I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
We do know the answer to many of those questions, though.
For a start, the people on the clinical trials are still being studied, and there doesn't seem to be any let up in protection for people on the Pfizer jab. (Bear in mind some of these people had their first shot 10 or 11 months ago now) If protection was going to fade quickly, we'd see it in the numbers from the trials
Secondly, we know that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is not dented by either Kent or Saffer Covid. There is some diminution in efficacy for AZ for the SA variant (although that is likely overstated by the very limited trial), but the other vaccines seem to also be pretty good against it.
Thirdly, we can look at Israel, They're a little ahead of us (and the AZ vaccine takes longer to cash its protective halo), but they are now essentially fully open to travel and their nightclubs are now booming. If there is a variant that can completely evade the vaccines, we'll see it soon enough there.
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
I don't have time to read this in detail, but at least they are asking some of the right questions, in particular how sensitive their analyses are to key variables, and checking whether the subsequent steps of the unlocking could be skipped.
On vaccine effectiveness, their numbers aren't ridiculous, but the effect of 2nd doses is going to be important. The scant data from the SIREN student didn't see any additional effect from the 2nd dose, but it was very noisy. I can understand why they modelled it, though. The 31% number only refers to infection rates, and it's really open as to how much the various vaccines prevent asymptomatic infection and transmission.
On vaccination rates, the dose rates (2.7m/2m per week) are what they were asked to model by the cabinet office. I hope this proves incorrect, but you can't fault them for modelling what they were asked.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Labour responds to government lockdown easing announcement
Labour MP and shadow health minister Justin Madders tells the BBC News Channel he thinks the announcement today is "positive that it appears to be working so far" and he's "very happy that things appear to be on track".
But he adds there are some things the UK "could be doing an awful lot better".
He says Labour "have got concerns" about vaccine passports, as they could have a "major impact on everyone" and individual liberties and freedoms. There are "very significant questions" about whether these are "the right and fair thing to do".
There are "lots of unanswered questions" about the passports, he adds.
Madders says he was "a little bit worried" the prime minister did not fully rule out vaccine passports for pubs and shops from 17 May.
On travel, he says overseas travel is "very difficult" and the situation continues to change "on a daily basis" but he says the industry needs some assurance for the summer.
He says testing is important to show people when they are ill, but he says Covid support payments, to help those to self-isolate who are on low incomes, are only available to one in eight people. Madders says eligibility needs to be expanded.
Labour's prevarication and waffle on vaccine passports continues.
Labour do not know which way to turn, right now.
Labour under Starmer try to avoid taking a strong position - shocked I tell you
In fairness, that worked for Tony Blair and David Cameron.
Cameron and Osborne backed the bank bailout, didn't they? Blair, to be fair, was LotO at a very placid time.
Not really. They said they wouldn’t oppose it but they weren’t very clear about what they would have done instead, beyond some waffle about an implausible bail in by other banks.
But that didn’t matter. Because the problem was Labour’s all the way, so the fact the Tories would have done even worse was irrelevant.
Just as had Smith and Brown been in charge on Black Wednesday things would have been a hundred times worse given they supported the government and were beyond furious when Britain withdrew from the ERM. Did that matter? No. And still doesn’t. Because they weren’t in charge.
People don’t remember such things. They remember government cockups. The reason Labour did OK last year is because the government was cocking up more often than Boris Johnson in an editorial meeting of young female journalists. With the vaccine rollout, that’s changed. But given we’ve still got a government ultimately of third rate intellects, many of whom are actual criminals as well, you’d be brave to bet on that remaining the same way for three years.
Starmer is probably doing as well as could be expected, right now. For a number of reasons, that is not ‘well.’ But much water will flow under many bridges before we make a final judgement.
Starmer has positioned Labour to the cautious side of the government with respect to COVID. Very much the right place to be. He needs to switch sides now. Doesn't need to get too specific, but does need to realise that things have changed.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
Living in Maryland, I can attest to the setbacks a too-rapid relaxation of social controls can have. As a state, the infection and hospitalization rates are creeping back up, despite 30%+ having already received one shot or more. The only two counties where this is not the case are Montgomery and Prince Georges', where the county executives overruled some of the statewide relaxations (e.g. for restaurants and gyms).
I am with the liberals in being against ID papers and vaxports, and for unnecessary prolongation of social measures. But I really do think we need to be patient and cautious. I, for one, won't be getting antsy about some measures remaining in place until we've got close to herd immunity levels of vaccination+exposed, and have shown that incremental relaxations thus far are not reversing the direction of travel on hospitalizations.
But I would like the government to make a strong statement now that it will remove all the control measures imposed to combat COVID once we are confident that we have reached normal flu levels of risk. There absolutely should be no surviving COVID curbs on our freedoms once COVID as a pandemic (not as a seasonal disease) is in the rear view mirror.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Maybe they thought they would be in a position to offer something early, and for some reason they're not and sticking to the original timetable. Could be anything from how other countries' stats are going to how discussions with other countries about vaccine passports are going. It might be down to just a few countries - I imagine we would want to be able to include countries such as Greece, Spain and Portugal, Turkey and France. Malta might be looking to be fully vaxxed but we can't all go there on holiday, it's smaller than the Isle of Wight. So I imagine this time last week the Travel Task Force's work was looking more advanced than it does today.
The overriding problem with the sunshine holiday destinations is the accumulation of cases taking off again *AND* grindingly slow vaccination programs. France, Turkey, Croatia and Cyprus all look awful. Italy is just starting to turn the corner, but only because of lockdown. Cases in Greece have taken off again, and Spain is beginning to follow. Really the only two from the obvious suspects that are doing relatively well are Malta (too tiny, as you point out, to provide many getaways for anyone,) and Portugal, where cases are low and currently flatlining.
Chances are an air bridge with Portugal would be eminently doable this Summer if only they could get a lot of people vaccinated very, very quickly but, alas, Portugal's vaccine stats are crawling along only slightly above the EU average. How long it will take until the other destinations are in any fit state to receive visitors, Lord alone knows.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
I don't agree. Not in either order. If I had 6 pints down the pub first, the haircut would never happen. It would have to be the haircut first.
They admitted: “There isn’t really a consensus yet” within the party, though they predicted Labour would probably end up supporting the certificates “but probably not make much of a song and dance about it”.
To be fair to Starmer, the Telegraph has grossly maligned him by implying that he might have a firm view about anything. His verbatim quote was as follows:
'Is that a fence I see over there? Quick, I must kneel on it!'
So it seems pretty clear the government have no idea how this all ends, right? Vaccinations might have been the way out but they don't seem to have the faith in that statement any more.
I wish they would be more transparent about this.
If the vaccines are as effective as they appear, we have nothing to worry about once 80%+ of the population is vaccinated.
If there's a vaccine-avoiding variant then we simply face another lockdown in the future. Vaccine passports wont stop it so I'd rather enjoy life as much as possible now before that point.
There is a very mixed message from the government, and I do have some sympathy about the difficulty about giving dates and certainty, but Boris has talked repeatedly of restrictions ending in June. Now it's becoming clear what restrictions ending in June means in practice, that is vaccine certificates/passports, LFT tests twice a week, a traffic light system for international travel with quarantining, and probably more measures. That actually sounds like a lot of restrictions to me, and I'm by and large quite happy to play it safe, but the government has clearly overstated what restrictions ending means.
Who are these people who will voluntarily test themselves?! With no symptoms? In a vaxxed society with no community spread?
I have lots of bridges to sell them....
Giving Johnson the opportunity to delay re-opening if he wants because people are no longer playing ball. After all, he can do what he wants.
Anyone who takes these tests is a masochist and/or a fool.
But not nearly as big a fool as someone who refuses the vaccine for spurious reasons to fulfil their own conspiracy theories on the subject.
I have no conspiracy theories and have been consistent in saying vaccines work. Check my posts.Take them if you want.
I simply don't want to play Johnson's game, I don't want to play SAGE's game, and its quite clear today that there is a game and that game is control.
I would far rather be an outcast than sign up to what is morphing slowly but recognisably into a Chinese style social credit system.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
I wonder if AZ will be either implicitly or explicitly reduced or cut out for females in G12/13
I suspect it might be, particularly if the flow of J&J and Novavax is strong by then.
In any case, once we get to oversupply status, I think everyone should be offered the choice of which vaccine they wish to receive.
