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Italy re-opening borders to tourists = Wave number 2 in Europe?

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    #62
    lainey_d_123
    Registered Users Posts: 2,385 ✭✭✭lainey_d_123


    is_that_so wrote: »
    Where is this all disease going to come from? It's no longer an unknown and systems are at a point where they can swiftly test the crap out of it. No other country including China has seen a second wave and now it is beginning to look like people are paying far too much attention to 1918. It may well return later in the year and into the winter but we're much better equipped to face that possibility.

    China ensured they had barely any new cases when they opened up, and they enforce a 14 day quarantine for anyone arriving in the country. South Korea have had tests for anyone who wants one since almost the beginning, and an excellent tracing app, and enforced quarantine for arrivals. They didn't say 'hey guys, it's all over, come over on your holidays and it'll be grand'.

    The UK still has over 3000 cases a day, no tracing app, and it's nearly impossible to get a test. Do Italy really want planeloads of British people heading over for their summer holidays?


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    #63
    is_that_so
    Registered Users Posts: 32,136 ✭✭✭✭is_that_so


    lainey_d_123 wrote: »
    China ensured they had barely any new cases when they opened up, and they enforce a 14 day quarantine for anyone arriving in the country. South Korea have had tests for anyone who wants one since almost the beginning, and an excellent tracing app, and enforced quarantine for arrivals. They didn't say 'hey guys, it's all over, come over on your holidays and it'll be grand'.

    The UK still has over 3000 cases a day, no tracing app, and it's nearly impossible to get a test. Do Italy really want planeloads of British people heading over for their summer holidays?
    That will be for Italy and individual travellers to decide. I am not for one minute claiming this will vanish, that's still unknown but as I said we're better placed now. We do have to face the world with COVID-19 in it else we run the risk of that cure being worse than the disease scenario.


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    #64
    lainey_d_123
    Registered Users Posts: 2,385 ✭✭✭lainey_d_123


    is_that_so wrote: »
    That will be for Italy and individual travellers to decide. I am not fro one minute claiming this will vanish, that's still unknown but as I said we're better placed now. We do have to face the world with COVID-19 in it else we run the risk of that cure being worse than the disease scenario.

    Sure, but numbers are getting lower and lower everywhere, and there should be tracing apps rolled out within a couple of months. So would it not be sensible to wait it out a little bit longer, until new cases really are very low, and we have tracing technology in place along with wider availability of tests? Rather than rushing to open up now? Is it not wise to be cautious for the sake of a couple of months? I'd much rather head to Italy in September knowing the risk is much lower, knowing that I can walk into a testing centre at my local hospital and get a test if I'm worried, than go in June when things are still not under control.


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    #65
    Wibbs
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 60,151 Mod ✭✭✭✭Wibbs


    is_that_so wrote: »
    No other country including China has seen a second wave and now it is beginning to look like people are paying far too much attention to 1918.
    Never mind that the 1918 pandemic was a very different beast. Very precise circumstances selected for the more virulent and deadly mutation to overtake the milder mutation, none of which are present today. Why the doom mongers, including way too many experts who should know better keep comparing the two outbreaks is beyond me.

    Rejoice in the awareness of feeling stupid, for that’s how you end up learning new things. If you’re not aware you’re stupid, you probably are.



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    #66
    lainey_d_123
    Registered Users Posts: 2,385 ✭✭✭lainey_d_123


    Wibbs wrote: »
    Never mind that the 1918 pandemic was a very different beast. Very precise circumstances selected for the more virulent and deadly mutation to overtake the milder mutation, none of which are present today. Why the doom mongers, including way too many experts who should know better keep comparing the two outbreaks is beyond me.

    I'd say the main reason we're in the position we're in right now is complacence, though. If the West had taken this seriously from Day 1, the world would look very different. We probably wouldn't have had lockdowns in Europe, we'd be out and about living our lives, looking forward to the Olympics this summer.

    The minute there was a sniff of another SARS, all flights from China should have been cancelled, and any person who had spent time in Wuhan or Hubei province quarantined for 14 days. It would have been on the news for a few months, the Chinese would be complaining, we'd be discussing whether or not it was fair to ban their athletes from the Olympics because of the virus risk, but we might well have stopped talking about it much by now. It's already been and gone in China. Started in January, it's now May, and they're pretty much back to normal. Their number of cases an deaths looks tiny compared to most major European countries.

    This could have been a little blip which was a bit of an annoyance. The only reason it's turned into a global catastrophe is the total inaction of the West. The choice to just sit back and relax, thinking it probably wasn't much of a big deal, is what has caused this. So any doom mongering at this point in time is long overdue. Better than the opposite.


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    #67
    The Nal
    Registered Users Posts: 12,735 ✭✭✭✭The Nal


    Would happily self isolate for 2 weeks. May get a trip to Rome in soon. Would love a bowl of pasta and a glass of chianti and a wander about.


