The UK is currently 3rd after Italy and spain overall.

Part of the problem with Italy and spains rapid spread was their cultural approach to being social. As in they greet physicaly and kiss eachother on the cheek even between strangers.
What excuse does the UK have other than inaction? Herd immunity.. Many will loose loved ones before their time was the strategy couple days ago. Everyone could see how dumb that was and how utterly callous for not looking out for its citizens the inaction was. Of course you are entitled to your opinion. That initial response is crucial in the slow down and management.

Im not saying these measures would have prevented this ultimately reaching critical mass.
As its an influenza virus the genie is well and truly out of the bottle according to Michael Osterholm, but the key thing is to delay as much as possible to give as many people as possible a chance and stagger the spread.

That's of course like my opinion given the limited knowledge only I certainly am no expert and just interpreting what information I have found.

Marxist artist wrote:
I hope this doesn't class as political question as it not meant to offend or for discussion but in general where do countries in Europe and us get such colossal sums of money for there stimulus packages? Do they have it in banks or what? And if they borrow from whom?

One of the profs In the uk said a death toll off 20000 would basically a great result, i am struggling to get my head round that , I understand what is going on and 20000 is probably conservative but wow what horrific numbers , a tradegy indeed and that's just uk estimate.

They get it from you. Governments don't have any money. They have your money.

That's really what democracies are; people paying Governments who in turn bribe them with their own money by making promises which they are seemingly under no legal obligation to deliver.

Either that or it comes from the Federal reserve, which unlike citizens, has the power to simply print more money and kick the can down the road forever. When this happens, Politicians then scream about how high national debt is, and manage to convince people that this is equivalent to the debts they have on their credit cards, car loans and mortgaes, whilst neglecting to mention the fact that you and I don't have the right of Fiat.

The context in regards the 20000 deaths was there mathematical models and expected outcomes , it was not hooray 20000 deaths more if that is what the actual figures turn out as it's less than expected and the strategy has been successful.

Anyone have information about the actual pandemic to share, or are we stuck on faux-politics?

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Anyone have information about the actual pandemic to share, or are we stuck on faux-politics?

Indeed. There are probably better places to get information on how national finances work. Let's keep it on topic, folks.