Galway COVID-19, local news and discussion

People are idiots I'm afraid, that's the main issue.

brutes1

Arghus wrote: »

Oh, it's not hard to figure out why.

But I find it very strange that people feel a lot more comfortable going out and about now, if you consider there's more active cases around now than there was when the lockdown was first declared.

I guess the view is there is no real risk to the vast majority of people and the initial forecasts of doom havent happened . Lockdown unsustainable for most. Plenty are very cautious and will stay under wraps but many are not

Whereisgalway

Fernando Muscular Sibilant wrote: »

People are idiots I'm afraid, that's the main issue.

Lots of idiots around

Mrs OBumble

Arghus wrote: »

Oh, it's not hard to figure out why.

But I find it very strange that people feel a lot more comfortable going out and about now, if you consider there's more active cases around now than there was when the lockdown was first declared.

The virus is still the same virus. People's attitudes were entirely different just a few weeks ago.

People who have it now are far more likely to know that they have it, and so stay home.

I was working with a lad who had it six weeks ago. Took ages for him to get tested, due to the criteria then. The rest of the office didn't catch it from him. So I'm feeling like I'm unlikely to catch it from other people, either. Not sure if my confidence is justified or not, but that's my sense of it.

Arghus

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

People who have it now are far more likely to know that they have it, and so stay home.

I was working with a lad who had it six weeks ago. Took ages for him to get tested, due to the criteria then. The rest of the office didn't catch it from him. So I'm feeling like I'm unlikely to catch it from other people, either. Not sure if my confidence is justified or not, but that's my sense of it.

I hope you are right, sincerely I do.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

Arghus wrote: »

Oh, it's not hard to figure out why.

But I find it very strange that people feel a lot more comfortable going out and about now, if you consider there's more active cases around now than there was when the lockdown was first declared.

The virus is still the same virus. People's attitudes were entirely different just a few weeks ago.

I don't find it strange at all. We've been listening to the numbers for weeks now so they have lost their ability to shock. They have been normalised in people's brains. So we're used to it AND there's been a rough downward trend in the numbers lately too. People aren't as freaked out as they once were and are letting their guard down a bit because of that. It was a new and unfamiliar situation in the beginning. The brain works hard to find equilibrium because that's the only sustainable place to live.

Mrs OBumble

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

People who have it now are far more likely to know that they have it, and so stay home.

I was working with a lad who had it six weeks ago. Took ages for him to get tested, due to the criteria then. The rest of the office didn't catch it from him. So I'm feeling like I'm unlikely to catch it from other people, either. Not sure if my confidence is justified or not, but that's my sense of it.

Approximately 20% of people who get the virus have no symptoms and plenty more have it mild and they will dismiss it and carry on.

Unfortunately I can see numbers increasing again even with this small easing in the lockdown as people are given an inch they will take a mile.

It's too quick for any easing in the lockdown imo, a tight lockdown should have been maintained until at least June and/or we have saya week of new infections in medium to low double figures.

JoeA3

Arghus wrote: »

Oh, it's not hard to figure out why.

But I find it very strange that people feel a lot more comfortable going out and about now, if you consider there's more active cases around now than there was when the lockdown was first declared.

The virus is still the same virus. People's attitudes were entirely different just a few weeks ago.

I would have thought its obvious tbh. As hard as it is to fathom for some, a great number of the population don't feel greatly threatened by it. It was a novel threat 2 months ago, now it's become part of our lives. People were avidly listening out for the new cases/new death numbers a few weeks ago, now its just another item in the news, another day another number. You get so used to it, almost immune to the news, pardon the pun. From what I can see, yes, lots of people are out and about, but in the main, everyone I see is in good spirits and maintaining sensible social distancing.

We have what, 350-odd total cases in Galway since this began?. You'd imagine a large proportion of that number have already recovered. This is an absolutely tiny percentage of the population of the county. How can anyone be surprised that many people just don't feel overly worried about it.
Its pretty clear to me that all the "idiots" spoken of on here, out in the fresh air, walking the prom or wherever they may be, are not passing it or spreading it or killing anyone.

In my opinion the lockdown has gone on long enough, the so called "road map" is far too cautious and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if its tweaked (in a positive way) in the coming weeks. Here's hoping, because it can't go on forever and thankfully the media have finally started focusing on the destruction this has done to our economy and how quickly we can get out of this hole.

Whereisgalway

JoeA3 wrote: »

ny people just don't feel overly worried about it.
Its pretty clear to me that all the "idiots" spoken of on here, out in the fresh air, walking the prom or wherever they may be, are not passing it or spreading it or killing anyone. .