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    #68
    MrDavid1976
    Closed Accounts Posts: 305 ✭✭MrDavid1976


    ek motor wrote: »
    Yes they will.

    'You will need to self-isolate for 14 days if you arrive in Ireland from any other country. This includes Irish citizens coming home.

    Self-isolation means staying indoors and completely avoiding contact with other people.'

    https://www2.hse.ie/conditions/coronavirus/travel.html

    They can put it up on the website but it is illegal. The European Commission has already signalled that they will not tolerate further restrictions on freedom of movement. A German court has already overturned a law there on the basis that you cannot restrict 98% of the population.


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    #69
    otnomart
    Registered Users Posts: 4,065 ✭✭✭otnomart


    lainey_d_123 wrote: »
    I'd much rather head to Italy in September knowing the risk is much lower, knowing that I can walk into a testing centre at my local hospital and get a test if I'm worried, than go in June when things are still not under control.
    Nobody is forcing anyone to go to Italy in June (or after that, or ever, for that matter).
    In any case, Ryanair has cancelled all their flights for the month of June.
    Possibilties for people to go from Ireland to Italy are none until the 5KM rules is lifted.
    Whenever that is lifted, those returning are subject to quarantine.
    I don't see how another Country opening their borders has any relevance to those who don't want to travel anyway.


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    #70
    ShineOn7
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,550 ✭✭✭ShineOn7


    lainey_d_123 wrote: »
    It's already been and gone in China. Started in January, it's now May, and they're pretty much back to normal. Their number of cases an deaths looks tiny compared to most major European countries.


    The Chinese have lied about this since day one and will continue to do so


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    #71
    d15ude
    Registered Users Posts: 316 ✭✭d15ude


    ShineOn7 wrote: »
    You'd fly into the country that started the spread of this in the EU and still has a huge number of casualties a day?



    Seriously?

    Their current number of casualties (per capita) isn't much higher than Irelands.


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    #72
    ShineOn7
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,550 ✭✭✭ShineOn7


    d15ude wrote: »
    Their current number of casualties (per capita) isn't much higher than Irelands.


    Are they including nursing home fatalities in their figures? Last I saw Ireland were one of only four countries doing this


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    #73
    lainey_d_123
    Registered Users Posts: 2,385 ✭✭✭lainey_d_123


    ShineOn7 wrote: »
    The Chinese have lied about this since day one and will continue to do so

    Not saying I believe everything they say, but it is highly likely they do have it under control now. Most of the Asian countries do. Because they actually took it seriously and tried to stop it instead of assuming it was a bit of flu.


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    #74
    CelticRambler
    Registered Users Posts: 6,822 ✭✭✭CelticRambler


    Wibbs wrote: »
    Never mind that the 1918 pandemic was a very different beast. Very precise circumstances selected for the more virulent and deadly mutation to overtake the milder mutation, none of which are present today.

    You've made this remark recently in other discussions, Wibbs, and I'm curious: why do you say this virus's behaviour is not comparable, when already we've seen the "Chinese" version that got DT so excited supplanted by the more contagious "European" version, to the extent that it has effectively eliminated the Chinese strain from the US.

    As we don't know how, when or why the European strain acquired its enhanced characteristics, how can you be so sure that we won't have to deal with an even more virulent "MAGA" strain come the autumn?


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    #75
    the kelt
    Registered Users Posts: 1,892 ✭✭✭the kelt


    The last time I checked We don’t have the power to arrest people on day trips from the worst affected jurisdiction in the entirety of Europe and we are worried about a country 1000 miles away where you require a flight to get to and from!


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    #76
    CelticRambler
    Registered Users Posts: 6,822 ✭✭✭CelticRambler


    NIMAN wrote: »
    But there is a difference this time.
    1st time, people were going about their normal lives, knew nothing of the virus or how to help curb it.

    This time people are going about their normal lives, within Gov restrictions which may still be in place,and they are socially distancing, washing their hands, possibly wearing masks and gloves etc.

    Opening after lockdown isn't like being open pre-lockdown. We all know so much more.

    Yeah ... :rolleyes: I'm working in one of France's hottest viral hotspots, ICU beds still running at more than 100% occupancy, the dead and dying being exported to hospitals in Germany, Switzerland and elsewhere in France, where just about everyone knows someone who's been affected by the virus. Since Monday, this area has had partially lifted restrictions; yesterday, I went on a "field trip" to observe the behaviour of the public who "know so much more".

    Well, social distancing? Nope. Lots of token gestures (stickers on floors, signs on windows, reminders on the bus shelter ads ...) but very little effective practice. Collective/team sports are still prohibited, but I saw a group of about twenty lads playing basketball on a non-enclosed court; and throughout the day many people (up to the age of about 50-ish) greeting each other with hand-shakes, kisses, hugs ... I tried walking down the town's central pedestrianised shopping street, and couldn't maintain a one-metre distance from strangers, mainly due to the sheer number of people queuing up outside shops that were imposing entry restictions.

