Grumpy thread

[Jay_Benson]

Well people on here are far too happy and what we need is a proper grumpy thread. I will start.

My FiL has COVID - he is 85 and has an underlying health condition so, whilst his chances are not great, they are not too bad at the moment.

When we first asked for a COVID test - on Christmas Eve IIRC - it was refused as he didn’t meet the three standard criteria despite being a typical fit for the way elderly people present their symptoms - sleepy and reduced appetite in my FiL’s case but also including confusion in other cases - in addition to the “normal” three symptoms (headache, fever, loss of taste / smell). The test was again refused on Christmas Day and early on Boxing Day. He was admitted last night and was finally tested then and lo and behold he tested positive.

So as a result he probably infected his wife who then went on to church on Christmas morning - I know that they were socially distanced but that just reduces the risk, it does not eliminate it. My family has also been exposed unnecessarily on Christmas Day - including my daughter who is an Health Care Assistant in the NHS and will now have to self isolate along with us - so costing the NHS an additional money to get cover in for her. But it is OK as they saved the cost of a test on Christmas Eve - twats.

The ineffective UK Test and Trace system is costing lives - hopefully not my FiL’s or MiL’s lives - because they are trying to penny pinch. Why this system is not being managed by professionals within the NHS - yes, looking at Dido Harding and the other the Tory cronies - for its management appointments process is utterly corrupt and this time corruption is costing lives again. I trust the NHS to get things right pretty quickly, this “service” is hampering the ability of the NHS to treat people early enough as they won’t test people unless they meet criteria that have been superseded months ago and when they do test they don’t get in contact with people quickly enough, if at all.

Sorry, I needed a rant and I can’t be bothered with Facepalm today.

[Threewheelbonnie]

Yeah, but we all went out every night in the summer and clapped for them, voted for this lot over the other even less palatable ones and got a day off for Christmas, so it must be fine

I feel your pain and frustration and wish you and your family well. Absolutely Get it off your chest if it feels better and then go battle the lazy, penny pinching, arse covering idiots.

Andy

[Jay_Benson]

Originally Posted by Threewheelbonnie

Yeah, but we all went out every night in the summer and clapped for them, voted for this lot over the other even less palatable ones and got a day off for Christmas, so it must be fine

I feel your pain and frustration and wish you and your family well. Absolutely Get it off your chest if it feels better and then go battle the lazy, penny pinching, arse covering idiots.

Andy

The Test and Trace service are not part of the NHS - they are a service that has been cobbled together by private companies, at a very significant cost (£22+ billion and rising) and by people with very direct links to the UK government. Cynical? Moi?

They have not been in contact with any of our family since the FiL tested positive - they have another 24 hours until they have failed to achieve their stated target of 48 hours. In reality I don’t expect a call to any of us. They have a target of contacting 80% of close contacts and normally achieve around 50% or less. they have never hit their target.

[Tim Cullis]

This evening I had a notification from the NHS Covid app that I have been in contact with someone who has the virus and that I need to self-isolate for two days until 23:59 on Monday 28 December (tomorrow).

This warning implies that the contact I had was on Friday 18 December so I suppose the person has either only just been tested, or has been waiting patiently for test results. In the meantime eight days have passed in which I could have passed the virus to my family.

I personally feel fine and will comply with the restrictions for tomorrow.

The way the app works, the NHS doesn't have a clue who I am, and that's just fine with me.

[Jay_Benson]

I wish I was surprised by this delay Tim but, sadly, I am not. That it was with the app is worrying as the impression is that as soon as the initial person identifies as being positive the alert goes out to all contacts immediately.

There is something wrong with the system that is built on very old versions of Excel - I really hope that the system improves dramatically but tracing is thought to be only truly effective when the infection numbers are significantly lower than they are in the UK now. Which makes the decision in March / April to abandon the system they had all the more unusual.

The systems that are in use by local authorities in the UK seem to be more efficient and rigorous than the national ones when they are given all of the available information - something they weren’t initially - but even with partial information they have consistently performed better than the very expensive contractors and government lacking that have been brought in - you have o wonder at the reasons for ring fencing the national system away from a co-ordinated effort by local authorities through something like the Local Government Association.

[Grant Johnson]

It's all super frustrating - here in Canada, there is a test and trace app - that only works in two provinces, and for everywhere else "they're working on it". So "we" are depending on people's memories of where they've been, and as a result our numbers are going way up.

And despite lots of things done right, they are still not mandating masks everywhere in public. Stupid. According to an article I read earlier today, those areas that locked down tight and early have by far done the best.

Waffling and cowardice are endemic in pollies, and the world suffers for a lack of vision.
We feel your pain, and sympathize with all who are suffering from this.

[Homers GSA]

I mentioned this in another thread but I found it amazing how well Australian’s have done with managing Covid.

Being a country formed by Englands humanitarian flotsam we tend to be anti authority. But when it came to Covid we all kinda shut up and sucked up the mask and social distancing stuff straight away. Was a bit weird.

I think the only thing anyone can do is isolate, mask, disinfect and social distance. Avoid any knobhead not wearing a mask like a zombie from hell.

Be safe.

