How much longer will social distancing go on for in the UK?

[Huntergreed]

There is no excuse for the government to continue distancing once the majority have been vaccinated. If they do this as a 'cautious precaution', then they may as well keep it forever, because this is one risk that will never be eliminated no matter how hard we try.

I don't for a second believe that the government want to keep lockdown for the sake of it, but rather they have scared the public so deeply that they are now backed into a corner, and they can't be seen to put people's lives in danger as that will almost certainly lose them credibility (and votes). We need a serious, serious dose of realism right now, otherwise I really don't see an easy way out of this complete mess.

 

[brad465]

Compliance is already “pick and mix”. The roads in particular as as busy as normal during the day, the only difference to normal is the absence of a high peak and quiet evenings.

I can't say exactly what they're all driving for, but I suspect it's mainly down to two things: more people physically going to work because more offices are demanding it, and possibly also poor weather encourages more driving instead of walking for visits to the shops. There maybe others, but I don't think road traffic is a major form of lower compliance at this stage, but I do agree compliance is down overall and will only decrease with time as the weather improves.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 3 Feb 2021 ==

There is no excuse for the government to continue distancing once the majority have been vaccinated. If they do this as a 'cautious precaution', then they may as well keep it forever, because this is one risk that will never be eliminated no matter how hard we try.

I don't for a second believe that the government want to keep lockdown for the sake of it, but rather they have scared the public so deeply that they are now backed into a corner, and they can't be seen to put people's lives in danger as that will almost certainly lose them credibility (and votes). We need a serious, serious dose of realism right now, otherwise I really don't see an easy way out of this complete mess.

If this is the case the best thing I think will bring realism is to end furlough no later than currently planned, because if there's one thing that talks louder than anything in this world, it's money.

 

[Class 33]

Well we're not at that point yet, but I think once the hospital numbers and deaths get really low(and that certainly will happen), if the government are still keeping this nonsense going on with no apparent end date in sight, then I think many business leaders will really start putting pressure on Johnson to end it so they can get their businesses back to normal again(that's if they haven't gone out of business already) without social distancing. Social distancing is absolutely killing many businesses.

 

[Solent&Wessex]

At this evening's conference Whitty gave quite a bit of prominence to the need to vaccinate cohorts 5 to 9 to really reduce the burden on the NHS.

My guess therefore is that this will soon become the new focus and there won't be significant easing until big inroads are made in that area.

He also suggested that the pace of first vaccination will drop from March as they will need to concentrate a lot more on giving 2nd doses too.

Therefore, I fear, that the bulk of social distancing and household mixing regulations will remain in place until at least May. I hope I'm wrong as I'm fairly keen to get out and visit some friends elsewhere in the country and I've got quite a bit of leave to use at work which must be used by the end of March. I've booked it as late as possible in the 2nd half of March, so hoping I can use it then to at least visit some folk. I'm not holding out much hope however and suspect the leave will for all intents and purposes be useless and wasted.

 

[farleigh]

Hug Count

xkcd.com

I suspect social distancing and masks will come and go for a couple of years until a stable state is reached. Perhaps this will be once the covid 19 jab is given with your flu jab each year.
Whatever the right or wrong of masks, the lockdown and use of masks seems to have cut the incidence of flu and colds.

I think it was the closing of hairdressers that has driven down flu & colds as masks were worn right through the period when it started increasing.

At least, it makes more sense from a correlation point of view

 

[brad465]

At this evening's conference Whitty gave quite a bit of prominence to the need to vaccinate cohorts 5 to 9 to really reduce the burden on the NHS.

My guess therefore is that this will soon become the new focus and there won't be significant easing until big inroads are made in that area.

He also suggested that the pace of first vaccination will drop from March as they will need to concentrate a lot more on giving 2nd doses too.

Therefore, I fear, that the bulk of social distancing and household mixing regulations will remain in place until at least May. I hope I'm wrong as I'm fairly keen to get out and visit some friends elsewhere in the country and I've got quite a bit of leave to use at work which must be used by the end of March. I've booked it as late as possible in the 2nd half of March, so hoping I can use it then to at least visit some folk. I'm not holding out much hope however and suspect the leave will for all intents and purposes be useless and wasted.

