Hairdressers and an authoritarian government

[Gal2]

I was booked in for a cut and blow on Tuesday after work, my HD is self employed and her 'salon' is a converted garage in her garden. When I went in, she was on putting a colour on tp another client and I was masked and waited for her to come to me, BUT, I have to admit to not being 100% comfortable to have the cut and b/d whilst the other lady was there, she was wearing a mask but the garage was really warm and it's quite a small space. In the end she did a fringe trim and I rebooked for a full cut and B/D in a few weeks - usually there's just me there anyway and I feel far safer this way.

[Suff]

Gal, I can understand the concern, the UK is now heading towards a normal situation with the vaccination and it would be pretty senseless to be taken out by the virus at the very last gasp.

However this is where a vaccination certification could give you and everyone else, some comfort. If I read the figures correctly, once vaccinated, your chances of getting the virus are reduced by 75%. Even if you do get it your chances of transmitting it to someone else (due to the reduction in the ability of the virus to infect you), is dropped by 50%. If I have my maths right, someone sitting next to you has a 12.5% chance of transmitting the virus.

If you have been vaccinated, then even if that 12.5% chance of becoming infected did happen, you have a 0% chance of dying from the virus. This is, of course, at the current levels of testing and understanding.

But if you think about it, that mask reduces 12.5% down to around 3% and if you are only there for 30 minutes or so, that becomes almost 0% chance of being infected.

I guess project fear, of covid, has done it's work but, now, they will have to undo that and it will take a lot of time.

Consider the Alternative. Locally to me, apparently, the village 5km away has 51 cases of Covid, active right now. That is about double the infection rate that Paris is seeing per % of the population. Our vaccination program is still pitiful, I am waiting to receive my appointment and will probably get it in early may for some time in June. Mrs S has not been to the hairdressers for 13 months because she is both profoundly deaf and claustrophobic. Yet she would have to wear a mask to get her hair done. Her hearing aids, which cost more than £5,000 are behind the ear and her mask keeps on pulling them out and dropping them on the street. She can't hear a thing anyone says because she lip reads along with the sounds and Nobody wears clear lenses in the masks so you can see the lips.

Mrs S really needs the hairdressers right now because large areas of her hair went snow white in the 2 weeks I was in hospital.

Over and above that we're pretty sure Mrs S has had the virus. She had at least 3 of the symptoms which would get an over the phone diagnosis today and it is now really too late to get her tested. We're almost as certain as we can be that she does not have the virus, yet she would still have to wear a mask which means no hairdresser for at least the rest of this year.

[miasmum]

Sounds like poor Mrs S could really do with a nice pamper Suff. Is there no way a mobile hairdresser would come to you and maybe if she wore a face shield so Mrs S can lip read there may be a solution?

[Suff]

Jo, she tried that last year but the person who came didn't do a good job. Her hairdresser in town is excellent but does not do home visits.

As we are not really socialising it is not too much of a problem, but the insistence on face masks even though the risk is down to virtually nothing is going to keep on impacting her.

She doesn't understand why, under the disability act, all masks for people who provide services are not mandatory with a window to see the lips. Must admit, living with the disability, I tend to agree.

[cruiser2]

When I went to have my hair cut last Friday, there were four chairs with a screen between each station. Each barber wore a face mask as did the customers
waiting to have their hair cut.
There did not seem t be a restriction on the number of customers in the shop.
This is the first time I have been to this barbers,