J&J might have the same issue, a case has already been noted in the US aiui. Novavax is the UK's best way out of this. It's our highest efficacy vaccine and has little to no dilution against any variant for serious disease and only very slight dilution against mild symptoms.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
Of course sick people have been quarantined. But people who aren;t sick? never. To my knowledge.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
I don't agree. Not in either order. If I had 6 pints down the pub first, the haircut would never happen. It would have to be the haircut first.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
We do know the answer to many of those questions, though.
For a start, the people on the clinical trials are still being studied, and there doesn't seem to be any let up in protection for people on the Pfizer jab. (Bear in mind some of these people had their first shot 10 or 11 months ago now) If protection was going to fade quickly, we'd see it in the numbers from the trials
Secondly, we know that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is not dented by either Kent or Saffer Covid. There is some diminution in efficacy for AZ for the SA variant (although that is likely overstated by the very limited trial), but the other vaccines seem to also be pretty good against it.
Thirdly, we can look at Israel, They're a little ahead of us (and the AZ vaccine takes longer to cash its protective halo), but they are now essentially fully open to travel and their nightclubs are now booming. If there is a variant that can completely evade the vaccines, we'll see it soon enough there.
While I agree with everything, it is worth remembering with Israel comparisons that their booming nightclubs (and bars etc) are with a compulsory vaxport scheme.
Since I won't support a compulsory vaxport scheme we need to do better even than Israel.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
And what does that say about them? what does that say about the people they are? When was the last British government to ever do something like that to its citizens? Or even contemplate doing it?
And yet still they are defended on here. Foursquare and by many people.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
We do know the answer to many of those questions, though.
For a start, the people on the clinical trials are still being studied, and there doesn't seem to be any let up in protection for people on the Pfizer jab. (Bear in mind some of these people had their first shot 10 or 11 months ago now) If protection was going to fade quickly, we'd see it in the numbers from the trials
Secondly, we know that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is not dented by either Kent or Saffer Covid. There is some diminution in efficacy for AZ for the SA variant (although that is likely overstated by the very limited trial), but the other vaccines seem to also be pretty good against it.
Thirdly, we can look at Israel, They're a little ahead of us (and the AZ vaccine takes longer to cash its protective halo), but they are now essentially fully open to travel and their nightclubs are now booming. If there is a variant that can completely evade the vaccines, we'll see it soon enough there.
While I agree with everything, it is worth remembering with Israel comparisons that their booming nightclubs (and bars etc) are with a compulsory vaxport scheme.
Since I won't support a compulsory vaxport scheme we need to do better even than Israel.
We will, Israel is stuck at about 80% of the adult population, the UK will easily get past that.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
Living in Maryland, I can attest to the setbacks a too-rapid relaxation of social controls can have. As a state, the infection and hospitalization rates are creeping back up, despite 30%+ having already received one shot or more. The only two counties where this is not the case are Montgomery and Prince Georges', where the county executives overruled some of the statewide relaxations (e.g. for restaurants and gyms).
I am with the liberals in being against ID papers and vaxports, and for unnecessary prolongation of social measures. But I really do think we need to be patient and cautious. I, for one, won't be getting antsy about some measures remaining in place until we've got close to herd immunity levels of vaccination+exposed, and have shown that incremental relaxations thus far are not reversing the direction of travel on hospitalizations.
But I would like the government to make a strong statement now that it will remove all the control measures imposed to combat COVID once we are confident that we have reached normal flu levels of risk. There absolutely should be no surviving COVID curbs on our freedoms once COVID as a pandemic (not as a seasonal disease) is in the rear view mirror.
In Seattle WA, county seat of Martin Luther King County (it's official, look it up!) we've been in Phase 3 for a few weeks, allow restaurants, gyms & similar to open at about half-capacity, and public schools to begin resuming some in-person classes for lower grades.
However, due to recent rise in COVID cases, it's possible even likely that King Co will go back to Phase 2 which means no sit-down restaurant service or gyms, and very limited in coffeehouses (big deal in Seattle!) and probably no or very few students in classrooms.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
When are you expecting a downturn in the polls and his ratings
I wonder if AZ will be either implicitly or explicitly reduced or cut out for females in G12/13
I was rather assuming that, on the assumption Moderna and Novavax are available from May, AZ would be aimed at solely second doses for the first doses already given from late April onwards (which would naturally exclude younger demographics).
Solely on the logistics efficiency: do as many as possible of the Phase 2 lot with the shorter-interval vaccines when supply is plentiful and the double-doses complete far faster. AZ works best with a minimum 8 week interval; Moderna and Novavax do very well with 3-4 weeks.
Should supply ramp up as we hope, you’d want to shift to the short-interval vaccines ASAP.
They admitted: “There isn’t really a consensus yet” within the party, though they predicted Labour would probably end up supporting the certificates “but probably not make much of a song and dance about it”.
To be fair to Starmer, the Telegraph has grossly maligned him by implying that he might have a firm view about anything. His verbatim quote was as follows:
'Is that a fence I see over there? Quick, I must kneel on it!'
He took over from Jeremy Corbyn.
I know it's almost unbelievable, but it's true. Nothing Starmer might do makes him anything other than a huge upgrade.
I'm not suggesting he deserves any votes of course. On the other hand a great number of people either were having an obscure joke, or found themselves genuinely bewildered at the last GE. When you've woken up in the morning and realised that you voted for Corbyn, then surely it's easy steps back to reality. Perhaps Starmer can offer that.
Barbs aside he's clearly one of the few capable people Labour have. I'm sure he fears the internal fights much more than the external ones.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
I don't agree. Not in either order. If I had 6 pints down the pub first, the haircut would never happen. It would have to be the haircut first.
Indeed, hence the haircut booked for 9am!
Good stuff; you'll be queuing for the pub garden before it opens then.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
Of course sick people have been quarantined. But people who aren;t sick? never. To my knowledge.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
And what does that say about them? what does that say about the people they are? When was the last British government to ever do something like that to its citizens? Or even contemplate doing it?
And yet still they are defended on here. Foursquare and by many people.
Some posters, not many. And even fewer ‘foursquare’.
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
Thanks for looking at this, PB benefits from people prepared to take time to actually look at the detail (I'm too lazy most of the time!).
A very wise economist once said years ago that the more significant an economic theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions usually are.
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
Living in Maryland, I can attest to the setbacks a too-rapid relaxation of social controls can have. As a state, the infection and hospitalization rates are creeping back up, despite 30%+ having already received one shot or more. The only two counties where this is not the case are Montgomery and Prince Georges', where the county executives overruled some of the statewide relaxations (e.g. for restaurants and gyms).
I am with the liberals in being against ID papers and vaxports, and for unnecessary prolongation of social measures. But I really do think we need to be patient and cautious. I, for one, won't be getting antsy about some measures remaining in place until we've got close to herd immunity levels of vaccination+exposed, and have shown that incremental relaxations thus far are not reversing the direction of travel on hospitalizations.
But I would like the government to make a strong statement now that it will remove all the control measures imposed to combat COVID once we are confident that we have reached normal flu levels of risk. There absolutely should be no surviving COVID curbs on our freedoms once COVID as a pandemic (not as a seasonal disease) is in the rear view mirror.
In Seattle WA, county seat of Martin Luther King County (it's official, look it up!) we've been in Phase 3 for a few weeks, allow restaurants, gyms & similar to open at about half-capacity, and public schools to begin resuming some in-person classes for lower grades.
However, due to recent rise in COVID cases, it's possible even likely that King Co will go back to Phase 2 which means no sit-down restaurant service or gyms, and very limited in coffeehouses (big deal in Seattle!) and probably no or very few students in classrooms.
Hogan removed all COVID-related restrictions on in-restaurant capacity but imposed a new rule on social distancing inside. I think the effect is essentially a 50% rule. Schools have been back, but I do not know at what capacity. Starbucks is sticking with its corporate decision for MD to remain drive through and pick up only, no in-house.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
You're absolutely right - no Founding Father of the United States of America would ever quarantine healthy people to keep them safe from infectious disease. Only a freedom-hating fascist would do that. Except, of course, for... a little-known fellow called George Washington:
In the aftermath of the battles of Lexington and Concord, Washington’s Continental Army had set up camp across the Charles River from the stricken city. To the dismay of many patriots seeking refuge from the British, the general prohibited anyone from Boston from entering the military zone. “Every precaution must be used to prevent its spreading,” he sternly warned one of his subordinates about the virus. To John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, Washington vowed to “continue the utmost Vigilance against this most dangerous enemy.”