The rollout started accelerating from the 10th January, which means the second doses need to start being rolled out at an accelerated pace from around Easter (4th April). Should the target of the 1-4 groups be reached mid-February, which is looking good so far, then there's still around 6-7 weeks after that to work through the 5-8 groups before second doses need to be rolled out. This maybe enough time to do them all, but even if not, the majority of them can be done, which combined with seasons coming onside will put us in a very good place by then. This may not be enough to end social distancing, but most things should be reopenable by then at least.

April is also when we should start getting Moderna doses, so if all Pfizer and AZ doses have to be allocated to second doses, it should still be possible to keep giving more first doses if capacity to administer is high enough.

 

[HSTEd]

Novavax CEO thinks it will be available in the UK by early April, and J&J should arrive relatively soon in significant quantities.

I think 5-9 by April is certainly achievable.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

I think trying to tell people who have been vaccinated to maintain restrictions / social distancing will be an incredibly hard sell, and I expect compliance will drop rapidly if they do try to drag this out any longer than it needs to be. We now know that not only does the vaccine prevent almost entirely against severe illness (apparently only 2 of the 12,000 people features in the trial for the AZ vaccine were hospitalised, and that was within the 3 week window for it to take effect), but it also prevents approximately 70-90% of symptomatic transmission (i.e. the likelihood of having the virus in a viable and transmissible state within you is fairly low after vaccination).

End of the day as others have said, the whole sell on these restrictions has been stopping people dying of COVID, and stopping the NHS becoming overwhelmed (it shouldn't be anyway by 30-40k people, but that's another matter). Once those two factors are no longer in the equation, it doesn't really matter how much COVID is swirling about if the maximum it will do is give you a nasty cough.

Absolutely and i would suggest that high uptake of the vaccine is because people believe its the route back to normality and if there is suggestion it won't be then there is risk that uptake will wane.

On your latter point we can see now that Hospitalisations are falling on a daily basis and i get the decline will take a lot longer but its hard wired in once cases are down so why the delay. At the outset it was strategy to manage the infection rate at a level the NHS could cope with but that now seems to have been abandoned to a zero case goal. I could accept that the NHS has been running on overload for some weeks so its sensible to cut it some slack and rebuild a buffer but why don't they just spell out there strategy now waiting till 22nd Feb is just a delaying tactic.

 

[XAM2175]

There is no excuse for the government to continue distancing once the majority have been vaccinated. ... I don't for a second believe that the government want to keep lockdown for the sake of it, but rather they have scared the public so deeply that they are now backed into a corner, and they can't be seen to put people's lives in danger as that will almost certainly lose them credibility

If this is the case the best thing I think will bring realism is to end furlough no later than currently planned, because if there's one thing that talks louder than anything in this world, it's money.

If the government are so badly backed into a corner that they can't roll back on distancing without taking a political hit I fail to see how cutting off the money without removing the restrictions will improve that situation.

 

[bramling]

There is no excuse for the government to continue distancing once the majority have been vaccinated. If they do this as a 'cautious precaution', then they may as well keep it forever, because this is one risk that will never be eliminated no matter how hard we try.

I don't for a second believe that the government want to keep lockdown for the sake of it, but rather they have scared the public so deeply that they are now backed into a corner, and they can't be seen to put people's lives in danger as that will almost certainly lose them credibility (and votes). We need a serious, serious dose of realism right now, otherwise I really don't see an easy way out of this complete mess.

They are totally backed into a corner, which is essentially restrictions until everyone is vaccinated, and this still leaves a political decision to be made as to how they square up those who can’t be vaccinated.

It’s politically unacceptable to steal a year of people’s life, screw up the education of a generation of children (etc) on the basis of something which is lethal, but then change the tune to say “thanks guys now off you all go and we don’t now care if you catch Covid now that the boomers are all vaccinated and busy booking their holidays”. This might change if job losses start to mount up, however.

Unfortunately this is the outcome of using scare tactics against a poorly informed population.

I am very much increasingly persuaded by the view that insufficient attention has been paid to shielding those who are vulnerable to Covid, especially in the period following last summer. Much easier to come up with a three part tag line taking advantage of romantic attachments to the NHS (and blame people for breaking clumsily drafted “rules”) than actually carry out meaningful actions.

 

[Bantamzen]

Hug Count

xkcd.com

I suspect social distancing and masks will come and go for a couple of years until a stable state is reached. Perhaps this will be once the covid 19 jab is given with your flu jab each year.
Whatever the right or wrong of masks, the lockdown and use of masks seems to have cut the incidence of flu and colds.

