Brexit, for once some facts.

[flecc]

The COVID-19 narrative promoted by Carl Heneghan and the Today programme that we should be transitioning to a Sweden-style response is dangerous and wrong. Look at the data. Deaths/100000: UK=62.9, Sweden=57.6, Canada=25.0, Germany=11.3, Denmark=11.0. Sweden is no exemplar."

I strongly disagree.

Clearly their outcome is no worse than ours, but look at the contrast in costs:

We've saddled ourselves with hundreds of billions of national debt, crippled our economy and at least a decade of our future, wrecked a major part of our children's education, all for no gain.

Sweden by not panicking and continuing with normal life has avoided virtually all of that.

Here we are continuing with the silly hysteria like the nonsense about 2 to 11 year olds, 17 to 24 year olds and 25 to 35 year olds now getting infected, promoted by the nanny state brigade who always think they know best but virtually never do.

So what?

They aren't dying or getting seriously ill, nearly all of them briefly suffer the mildest of cold symptoms that they often get each Autumn/Winter anyway.

The vast bulk of all the Covid associated deaths we've experienced have been of the vulnerable elderly people who by any standards we've been keeping expensively alive anyway, which I think pointless. For almost the entire history of humanity we've lived 35 years or much less, so anyone who has reached twice that has done far better than almost all humans who have ever lived.

Although with the help of science we've prolongued life, we've almost entirely failed to prolongue the health of youth, so the intrinsic value of life has been ever decreasing with each year of lifespan gained. But the fact that we are saddled from birth with a survival instinct blinds us to these truths, so we kid ourselved that continuously extending life is worthwhile despite the ever worsening fitness and illnesses and physical decay that it costs us.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dying in our sixties or seventies, those are old ages in which decline is already very evident, signalling the end is approaching, something which has been gradually true decade by decade from our thirties on. Therefore I don't regard Covid-19 as a problem, I regard it as a correction just like all past and future epidemics and pandemics.

We survive them, and than we resume our foolish pursuit of extending increasingly compromised life while making little to no attempt to extend health and fitness in parallel.
.

 

[RossG]

Meanwhile panic buying has started to rear it's ugly head once again. Longer than normal queues in the supermarket and shopping trolley's piled high with large boxes of tea, UHT milk, butter to freeze and toilet rolls ... here we go, start spending now

 

[Woosh]

The vast bulk of all the Covid associated deaths we've experienced have been of the vulnerable elderly people who by any standards we've been keeping expensively alive anyway, which I think pointless.

they vote for the ruling party.
Imagine Covid kills half a million of them. Kier Starmer will inherit the votes of the survivors.

 

[oyster]

Meanwhile panic buying has started to rear it's ugly head once again. Longer than normal queues in the supermarket and shopping trolley's piled high with large boxes of tea, UHT milk, butter to freeze and toilet rolls ... here we go, start spending now

I was absolutely shocked by the emptiness of some shelves yesterday - when we just went to get a few top up things.

If anyone had asked, I'd likely have agreed that panic buying would come back. But when we went, I hadn't even seen it mentioned.

 

[oldgroaner]

I strongly disagree.

Clearly their outcome is no worse than ours, but look at the contrast in costs:

We've saddled ourselves with hundreds of billions of national debt, crippled our economy and at least a decade of our future, wrecked a major part of our children's education, all for no gain.

Sweden by not panicking and continuing with normal life has avoided virtually all of that.

Here we are continuing with the silly hysteria like the nonsense about 2 to 11 year olds, 17 to 24 year olds and 25 to 35 year olds now getting infected, promoted by the nanny state brigade who always think they know best but virtually never do.

So what?

They aren't dying or getting seriously ill, nearly all of them briefly suffer the mildest of cold symptoms that they often get each Autumn/Winter anyway.

The vast bulk of all the Covid associated deaths we've experienced have been of the vulnerable elderly people who by any standards we've been keeping expensively alive anyway, which I think pointless. For almost the entire history of humanity we've lived 35 years or much less, so anyone who has reached twice that has done far better than almost all humans who have ever lived.

