Covid and Work, Covid Advice and General Chat

[JohnEGreen]

Right on.

 

[Robinredbreast]

It would seem my input to this thread is redundant as I am retired and shall not be returning to work so I shall bow out.

Edit to add if this thread is in the wrong forum then the mods have had the ability to move it to the general chat forum all along just an observation.

They are aware , but view certain threads content with discretion. This thread does have general chat in the title. Also it has been a fantastically useful informative and friendly thread for so many in these worrying and frustrating times because of Covid.

 

[JTL]

I feel for all of you who have to return to a work environment and especially those of you who have to use public transport.
I think where possible I'd ditch that and buy a bike.
I'm retired and live in a very small Welsh village on a hillside.
Nothing like living in an overcrowded town or city.
I count my blessings ... Quite rural life .... own transport .... can and do stay in for days on end as I don't really have to be anywhere.
My biggest gripe is that the UK so far hasn't had a total lockdown for three months.
Should have happened at the start.
England closes Wales opens up.
Wales closes England opens up ... it doesn't make sense.
I went to Home Bargains yesterday and in one isle .... couldn't buy an electric blanket duvets or sheets but could buy pillows ... who on earth makes these dumb decisions?

 

[Robinredbreast]

I feel for all of you who have to return to a work environment and especially those of you who have to use public transport.
I think where possible I'd ditch that and buy a bike.
I'm retired and live in a very small Welsh village on a hillside.
Nothing like living in an overcrowded town or city.
I count my blessings ... Quite rural life .... own transport .... can and do stay in for days on end as I don't really have to be anywhere.
My biggest gripe is that the UK so far hasn't had a total lockdown for three months.
Should have happened at the start.
England closes Wales opens up.
Wales closes England opens up ... it doesn't make sense.
I went to Home Bargains yesterday and in one isle .... couldn't buy an electric blanket duvets or sheets but could buy pillows ... who on earth makes these dumb decisions?

I love both of my jobs, but furloughed on one and travelling in a taxi with other's.
When i retire, i think i will go back to a relief /casual school escort. then i can pick and choose what i want to do

 

[Max68]

I feel for all of you who have to return to a work environment and especially those of you who have to use public transport.
I think where possible I'd ditch that and buy a bike.
I'm retired and live in a very small Welsh village on a hillside.
Nothing like living in an overcrowded town or city.
I count my blessings ... Quite rural life .... own transport .... can and do stay in for days on end as I don't really have to be anywhere.
My biggest gripe is that the UK so far hasn't had a total lockdown for three months.
Should have happened at the start.
England closes Wales opens up.
Wales closes England opens up ... it doesn't make sense.
I went to Home Bargains yesterday and in one isle .... couldn't buy an electric blanket duvets or sheets but could buy pillows ... who on earth makes these dumb decisions?

Incredible really isn't it. Hindsight it's easy to say but "if" the WHO had stopped flights out of China at the start then maybe just maybe the virus might have been contained. Yet now all these months later we now have mutations which are more transmissible which have come in or gone out by international travel. It beggars belief really that the UK seems to be one of the worst performing nations with regard to cases and deaths and yet we are an Island!! A small island which gave us the best protection in wars and from potential invaders and yet the country gets done by a virus you can't even see!

However whilst the government must take it's share of the blame so must sectors of the population. To see stations packed the other day with people trying to get out of the capital before Tier 4 lockdown was shocking as not only are they putting themselves at risk by travelling on packed trains but they are potentially carrying the virus to other areas of the country and also straight into the homes of their families at Christmas,. Is it really worth staying with mum, dad, grandma or grandad at Christmas to place them at risk of ending up in hospital a few weeks later?! Not only that but some of the areas that they have travelled to are Tier 4 from Boxing Day so are they allowed to travel back home?

 

[Robinredbreast]

I feel for all of you who have to return to a work environment and especially those of you who have to use public transport.
I think where possible I'd ditch that and buy a bike.
I'm retired and live in a very small Welsh village on a hillside.
Nothing like living in an overcrowded town or city.
I count my blessings ... Quite rural life .... own transport .... can and do stay in for days on end as I don't really have to be anywhere.
My biggest gripe is that the UK so far hasn't had a total lockdown for three months.
Should have happened at the start.
England closes Wales opens up.
Wales closes England opens up ... it doesn't make sense.
I went to Home Bargains yesterday and in one isle .... couldn't buy an electric blanket duvets or sheets but could buy pillows ... who on earth makes these dumb decisions?

My daughter, SIL and little granddaughter live in a village. I live in a expanding town, about 9 miles away from my daughter and we both will be in tier 4 come Boxing day

Very odd about buying certain items in Home Bargains. Did you manage to ask why?

 

[Robinredbreast]

Incredible really isn't it. Hindsight it's easy to say but "if" the WHO had stopped flights out of China at the start then maybe just maybe the virus might have been contained. Yet now all these months later we now have mutations which are more transmissible which have come in or gone out by international travel. It beggars belief really that the UK seems to be one of the worst performing nations with regard to cases and deaths and yet we are an Island!! A small island which gave us the best protection in wars and from potential invaders and yet the country gets done by a virus you can't even see!