This is a highly infectious disease. It thrives in crowds. It has the potential to rapidly spread to levels that our health service will find difficult to respond to. 23 more people died today bringing the total to almost 1,400 deceased. I wonder how many of these and how many future deaths can be put to complacency

JoeA3

Whereisgalway wrote: »

This is a highly infectious disease. It thrives in crowds. It has the potential to rapidly spread to levels that our health service will find difficult to respond to. 23 more people died today bringing the total to almost 1,400 deceased. I wonder how many of these and how many future deaths can be put to complacency

I’d suggest you ask Tony Holohan and his cohort about that - i.e. how they managed the situation in the nursing homes.

flazio

4 months of solitary confinement or self imposed house arrest. Nobody could stick that out. Especially as it looks unlikely we'll have any treatment for the disease this side of Christmas.

Arghus

JoeA3 wrote: »

In my opinion the lockdown has gone on long enough, the so called "road map" is far too cautious and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if its tweaked (in a positive way) in the coming weeks. Here's hoping, because it can't go on forever and thankfully the media have finally started focusing on the destruction this has done to our economy and how quickly we can get out of this hole.

I can't understand the logic of people saying the lockdown has gone far enough or long enough when the numbers of new daily cases, people in hospital and people in ICU are still higher today than where they were when the lockdown was first introduced.

The situation has remained controllable because of the lockdown. People think, "ah, yeah, it isn't that bad" without stopping to think that it's the success of the measures - that they were screaming out for a number of weeks ago - that they have to thank for this.

A week ago people were blasting the government because they failed to protect nursing homes and issue specific advice about them during the early days of the outbreak. Now the government have issued extremely clear advice that people should still stay at home because of the still real threat to public health - and it's being widely ignored.

The stupidity of people amazes me.

Arghus

JoeA3 wrote: »

I’d suggest you ask Tony Holohan and his cohort about that - i.e. how they managed the situation in the nursing homes.

This is exactly what I'm talking about:

"Hey, Tony why didn't you tell us about how we should avoid nursing homes and how dangerous and infectious this disease is?"

Okay, well, we're now repeatedly offering advice that people should stay at home except for essential journeys, because the virus is still present, highly transmissable and highly dangerous.

"Yeah, ah who cares.I'm going drinking cans by the river."

JoeA3

Arghus wrote: »

I can't understand the logic of people saying the lockdown has gone far enough or long enough when the numbers of new daily cases, people in hospital and people in ICU are still higher today than where they were when the lockdown was first introduced.

The situation has remained controllable because of the lockdown. People think, "ah, yeah, it isn't that bad" without stopping to think that it's the success of the measures - that they were screaming out for a number of weeks ago - that they have to thank for this.

A week ago people were blasting the government because they failed to protect nursing homes and issue specific advice about them during the early days of the outbreak. Now the government have issued extremely clear advice that people should still stay at home because of the still real threat to public health - and it's being widely ignored.

The stupidity of people amazes me.

If someone holds a different opinion to yours or has a different perspective on the situation or a different risk tolerance, it doesn’t make them stupid or make their point of view any less worthy.

You know what the stated purpose of the lockdown was? To “flatten the curve”. To allow the ICU’s cope with the surge (which never came). It was never the intention to lock us away until the cure/vaccine is found. The vaccine may never happen at all. As long as there’s no vaccine, the new case numbers will always likely be there to some degree, whether we relax now or relax in 2 months time. The Government are admitting that the emergency dole payments aren’t coming from a bottomless pit. We have loads of empty unused beds in hospitals. People who had scheduled non covid medical procedures have had them cancelled indefinitely. This can’t go on forever.

Arghus

JoeA3 wrote: »

If someone holds a different opinion to yours or has a different perspective on the situation or a different risk tolerance, it doesn’t make them stupid or make their point of view any less worthy.

So every opinion and perspective is equally valid, no matter what? Now, I'm sorry, but that is stupid.

You know what the stated purpose of the lockdown was? To “flatten the curve”. To allow the ICU’s cope with the surge (which never came). It was never the intention to lock us away until the cure/vaccine is found. The vaccine may never happen at all. As long as there’s no vaccine, the new case numbers will always likely be there to some degree, whether we relax now or relax in 2 months time. The Government are admitting that the emergency dole payments aren’t coming from a bottomless pit. We have loads of empty unused beds in hospitals. People who had scheduled non covid medical procedures have had them cancelled indefinitely. This can’t go on forever.

The surge didn't come because of the lockdown.

We have empty beds in hospital because of the lockdown.

If there had been no lockdown hospitals would be full of Covid cases and there'd be even less chance of getting treatment than there currently is.

Of course we can't be locked away until a vaccine is found, which might never happen, but you can't just lessen the lockdown before you even get back to the same level of the disease in society that was deemed dangerous enough to warrant a lockdown in the first place. That's nonsensical. It defeats the entire purpose of having restrictions.

Whereisgalway

JoeA3 wrote: »

If someone holds a different opinion to yours or has a different perspective on the situation or a different risk tolerance, it doesn’t make them stupid or make their point of view any less worthy. .

