Air bridges with European countries given "green light"

[Mag_seven]

It can't last forever but that doesn't mean we should say "bugger it" and move too quickly either.

The problem with acting too quickly is you end up yo-yoing between lockdown and not-lockdown, which is not good for anyone.

Define "acting too quickly" - with some whatever we do will always be "too quickly". We can't keep everything on hold forever.

 

[AdamWW]

I don't know how many times this needs repeating, but in the history of virology only 2 viruses have ever been eradicated, smallpox & rinderpest.

These authors claim that we should consider SARS to have been eradicated.

But in any case - what point are you making? It's very hard to eradicate a virus so we should do what?

 

[Bantamzen]

These authors claim that we should consider SARS to have been eradicated.

But in any case - what point are you making? It's very hard to eradicate a virus so we should do what?

Not set up & rely on strategies to completely eliminate them perhaps?

 

[AdamWW]

Not set up & rely on strategies to completely eliminate them perhaps?

I do not think that England is aiming for that. Not so sure about Wales and Scotland.

 

[Bantamzen]

I do not think that England is aiming for that. Not so sure about Wales and Scotland.

England isn't, yet. But Scotland for example seem to be.

 

[HSTEd]

This keeps getting repeated, but it's not really true, is it. If you impose lockdown then the virus transfer domestically will slow to a standstill. If you prevent foreign travel you stop importing the virus from elsewhere. It will fizzle out domestically. It did in New Zealand.

There was no sustained community transmission in New Zealand.

Its an isolated, largely agrarian, state at the end of the world.

It never even had endemic smallpox.
It has a record of less than a thousand years of human occupation!

 

[Tetchytyke]

Define "acting too quickly" - with some whatever we do will always be "too quickly". We can't keep everything on hold forever.

We can't, but equally throwing everything open and pretending the virus doesn't exist isn't a sensible option either.

I think foreign travel should be restricted to essential travel only, and subject to Quarantine, to stop the virus being re-imported into the country. I think- for once- the English government have actually done the right thing with Spain.

I think the English government were far too quick to encourage holidays again, and have also been about 4-6 weeks too early in loosening the lockdown on social events.

I don't think hiding until there's worldwide eradication is sensible or practicable, but stopping domestic transmission before loosening things would have been sensible. Another few weeks of lockdown would have achieved that, IMO.

Its an isolated, largely agrarian, state at the end of the world.

As an Australian, I like the idea that New Zealand is some backward fleapit inhabited purely by Hobbits. But it's not true.

88% of all New Zealanders live in urban areas. This is more than in England (83%) so I'm not sure what point you are trying to make. It is no more isolated than any other island.

in the history of virology only 2 viruses have ever been eradicated, smallpox & rinderpest.

Scotland almost reached elimination a month ago:

SCOTLAND is only weeks away from suppressing the coronavirus altogether, a situation that highlights the different approaches taken by the nation and England in recent months. While Scotland initially made many of the same mistakes as England, since late March, its government has acted on its own scientific advice.

Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/articl...virus-if-it-werent-for-england/#ixzz6TV46eq4U

Other illnesses, including polio and TB, have effectively been eliminated from many countries, and measles and rubella were very close to being eliminated in Western Europe.

So yes, it very much is possible.

 

[AdamWW]

Scotland almost reached elimination a month ago:

Other illnesses, including polio and TB, have effectively been eliminated from many countries, and measles and rubella were very close to being eliminated in Western Europe.

Of course it may be that Scotland had a lower level of infections to start with, rather than it being (just) due to different policies. (Having different half-term holiday dates might have made a difference).

Also, the near-elimination of the illnesses above has been rather helped by an effective vaccine, which we don't know we're going to have.

 

[Bantamzen]

We can't, but equally throwing everything open and pretending the virus doesn't exist isn't a sensible option either.

I think foreign travel should be restricted to essential travel only, and subject to Quarantine, to stop the virus being re-imported into the country. I think- for once- the English government have actually done the right thing with Spain.



As an Australian, I like the idea that New Zealand is some backward fleapit inhabited purely by Hobbits. But it's not true.