    Hand washing? The supermarkets have hand sanitisers at the exits. I watched one guy put a squirt into his hands as he left, quick massage on palms and the backs of his hands, didn't bother with his fingers, then put his hands back on the same trolley handle ...
    Masks and gloves? At least 25% of the people wearing masks have their nose hanging over the top :rolleyes: and I'd say about half of those who wear them while talking fiddle with them constantly (touching their faces in between times).

    The long and the short of it is: ordinary people do not know how to correctly use PPE, and have not learnt to do so during lockdown. The general public has been taught that you can kill 99.9% of all known germs by waving around a spray or a wipe (who cares about the technique) and anything really nasty will be cured by a vaccine.

    At this stage, I can't see any way that any European government (except, possibly, the Greeks) can "open up" their economies in a safe way, as the general public is far more concerned about "getting back to normal" than adopting new behaviours.


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    #77
    Wibbs
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 60,151 Mod ✭✭✭✭Wibbs


    CelticRambler wrote: »
    You've made this remark recently in other discussions, Wibbs, and I'm curious: why do you say this virus's behaviour is not comparable, when already we've seen the "Chinese" version that got DT so excited supplanted by the more contagious "European" version, to the extent that it has effectively eliminated the Chinese strain from the US.

    As we don't know how, when or why the European strain acquired its enhanced characteristics, how can you be so sure that we won't have to deal with an even more virulent "MAGA" strain come the autumn?
    Well the enhanced characteristics and more contagious strain part is still up for debate. There are too many variables and not enough information so far. Plus more contagious doesn't mean more deadly. It might be, but it might not be. A less deadly more contagious virus is going to be more successful at spreading through a population and survival is its primary "aim". The ideal virus from a viruses point of view would be extremely contagious, fully airborne, but asymptomatic with very little immune response. Extremely deadly and obviously symptomatic viruses tend to burn out pretty quickly, as they get contained more quickly.

    1918 was different. For a start it was an influenza virus and they mutate much more rapidly. Covid19 seems to be pretty stable, with very few of the rapid and wider changes that we see in flu strains. Secondly in 1918 there was a world war going on. It seems the far more deadly version sprang up from a positive selection for it in the population. In normal times if you have mild illness you get on with life, if you're very ill you stay home and away from other people, so the mild version gets selected for and spreads. Whereas in the battlefields of Europe the mild version kept soldiers in their positions, the deadlier version had them shipped back to overcrowded and pretty unhygienic military hospitals, which then spread the deadlier version to the rest of the world.

    So for Covid19 to get a second deadlier wave like 1918, we would have to pretty much reverse the current landscape. IE the very seriously ill and likely to die people would be out and about in the community, whereas the mild and asymptomatic would be locked up in quarantine.

    Though that's also assuming those seriously ill people have a different strain. I'd bet they don't and that the severity is down to the individual not the virus, and along pretty normal and obvious lines of risk. Before Covid19 Men died more and younger than women, people with chronic disease died more than those who didn't, the obese died more than the thin, the very old died more than the very young and so forth. This virus kills and becomes serious in those who you would expect it to kill and become serious in(smokers being the only outlier). This is where this virus is totally unlike the 1918 pandemic. It killed young and healthy people in the prime of life and tended to leave kids and the elderly alone.

    So while some lessons can be learned from 1918, particularly in measures that helped stop the spread, the two pandemic agents couldn't be more different.

    Rejoice in the awareness of feeling stupid, for that’s how you end up learning new things. If you’re not aware you’re stupid, you probably are.



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    #78
    wakka12
    Registered Users Posts: 9,786 ✭✭✭wakka12


    Atlantic Dawn wrote: »
    Those who were going to die in large numbers from it are now dead, they have picked the right time to progress for the rest of the populations health. The attitude some are taking is that people should stay in their bed all day waiting to die to minimise risk of death.

    What an ignorant remark. You think theres only 30,000 'vulnerable' people in Italy? There are 7 million people in Italy over 75 years of age


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    #79
    Charles Babbage
    Registered Users Posts: 5,654 ✭✭✭Charles Babbage


    d15ude wrote: »
    Their current number of casualties (per capita) isn't much higher than Irelands.


    In Italy, only regions adjacent to Lombardy had a bad outbreak of Covid19, it wasn't equal through the country.



    Probably, going to Sicily on holiday is not much more dangerous than going to Kerry.


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    #80
    ShineOn7
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,550 ✭✭✭ShineOn7


    Charles Babbage wrote: »
    Probably, going to Sicily on holiday is not much more dangerous than going to Kerry.


