Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
I agree. The vaccinated in particular are pretty much returning to a normal social life, insofar as visiting others’ homes is concerned. Only that most venues are still closed restricts more social interaction.
Yep. As I predicted, once vaccinations have happened and a very strong degree of immunity kicks in, people will be simultaneously craving contact and less fearful. All the oldies I know are now popping in for the odd cuppa. Lunches won't be far behind. I think one way the advice could be tweaked is allowing vaccinated people to interact with other vaccinated people. It is happening anyway, so might as well make it official.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
The government has developed a taste for what it has done, with the support of populism. Principles are absent. I agree that many are flouting the rules - but these are the little things. It's the big things that concern me most: businesses shuttered, Sunak's profligacy, cafes/restaurants shut, leisure centers closed, old folk in care homes hidden away, etc etc etc. The whole kit and caboodle.
I started answering this post saying that the big question to answer is where the BXP vote goes. But I've already changed my mind. Questions to answer include: - what the baseline conditions are. Ordinarily that would be GE2019, adjusted to current polls - but we know there hasn't been UNS since 2019. Has the Con advantage over Lab been eroded less in Hartlepool than UNS? I would instinctively think so - but by how much? - where the BXP vote goes (my guess is almost none to Labour. People motivated to vote BXP aren't going to be voting for Paul Williams. A chunk, but certainly not all to the Tories. I'd say the bulk would go to not voting or to Richard Tice, if he stands.) - what the Con vote does. Traditionally, in by-elections, it stays at home, particularly when the Tories are in power. - what the lab vote does. Traditionally it turns out a bit more enthusiastically than the Con vote when the Tories are in power. And will the non-Tory vote unite behind Paul Williams? Usually, in a relatively tight race, you would expect that to happen.
My expectation is that enough of the Con vote will stay at home, and enough of the non-Con vote will unite behind Paul Williams, and baseline conditions will be sufficient, to offset any advantage the Cons might receive from BXP splitting in their favour. Therefore Lab hold. But there is more uncertainty here than is usual in a by-election.
The Welsh poll (linked to by @Big_G_NorthWales ) is telling you the answer, assuming it is accurate.
There was a big UKIP/BXP vote in the Senedd (7 seats and 12 % of the vote) in 2016.
Some have stuck with Reform (3 %) or Abolish (3%), but a big chunk has now gone to the Tories,
What's driving the shift from UKIP/BXP to tory? best way to get rid of Drakeford vote?
I am not sure most people in Wales even notice Drakeford, or care enough about him to want to get rid of him. He is like a drippy nose, a bit annoying but not needing serious medical treatment.
pb.com is unusual in having a Drakeford Fan Club (Hon. Sec., @kinabalu) and the International Society for the Suppression of Drakefords (Hon. Sec., @Big_G_NorthWales).
I think the Welsh poll is just showing that the Big Welsh UKIP vote (12 %) from 2016 has got to go somewhere. And the Tories will get between a third & a half of it. That will be enough to turn some of the North East Walian seats blue.
The Tories could do with removing Ken Skates in Clwyd South, as that will knock out Drakeford's likely successor.
And also, Drakeford isn't as good as Carwyn, so the Labour vote from 2016 is going to unwind anyhow. But, the electoral system will save Labour from huge loses. As they lose constituency seats, they will gain list seats.
I expect Labour -4 to -6.Labour will surely still be largest party.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Agreed.
Btw, can you elucidate the German idiom 'rein in die Kartoffeln - raus aus den Kartoffeln' ? It seems loosely to mean to chop and change, but I don't think that quite grasps it ?
Sounds like 'plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose', but the internet is telling me 'chopping and changing'
Thinking about the examples given, it seems to have undertones of indecision and so 'flip-flopping' might be a better translation than 'chopping and changing'
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
If people feel safe and provided for I think freedom has always been a lesser priority than we think it is. It's part of why authoritarian regimes can last for so long before they need to ramp up the aggression when safety and prosperity are at risk (though many keep that going regardless, just to be safe)
Yes. As if isn't enough that I feel terrified by being trapped on this island, I'm utterly dejected by the things my fellow citizens are accepting. Hitting the pause button on our system of living was only ever legitimate if temporary, the vaccines persuaded me to elongate my patience on this. But now what do we see? As I suspected (and pointed out here weeks ago) people in positions of influence are finding new fears to excuse prolonging this. It's unbelievable.
I agree.
But at the same time, I'm not altogether despondent about the collectable acceptance of 'the rules' because not a single person I know is now obeying all the rules - and thank God there doesn't seem to be any of the bolshy enforcement that there was. Positively, no-one I know is taking the piss.
The government are going to quickly find themselves behind the pace, I think, if opening up isn't hastened. We can't be forever restricted by those who are utterly in fear of Covid despite the vaccination programme.
I agree. The vaccinated in particular are pretty much returning to a normal social life, insofar as visiting others’ homes is concerned. Only that most venues are still closed restricts more social interaction.
Yep. As I predicted, once vaccinations have happened and a very strong degree of immunity kicks in, people will be simultaneously craving contact and less fearful. All the oldies I know are now popping in for the odd cuppa. Lunches won't be far behind. I think one way the advice could be tweaked is allowing vaccinated people to interact with other vaccinated people. It is happening anyway, so might as well make it official.
Hard to formalise without the unvaccinated who have been at near zero risk all year asking why on earth they should carry on either when it's all been for the benefit of pensioners anyway.
Went for my (extended) annual Mole Clinic check up in central London this morning. Some observations:
1. Plenty of traffic, far fewer pedestrians although enough about. 2. Quite sad to see all the shops shut. How many will reopen? Can't believe the Bristol showroom is shut, looks like permanently. 3. Lots of marshalls around and about - not sure to what end. 4. About 40 people in two full teams (could - just - have been schoolchildren) in tabards playing footie in Hyde Park. 3. For people who so desire I'd say post-lockdown will be an orgy of sex. Just about everyone I engaged with my eyes was flirty. in particular, the one other woman d'un age certain (but fit, micro skirt, etc) in the clinic waiting room. As though people can't wait to jump each other.
Totally agree on 5 - despite not having had a haircut for 6 months or a clean shave for 30 days, I am constantly being flirted with on almost every shopping trip. @Gallowgate mentioned he had been given extra bacon this morning. I have a feeling the collective sigh of relief is going to make everyone very pleasant to each other for a few months.
It's typical tough talking and would be amusing if the stakes were not so high, but the thing is the UK really has not been looking for a fight on this issue (it hasn't needed one), whereas the EU's protestations that they do not want a fight with the UK do not accord with their actions over the last few months, where they repeatedly sought to bring the UK into its dispute with AZ as with the Article 16 stuff, and its current rhetoric which is focused on 'fairness' and crass comparisons of 'EU' exports vs UK exports.
They really do want a fight, and unfortunately if one side really wants that it is hard to avoid a fight.
Can't see how 'fairness' helps them anyway. Given the very large disparity between the EU and UK populations, even if they seize all our vaccine, it will not make much of a dent in the EU shortfall - though it might impact us significantly.
Unless their intention is solely to hold us back to their pace of vaccination, then it is pointless. And risks damage both to the rate of vaccine production, and increasing vaccine scepticism in Europe.
But that is precisely their intention. It is not to benefit EU citizens, it's to stop the UK making the EU look bad by comparison. It's to stop anyone else thinking of following the example of Brexit.
I'm always reluctant to ascribe motive, but the logic here is inescapable.
Doubt this is right. Ministers and PHE officials will still be urging caution this time next year.
Hodges is absolutely right about this. It is getting ridiculous now. The vaccine works. Confirm the roadmap dates, lockdown borders to risky countries if you have to, but end the earnest, sanctimonious "words of caution" schtick. I offer the same advice to the PB Lockdownistas – we see it daily on here. It's depressing in the extreme.
The road map is working. However -
The opening of schools caused a massive slowdown in the decline of cases in the unvaccinated groups. No, this is not "tests" - the adults will have received PCR tests.
That opening the schools would increase R was expected and debated. What I did not expect, and am rather glad to see, is that the increase in R has not resulted in a net rise in cases.
If we open up further, cases will rise. Until we are vaccinating down to 50 (and preferably below) that means an increase in hospitalisations.
I don't deny that the roadmap is working, indeed I support the roadmap and have said so repeatedly on here. What I don't like is the endless earnest lecturing about "caution" when the vaccines clearly work.
By the way, not sure I understand your point about cases/test. The rapid rise in the young is due to their being tested. Had they not been tested, most of them would be none the wiser as they are mostly asymptomatic surely?
Look at the other groups - *all* of them "turn" at pretty much the same time.