By immediately isolating anyone suspected of infection and limiting outside contact, Washington “prevented a disastrous epidemic among the Continental troops,” historian Ann Becker says. In March 1776, when the British withdrew from Boston, Washington even specified that only soldiers who had suffered from smallpox be allowed into the city and its surroundings.
So it seems pretty clear the government have no idea how this all ends, right? Vaccinations might have been the way out but they don't seem to have the faith in that statement any more.
I wish they would be more transparent about this.
If the vaccines are as effective as they appear, we have nothing to worry about once 80%+ of the population is vaccinated.
If there's a vaccine-avoiding variant then we simply face another lockdown in the future. Vaccine passports wont stop it so I'd rather enjoy life as much as possible now before that point.
There is a very mixed message from the government, and I do have some sympathy about the difficulty about giving dates and certainty, but Boris has talked repeatedly of restrictions ending in June. Now it's becoming clear what restrictions ending in June means in practice, that is vaccine certificates/passports, LFT tests twice a week, a traffic light system for international travel with quarantining, and probably more measures. That actually sounds like a lot of restrictions to me, and I'm by and large quite happy to play it safe, but the government has clearly overstated what restrictions ending means.
Who are these people who will voluntarily test themselves?! With no symptoms? In a vaxxed society with no community spread?
I have lots of bridges to sell them....
Giving Johnson the opportunity to delay re-opening if he wants because people are no longer playing ball. After all, he can do what he wants.
Anyone who takes these tests is a masochist and/or a fool.
But not nearly as big a fool as someone who refuses the vaccine for spurious reasons to fulfil their own conspiracy theories on the subject.
I have no conspiracy theories and have been consistent in saying vaccines work. Check my posts.Take them if you want.
I simply don't want to play Johnson's game, I don't want to play SAGE's game, and its quite clear today that there is a game and that game is control.
I would far rather be an outcast than sign up to what is morphing slowly but recognisably into a Chinese style social credit system.
If there is a conspiracy to keep us locked up (which by the way apart from certain nutters, there isn’t) you are absolutely playing their game by refusing to do the one thing that would kneecap that conspiracy and make it impossible.
And that makes you a fool, as well as on your own admission, an outcast.
Edit - incidentally, I didn’t accuse you of saying vaccines don’t work. I said you’re not taking it for spurious reasons, which remark your own post reveals to be amply justified.
Sorry to hear about the death of Cheryl Gillan. However, it could be a blessing in disguise for the Tories. They could install DRoss as candidate for the by-election. Even DRoss couldn’t lose a 16,000 majority, surely? And it gives them an opportunity to replace him in Scotland with someone less useless.
I wonder if AZ will be either implicitly or explicitly reduced or cut out for females in G12/13
I was rather assuming that, on the assumption Moderna and Novavax are available from May, AZ would be aimed at solely second doses for the first doses already given from late April onwards (which would naturally exclude younger demographics).
Solely on the logistics efficiency: do as many as possible of the Phase 2 lot with the shorter-interval vaccines when supply is plentiful and the double-doses complete far faster. AZ works best with a minimum 8 week interval; Moderna and Novavax do very well with 3-4 weeks.
Should supply ramp up as we hope, you’d want to shift to the short-interval vaccines ASAP.
I think that's what we're aiming to do, the strategy makes sense and the deliveries for Moderna and Novavax will match up for it too. It doesn't make sense to do any new AZ doses from May onwards as the necessary gap is too long.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
I don't agree. Not in either order. If I had 6 pints down the pub first, the haircut would never happen. It would have to be the haircut first.
Indeed, hence the haircut booked for 9am!
Good stuff; you'll be queuing for the pub garden before it opens then.
A day of work for me first, though I may tale the laptop down to there after lunch if the weather is any good.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
Thanks for looking at this, PB benefits from people prepared to take time to actually look at the detail (I'm too lazy most of the time!).
A very wise economist once said years ago that the more significant an economic theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions usually are.
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
I'd rather like to return to education and study economics. Unfortunately the subject is just nonsense really. It's like alchemy.
If anyone knows of any non-insane institutions economically then I'm all ears.
I wonder if AZ will be either implicitly or explicitly reduced or cut out for females in G12/13
I suspect it might be, particularly if the flow of J&J and Novavax is strong by then.
In any case, once we get to oversupply status, I think everyone should be offered the choice of which vaccine they wish to receive.
J&J might have the same issue, a case has already been noted in the US aiui. Novavax is the UK's best way out of this. It's our highest efficacy vaccine and has little to no dilution against any variant for serious disease and only very slight dilution against mild symptoms.
Is it higher efficacy than Pfizer? The long-term data on PFE including the SA variant that came out last week was very encouraging.
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
Thanks for looking at this, PB benefits from people prepared to take time to actually look at the detail (I'm too lazy most of the time!).
A very wise economist once said years ago that the more significant an economic theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions usually are.
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
I'd rather like to return to education and study economics. Unfortunately the subject is just nonsense really. It's like alchemy.
If anyone knows of any non-insane institutions economically then I'm all ears.
I think that's a bit of a sweeping statement. Some parts of economics are nonsense, but some are fairly rigorous and robust. It just depends which particular part you're interested in.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
We do know the answer to many of those questions, though.
For a start, the people on the clinical trials are still being studied, and there doesn't seem to be any let up in protection for people on the Pfizer jab. (Bear in mind some of these people had their first shot 10 or 11 months ago now) If protection was going to fade quickly, we'd see it in the numbers from the trials
Secondly, we know that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is not dented by either Kent or Saffer Covid. There is some diminution in efficacy for AZ for the SA variant (although that is likely overstated by the very limited trial), but the other vaccines seem to also be pretty good against it.
Thirdly, we can look at Israel, They're a little ahead of us (and the AZ vaccine takes longer to cash its protective halo), but they are now essentially fully open to travel and their nightclubs are now booming. If there is a variant that can completely evade the vaccines, we'll see it soon enough there.
*** ALERT. The following rambling post contains doomporn
I don’t think anyone can know what is going to happen.
Why was the cautious Downing Street briefing predicting a third wave to hit UK? And why is that even deemed controversial? I haven’t come here to knock them, because we can’t just nod when we agree with what they say, sit on our nodding when we don’t, unless Unless Science itself does help with problems but not with 100% record to make us know for sure what happens. I’m not as convinced as I had become the vaccines are going to bring this to an end anytime soon and the roadmap is leading to any end to COVID spikes and lockdowns. It all died back last year without vaccines.
The problems on the next phase I think is, 2nd and 3rd time of getting covid, where you can feel more sick than the other time and maybe even more chance of long covid the second and third time of getting sick with it, which, crucially, brings with it the issue of work age population not being able to work. The economic disaster bit of the pandemic could be yet to come.
My guess now is we are going into a lull between lockdown, also pandemic enters new phase where we try to live with it as normal as possible, yet the long covid casualties start mounting up into economic damage so all the countries go broke.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I wonder if AZ will be either implicitly or explicitly reduced or cut out for females in G12/13
I suspect it might be, particularly if the flow of J&J and Novavax is strong by then.
In any case, once we get to oversupply status, I think everyone should be offered the choice of which vaccine they wish to receive.
J&J might have the same issue, a case has already been noted in the US aiui. Novavax is the UK's best way out of this. It's our highest efficacy vaccine and has little to no dilution against any variant for serious disease and only very slight dilution against mild symptoms.
Is it higher efficacy than Pfizer? The long-term data on PFE including the SA variant that came out last week was very encouraging.
The same, 97% for Novavax and 95% for Pfizer against original COVID
Novavax makes sense for the UK as it has a domestic manufacturing and supply chain. We're not beholden to any country for it which is hugely important as vaccine wars rage all over the world.
Novavax has proven 65% efficacy against mild symptoms for the SA variant in a large trial and 100% against severe symptoms and hospitalisation.
Once again, we've got all of the doom mongers putting the emphasis on case numbers and trying to shove those into hospitalisations despite all of the evidence that our vaccines are all very efficacious wrt hospitalisation.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
And what does that say about them? what does that say about the people they are? When was the last British government to ever do something like that to its citizens? Or even contemplate doing it?
And yet still they are defended on here. Foursquare and by many people.
Some posters, not many. And even fewer ‘foursquare’.
Your kidding. On PB. Right up until people's own red lines were in danger there was near universal approval of every govt measure restricting freedoms.