Except when you call other people “idiots”

JoeA3

Whereisgalway wrote: »

Except when you call other people “idiots”

Who me? I vaguely recall it was you that directed that remark at me.

Whereisgalway

JoeA3 wrote: »

Who me? I vaguely recall it was you that directed that remark at me.

Not on this occasion lol

JoeA3

Arghus wrote: »

So every opinion and perspective is equally valid, no matter what? Now, I'm sorry, but that is stupid.

I don't think my opinion is stupid if thats what you are implying.

Arghus wrote:

Of course we can't be locked away until a vaccine is found, which might never happen, but you can't just lessen the lockdown before you even get back to the same level of the disease in society that was deemed dangerous enough to warrant a lockdown in the first place. That's nonsensical. It defeats the entire purpose of having restrictions.

So what's the safe level then? When the initial lockdown began, I think we'd had 1 death in total. The case numbers were less than 30. I think it's going to be a long time yet (if ever!) before we drop back down to those numbers. If we had 211 new cases (as per today) back in early March, then yes, we'd all be very concerned. But that number is considered pretty low now, in relative terms. It's been dropping day on day for about a week now. What is it, less than 1% growth? We were up on 10% day on day before Easter. Will we be seeing single digit cases in mid May, I doubt it, but the conservative health experts are deeming it safe to gently roll back from then.

gordongekko

The idea of the lockdown was to push the curve down and across so that the hospitals weren't overwhelmed. This has been achieved. The hospitals have acquired extra icu beds , and ventilators. People have become accustomed to social distancing and they seem to have secured enough ppe. They've never been overwhelmed. So the lockdown has done what it was supposed to do. We now move onto a new phase where we reopen the economy and its probably to be welcomed at this stage.

JoeA3

gordongekko wrote: »

The idea of the lockdown was to push the curve down and across so that the hospitals weren't overwhelmed. This has been achieved. The hospitals have acquired extra icu beds , and ventilators. People have become accustomed to social distancing and they seem to have secured enough ppe. They've never been overwhelmed. So the lockdown has done what it was supposed to do. We now move onto a new phase where we reopen the economy and its probably to be welcomed at this stage.

Yep, some of us anyway.

Arghus

JoeA3 wrote: »

So what's the safe level then? When the initial lockdown began, I think we'd had 1 death in total. The case numbers were less than 30. I think it's going to be a long time yet (if ever!) before we drop back down to those numbers. If we had 211 new cases (as per today) back in early March, then yes, we'd all be very concerned. But that number is considered pretty low now, in relative terms. It's been dropping day on day for about a week now. What is it, less than 1% growth? We were up on 10% day on day before Easter. Will we be seeing single digit cases in mid May, I doubt it, but the conservative health experts are deeming it safe to gently roll back from then.

211 new confirmed cases looks good when you put it alongside the daily rates of 500-600 we were experiencing a few weeks ago. It shows that progress has been made and it shows - clearly - that restrictions on movement do have an effect.

But 211 cases is still 211 cases. The diseases still has the same exact potential to grow exponentially all over again. It initally grew, presumably, from a handful of cases.

If I were King of Ireland and could do what I liked. I wouldn't be lifting anything until we were confident that community spread was nonexistent, that daily rates of new cases were literally a handful of cases and that everything in the testing, contact tracing and isolation infrastructure was working and robust. From where we are now that would probably take another month.

That's far too extreme for most people, I know, but if you're asking me what I would do. Then that's what I would do: I'd drive this fcking thing into the ground.

I think otherwise you're fooling yourself. Trying to slowly-slowly restart the economy over a period of months is one way of doing things, but it's fraught with potential hazards. I'd rather be utterly ruthless in trying to eliminate the virus, which I think, long term, is probably better for the economy.


Okay, it's a bit of a cliche to look towards New Zealand at this stage - but it's a cliche for a reason - they've shown that an elimination approach is possible. I know they have certain advantages that other countries don't have: isolation, not sharing a border, low population density, a robust approach right from the very beginning - but they were extremely stringent in their measures, far more so than us, and, as a result, they'll be able to return to something resembling normality while the rest of us are still scrambling around.

I would agree with the above, I think as an island we could eliminate the virus but the north makes it more challenging.

I would have gone for a stricter lockdown (only allowed to leave your house to shop once a week, chemist etc or an essential job (which I would have a much tighter criteria on), no exercise, immediate fine for anyone breaking with no warnings or second chances etc. I’d close all ports and airports bar freight and keep everything locked down until we approach zero new cases.

Then start opening slowly but keep no one allowed to enter the country, gradually we could return to normal with no virus in the community but keep ports and airports closed except for leaving the country or freight etc.

Extreme yes but it could actually eliminate the virus and it would get things back to normal faster so overall the economy should not be impacted too differently.