That schools going back would increase R was taken as a given. It was debated. A number of people said it was too early. The results so far suggest it was judged correctly.
We have given a first vaccine to most of those at risk of death from COVID. However, the hospitalisation high risk cohort goes to a younger age - down to below 50. So until we have vaccinated enough people to get that cohort protected, we need to be cautious.
At the moment. we have vaccinated, at least once, something like 40% of the whole UK population*. Herd immunity starts to kick in at about double that. Israel is at 77%...
*You need too include children when talking about herd immunity.
Does it not depend partly on what we're aiming for? If we're aiming to eliminate the possibility of the NHS collapsing under pressure, then we might be there already. If it's about reducing the risk for any one individual to an acceptable level, well, we need to talk about what is an acceptable level.
Yes, I guess, this is at the heart of the matter. It's worth remembering that younger people with UHC have already been vaxxed AIUI.
I honestly don't know what the truth is, but there is a disconnect between the claim that the average amount of life lost being 10 years and underlying health issues counting for much. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think both can be true.
A large part of why the elderly are more vulnerable is that with time so many more of them have a health condition, and if you are in later retirement with a serious condition your expectancy is likely less than ten years. The fewer younger people with serious conditions likely have longer expectancy and ten years seems reasonable as an overall average, especially when you consider over half our deaths (first wave, anyhow) were in care homes where average expectancy is one or two years at most
These things can get complicated but as I understand it, roughly, the average age of deaths is 80 and the average life lost is 10 years. The ONS estimate that on average an 80 year old will live for 10 more years. This is why I struggle to see how underlying health conditions really make much difference (unless having diabetes etc. doesn't actually reduce life expectancy, which I doubt).
The problem with averages is that you average out data that is extremely relevant.
The average 80 year old may have 10 years of life on average, but that's an average. A specific 80 year old won't be the average.
A healthy and active 80 year old non-smoker, living in their own home, with no major conditions besides those you'd expect in an 80 year old will not have the same life expectancy as an 80 year old living in a care home with dementia and Stage 4 cancer.
Conditions for the individual matter.
Well, yes, but we are talking about averages. I get that there are plenty of 88 year olds (ONS estimate average of 5 years left) dying, but the figure repeated by (I think) @Foxy is that on average, the amount of life lost to COVID is 10 years.
I don't see how underlying health conditions can matter all that much if the average life lost broadly matches the average life left of those dying.
I'd heard that the average age at death of people dying from covid was greater than the average age at death of the population in general. This doesn't seem to tally with an average of ten years lost?
This apparent contradiction is because at year X the average age of deaths in that year is a number, probably a bit over 80. Call it Y.
For any individual, A, who actually reaches age Y we know a vital fact about them; namely that they are not yet dead. We also know that from that point, age Y, they, on average are going to carry on living a determinable average length of time.
Covid can't kill all those very unhealthy people in the cohort that the individual A is in, because through eating drinking smoking betting and taking no exercise they have already died of something else and have never heard of Covid.
Even at age 103 (the age a friend of mine was recently), while the probability is that you are in fact already dead, if you aren't, the probability also is that you will live till the day after tomorrow.
Fun/horrifying fact. Prior to 1966, the most common age at death in the UK was....
Similarly, it is the most common score at cricket. I'm kind of surprised that it isn't still 0, advances in medicine aside. What is it now? My guess: 91.
Demographics is fascinating. Most people in the UK who make it to adulthood now make it to 90. Almost no-one gets to 100.
Mid-eighties(ish) - early-mid eighties for men, mid-late eighties for women (2018: 83 for men; 88 for women). Those mid-80s years each have ~8 times as many deaths as under 1s now. This is one of the big public health stories of the last 50 years, the plummeting infant deaths, with safer child birth and the near-eradication of deaths from the old childhood killers due to vaccination (also, more recently, the back to sleep campaign for cot deaths and advances in treatments for some of the severe inherited conditions)
You can tell when someone has a good reputation and good press at such moments. Some earlier reports was the Germans were backing tough talk, and indeed that the Commission/Council's harsher proposals had their roots in Berlin. But when you get gratitude for 'steering away' from trouble when you were helping steer into it in the first place? Genius.
Maybe they have learned something from Boris after all.
Perhaps it will be seen by historians that while Sun Tzu wrote "The Art of War", Boris Johnson inadvertently wrote "The Art of Bullshit" .
His most memorable quote from the book he hasn't written yet could be "All of my life is based on deception."
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
I'm fine with letting people leave the country. Slightly more leery about letting them back in again
More seriously, I'd leave it to SAGE to advise on this (as in provide estimates of the risks, it's then a political decision what to do, not their decision). Testing plus quarantine would make it manageable, I expect. However, I'm with others that I'd rather have all restrictions lifted here as a priority over foreign travel.
In this case I don't think it any worse calling it the British variant, than calling others Brazilian and SA.
I accept that - so can we call it the Chinese virus then?
For some strange reason that was a no no
I'm just pointing out that in the UK we constantly talk about SA and Brazil variants, so we shouldn't try to take the high ground over the B117 variant...
I'm pointing out hat there is hypocrisy involved here - why could the disease not be named after place first found - but its perfectly ok to use country names for mutations?
Yes, the Sinovirus has a good ring to it. Tempting to say it could be quite catchy
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
I have problems with mandatory limits on internal movements too. But, as I said, the ban on leaving the country is the ultimate, not only, no no. Because if you really don't like lockdown, and you are permitted to leave the country, you at least have the option (admittedly at a very high price) of choosing to emigrate or leave temporarily. If you ban exit, there is no escape.
I believe emigration is allowed still isn't it? It is holidays that are not, which quite reasonably fall under the Ebola exemption considering we're under lockdown.
If you want to escape by emigrating then fair enough. If you want to "escape" for a week, weekend or even a fortnight then come back then that's different. It is the coming back that is the issue more than the leaving, so quarantine is important if people do leave.
The Ebola exemption is presumably to prevent people from spreading Ebola. The note mentions specifically leaving an Ebola-ridden village. Our measure is to prevent people leaving and bringing back one of the scary variants (which until recently didn't every study agree the current vaccines guard against?).
So test and if necessary put people into quarantine when they come back. That is very different from these laws.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
I have problems with mandatory limits on internal movements too. But, as I said, the ban on leaving the country is the ultimate, not only, no no. Because if you really don't like lockdown, and you are permitted to leave the country, you at least have the option (admittedly at a very high price) of choosing to emigrate or leave temporarily. If you ban exit, there is no escape.
I believe emigration is allowed still isn't it? It is holidays that are not, which quite reasonably fall under the Ebola exemption considering we're under lockdown.
If you want to escape by emigrating then fair enough. If you want to "escape" for a week, weekend or even a fortnight then come back then that's different. It is the coming back that is the issue more than the leaving, so quarantine is important if people do leave.
Then we agree. Mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return for all travellers (regardless of vaccine status as vaccines do not provide 100% protection against infection nor infectiousness) at the traveller's expense.
It's typical tough talking and would be amusing if the stakes were not so high, but the thing is the UK really has not been looking for a fight on this issue (it hasn't needed one), whereas the EU's protestations that they do not want a fight with the UK do not accord with their actions over the last few months, where they repeatedly sought to bring the UK into its dispute with AZ as with the Article 16 stuff, and its current rhetoric which is focused on 'fairness' and crass comparisons of 'EU' exports vs UK exports.
They really do want a fight, and unfortunately if one side really wants that it is hard to avoid a fight.
Can't see how 'fairness' helps them anyway. Given the very large disparity between the EU and UK populations, even if they seize all our vaccine, it will not make much of a dent in the EU shortfall - though it might impact us significantly.
Unless their intention is solely to hold us back to their pace of vaccination, then it is pointless. And risks damage both to the rate of vaccine production, and increasing vaccine scepticism in Europe.
But that is precisely their intention. It is not to benefit EU citizens, it's to stop the UK making the EU look bad by comparison. It's to stop anyone else thinking of following the example of Brexit.
But in so doing, their moral standing goes from the high ground to the Marianas Trench. A bunch of seedy gangsters, prepared to kill to save their "reputation".
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
At a point where people can't even open their businesses and have to stay at home, the Red List should be all countries.
Once domestic restrictions are lifted, then we should be able to remove from the Red List those countries that don't jeopardise that. Getting our own country open again must be the most important issue.
But 100% agreed with others that if people want a one-way trip out (or return with mandatory quarantine) that's fair enough. Its the expecting to come back that is the issue.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Agreed.
