Reply To: Show us zee papers.. Passports of your not coming in ever….

[osbad 4279xp 0]

OK.  Case numbers in the UK are comfortably below the most optimistic predictions of SAGE models, as are hospital admissions and deaths.  It is time for us all as a nation to realise that while it is sensible to prepare for the worst case scenario as it is possible, but it is more sensible to expect the worst case situation not to be likely.

https://dailysceptic.org/2021/08/03/have-1200-experts-ever-been-proved-wrong-so-quickly/

Personally I think the doom-mongering and over-the-top predictions of death and destruction should all just stop now, and the press and “experts” of all persuasions take a long hard look at the messages they are putting out.

Right now out of the 10,000 on average deaths per week in the UK, Covid represented 3.4% last week.  https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/latest

Unless there is a new variant coming along, this is it now.  We are done with Covid.  It is now background noise.  Something to be aware of but not overly frightened of.

Last week I was in a horrendous car accident.  A lorry sideswiped me off the motorway and wrote off my car.  Fortunately other than mild whiplash I am OK, but it could easily have been fatal.  Driving to and from work is by far and away more dangerous than covid to me personally.  But if I lived my life avoiding driving altogether that would clearly be stupid.  I just have to assess the risk, take reasonable precautions, (like wearing a seatbelt) and get on with it.

Similarly now, with Covid, its a case of taking reasonable precautions and getting on with it – for me measures that severely restrict liberty of the uninfected, and measures that seriously harm enjoyment for the uninfected are not sustainable or realistic in the long term and the time has come now to drop them.

I respect others’ opinions on where we draw the line, but for me, the level of risk posed by covid no way justifies the levels of restrictions on civil liberties being proposed by some.  And the rather (now) transparent attempts from some quarters to scare the populace in order to drive clicks and views on news websites and to promote certain scientific careers need to be called out and balanced in the light of what is really happening, rather than on the worst-case scenarios of mathematical modelling based on assumptions that have been proven now to be inaccurate.

Sorry to flog this old horse. but I do think some of the scary numbers that were being bandied about in the news media (200,000 cases, etc., etc) need to be called out and put to bed as the extreme predictions they were, so that we can have a rational view on the subject the next time it comes up.  We can’t live our lives avoiding all risk all the time.  That’s not “life” its just existing and its inhuman.