IOM Covid removing restrictions

[Sheldon]

51 minutes ago, Roxanne said:

Maybe it was always going to come back, maybe there was always going to be a case slip through the net but people went to the Panto FFS, and  on NYE after the government KNEW there was a case, they allowed it to happen.

That's the real kicker, isn't it? I still can't believe that update from Quayle just before midnight on New Year's Eve was real, and the more I think about it the more unreal it gets.

[asitis]

13 minutes ago, Sheldon said:

That's the real kicker, isn't it? I still can't believe that update from Quayle just before midnight on New Year's Eve was real, and the more I think about it the more unreal it gets.

The timing of that smacks of a panicked ass covering exercise !

[Annoymouse]

26 minutes ago, Roxanne said:

And the waste of time from early morning before informing us.

I'm damn sure this was a conscious decision. Keep the money rolling in. Keep the publicans happy. To hell with the people. It'll be reet.

But it bloody wasn't.

How early did they actually know? I think it was 1886 that said they were contacted by contact tracing at 4pm but were told no action was required?

So far no cases seem to have come from Boxing Day/1886 which I find absolutely astonishing given the number of people that were present.

[Roger Mexico]

2 hours ago, Uhtred said:

Henrietta gets too mardy, too quickly, at too many topics.

Well that's true, but imagine what you'd be like if you had to spend your time trying to explain basic scientific facts to Howie and Ashie.  Without the use of blunt instruments.

The truth is there's always a tension in these jobs, such as Chief Medical Officer and Director of Public Health.  You can advise all you want, but in the end the decisions get made by the politicians often for non-scientific or even non-rational reasons.  And then it's your job to defend those decisions, while hopefully minimising any harm.  That's why you often see a lot of lip-biting at the UK press conferences and in other countries as well.

[Nellie]

3 hours ago, doc.fixit said:

• Sweden has already given the covid inoculation to 80,000 souls! Reuters report this am.

Thats actually less than half of what we've done per capita, so they must be really crap!!

[horatiotheturd]

Anyone else think its odd to have one decreased the frequency of the briefings away from daily.

Also, quick point.  Mass testing isn't really needed if people just stay in the bloody houses for a couple of weeks (wherever possible)

The greatest defence against this is to assume we all have it and minimise anytime spent outside our own homes as much as possible so that those who absolutely need to be out and about can do so as quickly and safely as possible.

I have plenty of opinions on who is to blame for us all being in lockdown but to some extent it's too late to worry about especially since they would appear to have only been a few days late implementing the measures that would have prevented it.

Priority now should be all doing out bit and every time I see someone out for a bike ride, or read someone asking which shops are open I just can't help thinking they are a selfish so and so who is just contributing to keeping us locked down for longer.

[Mr Shoe]

1 hour ago, Roger Mexico said:

In this case Henrietta.  Mass testing in a pandemic is fairly useless.  Either you find hardly anyone and (depending on the test you use) false positives may outweigh the actual cases or you provide false reassurance.  Or  you find loads and all it does is confirm you're in the mess you knew you were in.

..... 

It's only used by governments wanting to do something dramatic and headline-grabbing (so suits the current UK government) but it's completely ineffective, especially with Covid.  of course when they did it in Liverpool the test they used was so inaccurate that they might as well have tossed a coin anyway.

....

True. If you're an armchair statistician or on a forum.

False. If you have a statistics (or similar) degree, masters or phd.

What do you think they study for all those years? They learn how to piece together a solid result from a crappy mishmash of seemingly conflicting datasets. 

Collect all the data you can. Because if you don't and something turns out to be crucial, we don't have a time machine to go back and re-gather the data.

[Lxxx]

1 hour ago, Andy Onchan said:

But I thought Liverpool lab can't or won't do the sequencing. At least that's what I understood from something that HE said a few days ago when she was asked by a journo? And where do you get the idea that IOM is 'plugged' into PHE? The only thing they seemed to be plugged into is the regurgitating advice from UK SAGE.

The IOM will probably have to use labs accredited by PHE. Does Rachel's lab fulfil this criteria?

[Banker]

11 minutes ago, horatiotheturd said:

Anyone else think its odd to have one decreased the frequency of the briefings away from daily.

Also, quick point.  Mass testing isn't really needed if people just stay in the bloody houses for a couple of weeks (wherever possible)

The greatest defence against this is to assume we all have it and minimise anytime spent outside our own homes as much as possible so that those who absolutely need to be out and about can do so as quickly and safely as possible.

I have plenty of opinions on who is to blame for us all being in lockdown but to some extent it's too late to worry about especially since they would appear to have only been a few days late implementing the measures that would have prevented it.

Priority now should be all doing out bit and every time I see someone out for a bike ride, or read someone asking which shops are open I just can't help thinking they are a selfish so and so who is just contributing to keeping us locked down for longer.

Well I don’t think it’s realistic to ask everyone to stay in, if you keep your distance and where masks where required you’re fine.

Just driven along cooil road and there’s a steady stream of cars heading into b&q to beat closure on Thursday, seemed mostly retired couples!

[Out of the blue]

1 hour ago, AcousticallyChallenged said:

If it wasn't for a massive nail in my back tyre, I'd have been out Christmas day for the empty roads. Plenty of green lane stuff happens over this time of year too. Days like today aren't bad if you've got winter gear.

Ah, you are that 1%. I have been fair weather only for some years now as I am getting soft in my old age.

[Pieman]

Just joined having been reading the forums for many months, not just Covid related. Quick intro,  I live near Oxford, but have been visiting the Island since 1973, when I was a little kid. Mainly for TT / Manx GP, but in more recent years, whilst me and my daughter have been on bike for TT practice week (2013 to 2018, since she was 8), we have also been to visit as a family out of TT season and recommended it to first timers, particularly those with kids. We are big fans of the IOM, it has changed massively over the years, but always a plan to retire there, still a few years to go and get that sorted out!! 

