Why Are There Demonstrators Outside The Covid Enquiry?

[dave50]

What are they wanting? It was an infectious virus that could be dangerous to the old and the vulnerable. People were obviously going to die, we can't save everyone. There's no point in moaning about it, it was inevitable. Accept it and move on.

[Ellipsis]

> I don't know what they hope to achieve

Lessons to avoid doing the same again, or worse, any time soon maybe ...

> I haven’t talked about this before, in public. What you claim is my indifference to the pandemic. I just want to remind you when I went into intensive care. I saw around me a lot of people who were not actually elderly. They were middle-aged men and they were quite like me. And some of us were going to make it and some of us weren’t. - Boris Johnson

So, if you wanted people like Boris (in terms of age and healthiness) to die, then “let it rip” next time...

[New Judge]

"So, if you wanted people like Boris (in terms of age and healthiness) to die, then “let it rip” next time..."

Well, people "like Boris (in terms of age and healthiness)" are dying now because they suffered undiagnosed and untreated conditions which, with timely intervention, would probably have been cured. And that is a direct result of the NHS closing its doors to virtually everything other than Covid for two years. 

"Letting it rip" is a ridiculous term because it gives the impression that a government can do anything (within reaason) to prevent the virus spreading. Truth is, short of the most Draconian measures imaginable (which would involve keeping every person away from every other person) preventing the spread of the virus is impossible. The question which the enquiry should focus on (which it shows no sign of doing) is the level of "collateral damage" that is acceptable to provide a very small reduction in spread. This country slaughtered its economy, wrecked the education of young people, imposed measures which led to widespread depression and other mental illnesses among those unable to cope with the restrictions, withdrew the right to social interaction as if it was some sort of luxury instead of an intrinsic part of human existence and, most of all, fatally damaged its already frail health service and left it in a position from which it is unlikley ever to recover to any meaningful degree.

Was it worth it? That's something else the enquiry should investigate. There is considerable evidence to suggest that lockdowns do not work. They may delay spread and postpone some deaths. But ultimately those who are likely to succomb to a respiratory virus will eventually do so. The question is, how much damage is a government prepared to inflict on its economy and the wellbeing of its citizens to secure that momentary delay? That was a quaetion that was not fully explored at the start of Covid. Lockdowns had never been used to tackle any earlier pandemic and there's a very good reason for that. This time the UK did it because everybody else did and everybody else did it because China did. And they did it because they could. It should never be allowed to happen in the UK ever again.

[Ellipsis]

Should Boris have been allowed to die because he had " suffered undiagnosed and untreated conditions"?

What should happen next time, in a different pandemic?

1) Let people die like Boris die

2) Let rip and treat them at a massive scale

3) Lock them down and treat them in a longer, more manageable timescale

[CrapatCryptics2]

No one was an expert on a pandemic of that extent so our leaders did the best they could. They took advice from people who knew more than they did but not the sheer extent of the problems. I cant see that Dominic Cummings had any genuine place at that table. I have the most sincere condolences for all those people who lost family, friends etc but but of the transmission of Covid was down to people not taking even reasonable care and believing internet ill informed conspiracy merchants.

[Peter Pedant]

because the demonstrators wanted to stick red hot burning needles into both eyes at the same time

[Peter Pedant]

and poonie (*) a damned liar for what  he inflicted on us

(*) poonie - punish

[New Judge]

"Should Boris have been allowed to die because he had " suffered undiagnosed and untreated conditions"?"

But he didn't, did he? He was lucky. He had Covid.

[Ellipsis]

He was in intensive care for days ... if there was no lockdown, the intensive care units would have been overwhelmed.

[New Judge]

"He was in intensive care for days ... if there was no lockdown, the intensive care units would have been overwhelmed."

And your source for that claim is....?

[Ellipsis]

> And your source for that claim is....?

What claim? The fact that he was in intensive care, or the fact that there would have been a lot more people in intensive care a lot sooner if there wasn't a lockdown, or the fact that the NHS would not have had enough intensive care beds to cope with that number in that short a time?

[dave50]

As usual new judge hits the nail in the head.