JoeA3

Arghus wrote: »

If I were King of Ireland and could do what I liked. I wouldn't be lifting anything until we were confident that community spread was nonexistent, that daily rates of new cases were literally a handful of cases and that everything in the testing, contact tracing and isolation infrastructure was working and robust. From where we are now that would probably take another month.

That's far too extreme for most people, I know, but if you're asking me what I would do. Then that's what I would do: I'd drive this fcking thing into the ground.

Look, in ideal world, it would be difficult to argue with your point of view and at least you've argued it constructively this time.... But this isn't an ideal world and all I am suggesting here is that we need a reasonable balance, given who and where we are. Yes, we are in the middle of a health pandemic but imo the Government have to take input from other experts other than those in health, and thankfully it seems thats exactly what they're doing now. A total lockdown until we've driven it out is the stuff of fantasy. Who exactly is going to pay for it?

We are a tiny open economy, one that depends enormously on foreign direct investment and tourism to survive. One part (tourism) is shot to bits, probably for a very long time to come. Not much we do about that now. The other part is hanging by a thread. We had Donald on TV last night suggesting, not for the first time, that he wants to pull back from Ireland, bring all that employment back to the US. How many people in Galway alone (5000+ I think), and probably several people on this thread, depend on the likes of Boston, Medtronic, et all? I'm sure everyone on here, like me, has friends and family who've lost their jobs or are on reduced hours... some people are on the free €350 p/w and that's keeping them happy enough for now... as I said, that's only going to last so long, which is not very long at all.

You mention New Zealand. Yeah, it is a cliche, there is no comparison, other than we both happen to be islands in the strictest definition of the word. In fact their own president was in the news today, she specifically mentioned her surprise at Ireland's approach to the relaxing of the lockdown. She thinks we are being far too cautious!

I'd recommend a listen to respected economist Dan O'Brien (frequently on TV/radio) for a very sobering view on what's ahead of us in the months and years after this.

We have to get real, this thing isn't going away, we cannot hide away in a bunker hoping for miracles that won't come. Let those who can and want to get back to work get on with it.

amandstu

So contract tracing is out the window?

Are people here advocating just using mitigation and opening up as much of the economy as does not over whelme those efforts?

JoeA3

amandstu wrote: »

So contract tracing is out the window?

Are people here advocating just using mitigation and opening up as much of the economy as does not over whelme those efforts?

I don't know if contact tracing was ever "in the window".... by all accounts it has been shambolic.

But no, the whole idea of the gradual opening up is that they try and keep a lid on the number of people one comes into contact with in a given day while simultaneously getting things going again. So, for example, a cafe with reserved seating, where patrons are named/contactable as opposed to a free-for-all pub.

It's still a stretch in credibility that they'll manage contact tracing even in that scenario though, seeing as they haven't managed to do it very well so far.

JoeA3

JoeA3 wrote: »

I don't know if contact tracing was ever "in the window".... by all accounts it has been shambolic.

Really? All evidence to the contrary. I'd love for you to enlighten us on how it has been shambolic and don't forget to include some kind of evidence

JoeA3

Deleted User wrote: »

Really? All evidence to the contrary. I'd love for you to enlighten us on how it has been shambolic and don't forget to include some kind of evidence

Really? Are people incapable of googling for themselves?

Here’s one, I could probably find a few more: https://www.google.ie/amp/s/amp.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/contact-tracing-failing-in-some-cases-due-to-incorrect-phone-numbers--hse-995879.html

I’ve heard it discussed day in day out across the main current affairs shows.

Whereisgalway

JoeA3 wrote: »

Really? Are people incapable of googling for themselves?

Here’s one, I could probably find a few more: https://www.google.ie/amp/s/amp.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/contact-tracing-failing-in-some-cases-due-to-incorrect-phone-numbers--hse-995879.html

I’ve heard it discussed day in day out across the main current affairs shows.

The link you posted to back up your has zero substance. You were giving out earlier that someone didn’t respect your opinion and your coming out with passive aggressive reply. Pots and kettles spring to mind

JoeA3

JoeA3 wrote: »

Really? Are people incapable of googling for themselves?

You made the assertion, I challenged you on it, simples, no need to be so sensitive

JoeA3 wrote: »

Here’s one, I could probably find a few more: https://www.google.ie/amp/s/amp.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/contact-tracing-failing-in-some-cases-due-to-incorrect-phone-numbers--hse-995879.html

I’ve heard it discussed day in day out across the main current affairs shows.

So that talks about incorrect phone numbers on record for testee's, not a failing of contact tracing

Contact tracing not being immediately commenced, fair enough, but not unexpected given the emergency situation we're under.

Labs informing GP's before uploading results to the tracing system, not a failing of contact tracing.

Hardly shambolic