When this Covid thing all began just about 12m ago, we feared for the Island, I work (ed) a lot in mainland Europe and could see quite early on in Jan and early Feb that this was going to be a massive issue for the planet to deal with. I had concerns about places like USA where healthcare is sporadic and not universal, but where there is a very "liberal" and diverse way of life, and UK also, whilst healthcare is good, there are factions that are not very "compliant" and it was clear that the actions of a few could make a deal of pain for the many, with this virus.

My concerns for the IOM were the limited Healthcare facilities and the size of the Island which could mean Covid have just overwhelmed the whole Island in a few weeks. I am sure that mistakes have been made by the powers that be there, (well documented here), but IOM seems to have battled and controlled this better than most places with far more resources. By implementing sensible but often unpopular and expensive measures, the Island has limited it's exposure to the virus. And for that, some credit is due.    

We personally have a nice set up here, I wont pretend we live in a hellhole, we have a nice house in a pretty quiet village, we have a swimming pool in the summer that was a godsend this year, we are able to carry on working from home, and have room to school from home (not that that is easy, it all takes substantially longer than the way we used to work, but we are working and getting paid still!). We have avoided Covid here, but we have been very careful indeed. Fastidious with making sure anything coming into the house is safe, clean etc, so we can then relax in the confines of our home, wear masks when out and about, but in reality, apart from one term at school, we have been stuck here at home for coming up to a year!  I had one job of work that took me to a site in Reading, about 30 miles away back in July last year.... that is the furthest any of us have been in that time, and we are far from alone. My work colleagues, friends etc, we are all doing that. We are "allowed" to do more, at times, but most just don't. Follow the numbers here and things are looking pretty ropey.  We shop online for 4 houses in our street of 15 houses, inhabited by very elderly people, indeed, 3 ladies have had BOTH vaccine jabs already, two old boys that we shop and in one case cook for have had their first jab. At 50, my wife and i are the youngest adults in the street!  

As I say, we personally are pretty fortunate, we know that. The UK is being ravaged by this, and those that dont have access to the resources we have must be finding it unbearable. But for all of us, life has become an "existence" most of the time. We have parents / grandparents less than 10 miles away and yet have not seen them in person face to face since March 2020. Millions are in the same boat here.  

Most half sensible people here can see that the prospect of getting to levels of Covid that will allow us on the mainland to enjoy the sort of freedoms we used to take for granted are many years away. IOM has had that for most of last year and whilst in Lockdown at the moment, at least there is the realistic prospect of life being relatively normal in a couple of months or so! That is just not the case here. Politicians are talking about our "lockdown" being til mid Feb, or maybe Spring, but a year ago we had "no" Covid, now we have 50k to 60k cases per day and a thousand deaths per day. Our relatively free summer where we had pubs and restaurants shut til early July, gyms and hairdressers shut a bit longer, but we could at least go on holiday, (even abroad if we wanted), came off the back of "nil" cases in Jan and a well complied with for many weeks lockdown in April. This is just not the case now.  

We long to be able to come back to the IOM for our holidays as we have been doing for years, but realistically we know that is a long way off. And it needs to be, to protect the Island from this virus, which will continue to adversely affect our lives for a long time to come.   

Whilst your politicians and decision makers have no doubt made mistakes, and life for many on the Island has been very difficult financially and otherwise frustrating, life this side of the water has been no picnic and our short to medium term prospects are pretty dire. But we wish you all the very best success in quashing the current outbreaks and getting back to something resembling normal for later in the year. And of course we look forward to visiting a place we are very fond of again some day.  

 

[Neil Down]

3 minutes ago, Banker said:

Well I don’t think it’s realistic to ask everyone to stay in, if you keep your distance and where masks where required you’re fine.

Just driven along cooil road and there’s a steady stream of cars heading into b&q to beat closure on Thursday, seemed mostly retired couples!

you'd have thought the retired couples would have the common sense to wait for wrinkly Wednesday and get their discount...

[Andy Onchan]

2 minutes ago, Lxxx said:

The IOM will probably have to use labs accredited by PHE. Does Rachel's lab fulfil this criteria?

Very possibly but perhaps not for PHE quality/accreditation purposes and in any case why would she have to since we're not in PHE jurisdiction?

But then IOMG was more than happy to avail themselves of her services when it was for free, ie. non-commercial rates, which is why they put her personally on bank terms. 

Does Nobles lab meet PHE quality/accreditiation standards? For COVID purposes probably not, otherwise why would Rachel have to train the Nobles staff? 

[horatiotheturd]

22 minutes ago, Banker said:

Well I don’t think it’s realistic to ask everyone to stay in, if you keep your distance and where masks where required you’re fine.

Just driven along cooil road and there’s a steady stream of cars heading into b&q to beat closure on Thursday, seemed mostly retired couples!

Its bizarre.  People on here have been citing the health and safety aspect as to why window cleaners and builders who apparently clog up Nobles with all their accidents can't work (or earn money) but Bert who is 87 can still but a chainsaw and set to up a ladder at a tree.

I have very strongly told the wife that all jobs that involve me picking up anything shop, anything heavy, and heights, or any elevation of heart rate that might lead to an increased chance of heart attack are on hold

Sure I read somewhere there was a big increase in diy accidents in uk last year

[Banker]

There’s a report on bbc north west this lunchtime after bbc main news , it’s an Iom scientist says IOM could have done more to avoid second lockdown!! Rachel maybe?