[ToraToraTora]

21:15 that's why they set up the nightingale temp hospitals at great expense. They were not needed in the end.

[naomi24]

Are other countries intent on tearing themselves or their leaders to bits by staging ludicrously lengthy and stupidly expensive inquiries of this nature - or is it just us?

[douglas9401]

'Other countries' tend to DO something rather than just talk endlessly with no actual result.

Nobody jailed, no money traced and returned, no careers ended to save us from further harm.

As long as the appearance of action is there we seem content.

[naomi24]

//'Other countries' tend to DO something rather than just talk endlessly with no actual result.//

 

They didn't do anything except talk when the vaccine became available.   We were way out in front with that.

[Old_Geezer]

A lockdown wasn't necessary. Some nations didn't do so, including Sweden. They seem not noticeably disadvantaged because of it. My views at the time are on record here. Yes, nationwide they should have "let it rip" as the biased phrase goes, it was the correct strategy to follow as the "herd immunity" built up; just allow regions to apply further restrictions where needed to manage hospital demand for those that were that badly hit that they needed that level of care. A strategy that isn't a million miles away from what was being considered until they foolishly made a U-turn and fell between 2 stools. No real control of the health issue (in many cases making things worse) and no protection of the economy nor basic western culture citizens rights either. Parliament basically failed to stay consistent and will just have to settle for claiming that lessons will have been learnt; but from the disagreement we still see, it looks as if they won't be.

[Ellipsis]

> that's why they set up the nightingale temp hospitals at great expense

Yes, the lockdown worked and the nightingale hospitals weren't needed

>  "let it rip" as the biased phrase goes

As far as I knows, that was Boris's phrase ... in a kind of devil's advocate, blue sky thinking, wiff waff manner.

> when the vaccine became available. We were way out in front with that.

True, and lucky for the people who were still alive when the vaccine was administered, and who would have died if we had let it rip before then. Including more of those fifty-somethings that Boris was talking about.

[ToraToraTora]

ellipsis: "Yes, the lockdown worked and the nightingale hospitals weren't needed" - no doubt lockdown reduced cases but at what cost? Ask all those about to be repossesed because inflation has forecd up their mortgages for example.  The Nightingale facilities were set up so we'd cope without a lockdown then innexplicably we had a lockdown anyway. OG is correct there were many measures short of full lockdown that could have been taken that would have avoided trashing the economy.

[Ellipsis]

> no doubt lockdown reduced cases but at what cost

Fewer deaths. It was a trade-off. Lives for finances.

The point is that the lives were not "simply" the old, they were people like Boris. If Boris had not been in hospital or not had adequate care in hospital, because there was not enough capacity of beds or doctors, he would have died. As it was, others like Boris died anyway, that's how close things were for those fifty-somethings.

The nightingales would have been needed if the populace ignored the lockdown en masse, but fortunately they didn't. Good job, because the beds were not adequate, and there weren't enough doctors and nurses anyway.

[New Judge]

What claim? .......or the fact that the NHS would not have had enough intensive care beds to cope with that number in that short a time?

That one. You are making assumptions that have not been tested. And from the story so far, it doesn't look like the enquiry will be testing anything like that either. Though that said, if it di it would probably rely on teh sort of "expert advice" which led the UK being bounced into lockdowns anyway. 

Are other countries intent on tearing themselves or their leaders to bits by staging ludicrously lengthy and stupidly expensive inquiries of this nature - or is it just us?

I believe it’s just us. A number of countries have already produced their Covid enquiry reports. Among them is Sweden, which produced its report in February 2022 (having produced some interim reports in the meantime). Among their enquiry's findings was that the decision not to impose mandatory restrictions meant that Swedes “retained more of their personal freedom than in many other countries.” In addition, the enquiry found that it is “not convinced that extended or recurring mandatory lockdowns, as introduced in other countries, are a necessary element in the response to a new, serious epidemic outbreak”

Our enquiry is due to take evidence until the middle of 2026, with its final report being published some two years later. By that time, its Chairwoman, Baroness Hallett, will be approaching 80 years old. I also expect many people will have forgotten what Covid was.