[backofbeyond]

The whole UK track and trace system does seem to have taken its parentage from the old communist era joke - 'if you pretend to work. we'll pretend to pay you.' It's become more of a furlough substitute for the self employed than the essential third leg of the government's anti virus strategy milking stool (after masks+ lockdowns and vaccine development). You would think that with the virus turning up in around 30k new people per day tracing their contacts would be of prime importance, but I don't know of anybody who's been contacted by them. And, with a couple of people having contracted it and three others required to self isolate because of travel, (out of about 18 in our extended family) we should have been - multiple times. The system doesn't have any teeth and as people don't want to be tracked and traced 1984 style they're just ignoring it.

J-B, I hope it works out well for your FiL. Despite everything the odds are still on his side and the hospitals are getting better with knowing what works and what doesn't. My mid 80's in laws had much the same experience trying to get a test earlier in the year. They rang up after their son developed it and were told they'd be sent one in the post - it took a week to arrive and nearly two weeks to get a result after they sent it back - with a bug that works over a timescale of a couple of days. This is what happens when you try to combat biology with bureaucracy.

[Jay_Benson]

In hindsight, and as we know hindsight is 20:20, we should have acted differently. We should have lied about his symptoms to get him tested on Christmas Eve and then not gone to see him on Christmas Day. Clearly we should have ignored the government health line - not part of the NHS - and stayed away but we listened to them and went.

The self isolation is annoying but nothing we can’t handle but it is frustrating that the system that this government set up (after having dismantled the established system as we hadn’t used it in a while) seems determined to fail. BOB sums it up nicely - “ This is what happens when you try to combat biology with bureaucracy”.

[AnTyx]

Originally Posted by Homers GSA

Being a country formed by Englands humanitarian flotsam we tend to be anti authority.

That certainly seems to be both the external mythology of Australia and Australians' self-perception. But the more little details I hear, the more clear it becomes just how authoritarian and controlled life in Australia really is. There seems to be a culture of getting into your neighbors' business that seems rather surprising and pathological to me as an outsider, and I live in Mother Europe...

We think all Australians look like Chris Hemsworth. Turns out, most Australians look like Tim Minchin.

[Mezo]

Originally Posted by AnTyx

But the more little details I hear, the more clear it becomes just how authoritarian and controlled life in Australia really is.

Dickhead.

I moved from UK to Australia & am happy with authority telling us what we should & should not be doing, that it why we have had only 900 deaths.

We have not been allowed to go overseas on holiday, makes perfect sense to me, everyone coming here has to go in to two week hotel quarantine (also makes perfect sense) when i was watching the English going on the two weeks holidays to Benidorm & i thought WTF??

Would rather have Scomo leading the nation than Bojo thank you very much.

Mezo.

[Homers GSA]

Originally Posted by AnTyx

That certainly seems to be both the external mythology of Australia and Australians' self-perception. But the more little details I hear, the more clear it becomes just how authoritarian and controlled life in Australia really is. There seems to be a culture of getting into your neighbors' business that seems rather surprising and pathological to me as an outsider, and I live in Mother Europe...

We think all Australians look like Chris Hemsworth. Turns out, most Australians look like Tim Minchin.

Do go on ....

Expand upon your “little details” of our controlled lives and meddling with our neighbours of which you speak.

[AnTyx]

Originally Posted by Homers GSA

Expand upon your “little details” of our controlled lives and meddling with our neighbours of which you speak.

The small bits were things told to me by Australians who moved here and were deliriously happy to be in society where one's business is presumed to be one's own. It's hard to put a specific finger on it - like proving a negative - situations where you're simply not required to justify yourself socially. I'll come back and quote some if I come across any specific examples.

This is, of course, not to say that Britain is a shining beacon of equality. I'm not British and it's not Britain I'm comparing to.

The big bits, well, the most obvious one was that actually serious attempt to get a Great Australian Firewall that would ban internet pornography in the country. That was when I first thought to myself, This must not be quite the land of "a fair go" that I'd read about.

[AnTyx]

Originally Posted by Mezo

Dickhead.

That must be the famous Australian sunny disposition.

I moved from UK to Australia & am happy with authority telling us what we should & should not be doing, that it why we have had only 900 deaths.

Vietnam has had 35 (and 4x the population of Australia), that doesn't mean I want to move there.

[Jay_Benson]

It becomes clear as time passes that there is a balance to be struck between freedom to socialise and freedom to live. Australia chose to support their vulnerable populations by restricting everyone to protect the vulnerable from, it would appear, the younger generation that want to party because the risk to them is lower. As a result Australia have had 900 deaths, the UK 70,000, Vietnam 35, America 250,000, New Zealand 25 deaths - it is a balance and I would suggest that America and the UK were at one end and New Zealand and Vietnam at the other with Australia towards the middle. No country has achieved freedom and low deaths.

I think that countries that have allowed more freedom have to acknowledge the decision and to analyse their actions sooner rather than later as there will be another pandemic and we need to learn.

One thing that is clear is that people in “the West” are generally dickheads as we have been too reluctant to wear face masks, socially distance, etc. - I include myself in that as we went to see my in-laws with a nagging doubt that they may have Covid, despite what the Test and Trace people said.