Btw, can you elucidate the German idiom 'rein in die Kartoffeln - raus aus den Kartoffeln' ? It seems loosely to mean to chop and change, but I don't think that quite grasps it ?
Sounds like 'plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose', but the internet is telling me 'chopping and changing'
correct meaning: Indecision (literal translation: into the potato field, out of the potato field)
(military) There was a long dispute in 19th century Europe about the best attack strategy. Some military commanders thought the best attack is in the open field (rin in die Kartoffel); others insisted on the attack from a hiding place (raus aus die Kartoffeln).
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
I agree. I think this was being heavily talked up by people who desperately wanted it to happen, i.e., Anglophobes on one side of the channel and the usual xenophobe suspects on this side
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here') when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
liberal bias simply means that our swarm of Tories have more education than most
Like I said before. Drakeford closed the pubs, Johnson vaccinated the people. Not my view, but the view on the street.
Is it possible for the Tories to win in Wales.... (would make a good thread)
It is possible but expect Plaid to hold the balance of power with Plaid FM
A Plaid FM is unlikely. They have said they won't work with the Tories, so on the basis of a Tory administration with a puppet PC FM that would be a sell out of 2010 LD proportions, and look where that got them.
RT as FM would provide tremendous comedy value.
RT as Welsh Conservative leader has also firmly ruled out any deals with Plaid
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
Yes, I can get behind that assuming you are referring to the road map timetable. 17 May international travel permitted. 21 June all legal restriction removed.
No I don't.
21 June all domestic legal restrictions is more important than international travel.
If international travel in May jeopardises removing domestic restrictions on 21 June then we should say no to international travel. Getting rid of domestic restrictions must be our first priority. Once we can ensure domestic restrictions aren't coming back, then we should lift travel/quarantine restrictions.
I'd possibly have travel restrictions on America lifted before the EU given the state of the vaccine programmes too.
Yes, I think there's going to be a very good case for a bilateral exemption with the US. Would at least give those with wanderlust plenty of holiday opportunities: the US is an absolutely wonderful country to tour. Some of my best holidays have been in the Colorado Rockies, and the Shenandoah.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
To be honest there's nothing worse than seeing a mask slung under a chin. Either wear it or don't !
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
I have problems with mandatory limits on internal movements too. But, as I said, the ban on leaving the country is the ultimate, not only, no no. Because if you really don't like lockdown, and you are permitted to leave the country, you at least have the option (admittedly at a very high price) of choosing to emigrate or leave temporarily. If you ban exit, there is no escape.
I believe emigration is allowed still isn't it? It is holidays that are not, which quite reasonably fall under the Ebola exemption considering we're under lockdown.
If you want to escape by emigrating then fair enough. If you want to "escape" for a week, weekend or even a fortnight then come back then that's different. It is the coming back that is the issue more than the leaving, so quarantine is important if people do leave.
The Ebola exemption is presumably to prevent people from spreading Ebola. The note mentions specifically leaving an Ebola-ridden village. Our measure is to prevent people leaving and bringing back one of the scary variants (which until recently didn't every study agree the current vaccines guard against?).
So test and if necessary put people into quarantine when they come back. That is very different from these laws.
The law proposed doesn't prevent travel, it doesn't prevent emigration, which is clearly a reasonable excuse.
It is requires a reason which is what is required right now to leave your home even, it is aimed at holidays, at a point where businesses are still legally closed, its not a permanent law.
Holidays will be great to have. Jobs and normal life are too. First things first, we need to remove domestic restrictions.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Agreed.
Btw, can you elucidate the German idiom 'rein in die Kartoffeln - raus aus den Kartoffeln' ? It seems loosely to mean to chop and change, but I don't think that quite grasps it ?
Sounds like 'plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose', but the internet is telling me 'chopping and changing'
correct meaning: Indecision (literal translation: into the potato field, out of the potato field)
(military) There was a long dispute in 19th century Europe about the best attack strategy. Some military commanders thought the best attack is in the open field (rin in die Kartoffel); others insisted on the attack from a hiding place (raus aus die Kartoffeln).
The more recent version being: get on the bus get off the bus.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
It does, this site is more economically liberal and more socially liberal than the national average and also probably has more lockdown sceptics than the population as a whole.
Certainly less than half of PB commentators voted Leave compared to 52% UK wide
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
I've been surprised too by the low value people place on freedom vs safety. There's a quote by Ben Franklin, I think, about this - those prepared to give up their freedom for safety deserve neither freedom nor safety - or words to that effect. In reality, of course, it's always a trade off. At the extreme end I'm happy to trade the freedom to drive at 50mph along my wide but residential street for the safety gained from others not doing the same. But I would place a rather higher value on freedom and a rather lower value on safety than the arrangement we seem to have arrived at (along, it has to be said, with almost every other country in the world - I have to accept that I am an outlier here. It doesn't necessarily mean that I'm wrong though!)
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
btw I just finished Klara and the Sun, talking, broadly, of such concepts. Another excellent effort from Sir Kazuo.
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
btw I just finished Klara and the Sun, talking, broadly, of such concepts. Another excellent effort from Sir Kazuo.
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
It does, this site is more economically liberal and more socially liberal than the national average and also probably has more lockdown sceptics than the population as a whole.
Certainly less than half of PB commentators voted Leave compared to 52% UK wide
It would be very interesting if there was a way of evaluating the accuracy of statements like this. (You'd need to produce an answer weighted by number of posts and one weighted by individual posters.)
Went for my (extended) annual Mole Clinic check up in central London this morning. Some observations:
1. Plenty of traffic, far fewer pedestrians although enough about. 2. Quite sad to see all the shops shut. How many will reopen? Can't believe the Bristol showroom is shut, looks like permanently. 3. Lots of marshalls around and about - not sure to what end. 4. About 40 people in two full teams (could - just - have been schoolchildren) in tabards playing footie in Hyde Park. 3. For people who so desire I'd say post-lockdown will be an orgy of sex. Just about everyone I engaged with my eyes was flirty. in particular, the one other woman d'un age certain (but fit, micro skirt, etc) in the clinic waiting room. As though people can't wait to jump each other.
Totally agree on 5 - despite not having had a haircut for 6 months or a clean shave for 30 days, I am constantly being flirted with on almost every shopping trip. @Gallowgate mentioned he had been given extra bacon this morning. I have a feeling the collective sigh of relief is going to make everyone very pleasant to each other for a few months.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Agreed.
Btw, can you elucidate the German idiom 'rein in die Kartoffeln - raus aus den Kartoffeln' ? It seems loosely to mean to chop and change, but I don't think that quite grasps it ?
Sounds like 'plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose', but the internet is telling me 'chopping and changing'
correct meaning: Indecision (literal translation: into the potato field, out of the potato field)
(military) There was a long dispute in 19th century Europe about the best attack strategy. Some military commanders thought the best attack is in the open field (rin in die Kartoffel); others insisted on the attack from a hiding place (raus aus die Kartoffeln).
Thanks, I came to that sort of conclusion from reading the examples.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
I'm loving the middle third.
Give us some more attributes about that segment pls.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
Sadly, several, not to say many on here have not distinguished themselves in this regard.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
To be honest there's nothing worse than seeing a mask slung under a chin. Either wear it or don't !
Given the state of most masks I see now, I think having them on could be more dangerous than having them under the chin....
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
btw I just finished Klara and the Sun, talking, broadly, of such concepts. Another excellent effort from Sir Kazuo.
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
You will never look at a lobster the same way, again....
Looks great I'm going to take a look.
Of course this is the other thing with Ishiguro, Attwood, etc. They have made people revise their previous attitude to science fiction that I think it's fair to say prevailed when it came to "serious" literature.
I started answering this post saying that the big question to answer is where the BXP vote goes. But I've already changed my mind. Questions to answer include: - what the baseline conditions are. Ordinarily that would be GE2019, adjusted to current polls - but we know there hasn't been UNS since 2019. Has the Con advantage over Lab been eroded less in Hartlepool than UNS? I would instinctively think so - but by how much? - where the BXP vote goes (my guess is almost none to Labour. People motivated to vote BXP aren't going to be voting for Paul Williams. A chunk, but certainly not all to the Tories. I'd say the bulk would go to not voting or to Richard Tice, if he stands.) - what the Con vote does. Traditionally, in by-elections, it stays at home, particularly when the Tories are in power. - what the lab vote does. Traditionally it turns out a bit more enthusiastically than the Con vote when the Tories are in power. And will the non-Tory vote unite behind Paul Williams? Usually, in a relatively tight race, you would expect that to happen.