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
Thanks for looking at this, PB benefits from people prepared to take time to actually look at the detail (I'm too lazy most of the time!).
A very wise economist once said years ago that the more significant an economic theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions usually are.
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
I'd rather like to return to education and study economics. Unfortunately the subject is just nonsense really. It's like alchemy.
If anyone knows of any non-insane institutions economically then I'm all ears.
Through my employer I recently did a course on economic regulation, which was quite interesting (setting optimum prices in monopoly industries etc.), which was quite interesting. But I still found myself wanting to know more about the politics of it all!
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
One can only wonder what the Government response to plague today would be.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
One can only wonder what the Government response to plague today would be.
Interesting to note I was very wrong on the date of the last outbreak of plague. There was a minor outbreak in Suffolk between 1906 and 1918.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
We do know the answer to many of those questions, though.
For a start, the people on the clinical trials are still being studied, and there doesn't seem to be any let up in protection for people on the Pfizer jab. (Bear in mind some of these people had their first shot 10 or 11 months ago now) If protection was going to fade quickly, we'd see it in the numbers from the trials
Secondly, we know that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is not dented by either Kent or Saffer Covid. There is some diminution in efficacy for AZ for the SA variant (although that is likely overstated by the very limited trial), but the other vaccines seem to also be pretty good against it.
Thirdly, we can look at Israel, They're a little ahead of us (and the AZ vaccine takes longer to cash its protective halo), but they are now essentially fully open to travel and their nightclubs are now booming. If there is a variant that can completely evade the vaccines, we'll see it soon enough there.
*** ALERT. The following rambling post contains doomporn
I don’t think anyone can know what is going to happen.
Why was the cautious Downing Street briefing predicting a third wave to hit UK? And why is that even deemed controversial? I haven’t come here to knock them, because we can’t just nod when we agree with what they say, sit on our nodding when we don’t, unless Unless Science itself does help with problems but not with 100% record to make us know for sure what happens. I’m not as convinced as I had become the vaccines are going to bring this to an end anytime soon and the roadmap is leading to any end to COVID spikes and lockdowns. It all died back last year without vaccines.
The problems on the next phase I think is, 2nd and 3rd time of getting covid, where you can feel more sick than the other time and maybe even more chance of long covid the second and third time of getting sick with it, which, crucially, brings with it the issue of work age population not being able to work. The economic disaster bit of the pandemic could be yet to come.
My guess now is we are going into a lull between lockdown, also pandemic enters new phase where we try to live with it as normal as possible, yet the long covid casualties start mounting up into economic damage so all the countries go broke.
I think there is a lot still unknown about long COVID. Personally, I am always suspicious of broad spectrum syndromes being a real thing, rather than a collection of things. That said, long COVID is real enough for NIH to have launched a major study:
It's scope is indicative of what is not currently known:
"Some of the initial underlying questions that this initiative hopes to answer are:
- What does the spectrum of recovery from SARS-CoV-2 infection look like across the population? - How many people continue to have symptoms of COVID-19, or even develop new symptoms, after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection? - What is the underlying biological cause of these prolonged symptoms? - What makes some people vulnerable to this but not others? - Does SARS-CoV-2 infection trigger changes in the body that increase the risk of other conditions, such as chronic heart or brain disorders?"
Modelling by Warwick University, Imperial College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical medicine (LSHTM) warned of a late summer surge after 'freedom day' in June which could rival levels seen this January when hospitals were nearly overwhelmed.
What am I missing? This just doesn't sound plausible.
I don't see how we go back to full football grounds in London if social distancing remains a thing. The grounds might be deemed safe (but behind the terraces??), but London Underground won't be.
I get that I’m just some guy on the internet and they do this professionally, but their assumptions on vaccine efficacy against infection and against hospitalisation look rather divergent to what we already know or rather bewildering. As well as being massively variable between their three groups)
I can’t see the second dose of the AZ vaccine having zero effect as most of them seem to assume. I don’t see two doses only reducing infection by 31% or even 63%. That vaccination rates will only average a total of 2.7 million doses per week between now and June and then drop to 2 million a week seems incredibly pessimistic.
And yes, once again, I’m just some guy on the Internet, but I had very similar issues with their January modelling, which indeed proved to be based on incorrect and hugely overpessimistic assumptions.
Thanks for looking at this, PB benefits from people prepared to take time to actually look at the detail (I'm too lazy most of the time!).
A very wise economist once said years ago that the more significant an economic theory, the more unrealistic the assumptions usually are.
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
I'd rather like to return to education and study economics. Unfortunately the subject is just nonsense really. It's like alchemy.
If anyone knows of any non-insane institutions economically then I'm all ears.
Through my employer I recently did a course on economic regulation, which was quite interesting (setting optimum prices in monopoly industries etc.), which was quite interesting. But I still found myself wanting to know more about the politics of it all!
That's one of the more robust areas of microeconomics. Some of it is pretty mind-bending unless you have a lot of good maths though - check out the optimal methodology for pricing in an electricity or telecoms network if you want to see what I mean.
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
One can only wonder what the Government response to plague today would be.
Interesting to note I was very wrong on the date of the last outbreak of plague. There was a minor outbreak in Suffolk between 1906 and 1918.
I think there is a lot still unknown about long COVID. Personally, I am always suspicious of broad spectrum syndromes being a real thing, rather than a collection of things. That said, long COVID is real enough for NIH to have launched a major study:
It's scope is indicative of what is not currently known:
"Some of the initial underlying questions that this initiative hopes to answer are:
- What does the spectrum of recovery from SARS-CoV-2 infection look like across the population? - How many people continue to have symptoms of COVID-19, or even develop new symptoms, after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection? - What is the underlying biological cause of these prolonged symptoms? - What makes some people vulnerable to this but not others? - Does SARS-CoV-2 infection trigger changes in the body that increase the risk of other conditions, such as chronic heart or brain disorders?"
Thanks. Will be interesting to see what the conclusions are.
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
One can only wonder what the Government response to plague today would be.
Interesting to note I was very wrong on the date of the last outbreak of plague. There was a minor outbreak in Suffolk between 1906 and 1918.
But again, with modern hygiene, modern housing and modern antibiotics, it’s a minor issue, even though it’s clearly still endemic in American wildlife.
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
Thanks and wow hope things clear up for you both.
Cheers, slowly but surely my eczema is receding, just must not itch. Tinnitus comes and goes, but doesn't annoy me.
My sister is taking the Bobby Charlton approach to the alopecia!
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
Sorry to hear that. Can you not be tested for covid antibodies to at least see if you have had covid?
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
Sorry to hear that. Can you not be tested for covid antibodies to at least see if you have had covid?
My sister's now had her first jab because of her diabetes. I could I suppose, but I don't really care to be honest.
They admitted: “There isn’t really a consensus yet” within the party, though they predicted Labour would probably end up supporting the certificates “but probably not make much of a song and dance about it”.
To be fair to Starmer, the Telegraph has grossly maligned him by implying that he might have a firm view about anything. His verbatim quote was as follows:
'Is that a fence I see over there? Quick, I must kneel on it!'
He took over from Jeremy Corbyn.
I know it's almost unbelievable, but it's true. Nothing Starmer might do makes him anything other than a huge upgrade.
I'm not suggesting he deserves any votes of course. On the other hand a great number of people either were having an obscure joke, or found themselves genuinely bewildered at the last GE. When you've woken up in the morning and realised that you voted for Corbyn, then surely it's easy steps back to reality. Perhaps Starmer can offer that.
Barbs aside he's clearly one of the few capable people Labour have. I'm sure he fears the internal fights much more than the external ones.
I have no idea whether Starmer can ever surpass mediocrity.
Many on this site laugh hysterically at Starmer's pathetic ineptitude compared to their hero Boris Johnson, and his unassailable popularity amongst the great unwashed. They may be more astute than I am, because Johnson comes across to me as being incredibly casual and wholly unsuited to high office (lucky yes, but serious, absolutely not).
Now since the vaccination came on stream, the only issue of any interest to the national mainstream media has been vaccination progress statistics (no other metrics - or news- matters). On listening to the BBC R2 news broadcasts. I now try to pre-empt the presenter by beating him or her to the first words of the bulletin. So I start with a, "Boris Johnson..." I am correct around 50% of the time.