Although with the help of science we've prolongued life, we've almost entirely failed to prolongue the health of youth, so the intrinsic value of life has been ever decreasing with each year of lifespan gained. But the fact that we are saddled from birth with a survival instinct blinds us to these truths, so we kid ourselved that contimuously extending life is worthwhile despite the ever worsening fitness and illnesses and physical decay that it costs us.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dying in our sixties or seventies, those are old ages in which decline is already very evident, signalling the end is approaching, something which has been gradually true decade by decade from our thirties on. Therefore I don't regard Covid-19 as a problem, I regard it as a correction just like all past and future epidemics and pandemics.

We survive them, and than we resume our foolish pursuit of extending increasingly compromised life while making little to no attempt to extend health and fitness in parallel.
.

Warning! Word converted into asterisks here
typical right wing drivel
There may well be some serious long term effects yet to emerge, and really your argument gets down to this
Anything goes and no human is cost too high to protect my wallet
Strange that this so precious economy can always manage to fund wars, isn't it?

 

[oldgroaner]

they vote for the ruling party.
Imagine Covid kills half a million of them. Kier Starmer will inherit the votes of the survivors.

I believe the term is Pyrrhic victory!
There is a touch of the macabre in this
BS is rooting for a policy that will mostly kill off his fellow right wingers.
Now that's what I call being democratic!

 

[Woosh]

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dying in our sixties or seventies

in that case, most of us would not be here to keep this thread going.

 

[oldgroaner]

I strongly disagree.

Clearly their outcome is no worse than ours, but look at the contrast in costs:

We've saddled ourselves with hundreds of billions of national debt, crippled our economy and at least a decade of our future, wrecked a major part of our children's education, all for no gain.

Sweden by not panicking and continuing with normal life has avoided virtually all of that.

Here we are continuing with the silly hysteria like the nonsense about 2 to 11 year olds, 17 to 24 year olds and 25 to 35 year olds now getting infected, promoted by the nanny state brigade who always think they know best but virtually never do.

So what?

They aren't dying or getting seriously ill, nearly all of them briefly suffer the mildest of cold symptoms that they often get each Autumn/Winter anyway.

The vast bulk of all the Covid associated deaths we've experienced have been of the vulnerable elderly people who by any standards we've been keeping expensively alive anyway, which I think pointless. For almost the entire history of humanity we've lived 35 years or much less, so anyone who has reached twice that has done far better than almost all humans who have ever lived.

Although with the help of science we've prolongued life, we've almost entirely failed to prolongue the health of youth, so the intrinsic value of life has been ever decreasing with each year of lifespan gained. But the fact that we are saddled from birth with a survival instinct blinds us to these truths, so we kid ourselved that contimuously extending life is worthwhile despite the ever worsening fitness and illnesses and physical decay that it costs us.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with dying in our sixties or seventies, those are old ages in which decline is already very evident, signalling the end is approaching, something which has been gradually true decade by decade from our thirties on. Therefore I don't regard Covid-19 as a problem, I regard it as a correction just like all past and future epidemics and pandemics.

We survive them, and than we resume our foolish pursuit of extending increasingly compromised life while making little to no attempt to extend health and fitness in parallel.
.

Actually I spend most of my time trying to stave off the dreadful and inevitable end of someone whose life is compromised through no fault of her own.
I find your lack of faith in the virtue of life juvenile in the extreme.

The prime purpose of any organism is to exist, regarding that existence as less valuable than protecting the greed of a group of individuals who are strangers to morality is a sign of a corrupt society.

And look around you where it is taking this so called society of ours, back into the middle ages.

 

[oldgroaner]

in that case, most of us would not be here to keep this thread going.

I'm doing it posthumously, didn't you guess?

 

[Barry Shittpeas]

agreed.
but they don't have much else to offer.
Test and trace after 50,000 new cases a day is nigh impossible without a compulsory app.
Transmission at workplace is my biggest worry.
I have now closed my shop to callers and prepare to switch to shifts like we did during lockdown to reduce Covid risk.

Speaking of Apps, I believe it is App Day tomorrow. Not much publicity though. It must still be **** and they don't want people to download it yet.

 

[flecc]

typical right wing drivel

Not in any way political, simply the commonsense of the truth in everything I posted there.

To be read in rational thinking mode, free of the bias of preconceptions.
.

 

[flecc]

in that case, most of us would not be here to keep this thread going.