They haven't cut it for me, I've had at least 3 or cold this winter alone. And yes I have been obeying the rules as have others around me, I travelled no further than my local supermarkets, and worked from home for the entire time. Is it just possible that colds & flus have been taken as covid, especially given the number of symptoms that can now trigger a test? How many of those negative result tests were actually just colds & flus?

 

[87electric]

Amazing, isn’t it? Flu magically disappears. There’s an elephant in the room here, or should I say, the world.

 

[VauxhallandI]

This clown on the BBC breakfast - vaccine minister has just said “no one is safe until the whole world is safe”

Where do they find these cretins? Is he another one from the Brexit bargain bucket of MPs?

 

[duncanp]

Novavax CEO thinks it will be available in the UK by early April, and J&J should arrive relatively soon in significant quantities.

I think 5-9 by April is certainly achievable.

There are about 16.2 million people in cohorts 5 - 9.

If the government hits its' target and starts on cohorts 5 - 9 on 16th February, then at the rate of 400,000 vaccinations per day it will take until 29th March to complete vaccination of this group of people.

Even if the rate slows to something like 200,000 vaccinations per day, as Chris Whitty has said might happen due to second doses being administered, we should be able to vaccinate about 50% of cohorts 5 - 9 by the end of March.

This should be enough to have a statistically significant effect on hospital admissions, which in turn will justify a significant lifting of restrictions at the end of March.

I would have thought that someone in government is doing these sort of back of a fag packet calculations, so that they can work out what it likely to happen in the future, which will enable them to plan the lifting of the lockdown.

 

[takno]

There are about 16.2 million people in cohorts 5 - 9.

If the government hits its' target and starts on cohorts 5 - 9 on 16th February, then at the rate of 400,000 vaccinations per day it will take until 29th March to complete vaccination of this group of people.

Even if the rate slows to something like 200,000 vaccinations per day, as Chris Whitty has said might happen due to second doses being administered, we should be able to vaccinate about 50% of cohorts 5 - 9 by the end of March.

This should be enough to have a statistically significant effect on hospital admissions, which in turn will justify a significant lifting of restrictions at the end of March.

I would have thought that someone in government is doing these sort of back of a fag packet calculations, so that they can work out what it likely to happen in the future, which will enable them to plan the lifting of the lockdown.

Unfortunately with the recent falls in smoking, the only people who seem to have a back of a fag packet are Imperial College and Warwick University, and neither of them appear to know how to operate it.

 

[Class 33]

I remember watching BBC Points West News back in December, and there was a report on there about vaccinations starting, including a 98 year old man who was the first person in Bristol to be vaccinated. He said "Let's hope by the middle of next year that life is back to normal again.". I sincerely hope he gets to see his wish come true. It is certainly more than feasible now for life to be back to normal by the middle of this year. But whether Johnson will allow that to happen is another matter. It's sadly looking a bit doubtful going by what Johnson has said in the last few weeks.

 

[Markdvdman]

Look at this idiot from the WHO:

Covid: 'Society might not return to normal until 2022'

Prof Helen Rees, of the World Health Organization, warns original vaccines may become less effective.

www.bbc.co.uk

Incredible stating well into 2022 to end social distancing and masks. If they listen to her we will get anarchy!!!

 

[yorksrob]

Look at this idiot from the WHO:

Covid: 'Society might not return to normal until 2022'

Prof Helen Rees, of the World Health Organization, warns original vaccines may become less effective.

www.bbc.co.uk

Incredible stating well into 2022 to end social distancing and masks. If they listen to her we will get anarchy!!!

Interestingly, she is one of the more optimistic ones in suggesting normality in 2022.

Personally, I could live with rule of six and masks into 2022. The rest of it a can't, and I won't.

She uses the phrase "if you want to get rid of it". Well we won't be. We won't be closing our borders, so it will always be coming in anyway, so there's no point trying to get rid of it.

They should have asked her whether they would be persuing this policy in South Africa.

 

[DB]

Interestingly, she is one of the more optimistic ones in suggesting normality in 2022.

Personally, I could live with rule of six and masks into 2022. The rest of it a can't, and I won't.

She uses the phrase "if you want to get rid of it". Well we won't be. We won't be closing our borders, so it will always be coming in anyway, so there's no point trying to get rid of it.