My expectation is that enough of the Con vote will stay at home, and enough of the non-Con vote will unite behind Paul Williams, and baseline conditions will be sufficient, to offset any advantage the Cons might receive from BXP splitting in their favour. Therefore Lab hold. But there is more uncertainty here than is usual in a by-election.
The Welsh poll (linked to by @Big_G_NorthWales ) is telling you the answer, assuming it is accurate.
There was a big UKIP/BXP vote in the Senedd (7 seats and 12 % of the vote) in 2016.
Some have stuck with Reform (3 %) or Abolish (3%), but a big chunk has now gone to the Tories,
What's driving the shift from UKIP/BXP to tory? best way to get rid of Drakeford vote?
I am not sure most people in Wales even notice Drakeford, or care enough about him to want to get rid of him. He is like a drippy nose, a bit annoying but not needing serious medical treatment.
pb.com is unusual in having a Drakeford Fan Club (Hon. Sec., @kinabalu) and the International Society for the Suppression of Drakefords (Hon. Sec., @Big_G_NorthWales).
I think the Welsh poll is just showing that the Big Welsh UKIP vote (12 %) from 2016 has got to go somewhere. And the Tories will get between a third & a half of it. That will be enough to turn some of the North East Walian seats blue.
The Tories could do with removing Ken Skates in Clwyd South, as that will knock out Drakeford's likely successor.
And also, Drakeford isn't as good as Carwyn, so the Labour vote from 2016 is going to unwind anyhow. But, the electoral system will save Labour from huge loses. As they lose constituency seats, they will gain list seats.
I expect Labour -4 to -6.Labour will surely still be largest party.
I don't reject the title - it's an honour - but I confess my Drakeford fandom is an instinctive 'heart over head' affair. It's his speechifying. The way he communicates. Low key, conversational, sincere and (for me) extremely effective. Better than any other leading politician on these islands. I don't have much knowledge of his CV or his policies (and have shamefully not rectified this by doing the requisite research).
It seems Astrazeneca published efficacy data based on interim and partial data and then passed it off as official results. And did so without consulting NIAID, whose trial this actually is. NIAID aren't at all amused.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
Yes, I can get behind that assuming you are referring to the road map timetable. 17 May international travel permitted. 21 June all legal restriction removed.
No I don't.
21 June all domestic legal restrictions is more important than international travel.
If international travel in May jeopardises removing domestic restrictions on 21 June then we should say no to international travel. Getting rid of domestic restrictions must be our first priority. Once we can ensure domestic restrictions aren't coming back, then we should lift travel/quarantine restrictions.
I'd possibly have travel restrictions on America lifted before the EU given the state of the vaccine programmes too.
Yes, I think there's going to be a very good case for a bilateral exemption with the US. Would at least give those with wanderlust plenty of holiday opportunities: the US is an absolutely wonderful country to tour. Some of my best holidays have been in the Colorado Rockies, and the Shenandoah.
Birding along the Mexico-Arizona border was superb. Ditto New England. Still want to do Big Bend in Texas.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
To be honest there's nothing worse than seeing a mask slung under a chin. Either wear it or don't !
If I've had it on in the shop it can get tangled up in my earphones, so sometimes I just push it under my chin once I'm outside and carrying my shopping home rather than take it off.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
I don't think that's right or reasonable.
Some people seem to want to view this as holidays in isolation without taking into account other issues or restrictions.
My point, and that of many others, is that if holidays are jeopardising another lockdown then that is a serious problem. If they're not then great, we have no issues, but if lifting foreign travel means we can't lift domestic restrictions then its not a case of being liberal v authoritarian. It is a case of which restrictions do you choose to lift: the domestic ones, or the travel ones?
There are no restrictions on emigrating and never have been, the restrictions are entirely on coming back.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
Thing is though... When you're locked inside your home 24/7, what is there to do other than twitch the curtains?
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
To be honest there's nothing worse than seeing a mask slung under a chin. Either wear it or don't !
If I've had it on in the shop it can get tangled up in my earphones, so sometimes I just push it under my chin once I'm outside and carrying my shopping home rather than take it off.
Like people wearing their glasses on their forehead.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
I'm loving the middle third.
Give us some more attributes about that segment pls.
Unless it effects their immediate, very local concerns, there are a considerable group of people who don't notice massive changes in the world about them.
When you ask them, they tend to be dimly aware about "Something about that in the news" - but it hasn't registered as real.
So until the Nazi shot, say, the goal keeper for Man U. they wouldn't *really* think about the war as real.
I recall a story about a lady who was very upset on being told her summer holiday to France wasn't going to be possible. In 1941.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I though that was the case until I experienced this pandemic Cookie.
Now I think there are plenty who will accept and defend any restriction and privation if enough 'experts' and propaganda are thrown their way to justify it.
I thought people cared about their freedom. They don't. I've lost count of the times I have thought 'people just aren't going to accept this'. They always do.
I've been surprised too by the low value people place on freedom vs safety. There's a quote by Ben Franklin, I think, about this - those prepared to give up their freedom for safety deserve neither freedom nor safety - or words to that effect. In reality, of course, it's always a trade off. At the extreme end I'm happy to trade the freedom to drive at 50mph along my wide but residential street for the safety gained from others not doing the same. But I would place a rather higher value on freedom and a rather lower value on safety than the arrangement we seem to have arrived at (along, it has to be said, with almost every other country in the world - I have to accept that I am an outlier here. It doesn't necessarily mean that I'm wrong though!)
The place where it gets dodgy is where people can trade other peoples safety for their own freedom, and that's the woolly area where public health falls.
The key is to judge what is and what is not genuinely in that area.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
I don't think that's right or reasonable.
Some people seem to want to view this as holidays in isolation without taking into account other issues or restrictions.
My point, and that of many others, is that if holidays are jeopardising another lockdown then that is a serious problem. If they're not then great, we have no issues, but if lifting foreign travel means we can't lift domestic restrictions then its not a case of being liberal v authoritarian. It is a case of which restrictions do you choose to lift: the domestic ones, or the travel ones?
There are no restrictions on emigrating and never have been, the restrictions are entirely on coming back.
I actually wasn't responding to holidays thing. I think a temporary ban is probably a price worth paying to guarantee 176 May and 21 June. However, what seems to be happening is rather different: a new set of measures arrive with no payoff. So we end up with ever increasing measures, and earnest "words of caution" but without the counterbalance of having something clear to look forward to.
Of course, the authoritarians lap it up, and say it's for our own good.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
I'm loving the middle third.
Give us some more attributes about that segment pls.
Unless it effects their immediate, very local concerns, there are a considerable group of people who don't notice massive changes in the world about them.
When you ask them, they tend to be dimly aware about "Something about that in the news" - but it has registered as real.
So until the Nazi shot, say, the goal keeper for Man U. they wouldn't *really* think about the war as real.
I recall a story about a lady who was very upset on being told her summer holiday to France wasn't going to be possible. In 1941.
Autumn 2001 I was in the Student Union bar chatting with friends when discussion turned to the war (Afghanistan). One of my friends responded incredulously with "we're at war!?"
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
I suppose it's kind of refreshing that we are cleaving along different lines. Fifteen years ago there wasn't all that much variation - if you agreed with poster X on matter A, you would probably agree with him on matters B, C and D as well. Nowadays it's pretty hard to tell from one issue to the next where you will be agreeing or disagreeing.
You can tell when someone has a good reputation and good press at such moments. Some earlier reports was the Germans were backing tough talk, and indeed that the Commission/Council's harsher proposals had their roots in Berlin. But when you get gratitude for 'steering away' from trouble when you were helping steer into it in the first place? Genius.
Maybe they have learned something from Boris after all.
Perhaps it will be seen by historians that while Sun Tzu wrote "The Art of War", Boris Johnson inadvertently wrote "The Art of Bullshit" .
His most memorable quote from the book he hasn't written yet could be "All of my life is based on deception."
There's a song. There's always a song.
I was born with a smile on my face The whole of my life's been a pantomime Born with the need to embrace The life of a clown telling li ... rhymes
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
I don't think that's right or reasonable.
Some people seem to want to view this as holidays in isolation without taking into account other issues or restrictions.
My point, and that of many others, is that if holidays are jeopardising another lockdown then that is a serious problem. If they're not then great, we have no issues, but if lifting foreign travel means we can't lift domestic restrictions then its not a case of being liberal v authoritarian. It is a case of which restrictions do you choose to lift: the domestic ones, or the travel ones?
There are no restrictions on emigrating and never have been, the restrictions are entirely on coming back.
I actually wasn't responding to holidays thing. I think a temporary ban is probably a price worth paying to guarantee 176 May and 21 June. However, what seems to be happening is rather different: a new set of measures arrive with no payoff. So we end up with ever increasing measures, and earnest "words of caution" but without the counterbalance of having something clear to look forward to.