However whilst the government must take it's share of the blame so must sectors of the population. To see stations packed the other day with people trying to get out of the capital before Tier 4 lockdown was shocking as not only are they putting themselves at risk by travelling on packed trains but they are potentially carrying the virus to other areas of the country and also straight into the homes of their families at Christmas,. Is it really worth staying with mum, dad, grandma or grandad at Christmas to place them at risk of ending up in hospital a few weeks later?! Not only that but some of the areas that they have travelled to are Tier 4 from Boxing Day so are they allowed to travel back home?

I try not to mention China to my son as he gets quite angry about it.

 

[Max68]

I try not to mention China to my son as he gets quite angry about it.

Don't blame him! Every time I think about it I need to add "Mad" in front of my user name!!

 

[Robinredbreast]

Does General Chat come up in the 'new posts' list?

No

 

[DCUKMod]

No

All you have to do is Watch the thread, and you will receive a notification when there's new activity on it.

 

[Jaylee]

Does General Chat come up in the 'new posts' list?

It does (or should do.) in notification panel regarding a new post on the topic...

 

[Robinredbreast]

All you have to do is Watch the thread, and you will receive a notification when there's new activity on it.

Yes I know, but now the thread cannot actually be seen in new posts or recent posts, as we did before it was moved to General chat.. I think that's what @lucylocket61 may have been asking.

 

[lucylocket61]

Yes I know, but now the thread cannot actually be seen in new posts or recent posts, as we did before it was moved to General chat.. I think that's what @lucylocket61 may have been asking.

Thanks. Yes @Goonergal , that's what I meant. Sorry I wasn't clear.

 

[HSSS]

Even those not returning to work can still discuss it, surely?

 

[HSSS]

No, you’ll need to keep the thread on watch to receive alerts about new posts.

Well that’s this post half dead then if others use the forum as I do. I for one only use recent threads and don’t check watched ones.

 

[becca59]

What fills me with absolute dread is I if the new South African strain gets out here. They are saying it seriously affects the young. If that happens and we start seeing deaths in fit young people, rather then the so called expendable elderly and vulnerable, there is going to have to be a major rethink.

 

[zand]

What fills me with absolute dread is I if the new South African strain gets out here. They are saying it seriously affects the young. If that happens and we start seeing deaths in fit young people, rather then the so called expendable elderly and vulnerable, there is going to have to be a major rethink.

I agree and this should have been done many months ago. It is obvious that the more the virus spreads the more mutations will result.

 

[Max68]

It certainly is scary. Also because it seems to affect "fit young people" does this mean that it is even more aggressive in older people on top of that? What is concerning is at the very start of the pandemic there was some discussion online about the behaviours of viruses. The stand out comments from scientists that I remember are that "viruses ideally need an alive host to spread" and that "many mutations in a virus can often make it more transmissible but less deadly". Spanish Flu for instance as far as I can remember eventually became more like a regular flu rather than the mass killer that it started out as, although that took around three years I believe to happen,. This virus at the moment seems to be mutating, getting more transmissible, but not losing any of it's it's deadly potential, and as mentioned above is apparently hitting younger groups in South Africa. Seems strange and scary that the virus seems to be upping it's game at a time when our scientists had upped theirs with the vaccines, almost as if it has an intelligence and is trying to evade capture and survive itself which all life forms try and do.

Thus now is "hands. face, space" enough? Is two metres enough, not that it ever was?! I'm quite nervous now and I suspect many of us are, because I was "fairly" comfortable that as long as I was doing what I was doing with keeping distance, wearing a mask and keeping hands clean in shops etc I was as ok as I could be. Now is that enough? I assume by more transmissible they mean people shed a higher viral load, so is that two metres or mask wearing going to be enough protection so what do we do to keep safe bar closing the front door and literally not go anywhere?!

Let's pray the vaccines work with new strains but my concern is with new strains seemingly popping up all over the place how do we know we can't pick up a new strain after we have had the vaccine without knowing it?!

 

[JohnEGreen]

On May 14, 1796, Jenner took fluid from a cowpox blister and scratched it into the skin of James Phipps, an eight-year-old boy. A single blister rose up on the spot, but James soon recovered. On July 1, Jenner inoculated the boy again, this time with smallpox matter, and no disease developed. The vaccine was a success.

In 1979 Smallpox was officially declared as eradicated just 183 years later I hope it doesn't take that long to rid us of covid 19 and it's variants.

 

[Fairygodmother]

The people who first extracted Covid DNA and the creators of the vaccines have worked amazingly, incredibly swiftly during the past eleven months. I just hope they’ve not become too broken by long hours to continue.
Like I said in another post, the RNA vaccines are, I think, adaptable to new strains. I just hope that we all have the stamina to continue our avoidance of situations which can exacerbate the spread.
I suspect I’ll be working online for the next year or so; so far it’s been ok though Charnwood Council have decided to bring in new regulations that require more input than I can achieve online. They’re the only Council to do this during the pandemic and it’s left me, and others, figuratively tearing our hair out.
I have to add that I’ve not visited a hairdresser since February and am having to find ‘oldie’ ways to deal with the length - I’m beginning to look more and more like a throwback to the oldies of my youth, the ones whose hair was in strange twists and knots and always escaping.