They should have asked her whether they would be persuing this policy in South Africa.

And still no evidence that masks make any difference, of course - it's now just takena as read that this is "Proven", when it clearly isn't.

 

[WelshBluebird]

Amazing, isn’t it? Flu magically disappears. There’s an elephant in the room here, or should I say, the world.

Of course back in the real world, it hasn't "magically disappeared" at all.
What has happened is that:

• The measures taken against COVID have also have an impact on flu and colds (especially think of things like working from home which has meant someone who had a cold / the flu wasn't able to easily transmit it to the whole workplace!)
• There was an increase in the number of people (especially the more vulnerable) taking up the flu jab this winter.

 

[Yew]

Interestingly, she is one of the more optimistic ones in suggesting normality in 2022.

Personally, I could live with rule of six and masks into 2022. The rest of it a can't, and I won't.

She uses the phrase "if you want to get rid of it". Well we won't be. We won't be closing our borders, so it will always be coming in anyway, so there's no point trying to get rid of it.

They should have asked her whether they would be persuing this policy in South Africa.

I cannot. We need significant relaxation once groups 1-4 are vaccinated, and then a full return to normality once groups 1-9 are. The harms caused by restrictions are disproportionate under normal circumstances, never mind once the most vulnerable 40% of the population are vaccinated.

 

[Bertie the bus]

There are about 16.2 million people in cohorts 5 - 9.

If the government hits its' target and starts on cohorts 5 - 9 on 16th February, then at the rate of 400,000 vaccinations per day it will take until 29th March to complete vaccination of this group of people.

Even if the rate slows to something like 200,000 vaccinations per day, as Chris Whitty has said might happen due to second doses being administered, we should be able to vaccinate about 50% of cohorts 5 - 9 by the end of March.

This should be enough to have a statistically significant effect on hospital admissions, which in turn will justify a significant lifting of restrictions at the end of March.

I would have thought that someone in government is doing these sort of back of a fag packet calculations, so that they can work out what it likely to happen in the future, which will enable them to plan the lifting of the lockdown.

The problem is that although the priority groups have been split into 9 they have then been merged back into just 2 – those who make up most of the deaths (groups 1 – 4) and those who make up most of the hospital admissions who don’t die (groups 5 – 9). I can only see any relaxations happening after each of the 2 groups have been vaccinated, not mid way through. If you relax some restrictions half way through merged group 2 you will get moral objections – why is the health of some people at risk of serious disease worth less than others who have been vaccinated? It doesn’t matter whether these objections are well founded, they would be raised.

I think it is likely that on 22 Feb school reopenings will be confirmed and possibly stay at home orders lifted and then no more relaxations until group 9 is complete.

 

[Yew]

The problem is that although the priority groups have been split into 9 they have then been merged back into just 2 – those who make up most of the deaths (groups 1 – 4) and those who make up most of the hospital admissions who don’t die (groups 5 – 9). I can only see any relaxations happening after each of the 2 groups have been vaccinated, not mid way through. If you relax some restrictions half way through merged group 2 you will get moral objections – why is the health of some people at risk of serious disease worth less than others who have been vaccinated? It doesn’t matter whether these objections are well founded, they would be raised.

I think it is likely that on 22 Feb school reopenings will be confirmed and possibly stay at home orders lifted and then no more relaxations until group 9 is complete.

Whilst completely ignoring the moral objections to lockdowns and indiscriminately damaging restrictions.

 

[duncanp]

The problem is that although the priority groups have been split into 9 they have then been merged back into just 2 – those who make up most of the deaths (groups 1 – 4) and those who make up most of the hospital admissions who don’t die (groups 5 – 9). I can only see any relaxations happening after each of the 2 groups have been vaccinated, not mid way through. If you relax some restrictions half way through merged group 2 you will get moral objections – why is the health of some people at risk of serious disease worth less than others who have been vaccinated? It doesn’t matter whether these objections are well founded, they would be raised.

I think it is likely that on 22 Feb school reopenings will be confirmed and possibly stay at home orders lifted and then no more relaxations until group 9 is complete.

But the moral objections you talk about are not the only thing that needs to be taken into consideration.

There are the economic and mental health consequences of prolonging the lockdown, which have been swept under the carpet for far too long.

I also don't see that it is immoral to relax restrictions before everyone in groups 5 - 9 have been vaccinated, and I speak as someone who is in group 6.