Starmer may be dreadful, that remains to be seen, but he hardly gets a word in. During my almost 60 years, I have not come across a politician that dominates the media narrative like Johnson. It is predominantly positive too, and even when he gets it wrong, his errors are hoovered up (the Cenotaph effect). Not even Mrs Thatch. could manage that.
On that subject, I hope you and Mrs Wise are improving. I haven’t crossed paths with you for a while but I seem to remember it was a slow process.
My wife, I don't think has fully recovered yet but is probably 90% there. I am 100% and it took me about 6 months to get over it physically. Longer mentally.
I think you are a teacher? My wife resigned from her teaching career of 10+ years last June. After the acute phase of the illness, she went back for a few keeping in touch days and observed her school's Covid-safe plan in action. Needless to say they had a major outbreak in September and the school closed for a few weeks.
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
Both can also be related to regular high alcohol consumption, tbf
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
That’s a long time to be locked in your house, to be sure.
On that subject, I hope you and Mrs Wise are improving. I haven’t crossed paths with you for a while but I seem to remember it was a slow process.
My wife, I don't think has fully recovered yet but is probably 90% there. I am 100% and it took me about 6 months to get over it physically. Longer mentally.
I think you are a teacher? My wife resigned from her teaching career of 10+ years last June. After the acute phase of the illness, she went back for a few keeping in touch days and observed her school's Covid-safe plan in action. Needless to say they had a major outbreak in September and the school closed for a few weeks.
Glad to hear you’re recovered, hope Mrs Wise continues to make progress.
I am a teacher, and your wife is well out of education at the moment, it’s a total shitshow.
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
Both can also be related to regular high alcohol consumption, tbf
Definitely not the case with me! I reckon I last drank alcohol on 24 December 2019. My sister, to be fair, is another matter!
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
That’s a long time to be locked in your house, to be sure.
Although if it was Gavin Williamson it would still be too short a time.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
May does not mean will and you are really beyond all hope if you take what the press reports as the gospel truth.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
Of course sick people have been quarantined. But people who aren;t sick? never. To my knowledge.
The origin of the term “quarantine” was from ships that came from infected ports being required to sit at anchor for forty days regardless of whether anyone appeared sick.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
May does not mean will and you are really beyond all hope if you take what the press reports as the gospel truth.
The press being inaccurate is not novel.
The irony is that your defence rests upon the assumption that he is a political imbecile.
Anyone with experience of high office would understand the consequences of announcing weeks in advance that on April 5 you may be able to say more about travel restrictions (or permissions) and then briefing the press a day or two beforehand that this is what you intend to do.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
The problem is that if they are honest and say "We want the ability to monitor whoever we like at any time" then it is not exactly a vote-winning policy.
I would not be surprised if many of the public said "Oh that's a great idea" expecting such a policy would only be applied to those that they themselves do not like...
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Happily, outside of a few naysayers and religious nutcases, we're heading in that direction. Hence my own switch of position from being agnostic on vaccine passports to being against. I could just about understand the nudge of a time limited scheme if we were heading for 70-80% as we first thought or even 60% in the worst case scenario. We're looking at 95% of adults by the end of June with a first dose and 95% with both doses by the end of August.
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
It's quite bizarre and almost hysterical the way people are over-reacting to the Government being cautious. At this point we have a hugely successful vaccine programme but no-one can know yet , for example, how long the vaccines will provide protection and there is still some uncertainty about the potential impact of variants and the extent to which transmission is controlled. All of the signs are good but it would be wilfully irresponsible of any government to declare it's all over and let's all party! Obviously I can understand how exhausted people are - personally I have at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
No it isn't. I will not put people around me at risk. If they ask me to wear a mask or stay 2 metres away, I will do so - out of politeness and consideration for my fellow man. What I will not do is comply with the government's increasingly illiberal measures - such as ID cards or testing or whatever.
The government is not being cautious. If it were it would be doing something intelligent about people coming to this country. It isn't. Rather, it is using fear of Covid as a pretext to seize more and more power for itself at the expense of our freedoms, with as little scrutiny as possible, and lying about its reasons for doing so. I will not participate in that or facilitate it in any way. And I will speak up against it.
I hope you in Spain get your vaccines as soon as possible. I have friends there, as I have family in Italy, France and Ireland who are similarly waiting anxiously.
Ben Franklin's comments about liberty and safety are echoing down the centuries. Echoing. They are the first, last and final epitaph for what is being done and they should be carved on the walls of every public building in existence.
Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it.
Life without liberty is not life at all. It is merely existence. And now we are forced to queue up for dollops of what is our birthright that has been bought in blood, in return for all sorts of indignities and insults from those we have ceded power to.
"Its surely becoming clear there were extremely good reasons why no government in history ever locked its citizens down no matter what befell them, one being those citizens would not bloody stand for it."
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
The first thing that happened when plague broke out in Tudor England was that taverns and theatres were shut and anyone displaying symptoms was locked in their own house. That held good until the last plague outbreak, which I think was in 1688 (although the last widespread outbreak was 1664-66).
One can only wonder what the Government response to plague today would be.
Interesting to note I was very wrong on the date of the last outbreak of plague. There was a minor outbreak in Suffolk between 1906 and 1918.
The measures taken were basically similar, although there was an energetic pest control programme as part of it.
My grandmother, Edith Godward, was the sister of Annie Goodall, and is listed in the sources. I remember her telling me about it, and that the outbreak was caused by black rats infecting the pond that was their water supply. She also told me that her mother and sister were the last people in England killed by the plague, which, having read the article, was not strictly true.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
May does not mean will and you are really beyond all hope if you take what the press reports as the gospel truth.
The press being inaccurate is not novel.
The irony is that your defence rests upon the assumption that he is a political imbecile.
Anyone with experience of high office would understand the consequences of announcing weeks in advance that on April 5 you may be able to say more about travel restrictions (or permissions) and then briefing the press a day or two beforehand that this is what you intend to do.
The consequence being mainly that IanB, who hates him anyway, has simply found another reason to hate him.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Great we agree. So let's be patient until everyone who can has been vaccinated.
You're a legal mind I believe? What does the law say or typically do, about what an economist might call a 'negative externality'? I.e. something that you do that has a negative effect on someone else, effectively making you overconsume it because it's not part of your (self-interested) utility function.
An economist might suggest a 'Pigovian tax' which effectively internalises the negative outcome within your utility function, altering consumption.
So, what's the intersection, if there is one, between a market correction such as a Pigovian tax, liberty, the law and an infectious disease such as Covid-19?
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
May does not mean will.
Do you have a Number Ten press release that says Monday's conference "will" include an announcement on travel?
5 April arrives and the conference is exactly as had been said. It "may" have contained an announcement, but that also means it "may not". In this instance the latter was correct, exactly as was said.
There was no advance trailing other than it "may" have announcement. May doesn't mean "will". Reports in the press are not "will" either. The press will happily take a "may" and turn it into a "will" but unless the statement was "will" that's just the press playing silly buggers as they have a tendency to do. They will always report things in the most dramatic way possible, the press never lead with "it all depends, wait and see" because that doesn't generate clicks.
You are really beyond all hope if you think the PM expected to get away with not saying anything, after so much pre-trailing, on the basis of may versus will.
May does not mean will and you are really beyond all hope if you take what the press reports as the gospel truth.
The press being inaccurate is not novel.
The irony is that your defence rests upon the assumption that he is a political imbecile.
Anyone with experience of high office would understand the consequences of announcing weeks in advance that on April 5 you may be able to say more about travel restrictions (or permissions) and then briefing the press a day or two beforehand that this is what you intend to do.
The consequence being mainly that IanB, who hates him anyway, has simply found another reason to hate him.
Now, now, be fair - Ian would never have done something like that during his time as Prime Minister.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Happily, outside of a few naysayers and religious nutcases, we're heading in that direction. Hence my own switch of position from being agnostic on vaccine passports to being against. I could just about understand the nudge of a time limited scheme if we were heading for 70-80% as we first thought or even 60% in the worst case scenario. We're looking at 95% of adults by the end of June with a first dose and 95% with both doses by the end of August.
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
A thought occurs....
If we go for just the vaccines and no restrictions in June, within a short time, COVID will pass through the unvaccinated groups like a chainsaw through cheese.
Given what we know about the virus, and who the unvaccinated groups are currently, this will mean that the resulting damage, while limited, will be very largely among particular groups....
Which according to our old friend "institutional racism" - defined as policies whose outcome is racially differential, no matter what the intent - will make such a policy... institutionally racist.