Of course, the authoritarians lap it up, and say it's for our own good.
Then we're agreed. 👍
Vaccination and cases are better here than had been hoped for, and worse in Europe than had been expected. We should be postponing international travel but bringing forward the lifting of domestic restrictions.
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
btw I just finished Klara and the Sun, talking, broadly, of such concepts. Another excellent effort from Sir Kazuo.
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
You will never look at a lobster the same way, again....
Looks great I'm going to take a look.
Of course this is the other thing with Ishiguro, Attwood, etc. They have made people revise their previous attitude to science fiction that I think it's fair to say prevailed when it came to "serious" literature.
Stross used to have it on his website to read for free.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
Fighting in the Shadows - a new heavyweight history of resistance in France that came out about five years ago - is worth a read.
Thirds is most unlikely. Active fight to the death types were extremely rare in the early years, when Germany was rolling everything before it (which clearly would have been more so the case had the UK succumbed). Collaborators were a significant minority and everyone else had livelihoods and families to try and protect as best they could. Hence most early resisters were late teenage or early twenties, often people who had already lost older family members to the war.
The majority of resisters tended to be of left wing politics and many didn’t get involved until after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Recruits only began to come in any numbers once the tide of the war had turned, with Germany up against both the USSR and the US.
Later in the war, floods of people tried to get involved, for a variety of reasons ranging from noble and patriotic through self interest, including people who had collaborated trying to rewrite their CV.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
I would never describe myself as conservative or libertarian, but I also find myself horrified by this law.
Yesterday people were queuing up to say how reasonable it was. They were quoting the UN's explanatory note on UDHR Art.13
(1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. 2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.)
which mentions as an exemption example not letting people leave an Ebola-ridden village.
The majority on here, I'd say, were applauding the idea of making it illegal to leave the country.
PB. Home of the independent, questioning spirit. Not.
Before all this I can remember HYUFD saying that this site had a liberal bias. I agreed. But wow the pandemic has exposed this as false - and some. We have conservative authoritarians and mean-spirited curtain twitchers on one side and hectoring moralising collectivists on the other. Liberals caught in a pincer movement and the LibDems have left the battle field...
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
Thing is though... When you're locked inside your home 24/7, what is there to do other than twitch the curtains?
Get yourself an exquisitely knapped flint ... no, I won't go there.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands
It seems Astrazeneca published efficacy data based on interim and partial data and then passed it off as official results. And did so without consulting NIAID, whose trial this actually is. NIAID aren't at all amused.
It seems Astrazeneca published efficacy data based on interim and partial data and then passed it off as official results. And did so without consulting NIAID, whose trial this actually is. NIAID aren't at all amused.
Extraordinary way to behave.
Second sentence of the press release:
This interim safety and efficacy analysis was based on 32,449 participants accruing 141 symptomatic cases of COVID-19.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands
"Handful"?
There were two Germans for every three islanders!
Seems like a waste of resources, did they think each Islander was thunderous Norse god or something?
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands
"Handful"?
There were two Germans for every three islanders!
Fair enough. A lot of the denunciation letters were destroyed, for a variety of obvious reasons, but there was a Cambridge University study of those that survived published recently. Its conclusion was that the pattern of collaboration and denunciation didn’t appear substantially different from the rest of occupied Europe.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
Fighting in the Shadows - a new heavyweight history of resistance in France that came out about five years ago - is worth a read.
Thirds is most unlikely. Active fight to the death types were extremely rare in the early years, when Germany was rolling everything before it (which clearly would have been more so the case had the UK succumbed). Collaborators were a significant minority and everyone else had livelihoods and families to try and protect as best they could. Hence most early resisters were late teenage or early twenties, often people who had already lost older family members to the war.
The majority of resisters tended to be of left wing politics and many didn’t get involved until after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Recruits only began to come in any numbers once the tide of the war had turned, with Germany up against both the USSR and the US.
Later in the war, floods of people tried to get involved, for a variety of reasons ranging from noble and patriotic through self interest, including people who had collaborated trying to rewrite their CV.
I was being somewhat facetious.
My favourite resistance story is that of Francois Mitterrand. Apparently he was a secret resister from before De Gaulle, but cunningly hid it by working really, really hard for Vichy. Sadly, all those who knew about his resistance work had died during the war.
It seems Astrazeneca published efficacy data based on interim and partial data and then passed it off as official results. And did so without consulting NIAID, whose trial this actually is. NIAID aren't at all amused....
I'm not sure I'd characterise it quite like that. The 'official results' are the ones which will get submitted to the FDA is a few weeks' time. What they did was present already analysed data from the pre-arranged interim analysis (which is fine), without labelling it as such, and without adding that further data is still to be fully analysed - which was indeed stupid.
The NIAID got pissed as they'd issued their own release based on the AZN one.
I really don't understand the point of issuing an overly bullish PR, as at the end of the day you still have to submit all the fully analysed data to the regulator.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
Invading Love Island would really rile the unaware third.....
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
My theory is that the country would have divided into 3 groups
- those who would fight to the death - those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred - those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
Fighting in the Shadows - a new heavyweight history of resistance in France that came out about five years ago - is worth a read.
Thirds is most unlikely. Active fight to the death types were extremely rare in the early years, when Germany was rolling everything before it (which clearly would have been more so the case had the UK succumbed). Collaborators were a significant minority and everyone else had livelihoods and families to try and protect as best they could. Hence most early resisters were late teenage or early twenties, often people who had already lost older family members to the war.
The majority of resisters tended to be of left wing politics and many didn’t get involved until after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Recruits only began to come in any numbers once the tide of the war had turned, with Germany up against both the USSR and the US.
Later in the war, floods of people tried to get involved, for a variety of reasons ranging from noble and patriotic through self interest, including people who had collaborated trying to rewrite their CV.
Was that the book (there was one, can't remember the name) which said that the French Resistance was largely useless, or at best marginal in its aim of, er, resisting the Germans but was hugely important to the maintenance and support of the French national psyche.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
Yes, I can get behind that assuming you are referring to the road map timetable. 17 May international travel permitted. 21 June all legal restriction removed.
No I don't.
21 June all domestic legal restrictions is more important than international travel.
If international travel in May jeopardises removing domestic restrictions on 21 June then we should say no to international travel. Getting rid of domestic restrictions must be our first priority. Once we can ensure domestic restrictions aren't coming back, then we should lift travel/quarantine restrictions.
I'd possibly have travel restrictions on America lifted before the EU given the state of the vaccine programmes too.
Yes, I think there's going to be a very good case for a bilateral exemption with the US. Would at least give those with wanderlust plenty of holiday opportunities: the US is an absolutely wonderful country to tour. Some of my best holidays have been in the Colorado Rockies, and the Shenandoah.
Birding along the Mexico-Arizona border was superb. Ditto New England. Still want to do Big Bend in Texas.
Have you ever birded at the southern tip of the Delmarva peninsula. I used to live in Cape Charles, VA. The peninsula (The Eastern Shore) is a major migratory route, and narrows towards the southern tip where it is less than 1 mile across. This funnels the birds into a very high density. They (and monarch butterflies) rest up a while at the southern tip before making the 17 mile jump across the mouth of the Chesapeake, so it is, at the right time of year, spectacularly high concentrations of migratory birds and raptors.
It seems Astrazeneca published efficacy data based on interim and partial data and then passed it off as official results. And did so without consulting NIAID, whose trial this actually is. NIAID aren't at all amused....
I'm not sure I'd characterise it quite like that. The 'official results' are the ones which will get submitted to the FDA is a few weeks' time. What they did was present already analysed data from the pre-arranged interim analysis (which is fine), without labelling it as such, and without adding that further data is still to be fully analysed - which was indeed stupid.
The NIAID got pissed as they'd issued their own release based on the AZN one.
I really don't understand the point of issuing an overly bullish PR, as at the end of the day you still have to submit all the fully analysed data to the regulator.
Unless AZ have edited yesterdays press release, then it is mentioned several times in it that the data was only 'interim' - once in the headline itself.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
Yes, I can get behind that assuming you are referring to the road map timetable. 17 May international travel permitted. 21 June all legal restriction removed.
No I don't.
21 June all domestic legal restrictions is more important than international travel.
If international travel in May jeopardises removing domestic restrictions on 21 June then we should say no to international travel. Getting rid of domestic restrictions must be our first priority. Once we can ensure domestic restrictions aren't coming back, then we should lift travel/quarantine restrictions.
I'd possibly have travel restrictions on America lifted before the EU given the state of the vaccine programmes too.