88% of all New Zealanders live in urban areas. This is more than in England (83%) so I'm not sure what point you are trying to make. It is no more isolated than any other island.



Scotland almost reached elimination a month ago:


Other illnesses, including polio and TB, have effectively been eliminated from many countries, and measles and rubella were very close to being eliminated in Western Europe.

So yes, it very much is possible.

As I said, only two viruses have ever been eliminated. Some viruses may have been brought close to extinction in some countries, that is true. But even with the low rate in many countries, covid keeps bubbling away, as it is likely to do for a very long time.

 

[AdamWW]

As I said, only two viruses have ever been eliminated. Some viruses may have been brought close to extinction in some countries, that is true. But even with the low rate in many countries, covid keeps bubbling away, as it is likely to do for a very long time.

But what you don't know and I don't know is whether we can keep it at a low level without onerous restrictions. We certainly don't know that we will have to carry on as we are now for years in the absence of a vaccine in order to keep this under control.

 

[Bantamzen]

But what you don't know and I don't know is whether we can keep it at a low level without onerous restrictions. We certainly don't know that we will have to carry on as we are now for years in the absence of a vaccine in order to keep this under control.

I'm afraid its been very clear cut for a long time, vaccine or no vaccine, we will have to learn to live with it. And by living with it I don't mean carrying on with crippling restrictions. We know who are vulnerable are, we are learning to treat them, and we are going to have to accept that we need to protect them whilst also getting ourselves back on with it.

 

[AdamWW]

I'm afraid its been very clear cut for a long time, vaccine or no vaccine, we will have to learn to live with it. And by living with it I don't mean carrying on with crippling restrictions. We know who are vulnerable are, we are learning to treat them, and we are going to have to accept that we need to protect them whilst also getting ourselves back on with it.

Depends what you mean.

If you think it's "clear cut" that we should try to shelter the vulnurable and otherwise open up the country back to how it was and just let the majority of the population catch it, then I disagree.

 

[43066]

Depends what you mean.

If you think it's "clear cut" that we should try to shelter the vulnurable and otherwise open up the country back to how it was and just let the majority of the population catch it, then I disagree.

Then what do you suggest we do?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Then what do you suggest we do?

Well, the ideal is a vaccine or effective treatment. But otherwise some sort of measures will have to stay in place - or we hit it now and we hit it hard, and we secure our borders against it.

Absent the first of those, the latter is my preference. Several countries have proven it possible.

 

[AdamWW]

Then what do you suggest we do?

Continue as we are - opening up the country cautiously, doing what we can to make sure exponential growth doesn't start again.

In hindsight it might turn out to have been the wrong thing.

But I don't think it's obvious now.

I don't buy the idea that we can 1) divide the whole country into "safe to catch it" and "not safe" and 2) isolate the "not safe" people so completely that they can carry on in safety while we let coronavirus go through the rest of the population without constraints, nor that we can have much confidence that the health system would cope if we did.

 

[AdamWW]

Well, the ideal is a vaccine or effective treatment. But otherwise some sort of measures will have to stay in place - or we hit it now and we hit it hard, and we secure our borders against it.

Absent the first of those, the latter is my preference. Several countries have proven it possible.

There are various things that could be a game-changer:
1) Effective vaccine (no guarantee, but certainly can't be ruled out either)
2) Effective treatments (some good news on that recently)
3) Quick, cheap tests (not sure what our chances are there).

Regarding international travel, it would make a huge difference if you could quickly and accurately test everyone arriving in a country (though I'm not confident we could tell if someone is incubating it but not yet infectious).

 

[Tetchytyke]

Well, the ideal is a vaccine or effective treatment. But otherwise some sort of measures will have to stay in place - or we hit it now and we hit it hard, and we secure our borders against it.

Indeed. On a small level the IOM and Guernsey did that, and on bigger levels so did New Zealand and Taiwan.

Sort it out domestically and you can go back to a reasonably normal domestic life. We have here. You'll still need some controls for foreign travel for longer- testing or quarantine- but that affects fewer people and less regularly.

We know who are vulnerable are, we are learning to treat them, and we are going to have to accept that we need to protect them whilst also getting ourselves back on with it.

"The vulnerable" don't exist in a nice self-contained little bubble outside of society.