    Eh?

    Based on what stats are you getting that?


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    #81
    Wibbs
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 60,151 Mod ✭✭✭✭Wibbs


    IIRC Sicily has fewer cases and deaths than Ireland with near enough the same number of people living there? The main risk I'd imagine would be the actual travel too and from there. What with sharing recirculating air with a couple of hundred other people in an aluminium tube for eight hours there and back.

    Rejoice in the awareness of feeling stupid, for that’s how you end up learning new things. If you’re not aware you’re stupid, you probably are.



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    #82
    The_Brood
    Closed Accounts Posts: 838 ✭✭✭The_Brood


    Many other European countries unlike Ireland are also re-opening now, in various degrees, but in any way way faster than Ireland. So are they all wrong and will suffer badly with a new virus wave? We will see.

    The alternative is that Leo is keeping us under needless lockdown because obviously he won't have to deal with the various serious consequences of Ireland being very late and among the last the reopen.


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    #83
    wakka12
    Registered Users Posts: 9,786 ✭✭✭wakka12


    Different European countries are in different positions . We are not the very last, Scotland remains in lockdown still. With only minor changes to the measures expected next week, so they are even slower than us. The R0 in Scotland is thought to be higher than the rest of the UK currently.

    https://www.breakingnews.ie/world/coronavirus-deaths-in-scotland-rise-by-41-999943.html


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    #84
    RandomViewer
    Registered Users Posts: 6,191 ✭✭✭RandomViewer


    NegativeCreep wrote: »
    There’d be no reason for them to know that you were in Rome for the weekend.

    If someone is going away they usually tell their workmates, if you come back in after a weekend in Rome they won't want to be near you and will rise a stink with management, anyone failing to say they were in a hot zone could be sacked with no issue.


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    #85
    HBC08
    Registered Users Posts: 3,437 ✭✭✭HBC08


    GT89 wrote: »
    I'm entitled to a bloody holiday after working my ass off. I have the money and I think I've earned it. Tbh I'd probably get more health benefit out going on holiday from vitamin D. Too add insult to injury I have no doubt the Germans will be in Italy in they're droves this summer.

    "I'm entitled"
    Says it all really.


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    #86
    ShineOn7
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,550 ✭✭✭ShineOn7


    RandomViewer wrote: »
    anyone failing to say they were in a hot zone could be sacked with no issue.


    I could see HR departments seeing that differently. Unless company rules are re-written and even then, would they stand upto a challenge in the Labour Court?


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    #87
    RandomViewer
    Registered Users Posts: 6,191 ✭✭✭RandomViewer


    ShineOn7 wrote: »
    I could see HR departments seeing that differently. Unless company rules are re-written and even then, would they stand upto a challenge in the Labour Court?

    Risked staff and business, be lucky not to get sued by company. People need to stop being selfish


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    #88
    stephenjmcd
    Registered Users Posts: 15,258 ✭✭✭✭stephenjmcd


    RandomViewer wrote: »
    Risked staff and business, be lucky not to get sued by company. People need to stop being selfish

    Firstly a company is not going to sue an employee on the grounds you've laid out they wouldn't get near a court with that, secondly unless it's in their contract that they have to notify the company then sacking them is against employment law and the employee would be well within their rights to go to the labour court and would probably win a substantial payment for unfair dismissal.

    Regardless of your views on people being selfish, saying its grounds for sacking is wishful thinking


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    #89
    stephenjmcd
    Registered Users Posts: 15,258 ✭✭✭✭stephenjmcd


    ShineOn7 wrote: »
    I could see HR departments seeing that differently. Unless company rules are re-written and even then, would they stand upto a challenge in the Labour Court?

    Not a chance, employee wins unfair dismissal case all day long


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    #90
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 8,856 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Wibbs wrote: »
    IIRC Sicily has fewer cases and deaths than Ireland with near enough the same number of people living there? The main risk I'd imagine would be the actual travel too and from there. What with sharing recirculating air with a couple of hundred other people in an aluminium tube for eight hours there and back.

    Yeah, I think if you gave me a free all inclusive holiday package to Italy this year, I'd just say no, without any hesitation- or indeed any destination abroad.

    While the risk might be "minimal" in some countries, I think there's a personal responsibility for all citizens in all countries to just stay put in 2020- travel your own country by all means if that's what you want to do but leave foreign travel alone for 1 year. Airlines will suffer, tourism dollars won't be made - yes- but I think we'd be mad to risk undoing all the good work so far. I'm anxious to see economies up and running again but not at any price.


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    #91
    jam_mac_jam
    Registered Users Posts: 4,726 ✭✭✭jam_mac_jam


    Would you not just go to a country with a lower rate of infection if a holiday is an absolute must. No way I would be going to Italy on holiday. It's completely unnecessary


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