Yes, I think there's going to be a very good case for a bilateral exemption with the US. Would at least give those with wanderlust plenty of holiday opportunities: the US is an absolutely wonderful country to tour. Some of my best holidays have been in the Colorado Rockies, and the Shenandoah.
Birding along the Mexico-Arizona border was superb. Ditto New England. Still want to do Big Bend in Texas.
Have you ever birded at the southern tip of the Delmarva peninsula. I used to live in Cape Charles, VA. The peninsula (The Eastern Shore) is a major migratory route, and narrows towards the southern tip where it is less than 1 mile across. This funnels the birds into a very high density. They (and monarch butterflies) rest up a while at the southern tip before making the 17 mile jump across the mouth of the Chesapeake, so it is, at the right time of year, spectacularly high concentrations of migratory birds and raptors.
And if you are interested in butterflies and moths, they have a strange cousin of both called skippers
Like I said before. Drakeford closed the pubs, Johnson vaccinated the people. Not my view, but the view on the street.
Is it possible for the Tories to win in Wales.... (would make a good thread)
It is possible but expect Plaid to hold the balance of power with Plaid FM
A Plaid FM is unlikely. They have said they won't work with the Tories, so on the basis of a Tory administration with a puppet PC FM that would be a sell out of 2010 LD proportions, and look where that got them.
RT as FM would provide tremendous comedy value.
RT as Welsh Conservative leader has also firmly ruled out any deals with Plaid
Very much a statement by RT on on the lines of Lord Astor's earlier statement as commented upon by Mandy Rice-Davies.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
How about forbidding people from leaving their homes?
How about forbidding people from gathering with others?
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, what has happened over the past 12 months is absolutely horrendous and needs to be reversed. If keeping quarantine or travel restrictions for a few months more allows all other restrictions to be lifted, then that's much more liberal than lifting everything then resuming lockdowns.
Yes, I can get behind that assuming you are referring to the road map timetable. 17 May international travel permitted. 21 June all legal restriction removed.
No I don't.
21 June all domestic legal restrictions is more important than international travel.
If international travel in May jeopardises removing domestic restrictions on 21 June then we should say no to international travel. Getting rid of domestic restrictions must be our first priority. Once we can ensure domestic restrictions aren't coming back, then we should lift travel/quarantine restrictions.
I'd possibly have travel restrictions on America lifted before the EU given the state of the vaccine programmes too.
Yes, I think there's going to be a very good case for a bilateral exemption with the US. Would at least give those with wanderlust plenty of holiday opportunities: the US is an absolutely wonderful country to tour. Some of my best holidays have been in the Colorado Rockies, and the Shenandoah.
Birding along the Mexico-Arizona border was superb. Ditto New England. Still want to do Big Bend in Texas.
Have you ever birded at the southern tip of the Delmarva peninsula. I used to live in Cape Charles, VA. The peninsula (The Eastern Shore) is a major migratory route, and narrows towards the southern tip where it is less than 1 mile across. This funnels the birds into a very high density. They (and monarch butterflies) rest up a while at the southern tip before making the 17 mile jump across the mouth of the Chesapeake, so it is, at the right time of year, spectacularly high concentrations of migratory birds and raptors.
Tim, not yet. I have a friend with a morbid fear of flying - and getting out to see the spring migration of American wood warblers has been the spur to get him to tackle it. Sadly, he's gone backwards since lockdown, but if he doesn't get his arse in gear some time soon, I'm going without him!
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
It won't be if you have a reasonable excuse.
You shouldn't really need one to leave a country. To come back in, perhaps. Just as you shouldn't really need one to go to Wales, or to see your parents.
We all decide how far state extension of powers is too far, and to what extent current circumstances justify this changing. Contrarian just draws his line slightly further along the scale.
I agree with you about criminalising leaving the country. I guess the thinking is that if you are a British citizen and/or resident then you can't be stopped from coming back in, but I do think it's a bad law.
To me, as a small c conservative libertarian, the ultimate test of authoritarianism is when a country bans its citizens from leaving the country. This is the ultimate no no as far as I am concerned and it appalls me that the UK is pursuing it, regardless of exigency.
Would you prefer the Australian method of banning them from returning to the country?
Short answer, yes. But I'd prefer the option of mandatory and enforced quarantine upon return at the traveller's expense.
Agree. I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country. Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate. The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
We have a Red List of countries, ten days quarantine for other returnees, negative PCR test before arrival - and still that's not enough to quench the thirst of what is looking to me like a vendetta against travellers fueled by irrational fears, bitterness and envy.
I am quite surprised how often I have had to gently remind several of those who I love dearly to give others a break, rather than rail about 'groups of teenagers milling about', 'two families clearly having a walk at the beach' or 'lots of cars gone for Mother's day'. My other-half is a lovely, rational, logical, none-interfering being, but can't stop criticising people for wearing their mask wrongly.
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here) when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
Despite our self delusions there’s no reason to believe the experience of occupation would have been any different here from the rest of Europe. For example the handful of Germans occupying the Channel Islands received more denunciations than they could deal with.
The channel islands was an interesting study. Madeleine something called it 'The Model Occupation', as in a model for what could have happened if the mainland had been invaded. Her contention was that we'd have been much as the Europeans were a mix of reactions. She also pointed out a lack of serious resistance on the islands, although others have suggested that the relatively small size of the islands and relatively high number of german troops made it a much more difficult place to mount resistance campaigns, and this is surely correct. Much of occupied France was not that heavily garrisoned. At the end of the day we'll never know...
Muppet would be more apposite. Whose puppet is he supposed to be?
There is a clear negative correlation between things that have gone well and things with which the clown has had direct hands on involvement.
There's a clear negative correlation between insightful commentary on the pandemic and those who feel it is enough just to use the word "clown" as if it is some sort of detailed analysis
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
I assume you didn't see the risk of deafness in people who survive Covid then?
What point are you making? We all know that Covid kills and Covid can have myriad long-term effects when it doesn't kill. Vaccines are (were?) the silver bullet to restore civil liberties. We have the vaccines - they never were never going to be 100% effective - and some people were always going to refuse them/unable to have them - now give us our liberties back - and allow individuals to take responsibility for one's own health.
Its worth doing some fairly basic mathematical modelling on what would happen if we ended restrictions today.
We've 44% of the population jabbed at a level which gives them a ~70% reduction in their chances of being able to spread the virus. Given R0 was probably about 3, R would jump to around (1-(0.44*0.7))*3, or about 2. The doubling time with R=3 was about 7 days, so we'd expect a doubling time with R=2 of about 10days.
Cases currently are at about 5k daily, to get to the December peak of about 60k daily cases is 3.5 doublings, so about 35 days, so we'd expect to be seeing 60k cases a day the end of April.
At 60k cases a day, we got a peak of about 4k daily hospital admissions. Now we've vaccinated ~90% of those likely to be admitted with a vaccine about 85% likely to prevent hospitalisation, so we should actually see 4k * (1-(.9*.85) admissions, or 900 admissions a day.
It's another 3 doublings to that 4k admission point that would represent the NHS, being overrun. At that point we're at 500k infections a day.
This is all presuming no seasonal effects, no attempts by anyone to reduce any risk, and that we cease vaccination entirely tomorrow.
In reality, by mid May we'll have jabbed about another 18 million (15% of the population, so another 12% off R), some of the more timid population will still be in hiding, and the weather would be with us. Add in some WFH (probably baked in anyway) and maybe some very minor social distancing (say masks in supermarkets and on public transport) and its very unlikely that the caseload would ever top out the NHS's capacity.
Given all this, we should massively accelerate opening up - maybe not ditch everything tomorrow, but say shops next Monday, pubs at Easter, and all restrictions gone* mid May.
*Except foreign travel. You should be free to go wherever you like, but 2 weeks hotel isolation on entering the country, no exceptions, until most of the rest of the world is jabbed - importing a vaccine resistant variant is the only big risk, and we should manage things accordingly.
Won't happen. Was never going to happen. There are enough grownups in the UK and EU to make such a ludicrous outcome impossible. There are plenty of reckless idiots too, but they lack a critical mass of numbers.
A noted scientist once argued that the 2 commonest things in the universe were hydrogen and stupidity. And that he was worried about running out of hydrogen.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
btw I just finished Klara and the Sun, talking, broadly, of such concepts. Another excellent effort from Sir Kazuo.
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
You will never look at a lobster the same way, again....
Looks great I'm going to take a look.
Of course this is the other thing with Ishiguro, Attwood, etc. They have made people revise their previous attitude to science fiction that I think it's fair to say prevailed when it came to "serious" literature.
