Stay home. Stay safe. "Shield"!

[Workingman]

This could be the mantra for hundreds of thousands of us in the local hotspots.

Professor John Edmunds, a member of the government's Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) has hinted that those of us most at risk could be asked to stay home for a month and told to avoid seeing other people, according to the Times.

We do not know which month but he said the current rises will not manifest themselves into hospital admissions for a few weeks, so it looks likely to be November - at first. He was backed up by Dr Stephen Griffin, associate professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Leeds.

Sod it, I am not going to comply. I will go shopping as I do now - late evening. I will go for my solitary walks in the cemetery and playing fields, also as I do now. I will social distance, wear a mask and wash / sanitise my hands as I have always done since this mess started.

Yes, I might be at risk, but being inactive could do me more damage - I need exercise. When I am out I hardly meet anyone and when I do it is at distance and only for a few minutes, if that.

[medsec222]

I agree Frank. I will do much as I am doing now. I go shopping as little as possible now and am content to do a bit of work from home and generally potter about the house. I am not really interested in going out for a meal at the moment and even a takeaway doesn't tempt me. I would like to think I could get back to my caravan in North Wales but even there I would be doing much the same as I do at home.

[Suff]

This whole "everyone" approach doesn't make a lot of sense to me. We had over 18,000 cases in France yesterday. Yet our local town still has Zero reported cases. We shop, go for a drink or a meal, carry on our lives much as before.

#1 Son and Dil, came here highly strung about "being close to" people. They were critical of the people without masks at markets, wanted to avoid everyone and everything. Then they started reading up the local press and realised that, locally, there were less cases in a 25 mile radius than they had experienced in their small scottish town on the top of a mountain.

By the time they left, they were far more relaxed about meeting people locally, the wearing of masks outside and generally moving about.

There appears to be a divide here. The older people exercising simple common sense and the younger people who have just done what the hell they want and found out that the virus is no respecter of "attitude".

Yet the recommendations are as if those who were exercising common sense must do "more" along with the others who don't care. In fact those who have been exercising common sense all along don't need to do any more, they just need to keep doing so. Whereas those who have been acting as if the virus simply doesn't exist need to be far more careful.

[cruiser2]

We will carry on only going out shopping. We like to cook our own meals so do not have takeaways.
Have bought some goods on line which we can't get in shops.
Had to wear a mask in the taxi which took us to and from the hospital yesterday.
It is the youngsters and celebrities such as footballers who seem to think the rules do not apply to them.

[TheOstrich]

Interesting topic which Mrs O and I were discussing only this morning.

We are not technically "Shielders", but we are at risk due to age and health issues. So, like many who have already posted, we have modified our life-style to remain what we see as "sensible". So we shop as infrequently as possible, and largely in the evening. We no longer go out for meals - yes, we took advantage of the Sunak Offer when it was on, but that stopped at the end of August, and so did we. We rarely socialise because "family" is at a distance so there's no casual hook-ups, and we have ceased church meetings. Yes, we will still go for local walks, yes, we might have the occasional run out in the car - again local - and yes, there's things like the hairdressers, but that's about it. We are, effectively, hunkering down - which we would do in the winter months anyway.

It's a choice when you get to our stage. We're not whippersnappers like some of you ! Do you "preserve life" and hope for better days to come (looking increasingly unlikely), or do you "go out with a bang", indulge yourselves, take risks, carpe diem as the saying goes .... You can only do what's right for you and those close to you.

We had over 18,000 cases in France yesterday. Yet our local town still has Zero reported cases. We shop, go for a drink or a meal, carry on our lives much as before.

Be careful what you wish for, Suff. We had no cases in our town until the last 6 weeks. Now we have at least 3 that I'm aware of. That equates to 30 per 100,000. Not as bad as Nottingham, admittedly, but it's definitely out there ....

[Suff]

I wasn't wishing Ossie, just reporting. We had tens of thousands of tourists, all summer. The town was almost close to normal minus the festival which was cancelled.

Still no reported cases. Because our area is a complete green spot for up to 30 miles in some directions we don't suck in the kind of people who would transmit it. Advantages of being a sleepy town deep in rural France.

[cromwell]

I'm increasingly of the opinion that there is something else going on here.
And I've heard enough scaremongering bs to last me a lifetime coming from the media.
Plus enough third rate slogans like "circuit breaker" or "traffic lights".
If I think something is sensible I'll do it and that's it.

[cromwell]

I just want to quote parts of a letter in yesterdays Telegraph, simply because it exactly mirrors my mood.
"Does no one in Government hear the screams and whimpers of this tormented nation, amid the unemployment, the loneliness, the heartbreak, the fear, the poverty, the despair, the cruelty caused by blind adherence to unproven theories?
It is as if someone who, to kill a hornet, sets off a bomb in the house - and in the ruins says that it was the only way.
I am 80, and it is no business of the government to tell me whether or not to kiss my grandchildren, or whom I may invite into my house."

I absolutely applaud this lady.

[saundra]

Crommers I feel the same what I do I feel safe
I'm not on this earth to just exist in here to live when my son and family come
They come indoors after a 2hour drive
We don't hug we just take care
And I will continue to do that
It goes to show keeping the elderly inside hasent stopped younger generation going out
Because they don't and won't listen im,sure in spite of a probable vaccine in the future it won't just go away like magic

[Suff]

On Friday, France had over 20,000 new cases and on Saturday just short of 27,000. Sunday numbers are always low and we're over 13,000. I expect Monday numbers to rocket.

France is doing far less than the UK and is being pragmatic. Deaths have not broken 3 figures and are currently lower than the UK.

The difference? Back in April the cases we saw were sick people. Virtually all of them.

Roll forward to October and the vast majority of cases are asymptomatic test results because we are trying to trace.

The two result sets are being treated as the same but they are certainly not.