It may well be that some measures are put in place to mitigate the risk of transmission when places are reopened. (eg for pubs, hand sanitiser, track & trace, capacity restrictions, masks when not sitting down, table service only) These restrictions would only be in place temporarily until everyone in groups 5 - 9 have been vaccinated, at which point they can be removed.

In any case, someone in groups 5 - 9 who hasn't been vaccinated can be given advice about minimising risk, and they can be left to decide for themselves how much of a risk they are prepared to take.

There may not be too much of a problem anyway, as at current rates of vaccination, everyone in groups 5 - 9 should be done by Easter (April 4th) and the second tranche of relaxation of restrictions is not likely until about 2 - 3 weeks after the reopening of schools, which would be around 22nd March.

 

[yorksrob]

But the moral objections you talk about are not the only thing that needs to be taken into consideration.

There are the economic and mental health consequences of prolonging the lockdown, which have been swept under the carpet for far too long.

I also don't see that it is immoral to relax restrictions before everyone in groups 5 - 9 have been vaccinated, and I speak as someone who is in group 6.

It may well be that some measures are put in place to mitigate the risk of transmission when places are reopened. (eg for pubs, hand sanitiser, track & trace, capacity restrictions, masks when not sitting down, table service only) These restrictions would only be in place temporarily until everyone in groups 5 - 9 have been vaccinated, at which point they can be removed.

In any case, someone in groups 5 - 9 who hasn't been vaccinated can be given advice about minimising risk, and they can be left to decide for themselves how much of a risk they are prepared to take.

There may not be too much of a problem anyway, as at current rates of vaccination, everyone in groups 5 - 9 should be done by Easter (April 4th) and the second tranche of relaxation of restrictions is not likely until about 2 - 3 weeks after the reopening of schools, which would be around 22nd March.

Indeed. We really ought to be going into the intermediate stage of mitigating against transmission, whilst enabling as much of life to go on as possible at that stage.

 

[MikeWM]

I also don't see that it is immoral to relax restrictions before everyone in groups 5 - 9 have been vaccinated, and I speak as someone who is in group 6.

Ditto. I'm probably in 'group 6' too [1], and anyone who starts arguing we need to continue to lockdown society to protect me is going to get a large piece of my mind! I can make my own decisions and risk assessments.


[1] not that I have any intention of being vaccinated, at least not yet, but that's a different matter...

 

[Dent]

The problem is that although the priority groups have been split into 9 they have then been merged back into just 2 – those who make up most of the deaths (groups 1 – 4) and those who make up most of the hospital admissions who don’t die (groups 5 – 9). I can only see any relaxations happening after each of the 2 groups have been vaccinated, not mid way through.

I believe Groups 1-6 cover most hospitalisations, so why wait for Groups 7-9 to be vaccinated?

 

[duncanp]

I believe Groups 1-6 cover most hospitalisations, so why wait for Groups 7-9 to be vaccinated?

As I understand it, groups 1 - 4 account for most of the deaths, but groups 5 - 9 account for most of the cases where people are hospitalised, but they then recover.

So vaccinating groups 5 - 9 will reduce pressure on the NHS by a considerable amount.

But I don't think we have to wait until everyone in groups 5 - 9 is vaccinated before restrictions can be released.

If you vaccinate between half and two thirds of groups 5 - 9, that should reduce pressure on the NHS to a level where they can cope.

 

[Class 33]

And some of the other things that Johnson and other ministers have said.....

"These vaccines are our way out of all these restrictions.".

"We are at the final phase of this pandemic now.".

"We can see the light at the end of the tunnel now. We are almost there!" (said by Johnson last month!)

"Everyone's going to have a fantastic summer, doing what they all enjoy." (said by Hancock back in December)

"If everyone can just bear with these restrictions for just a few more months, then we'll be out of all this." (said by Robert Jenrick back in December!)

Another comment I remember Hancock saying to parliament only last month was "We won't keep any of these restrictions going for a moment longer than necessary.". Well Hancock, we will very soon be at that point when these restrictions will just not be needed any longer. So let's hope you do what you say you'll do, and that they'll be scrapped.

 

[yorksrob]

Indeed. Groups 5-7 are in turn more likely to be hospitalised than 8-9, so I don't see any more of a moral dilemma in relaxing some restrictions between the vaccination of these groups than between groups 4 and 5 or even 9 and the rest of us.