Stross used to have it on his website to read for free.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
I assume you didn't see the risk of deafness in people who survive Covid then?
What point are you making? We all know that Covid kills and Covid can have myriad long-term effects when it doesn't kill. Vaccines are (were?) the silver bullet to restore civil liberties. We have the vaccines - they never were never going to be 100% effective - and some people were always going to refuse them/unable to have them - now give us our liberties back - and allow individuals to take responsibility for one's own health.
Its worth doing some fairly basic mathematical modelling on what would happen if we ended restrictions today.
We've 44% of the population jabbed at a level which gives them a ~70% reduction in their chances of being able to spread the virus. Given R0 was probably about 3, R would jump to around (1-(0.44*0.7))*3, or about 2. The doubling time with R=3 was about 7 days, so we'd expect a doubling time with R=2 of about 10days.
Cases currently are at about 5k daily, to get to the December peak of about 60k daily cases is 3.5 doublings, so about 35 days, so we'd expect to be seeing 60k cases a day the end of April.
At 60k cases a day, we got a peak of about 4k daily hospital admissions. Now we've vaccinated ~90% of those likely to be admitted with a vaccine about 85% likely to prevent hospitalisation, so we should actually see 4k * (1-(.9*.85) admissions, or 900 admissions a day.
It's another 3 doublings to that 4k admission point that would represent the NHS, being overrun. At that point we're at 500k infections a day.
This is all presuming no seasonal effects, no attempts by anyone to reduce any risk, and that we cease vaccination entirely tomorrow.
In reality, by mid May we'll have jabbed about another 18 million (15% of the population, so another 12% off R), some of the more timid population will still be in hiding, and the weather would be with us. Add in some WFH (probably baked in anyway) and maybe some very minor social distancing (say masks in supermarkets and on public transport) and its very unlikely that the caseload would ever top out the NHS's capacity.
Given all this, we should massively accelerate opening up - maybe not ditch everything tomorrow, but say shops next Monday, pubs at Easter, and all restrictions gone* mid May.
*Except foreign travel. You should be free to go wherever you like, but 2 weeks hotel isolation on entering the country, no exceptions, until most of the rest of the world is jabbed - importing a vaccine resistant variant is the only big risk, and we should manage things accordingly.
A good piece of analysis - the current effect on R of vaccination isn't as large as people might like to think, and the effect of R by infection prior to the vaccination program kicking off was likely negligible. As you say though, we'll get there.
I suspect that the Speccy is going to have a very juicy article out soon about how a week ago Reddit hired this woman to moderate and safeguard teenagers' spaces on Reddit.
They got instantly banned and the subreddit shut down (on a side note, about 6 years ago I used to moderate a Reddit PolSim where Ms. Challenor and the person banned were not exactly friendly with each other), now any mention of Ms. Challenor results in being instantly banned, so consequently it is now Streislanding its' way across the internet.
Not a stunning victory for the 'let big social media firms regulate themselves' crowd, given that we now have someone who from my interactions with her is not overly stable, and unfortunately has clearly been very damaged from her childhood moderating these vulnerable childrens' places.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
I assume you didn't see the risk of deafness in people who survive Covid then?
What point are you making? We all know that Covid kills and Covid can have myriad long-term effects when it doesn't kill. Vaccines are (were?) the silver bullet to restore civil liberties. We have the vaccines - they never were never going to be 100% effective - and some people were always going to refuse them/unable to have them - now give us our liberties back - and allow individuals to take responsibility for one's own health.
Its worth doing some fairly basic mathematical modelling on what would happen if we ended restrictions today.
We've 44% of the population jabbed at a level which gives them a ~70% reduction in their chances of being able to spread the virus. Given R0 was probably about 3, R would jump to around (1-(0.44*0.7))*3, or about 2. The doubling time with R=3 was about 7 days, so we'd expect a doubling time with R=2 of about 10days.
Cases currently are at about 5k daily, to get to the December peak of about 60k daily cases is 3.5 doublings, so about 35 days, so we'd expect to be seeing 60k cases a day the end of April.
At 60k cases a day, we got a peak of about 4k daily hospital admissions. Now we've vaccinated ~90% of those likely to be admitted with a vaccine about 85% likely to prevent hospitalisation, so we should actually see 4k * (1-(.9*.85) admissions, or 900 admissions a day.
It's another 3 doublings to that 4k admission point that would represent the NHS, being overrun. At that point we're at 500k infections a day.
This is all presuming no seasonal effects, no attempts by anyone to reduce any risk, and that we cease vaccination entirely tomorrow.
In reality, by mid May we'll have jabbed about another 18 million (15% of the population, so another 12% off R), some of the more timid population will still be in hiding, and the weather would be with us. Add in some WFH (probably baked in anyway) and maybe some very minor social distancing (say masks in supermarkets and on public transport) and its very unlikely that the caseload would ever top out the NHS's capacity.
Given all this, we should massively accelerate opening up - maybe not ditch everything tomorrow, but say shops next Monday, pubs at Easter, and all restrictions gone* mid May.
*Except foreign travel. You should be free to go wherever you like, but 2 weeks hotel isolation on entering the country, no exceptions, until most of the rest of the world is jabbed - importing a vaccine resistant variant is the only big risk, and we should manage things accordingly.
I like your posts. I was with up until the last bit. Importing a vaccine resistant variant - or indeed a different virus entirely - is a risk that we live with always. That has always been and will always be. We will be hit again. That is almost certain, we will not stop encroaching into rainforests, for example. When it does happen again we cannot react like we have this time. For one thing the extraordinary debt that we have incurred cannot be repeated.
Going abroad from Britain will soon be illegal. Illegal. Against the law. Like in North Korea presumably.
Wow.
But hey. You have a vaccine that protects you from a disease you almost certainly wouldn't die from.
So that's alright then.
I assume you didn't see the risk of deafness in people who survive Covid then?
What point are you making? We all know that Covid kills and Covid can have myriad long-term effects when it doesn't kill. Vaccines are (were?) the silver bullet to restore civil liberties. We have the vaccines - they never were never going to be 100% effective - and some people were always going to refuse them/unable to have them - now give us our liberties back - and allow individuals to take responsibility for one's own health.
Its worth doing some fairly basic mathematical modelling on what would happen if we ended restrictions today.
We've 44% of the population jabbed at a level which gives them a ~70% reduction in their chances of being able to spread the virus. Given R0 was probably about 3, R would jump to around (1-(0.44*0.7))*3, or about 2. The doubling time with R=3 was about 7 days, so we'd expect a doubling time with R=2 of about 10days.
Cases currently are at about 5k daily, to get to the December peak of about 60k daily cases is 3.5 doublings, so about 35 days, so we'd expect to be seeing 60k cases a day the end of April.
At 60k cases a day, we got a peak of about 4k daily hospital admissions. Now we've vaccinated ~90% of those likely to be admitted with a vaccine about 85% likely to prevent hospitalisation, so we should actually see 4k * (1-(.9*.85) admissions, or 900 admissions a day.
It's another 3 doublings to that 4k admission point that would represent the NHS, being overrun. At that point we're at 500k infections a day.
This is all presuming no seasonal effects, no attempts by anyone to reduce any risk, and that we cease vaccination entirely tomorrow.
In reality, by mid May we'll have jabbed about another 18 million (15% of the population, so another 12% off R), some of the more timid population will still be in hiding, and the weather would be with us. Add in some WFH (probably baked in anyway) and maybe some very minor social distancing (say masks in supermarkets and on public transport) and its very unlikely that the caseload would ever top out the NHS's capacity.
Given all this, we should massively accelerate opening up - maybe not ditch everything tomorrow, but say shops next Monday, pubs at Easter, and all restrictions gone* mid May.
*Except foreign travel. You should be free to go wherever you like, but 2 weeks hotel isolation on entering the country, no exceptions, until most of the rest of the world is jabbed - importing a vaccine resistant variant is the only big risk, and we should manage things accordingly.
Have you also taken into account immunity from prior infections - which must be, what, 30% of the unvaccinated population?
Comments
I'm very uncomfortable with banning people from leaving a country.
Making mandatory enforced quarantine a condition of entry or re-entry would be far better and more proportionate.
The intent is to avoid importing new variants; I get that. So entry is the point where the focus needs to be. If people want to bugger off to Brazil, they can go, for all I care. It's their life and their free choice.
It's just their re-entry that needs the controls applied.
Re my reference, Chair at the very least !!!
And I agree with your post
His most memorable quote from the book he hasn't written yet could be "All of my life is based on deception."