Take care homes. We "protect" the residents by confining them to their rooms, restricting visitors, etc. So far, so good. What about the staff? The staff's family? The staff's friends? The cashier in Tesco the staff saw on their weekly shop?

It's a lovely idea that we shove "the vulnerable" in bubble wrap in the corner and everyone else goes back to normal but a) what sort of life is that for them and b) it's impossible to isolate a group of people from wider society.

Regarding international travel, it would make a huge difference if you could quickly and accurately test everyone arriving in a country (though I'm not confident we could tell if someone is incubating it but not yet infectious).

Definitely.

FWIW I think the asymptomatic threat is overstated, I think what is more common is people thinking the cough/sneeze/light fever is Not Covid when it is Covid. Testing would hopefully catch those and allow them to be quarantined.

Covid reached the IOM just before lockdown through a man who caught it in Spain whilst on holiday, felt poorly, but still got on a plane from Spain to Liverpool and then another plane from Liverpool to the IOM. And therein lies a lesson.

 

[Mag_seven]

Just a gentle reminder we are discussing "Air Bridges With European Countries" in this thread.

Thanks.

 

[Bantamzen]

Depends what you mean.

If you think it's "clear cut" that we should try to shelter the vulnurable and otherwise open up the country back to how it was and just let the majority of the population catch it, then I disagree.

Quite honestly, and if we had the benefit and hindsight, yes I very would much propose a lot less of a cautious approach and concentrate resources to those who would need it most, not simply locking them up along with everyone else which is effectively what we did. Its painfully clear that a lot of problems stemmed from us trying eradicate it through lockdown, instead of managing by getting the right treatment to the right people.

Well, the ideal is a vaccine or effective treatment. But otherwise some sort of measures will have to stay in place - or we hit it now and we hit it hard, and we secure our borders against it.

Absent the first of those, the latter is my preference. Several countries have proven it possible.

<looks to the horizon for the fleeing horse before slowing closing the stable door>

So, even if we had closed the borders as soon as we knew about it, do you actually believe that this would have stopped it? Because its very widely speculated it that it had long escaped the Chinese borders long before 31/12/19, indeed it is believed to have been right here in my home town by then, perhaps even swimming around inside of me by that point. Even your poster child New Zealand couldn't snap their borders closed quickly enough, and the virus is still brimming under the surface there.

And all of this comes with the added problem of how when you've closed your borders do you reopen them, New Zealand have this dilemma already. Now I know what you might be dreaming about, a few years where everyone that previously went abroad could instead stay in some B&B on the coast, or in a tent in a rainy field in the Lakes. However what you are blissfully ignoring is that we simply don't have the capacity to replace all that. According to statistics Brits made some 72.6 million trips abroad in 2019. Now transpose those to some of your favourite destinations. If you think the scenes from Bournemouth recently were shocking, imagine many times more ramming onto the beaches, forming queues on the roads, pushing up the cost around the country. Probably at this point you might go onto suggest less travel in the UK as a result, so long of course that Bletchley to Cumbria was still an open path....

Continue as we are - opening up the country cautiously, doing what we can to make sure exponential growth doesn't start again.

In hindsight it might turn out to have been the wrong thing.

But I don't think it's obvious now.

I don't buy the idea that we can 1) divide the whole country into "safe to catch it" and "not safe" and 2) isolate the "not safe" people so completely that they can carry on in safety while we let coronavirus go through the rest of the population without constraints, nor that we can have much confidence that the health system would cope if we did.

Remember the phrase "flatten the curve"? Yes, that was the original strategy, to slow but not necessarily stop the spread until capacity was available. And that capacity was never fully, or even partially used. That was the first "just in case" measure, and we've been flipping between such ever since. However as you may have noticed today, the mood in the country is just starting to shift. This might be the first indication that people are starting to grow weary of measure after measure, "just in case". And if that grabs hold, opinion will shift rapidly. I'm afraid once again trying to tip-toe towards a solution, whilst taking one step forward and two back isn't going to cut it much longer. The solution has to look to protecting those that need it whilst not curtailing those that do not so much.

 

[Tetchytyke]

instead of managing by getting the right treatment to the right people.

