Just being curious - what do you think will happen .....

[meriad]

Manxie, I suspect we won't be far behind with that one; ie more freedom of movement provided the 2m social distance is maintained. And you know what, even in restaurants it can be done.... not easy but it can be done. I think it was in italy where a few smaller places reopened and instead of having 10 tables crammed in, they had say 5; all at the necessary distance apart - but to them having the income of even just the 5 was better than nothing - for the rest they did take away. Quite how it worked with any PPE I'm not sure but that would always be an issue and will be for months and months to come. I think the industry that will be hit hardest will be the tourism / airline industry. I wonder how long it will take for countries to freely open their borders again to travel?

The baseline of all of this is testing testing and more testing and getting that vaccine sorted

[Workingman]

The authorities have to be very careful if we are going to keep on top of this.

Yesterday I posted what appear to be the three favoured approaches from experts, and they all have problems.

What I will now say is that whichever approach we take the message(s) from government will have to be unambiguous and specifically clear - orders if you will. They are going to have to say 'you, you and you can do this' and 'you, you and you cannot do that'. No ifs, no buts, no exceptions, and no half measures. They will have to tell us the truth, warts and all, not amorphous hopes and aims and goals.

If they are not honest with us they could lose the support of large sections of society who will go off and do their own things, and that really worries me.

[meriad]

Government and honest are not two words that one would ever find in the same sentence - and therein lies the problem.

I find it astounding that a third world country like South Africa has taken a totally different stance, and they took it super quick. They started with a total lockdown which allowed only essential trips for food / medical reasons. Shops are not allowed to sell non-essentials and no alcohol nor tobacco. You're not allowed out the own property for excercise or take your dogs for a walk. They went into lock down the Friday after us. 1st may they are dropping from what is now level 5 to level 4 which will allow certain business to open, the sale of some non essentials and are going to see how that goes with no hesitation to bring level 5 right back if they have to. If level 4 works out then they'll move to level 3 and the process repeats. It's a long document but https://www.satsa.com/wp-content/upload ... titled.pdf explains it all

And quite honestly, if they can do it there - then we can do it here. And at least there is some transparency in the plans of the government and they've put pen to paper outlining what they are looking to do.

[Workingman]

Thanks Ria. What a well laid out, well explained, well reasoned, and clear document.

It covers just about everything sector by sector, region by region, metro v rural and even district by district. Nobody who has read it can be in any doubt in general terms about what they can or cannot do or where to find such information if they are unsure.

People are well informed about when and, most importantly, why the level might be raised or lowered and could do so on many occasions.

It is also interesting that SA chose to go in hard with a view to dropping levels as things improved rather than going in medium and hoping. It is also very clear that if they go down to L3 and things start to get worse there will be no hesitation in going up to L4 or L5 in an instant and without any discussion.

Unfortunately the UK went its own way and we are where we are. Introducing the SA system now would be impossible because we are simply not set up for it.

[Gal2]

Can your stores operate with just a skeleton staff, Gal, to maintain distancing? Obviously it would mean fewer appointments in number, which might mean it's not financially viable, but it might be a way forward?

Ossie the Optoms cannot avoid being really up close, they use instruments that have to be held very close to the eye to be able to see the back of the eye, among other things. When they handover to us to dispense glasses, if they want bifocals or varifocals, we need to make some accurate measurements which again have to be close to the patient to do this - you simply can't guess a measurement from a distance when you are dispensing expensive lenses. And of course, without the revenue from people buying specs, how do we manage?

[miasmum]

would giving the clients masks help gal

[Suff]

Last week Mrs S, #2 son and I had a spirited discussion about this. In the end I said it doesn't matter what the government says, they'll produce a plan and then Scotland, Wales and NI will just refuse to accept it and do their own thing. At that point Westminster will be forced to do something similar for England.

The consensus, right now, is to allow a ramp up of cases in the least vulnerable and ring fence the most vulnerable.

We'll see how that goes. I don't expect it will go well. I expect that when things calm down a bit and levels get somewhere closer to seasonal flu, there will be a strong movement to try and get as close to back to normal as possible.

There is little point in saving the whole population only to inherit a fundamentally crippled economy and decades of austerity. At some point this view will prevail and things will change.

[meriad]

There is little point in saving the whole population only to inherit a fundamentally crippled economy and decades of austerity. At some point this view will prevail and things will change.

Totally agree and there are mumblings in government to this effect already

[Kaz]

Agreed.

[miasmum]

completely agree suff