Given the increasingly threadbare economic case for Scexit, which I think would be amplified by a referendum campaign if managed properly, I almost wondering if Boris might go along with the demand for one.
I don't think so, but you do wonder sometimes.
I should say, this is why I think the Salmondites have their doubts about Sturgeon's commitment. They wonder if she really would be prepared to argue black is white during a campaign. I think she would but, obviously, Eck knows her better than I do.
I must admit, your last point there, I don't totally get where this view that Sturgeon is not committed to Sindy is coming from. I mean, I'm sure there are plenty of people in the SNP machine who are just comfortable with their big secure lucrative jobs, you get that in politics, but Nicola Sturgeon herself? I don't see it. Sindy has been the cause of her life. Perhaps she has lost interest, only she knows, but the evidence for this is not obvious to me.
The lost referendum was only in 2014 and since then there has been Brexit and the pandemic with room for little else. Sturgeon has consistently made the drip drip case that Brexit means Sindy2 must happen once Covid is dealt with and she is putting it - Sindy2 - front and centre of the SNP campaign for these elections.
What is it she was expected to do (up to now) that she hasn't done?
I don't disagree. But there's certainly a meme which casts doubt on her commitment. Actually, I don't think her commitment is in doubt, it's just that the economic case is such a slam dunk against Indy, that it would be very challenging to lead a successful campaign and be honest about the deficit, currency, pensions, mortgage risk, capital flight etc etc. You can see the attraction of just making a noise about Indy while presiding queen-like at Bute House.
Agree. I do not doubt Nicola's philosophical commitment to independence, but it like our collective commitment to world peace and the abolition of poverty, at best it is slow progress and it isn't actually going to happen.
If following Brexit the indy cause can't get polling at 60% or so - and they can't - it is hard to see it happening. To win a Ref2 they need to be at 60% or so now, because their actual case is so terrible they are bound to suffer losses in a campaign.
Until the weather changes Nicola needs to keep this on the permanent horizon. (Hint: Christianity has been doing this about the second coming for 2000 years and it works fine).
But if you're saying Sturgeon is not keen for a quick referendum because she knows it will be another No - which kills Sindy for the foreseeable future - this would be by your own logic the correct approach for someone truly committed to the cause.
You are trying to have your cake and eat it, argumentally.
I continue to wait for actual evidence that she cares far more about being FM than about achieving an independent Scotland.
No, I think we are agreed about Nicola Sturgeon. She does want independence, and isn't going to go for it until she can get it. As it happens I don't think that time can be foreseen. The difference I suspect is only that we are on different sides about the outcome we would like and the strength of the case once the gloves were off and campaigning mode began.
Nicola Sturgeon is one of the two outstandingly able politicians in the UK. My admiration for her is almost limitless. I just think she is wrong. So do most people who, like me, live in close to the border of England and Scotland.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Happily, outside of a few naysayers and religious nutcases, we're heading in that direction. Hence my own switch of position from being agnostic on vaccine passports to being against. I could just about understand the nudge of a time limited scheme if we were heading for 70-80% as we first thought or even 60% in the worst case scenario. We're looking at 95% of adults by the end of June with a first dose and 95% with both doses by the end of August.
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
A thought occurs....
If we go for just the vaccines and no restrictions in June, within a short time, COVID will pass through the unvaccinated groups like a chainsaw through cheese.
Given what we know about the virus, and who the unvaccinated groups are currently, this will mean that the resulting damage, while limited, will be very largely among particular groups....
Which according to our old friend "institutional racism" - defined as policies whose outcome is racially differential, no matter what the intent - will make such a policy... institutionally racist.
We can call that The Guardian editor's dream scenario.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Happily, outside of a few naysayers and religious nutcases, we're heading in that direction. Hence my own switch of position from being agnostic on vaccine passports to being against. I could just about understand the nudge of a time limited scheme if we were heading for 70-80% as we first thought or even 60% in the worst case scenario. We're looking at 95% of adults by the end of June with a first dose and 95% with both doses by the end of August.
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
A thought occurs....
If we go for just the vaccines and no restrictions in June, within a short time, COVID will pass through the unvaccinated groups like a chainsaw through cheese.
Given what we know about the virus, and who the unvaccinated groups are currently, this will mean that the resulting damage, while limited, will be very largely among particular groups....
Which according to our old friend "institutional racism" - defined as policies whose outcome is racially differential, no matter what the intent - will make such a policy... institutionally racist.
We can call that The Guardian editor's dream scenario.
Maybe it is because I am an evil barsteward. Maybe it is because I am tired of people with their "I have a *right* to my own, post imperialist truth".
But my attitude is this - if you want to set yourself on fire, fine. But I won't feel bad about it. Especially when the government and the country has spent billions on making sure that you can avoid it.
And I can say, without absolute certainty that all my relatives in Peru will not be so polite. They would love a vaccine and regard the refusnik types as stupid assholes. They've buried too many people to give a shit about being nice.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
Oh sorry the Global Travel Taskforce reporting date is 12 April, not 17 May.
Still why would anything be announced today when the report is being made on 12 April, which is a week today?
The Times this morning reported that Boris would announce details of the overseas travel traffic light scheme and apparently an update from the global travel task force has been published this evening, though I can’t find a link... the Times report includes actual quotes from the PM’s speech so they seem to have been briefed by No 10... from that, I’d conclude that the intention to talk about overseas travel was dropped for some reason...
That doesn't sound like a promise.
No, not a promise... though having checked, the expectation of an update today originates from the PM himself at the March 23rd briefing:
Johnson said: “A lot of people do want to know about what’s going to happen on the holiday front and I know there’s a great deal of curiosity and interest.
“All I can say is it’s just too early to say and my advice is to everybody to wait for the global travel task force to report.
“We’ve heard already that there are other European countries where the disease is now rising so things certainly look difficult for the time being but we will be able to say more we hope in a few days’ time, I certainly hope to say more by April 5.”
So he said then to wait for the global travel task force to report. Since then it's been announced that report is coming on 12 April. That's not today.
From the same report: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that he may announce on April 5 whether holidays abroad this summer may be possible, a week ahead of the date the government’s Global Travel Taskforce is due to report.
I can’t see why you choose to make an issue of this. Boris himself said that an update would be given today, this morning’s press said he would. He didn’t. It’s not too important, other than expectations were raised. But to deny that today had been trailed as a possible update on travel just seems odd.
For example see this morning’s headline news stories on SKY.
It’s simply the clown doing his usual over-promising.
And Philip having his usual go at defending the indefensible.
If he is quoted as he "may announce" something, and the media report it as he will announce something, who is at fault?
Surely you're not that naive?
Saying that you may be in a position to announce something by a certain date and not doing so is not breaking a promise.
Well obviously, but you can't be naive enough to believe that those stories were not leaked to the press on purpose over the weekend.
How was it leaked? They have a direct quote from the PM!
I'm referring to the reporting in general over the weekend and not that specific quotation.
Wouldn't be surprised if it was done to try and bounce them into a decision. Still, it wasn't a promise.
PM trails the 5 April as the day he may be able to say more about future policy on travel.
Number Ten briefs the press over Easter that Monday's conference will include an announcement on travel.
Then when 5 April comes, the PM says it all depends, wait and see.
It surprises me the lengths PB's fanclub will go to, to try and excuse another booboo by our chief clown. There was no need for all this advance trailing at all, and simply makes him look stupid.
Wow you really thought Johnson & Co. would allow you to travel abroad this summer? goodness.
I think they will. Better than 50/50 anyway. I actually think 17 May will be adhered to, Johnson said three times today that roadmap is on track. But I think there will be degrees, depending on situation in the particular country (traffic light system, or red list, or corridor system).
Seriously Stocky when are you and the other Johnson apologists going to stop giving this most mendacious of men the benefit of the doubt? At what point is enough enough for you?
The fact is that REAL freedom was never on the table until Mid May anyway and now there are clearly questions around that, despite incredible data.
On April 12th - that's next week - you can have a haircut and 6 pints down the pub. In either order. Just think about that for a second.
Where are these pubs offering haircuts ? @Cyclfree ?
I don't get why so many people were ok with the govt locking us indoors for a year and are now horrified at them being cautious about letting us all out again - I must be one of a a small number on here who was angry about the former but can understand the latter
ve at least 2 months to wait for a vaccine here in Spain so I do get it. However, I see people here displaying the traits of the very worst of the crappy journalists. Cyclefree's declaration that now she's being jabbed the government can get stuffed was just one of the appalling and least sensitive comments, but she is not alone.