More seriously, I'd leave it to SAGE to advise on this (as in provide estimates of the risks, it's then a political decision what to do, not their decision). Testing plus quarantine would make it manageable, I expect. However, I'm with others that I'd rather have all restrictions lifted here as a priority over foreign travel.
So test and if necessary put people into quarantine when they come back. That is very different from these laws.
Once domestic restrictions are lifted, then we should be able to remove from the Red List those countries that don't jeopardise that. Getting our own country open again must be the most important issue.
But 100% agreed with others that if people want a one-way trip out (or return with mandatory quarantine) that's fair enough. Its the expecting to come back that is the issue.
(military) There was a long dispute in 19th century Europe about the best attack strategy. Some military commanders thought the best attack is in the open field (rin in die Kartoffel); others insisted on the attack from a hiding place (raus aus die Kartoffeln).
I find it all rather sinister, and totally contradicts what my Balliol history Tutor said to me ('don't worry, it wouldn't happen here') when we were talking about the rise of Fascism and I said I was utterly depressed about humanity.
I extended that theory in the following manner - most civilisations eventually create Matrioshka brain. Entire solar systems remade as computrium to run uploaded sentients. When, inevitably, the equivalent of Foxtons estate agents take over such structures, they collapse. Creating dark matter. Yes, the missing matter in the universe is condensed, super massive... bullshit.
I await my Nobel.
It is requires a reason which is what is required right now to leave your home even, it is aimed at holidays, at a point where businesses are still legally closed, its not a permanent law.
Holidays will be great to have. Jobs and normal life are too. First things first, we need to remove domestic restrictions.
https://twitter.com/AdamBienkov/status/1374343767772237826?s=20
Certainly less than half of PB commentators voted Leave compared to 52% UK wide
In reality, of course, it's always a trade off. At the extreme end I'm happy to trade the freedom to drive at 50mph along my wide but residential street for the safety gained from others not doing the same.
But I would place a rather higher value on freedom and a rather lower value on safety than the arrangement we seem to have arrived at (along, it has to be said, with almost every other country in the world - I have to accept that I am an outlier here. It doesn't necessarily mean that I'm wrong though!)
Very much of a piece with Never Let me Go with a nod to Black Mirror also.
You will never look at a lobster the same way, again....
Don't want to jynx it, but impressive so far.
Yes the dominant credo is decidedly authoritarian.
Few instinctively left-liberal-libertarians like me. I have been disgusted with some of the curtain twitching and moralising: which reached its zenith last spring when people were lining up to attack people as "selfish" for going on holidays which were a) legal b) legitimised by the government c) encouraged by the destination nation.
- those who would fight to the death
- those who would be unaware that an invasion had occurred
- those who would queue up round the block to get an armband.
I'm thinking equal thirds....
Give us some more attributes about that segment pls.
Of course this is the other thing with Ishiguro, Attwood, etc. They have made people revise their previous attitude to science fiction that I think it's fair to say prevailed when it came to "serious" literature.
Extraordinary way to behave.
https://twitter.com/hildabast/status/1374341756536324101
Some people seem to want to view this as holidays in isolation without taking into account other issues or restrictions.
My point, and that of many others, is that if holidays are jeopardising another lockdown then that is a serious problem. If they're not then great, we have no issues, but if lifting foreign travel means we can't lift domestic restrictions then its not a case of being liberal v authoritarian. It is a case of which restrictions do you choose to lift: the domestic ones, or the travel ones?
There are no restrictions on emigrating and never have been, the restrictions are entirely on coming back.
When you ask them, they tend to be dimly aware about "Something about that in the news" - but it hasn't registered as real.
So until the Nazi shot, say, the goal keeper for Man U. they wouldn't *really* think about the war as real.
I recall a story about a lady who was very upset on being told her summer holiday to France wasn't going to be possible. In 1941.
The key is to judge what is and what is not genuinely in that area.
Of course, the authoritarians lap it up, and say it's for our own good.
Fifteen years ago there wasn't all that much variation - if you agreed with poster X on matter A, you would probably agree with him on matters B, C and D as well. Nowadays it's pretty hard to tell from one issue to the next where you will be agreeing or disagreeing.
I was born with a smile on my face
The whole of my life's been a pantomime
Born with the need to embrace
The life of a clown telling li ... rhymes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-Oz9uCTr1k
Vaccination and cases are better here than had been hoped for, and worse in Europe than had been expected. We should be postponing international travel but bringing forward the lifting of domestic restrictions.
Thirds is most unlikely. Active fight to the death types were extremely rare in the early years, when Germany was rolling everything before it (which clearly would have been more so the case had the UK succumbed). Collaborators were a significant minority and everyone else had livelihoods and families to try and protect as best they could. Hence most early resisters were late teenage or early twenties, often people who had already lost older family members to the war.
The majority of resisters tended to be of left wing politics and many didn’t get involved until after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Recruits only began to come in any numbers once the tide of the war had turned, with Germany up against both the USSR and the US.
Later in the war, floods of people tried to get involved, for a variety of reasons ranging from noble and patriotic through self interest, including people who had collaborated trying to rewrite their CV.
There were two Germans for every three islanders!
The headline of yesterdays AZ release was "AZD1222 US Phase III trial met primary efficacy endpoint in preventing COVID-19 at interim analysis"
Clearly states it was an interim analysis so no reason for NIAID to get itself all wound up.
This interim safety and efficacy analysis was based on 32,449 participants accruing 141 symptomatic cases of COVID-19.
My favourite resistance story is that of Francois Mitterrand. Apparently he was a secret resister from before De Gaulle, but cunningly hid it by working really, really hard for Vichy. Sadly, all those who knew about his resistance work had died during the war.
The 'official results' are the ones which will get submitted to the FDA is a few weeks' time.
What they did was present already analysed data from the pre-arranged interim analysis (which is fine), without labelling it as such, and without adding that further data is still to be fully analysed - which was indeed stupid.
The NIAID got pissed as they'd issued their own release based on the AZN one.
I really don't understand the point of issuing an overly bullish PR, as at the end of the day you still have to submit all the fully analysed data to the regulator.
https://www.astrazeneca.com/content/astraz/media-centre/press-releases/2021/astrazeneca-us-vaccine-trial-met-primary-endpoint.html
There is a clear negative correlation between things that have gone well and things with which the clown has had direct hands on involvement.
At the end of the day we'll never know...
We've 44% of the population jabbed at a level which gives them a ~70% reduction in their chances of being able to spread the virus. Given R0 was probably about 3, R would jump to around (1-(0.44*0.7))*3, or about 2.
The doubling time with R=3 was about 7 days, so we'd expect a doubling time with R=2 of about 10days.
Cases currently are at about 5k daily, to get to the December peak of about 60k daily cases is 3.5 doublings, so about 35 days, so we'd expect to be seeing 60k cases a day the end of April.
At 60k cases a day, we got a peak of about 4k daily hospital admissions.
Now we've vaccinated ~90% of those likely to be admitted with a vaccine about 85% likely to prevent hospitalisation, so we should actually see 4k * (1-(.9*.85) admissions, or 900 admissions a day.
It's another 3 doublings to that 4k admission point that would represent the NHS, being overrun. At that point we're at 500k infections a day.
This is all presuming no seasonal effects, no attempts by anyone to reduce any risk, and that we cease vaccination entirely tomorrow.
In reality, by mid May we'll have jabbed about another 18 million (15% of the population, so another 12% off R), some of the more timid population will still be in hiding, and the weather would be with us. Add in some WFH (probably baked in anyway) and maybe some very minor social distancing (say masks in supermarkets and on public transport) and its very unlikely that the caseload would ever top out the NHS's capacity.
Given all this, we should massively accelerate opening up - maybe not ditch everything tomorrow, but say shops next Monday, pubs at Easter, and all restrictions gone* mid May.
*Except foreign travel. You should be free to go wherever you like, but 2 weeks hotel isolation on entering the country, no exceptions, until most of the rest of the world is jabbed - importing a vaccine resistant variant is the only big risk, and we should manage things accordingly.
Not so much anymore.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aimee_Challenor
This is all blowing up because yesterday someone on /r/UKPolitics posted this Speccy article: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-green-party-s-gender-intolerance-problem
They got instantly banned and the subreddit shut down (on a side note, about 6 years ago I used to moderate a Reddit PolSim where Ms. Challenor and the person banned were not exactly friendly with each other), now any mention of Ms. Challenor results in being instantly banned, so consequently it is now Streislanding its' way across the internet.
Not a stunning victory for the 'let big social media firms regulate themselves' crowd, given that we now have someone who from my interactions with her is not overly stable, and unfortunately has clearly been very damaged from her childhood moderating these vulnerable childrens' places.