There is no treatment for Covid, though. All you can do is try and support people's immune systems to fight it off. Some will, some won't.

This is the issue. The only effective treatment is stopping them getting it in the first place.

So, even if we had closed the borders as soon as we knew about it, do you actually believe that this would have stopped it?

Yes. The initial outbreak in Cumbria was partly related to a skiing trip to Italy that my daughter and her family, among others, went on in early February. They went because they'd lose their money if they didn't go. Government restrictions then would have helped- it would have let travel insurance kick in, for starters.

As I said above, Covid reached the IOM in much the same way. And we've eradicated it by isolating it in our community till it died off, then by isolating our community from external infection.

I think closing the borders early would have worked wonders, and could even have avoided the need for a huge long-lasting lockdown.

 

[Ianno87]

There is no treatment for Covid, though. All you can do is try and support people's immune systems to fight it off. Some will, some won't.

This is the issue. The only effective treatment is stopping them getting it in the first place.



Yes. The initial outbreak in Cumbria was partly related to a skiing trip to Italy that my daughter and her family, among others, went on in early February. They went because they'd lose their money if they didn't go. Government restrictions then would have helped- it would have let travel insurance kick in, for starters.

As I said above, Covid reached the IOM in much the same way. And we've eradicated it by isolating it in our community till it died off, then by isolating our community from external infection.

I think closing the borders early would have worked wonders, and could even have avoided the need for a huge long-lasting lockdown.

Total border closures would only have been a solution if *every* country had done it NZ-style. And even then, it seems Covid had spread further than first though through many counties' populations much earlier than first thought.

If not, the UK would just be equally stuck in a permanent 'how do we reopen?' limbo.

 

[PHILIPE]

From Mail (Daily) On Line

Chris Whitty 'urged ministers to put Spain back on quarantine list'

Ministers decided to reimpose quarantine travel restrictions on Spain after it emerged 10 Britons had returned from the country with coronavirus.

www.dailymail.co.uk

How Chris Whitty killed Spanish holidays: Chief Medical Officer 'DEMANDED ministers put Spain back on quarantine list after ten Brits returned with virus' - amid fears that French and German holidays could also be axed

• Government decided on Saturday afternoon to reimpose quarantine travel rules on Spain at five hours notice
• The decision was made after chief medical officer Professor Chris Whitty said 'doing nothing isn't an option'
• Ministers acted after it emerged that 10 Britons who had come back from Spain subsequently tested positive
• Reimposition of restrictions on Spain prompted fears of similar crackdown on trips to France and Germany
• Transport Secretary Grant Shapps is due to fly back to the UK from Spain tomorrow after family holiday

Ministers decided to reimpose quarantine travel restrictions on Spain after it emerged 10 Britons had returned from the country with coronavirus and Professor Chris Whitty said 'doing nothing isn't an option'.
The Government's Covid-O committee met on Saturday afternoon after Health Secretary Matt Hancock raised concerns about a spike in Spanish infections on Friday.
The group of six senior ministers, which includes Michael Gove, Grant Shapps and Priti Patel, were apparently told by Prof Whitty, the chief medical officer, that the situation in Spain had deteriorated in the last 48 hours.

So it would appear that Whitty is behind the Spanish quarantine decision.

 

[AdamWW]

Yes. The initial outbreak in Cumbria was partly related to a skiing trip to Italy that my daughter and her family, among others, went on in early February. They went because they'd lose their money if they didn't go. Government restrictions then would have helped- it would have let travel insurance kick in, for starters.

I think one of the biggest mistakes was the government not recommending travel to Italy earlier so that, as you say, insurance would have kicked in.

I expect it would have been very hard for them to have done it at a point which in hindsight we'd now say they should.

But there was a period when I remember thinking if it was me, I would very much not want to go to Italy for a holiday, but probably not enough to lose my money if I did so.

 

[Bantamzen]

There is no treatment for Covid, though. All you can do is try and support people's immune systems to fight it off. Some will, some won't.

This is the issue. The only effective treatment is stopping them getting it in the first place.