For Cyclefree, and other liberals like me, freedoms can only be taken by the state in exceptional and time-limited circumstances. For me, extreme pressure on health services counted. We are not in this position now. The vaccine programme cannot be described as hugely successful with no corresponding return of liberties which have clearly now been relegated to privileges rather than the basic rights of a liberal democracy.
Get over yourself. The situation is much improved and restrictions are and will continue to be lifted and lightened. We are though in the midst of a massive trial wrt to vaccine efficacy. We do not yet know how long the vaccine works for, the potential impact of new variants from a world largely unvaccinated and a disease still fairly rampant within 20 miles of Uk shores. Give the government a chance to get many more people jabbed.
If vaccines work - and the evidence is that they do - we do not need existing restrictions replaced by new ones. If they don't work, vaccine ID cards are pointless. The government is not going to increase the uptake of vaccinations if it still means restrictions at the end of it. If anything they are undermining it.
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
Vaccines work for some but not all. More importantly, a huge block of the population has yet to be vaccinated including pregnant women (effectively untreatable if they fall ill) and those who are immunosuppresed. Oh and the younger cohorts. A 25 year old with long Covid, with prognosis currently unknown, is a huge loss to society. Hundreds of thousands of them is a disaster. But I guess once the older groups have been vaccinated then it's time to pick up the baton for liberty again.
I am in the side of the young in this debate. The vaccination programme needs to be ramped up so that they are all vaccinated ASAP. But these vaccination passports discriminate against the young. All my children are very against them. They also discriminate against those who cannot have vaccines - another reason why they are a bad idea.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Happily, outside of a few naysayers and religious nutcases, we're heading in that direction. Hence my own switch of position from being agnostic on vaccine passports to being against. I could just about understand the nudge of a time limited scheme if we were heading for 70-80% as we first thought or even 60% in the worst case scenario. We're looking at 95% of adults by the end of June with a first dose and 95% with both doses by the end of August.
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
A thought occurs....
If we go for just the vaccines and no restrictions in June, within a short time, COVID will pass through the unvaccinated groups like a chainsaw through cheese.
Given what we know about the virus, and who the unvaccinated groups are currently, this will mean that the resulting damage, while limited, will be very largely among particular groups....
Which according to our old friend "institutional racism" - defined as policies whose outcome is racially differential, no matter what the intent - will make such a policy... institutionally racist.
We can call that The Guardian editor's dream scenario.
Maybe it is because I am an evil barsteward. Maybe it is because I am tired of people with their "I have a *right* to my own, post imperialist truth".
But my attitude is this - if you want to set yourself on fire, fine. But I won't feel bad about it. Especially when the government and the country has spent billions on making sure that you can avoid it.
And I can say, without absolute certainty that all my relatives in Peru will not be so polite. They would love a vaccine and regard the refusnik types as stupid assholes. They've buried too many people to give a shit about being nice.
Yes, I absolutely agree. People are more than welcome to set themselves on fire.
We had enough questions asked about vaccine passports today to know that the PM cannot, or will not, answer them. Given the ferocity of the debate ahead — and the depth of concern in his party — this bodes ill.
Looks like we are finally getting a poll of Hartlepool. Going to be very interesting to see how close it is to the MRP projection from a bunch of Red Wall seats.
I suspect there will be a Tory lead. Far from certain, but the two former Labour MPs standing are an issue for them and it feels like former RefUK voters should be pretty willing to vote Tory this time given the buoyant general mood towards the government on vaccines. We'll see.
The one positive I think of for the covid id app passport is that Johnson will finally run out of excuses why he can't face a room full of face-to-face journalists who can ask a follow up.
Looks like we are finally getting a poll of Hartlepool. Going to be very interesting to see how close it is to the MRP projection from a bunch of Red Wall seats.
I suspect there will be a Tory lead. Far from certain, but the two former Labour MPs standing are an issue for them and it feels like former RefUK voters should be pretty willing to vote Tory this time given the buoyant general mood towards the government on vaccines. We'll see.
How does he know people want 'radical change' before we see the outcome of the poll that has been commissioned to see if they want it? And if it does show a Tory lead, in what universe would that mean people actually want radical change from their opposition parties (including the one currently holding the seat), rather than showing they, for whatever reason, want what the Tories are offering?
We are being roadmapped to a national id and health status app that tracks your movements.
And Johnson can't bring himself to even talk properly about. Just bluster about we wont need it to go to the pub next Monday.
Jeh, thanks.
Yup, it's so obvious that Hancock and Gove are pushing this now. Look at the new bullshit model that's been briefed out tonight. They're simply trying to scare people into accepting that this is the price of a "free" society. Look at how so many usually well informed people on here have accepted that business will not be able to operate as normal without them when there is no scientific basis for that to be true.
Comments
On vaccine effectiveness, their numbers aren't ridiculous, but the effect of 2nd doses is going to be important. The scant data from the SIREN student didn't see any additional effect from the 2nd dose, but it was very noisy. I can understand why they modelled it, though. The 31% number only refers to infection rates, and it's really open as to how much the various vaccines prevent asymptomatic infection and transmission.
On vaccination rates, the dose rates (2.7m/2m per week) are what they were asked to model by the cabinet office. I hope this proves incorrect, but you can't fault them for modelling what they were asked.
--AS
Whitty and co said right at the start that vaccines are our way out of this. We now have them. We have a good vaccination programme. Once vaccinated there really is no basis for continuing restrictions. And it not libertarian or selfish to say so. The whole point of vaccination is to return to normality because Covid is not going to be eliminated.
The government, as another poster said a few days ago, is trying to hold us hostage to enforce compliance with yet more restrictions imposed for no very good reason.
I am with the liberals in being against ID papers and vaxports, and for unnecessary prolongation of social measures. But I really do think we need to be patient and cautious. I, for one, won't be getting antsy about some measures remaining in place until we've got close to herd immunity levels of vaccination+exposed, and have shown that incremental relaxations thus far are not reversing the direction of travel on hospitalizations.
But I would like the government to make a strong statement now that it will remove all the control measures imposed to combat COVID once we are confident that we have reached normal flu levels of risk. There absolutely should be no surviving COVID curbs on our freedoms once COVID as a pandemic (not as a seasonal disease) is in the rear view mirror.
Chances are an air bridge with Portugal would be eminently doable this Summer if only they could get a lot of people vaccinated very, very quickly but, alas, Portugal's vaccine stats are crawling along only slightly above the EU average. How long it will take until the other destinations are in any fit state to receive visitors, Lord alone knows.
I don't think that's true at all: there have been lots of lockdowns associated with outbreaks of infectious diseases in the past, including quite extensive ones around the Spanish flu.
What is different is both the breadth (as in the number of places locking down) and the length (time-wise) of the restrictions.
In any case, once we get to oversupply status, I think everyone should be offered the choice of which vaccine they wish to receive.
To be fair to Starmer, the Telegraph has grossly maligned him by implying that he might have a firm view about anything. His verbatim quote was as follows:
'Is that a fence I see over there? Quick, I must kneel on it!'
I simply don't want to play Johnson's game, I don't want to play SAGE's game, and its quite clear today that there is a game and that game is control.
I would far rather be an outcast than sign up to what is morphing slowly but recognisably into a Chinese style social credit system.
Since I won't support a compulsory vaxport scheme we need to do better even than Israel.
And yet still they are defended on here. Foursquare and by many people.
However, due to recent rise in COVID cases, it's possible even likely that King Co will go back to Phase 2 which means no sit-down restaurant service or gyms, and very limited in coffeehouses (big deal in Seattle!) and probably no or very few students in classrooms.
@Cyclfree ?
Solely on the logistics efficiency: do as many as possible of the Phase 2 lot with the shorter-interval vaccines when supply is plentiful and the double-doses complete far faster. AZ works best with a minimum 8 week interval; Moderna and Novavax do very well with 3-4 weeks.
Should supply ramp up as we hope, you’d want to shift to the short-interval vaccines ASAP.
I know it's almost unbelievable, but it's true. Nothing Starmer might do makes him anything other than a huge upgrade.
I'm not suggesting he deserves any votes of course. On the other hand a great number of people either were having an obscure joke, or found themselves genuinely bewildered at the last GE. When you've woken up in the morning and realised that you voted for Corbyn, then surely it's easy steps back to reality. Perhaps Starmer can offer that.