The future I would have preferred for all of us, one where we'd had the sense to scientifically pursue a shorter lifespan in near perfect health and fitness, instead of an ever longer one of deterioration.
.

 

[oldgroaner]

Not in any way political, simply the commonsense of the truth in everything I posted there.

To be read in rational thinking mode, free of the bias of preconceptions.
.

Sorry but that simply means a lack of recognition on your part
You are assuming that Human life devalues over time and condition like an old car.

 

[flecc]

Actually I spend most of my time trying to stave off the dreadful and inevitable end of someone whose life is compromised through no fault of her own.
I find your lack of faith in the virtue of life juvenile in the extreme.

The prime purpose of any organism is to exist, regarding that existence as less valuable than protecting the greed of a group of individuals who are strangers to morality is a sign of a corrupt society.

And look around you where it is taking this so called society of ours, back into the middle ages.

Wrong in everything, rational thought is the opposite of juvenile.

You say the prime purpose of any organism is to exist, but you should have completed that by adding, for no purpose. That's why humanity continues to search in vain for a purpose to life. There is none and never will be since this isn't a biological universe.

And once again you prevent rational consideration by your thoughts being corrupted by political obsession.

Our natural fully fit and healthy lifespan has nothing whatsoever to do with the Middle Ages of yesteryear, or more recent science and medicine. It is solely due to evolution and it isn't anything remotely like today's eighty odd years of continued life at any cost.
.

 

[Woosh]

The future I would have preferred for all of us, one where we'd had the sense to scientifically pursue a shorter lifespan in near perfect health and fitness, instead of an ever longer one of deterioration.
.

I bet you those who have a perfect health don't want to die in their 60s or 70s.

 

[flecc]

You are assuming that Human life devalues over time and condition like an old car.

Not an assumption, a simple fact.
.

 

[flecc]

I bet you those who have a perfect health don't want to die in their 60s or 70s.

Please read what is posted. Once again, an artificial situation created by our being saddled by a survival instinct from birth which blocks rational thought.
.

 

[Barry Shittpeas]

I’ve just been listening to Sir David King, the Chair of Independent SAGE. He is questioning why the government has put the provision of Test and Trace entirely into the hands of private companies with absolutely no experience of providing health services. I was wondering why a firm of accountants had been tasked with supplying PPE to the Health Service during March. We are the only country in Europe doing it. I believe that we are also the only country in the world to put a horse jockey in charge of testing & tracing too.

 

[flecc]

I’ve just been listening to Sir David King, the Chair of Independent SAGE. He is questioning why the government has put the provision of Test and Trace entirely into the hands of private companies with absolutely no experience of providing health services. I was wondering why a firm of accountants had been tasked with supplying PPE to the Health Service during March. We are the only country in Europe doing it. I believe that we are also the only country in the world to put a horse jockey in charge of testing & tracing too.

I would have thought the answer was obvious, we are and always have been amateurs at everything.

We have an amateur lifeboat and lifefguards service.

We even have an amateur Coastguard service now.

We have the St Johns amateur emergency ambulance service.

We have a wide variety of amateur police services now.

And we are currently threatened with getting amateur Covid regulation enforcers.

We have an amateur army, a reserve which recruits directly from civilians who oddly see some glamour in it. We have one such Paratroop Regiment depot here, mainly staffed by starry eyed local older teens and young twenties.

We've previously had the Home Guard, ARPs etc.

And surely our parliament is the biggest bunch of amateurs yet, so likely to remain loyal to amateurism whenever some unexpected need arises. I'm just surprised they haven't asked the general public to have a bash at knocking up a vaccine.
.

 

[oyster]

I’ve just been listening to Sir David King, the Chair of Independent SAGE. He is questioning why the government has put the provision of Test and Trace entirely into the hands of private companies with absolutely no experience of providing health services. I was wondering why a firm of accountants had been tasked with supplying PPE to the Health Service during March. We are the only country in Europe doing it. I believe that we are also the only country in the world to put a horse jockey in charge of testing & tracing too.

The answer is depressingly simple. Some of them are the companies that are hugely skilled at gaining government contracts. Whether they built those skills up or were merely advised/pushed appropriately. The others seem to be in the right place at the right time.