Yes. The initial outbreak in Cumbria was partly related to a skiing trip to Italy that my daughter and her family, among others, went on in early February. They went because they'd lose their money if they didn't go. Government restrictions then would have helped- it would have let travel insurance kick in, for starters.

As I said above, Covid reached the IOM in much the same way. And we've eradicated it by isolating it in our community till it died off, then by isolating our community from external infection.

I think closing the borders early would have worked wonders, and could even have avoided the need for a huge long-lasting lockdown.

Actually there are treatments for the most chronically ill being developed, tested and rolled out. Some of which were pioneered right here in little old Bradford.

 

[HSTEd]

As an Australian, I like the idea that New Zealand is some backward fleapit inhabited purely by Hobbits. But it's not true.

88% of all New Zealanders live in urban areas. This is more than in England (83%) so I'm not sure what point you are trying to make. It is no more isolated than any other island.

It's agrarian in that most of its economy is not based on large scale international travel and trade, like the UK's is.

Essentially all international travel with New Zealand goes through a single point of entry, and the numbers of passengers moving through that point of entry would make it a minor UK airport!

Scotland almost reached elimination a month ago:

Almost is of no value.
Either you can or you cannot.

Scotland has not eliminated the virus.

Other illnesses, including polio and TB, have effectively been eliminated from many countries, and measles and rubella were very close to being eliminated in Western Europe.

So yes, it very much is possible.

So in the cases of polio, measles and rubella... we had a working vaccine?
And in the case of TB, an extremely effective treatment?

 

[takno]

Yes absolutely in February an effective way of testing incoming passengers (not just temperature screening) or quarantining would probably have made a huge difference - if nothing else quarantining would have supressed travel somewhat. You seemed to be talking about April when infection rates were already much higher, though.

I think what in hindsight would have made a huge difference would have been recommending against inessential travel to any areas of Italy much sooner. But I'm not sure it would have been easy to do. Even now, people are arguing over whether Spain merits a whole-country quarantine rule or just for affected parts of the country...

To be fair, most of the problem with Italy was with the exact part people were going to. People could perfectly safely have carried on going to Rome (if they really wanted to in February). It really made no sense at all that they didn't react in February - there were civil service teams in place and dealing with our response to the obviously coming pandemic, but the cabinet were still all off play

From Mail (Daily) On Line

Chris Whitty 'urged ministers to put Spain back on quarantine list'

Ministers decided to reimpose quarantine travel restrictions on Spain after it emerged 10 Britons had returned from the country with coronavirus.

www.dailymail.co.uk

So it would appear that Whitty is behind the Spanish quarantine decision.

It would appear that the Daily Mail want us to think that he is, certainly. Interesting that they were so concerned about 10 tourists coming back from Spain with it. That could quite easily be a single party, and for that matter it's quite possible that they took it out there with them.

 

[adc82140]

From Mail (Daily) On Line

Chris Whitty 'urged ministers to put Spain back on quarantine list'

Ministers decided to reimpose quarantine travel restrictions on Spain after it emerged 10 Britons had returned from the country with coronavirus.

www.dailymail.co.uk

So it would appear that Whitty is behind the Spanish quarantine decision.

In true Daily Mail style, the article is click bait. There are no plans to reintroduce quarantine for France or Germany, as the infection rates are on a par with us (France) or below us (Germany)

 

[Mag_seven]

In true Daily Mail style, the article is click bait. There are no plans to reintroduce quarantine for France or Germany, as the infection rates are on a par with us (France) or below us (Germany)

Indeed - Fears that [insert random country here] may be next, is not news!

 

[AdamWW]

Almost is of no value.
Either you can or you cannot.

And your evidence for that is?

I wouldn't put any money on it being true that we can contain this without a vaccine, but I think it's a bit early too to say that we can't.

 

[Tetchytyke]

the numbers of passengers moving through that point of entry would make it a minor UK airport!

New Zealand is a smaller country, yes, we know that.

It's agrarian in that most of its economy is not based on large scale international travel and trade, like the UK's is.

Wrong again! 63% of their GDP is based on the service sector, agriculture accounts for only 6%.

So it has a similar economy to the UK, and a similarly urbanised population, but what worked there couldn't work in the UK. Aye, right.