Barbs aside he's clearly one of the few capable people Labour have. I'm sure he fears the internal fights much more than the external ones.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Mallon
That's a very good rule for spreadsheet models too.
In the aftermath of the battles of Lexington and Concord, Washington’s Continental Army had set up camp across the Charles River from the stricken city. To the dismay of many patriots seeking refuge from the British, the general prohibited anyone from Boston from entering the military zone. “Every precaution must be used to prevent its spreading,” he sternly warned one of his subordinates about the virus. To John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, Washington vowed to “continue the utmost Vigilance against this most dangerous enemy.”
By immediately isolating anyone suspected of infection and limiting outside contact, Washington “prevented a disastrous epidemic among the Continental troops,” historian Ann Becker says. In March 1776, when the British withdrew from Boston, Washington even specified that only soldiers who had suffered from smallpox be allowed into the city and its surroundings.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/george-washington-beat-smallpox-epidemic-with-controversial-inoculations
And that makes you a fool, as well as on your own admission, an outcast.
Edit - incidentally, I didn’t accuse you of saying vaccines don’t work. I said you’re not taking it for spurious reasons, which remark your own post reveals to be amply justified.
If anyone knows of any non-insane institutions economically then I'm all ears.
I don’t think anyone can know what is going to happen.
Why was the cautious Downing Street briefing predicting a third wave to hit UK? And why is that even deemed controversial? I haven’t come here to knock them, because we can’t just nod when we agree with what they say, sit on our nodding when we don’t, unless Unless Science itself does help with problems but not with 100% record to make us know for sure what happens. I’m not as convinced as I had become the vaccines are going to bring this to an end anytime soon and the roadmap is leading to any end to COVID spikes and lockdowns. It all died back last year without vaccines.
The problems on the next phase I think is, 2nd and 3rd time of getting covid, where you can feel more sick than the other time and maybe even more chance of long covid the second and third time of getting sick with it, which, crucially, brings with it the issue of work age population not being able to work. The economic disaster bit of the pandemic could be yet to come.
My guess now is we are going into a lull between lockdown, also pandemic enters new phase where we try to live with it as normal as possible, yet the long covid casualties start mounting up into economic damage so all the countries go broke.
Novavax makes sense for the UK as it has a domestic manufacturing and supply chain. We're not beholden to any country for it which is hugely important as vaccine wars rage all over the world.
Novavax has proven 65% efficacy against mild symptoms for the SA variant in a large trial and 100% against severe symptoms and hospitalisation.
Once again, we've got all of the doom mongers putting the emphasis on case numbers and trying to shove those into hospitalisations despite all of the evidence that our vaccines are all very efficacious wrt hospitalisation.
http://europepmc.org/backend/ptpmcrender.fcgi?accid=PMC1034015&blobtype=pdf
The measures taken were basically similar, although there was an energetic pest control programme as part of it.
https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/who-we-are/nih-director/statements/nih-launches-new-initiative-study-long-covid
It's scope is indicative of what is not currently known:
"Some of the initial underlying questions that this initiative hopes to answer are:
- What does the spectrum of recovery from SARS-CoV-2 infection look like across the population?
- How many people continue to have symptoms of COVID-19, or even develop new symptoms, after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection?
- What is the underlying biological cause of these prolonged symptoms?
- What makes some people vulnerable to this but not others?
- Does SARS-CoV-2 infection trigger changes in the body that increase the risk of other conditions, such as chronic heart or brain disorders?"
I haven't mentioned this before, but I might be a sufferer. The reason is that I've been suffering from some nasty eczema and tinnitus for about four months. It might be that these are related to stress.
What makes me think that it could be COVID is that my sister has also developed tinnitus and is suffering from alopecia. Neither of us have tested positive for COVID - indeed, I've never been tested as I've never had the regular symptoms - but it is interesting that we've both developed these conditions around the same time.
https://www.cdc.gov/plague/maps/index.html
But again, with modern hygiene, modern housing and modern antibiotics, it’s a minor issue, even though it’s clearly still endemic in American wildlife.
My sister is taking the Bobby Charlton approach to the alopecia!
Many on this site laugh hysterically at Starmer's pathetic ineptitude compared to their hero Boris Johnson, and his unassailable popularity amongst the great unwashed. They may be more astute than I am, because Johnson comes across to me as being incredibly casual and wholly unsuited to high office (lucky yes, but serious, absolutely not).
Now since the vaccination came on stream, the only issue of any interest to the national mainstream media has been vaccination progress statistics (no other metrics - or news- matters). On listening to the BBC R2 news broadcasts. I now try to pre-empt the presenter by beating him or her to the first words of the bulletin. So I start with a, "Boris Johnson..." I am correct around 50% of the time.
Starmer may be dreadful, that remains to be seen, but he hardly gets a word in. During my almost 60 years, I have not come across a politician that dominates the media narrative like Johnson. It is predominantly positive too, and even when he gets it wrong, his errors are hoovered up (the Cenotaph effect). Not even Mrs Thatch. could manage that.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9437545/Parisians-turn-Socialist-mayor-Twitter-campaign-accusing-making-city-rubbish-dump.html
I think you are a teacher? My wife resigned from her teaching career of 10+ years last June. After the acute phase of the illness, she went back for a few keeping in touch days and observed her school's Covid-safe plan in action. Needless to say they had a major outbreak in September and the school closed for a few weeks.
I am a teacher, and your wife is well out of education at the moment, it’s a total shitshow.
The press being inaccurate is not novel.
It’s literally from the origin of the term.
The only way out is to vaccinate all the population that can be so as to protect those who cannot be.
Anyone with experience of high office would understand the consequences of announcing weeks in advance that on April 5 you may be able to say more about travel restrictions (or permissions) and then briefing the press a day or two beforehand that this is what you intend to do.
https://twitter.com/mrianleslie/status/1379096799709949952?s=20
I would not be surprised if many of the public said "Oh that's a great idea" expecting such a policy would only be applied to those that they themselves do not like...
In September AZ are set to deliver the variant buster as are Novavax. Both of those will be made in the UK.
Vaccines, not restrictions on freedom, are the way out of this. There are too many politicians and officials who realise that once the vaccines have reached 80%+ of the population they will lose all of their COVID powers and people will no longer be as compliant with these rules as they are now. That's why they are pushing these new dodgy models and talking about the vaccine passport. It's Gove and Hancock that are behind all of this.
You're a legal mind I believe? What does the law say or typically do, about what an economist might call a 'negative externality'? I.e. something that you do that has a negative effect on someone else, effectively making you overconsume it because it's not part of your (self-interested) utility function.
An economist might suggest a 'Pigovian tax' which effectively internalises the negative outcome within your utility function, altering consumption.
So, what's the intersection, if there is one, between a market correction such as a Pigovian tax, liberty, the law and an infectious disease such as Covid-19?
If we go for just the vaccines and no restrictions in June, within a short time, COVID will pass through the unvaccinated groups like a chainsaw through cheese.
Given what we know about the virus, and who the unvaccinated groups are currently, this will mean that the resulting damage, while limited, will be very largely among particular groups....
Which according to our old friend "institutional racism" - defined as policies whose outcome is racially differential, no matter what the intent - will make such a policy... institutionally racist.
Nicola Sturgeon is one of the two outstandingly able politicians in the UK. My admiration for her is almost limitless. I just think she is wrong. So do most people who, like me, live in close to the border of England and Scotland.
But my attitude is this - if you want to set yourself on fire, fine. But I won't feel bad about it. Especially when the government and the country has spent billions on making sure that you can avoid it.
And I can say, without absolute certainty that all my relatives in Peru will not be so polite. They would love a vaccine and regard the refusnik types as stupid assholes. They've buried too many people to give a shit about being nice.
I also did economics as my main degree. I will have to think about your question, once I understand it!
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/johnson-is-in-trouble-over-vaccine-passports-and-it-s-showing
I suspect there will be a Tory lead. Far from certain, but the two former Labour MPs standing are an issue for them and it feels like former RefUK voters should be pretty willing to vote Tory this time given the buoyant general mood towards the government on vaccines. We'll see.
https://twitter.com/DaveWardGS/status/1379161288052518914
Today's presser was a disgrace.
And Johnson can't bring himself to even talk properly about. Just bluster about we wont need it to go to the pub next Monday.
Jeh, thanks.
Can someone show Sir Keir how to use google ?