Lockdown for Kildare (Aug 8th-31st)

DeanAustin

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

I don't understand it. It makes no sense to me. My wife now can't visit her mother who lives in Lucan. We live in Celbridge and we want to take our kids to St Catherine's Park... but half the park is in county Dublin, the other half is county Kildare. Can my kids play in the Kildare side only? It's absolute madness.

Choosing county borders also makes it harder to enforce. If you need to lock down a town, you can at least concentrate your forces at all entry and exit points for the town. How much harder is that at county level? especially since people still pass through Kildare on their way to Limerick, Cork & Galway etc. It makes zero sense to do the lock down at county level.

You do understand it. You understand what they have implemented perfectly. You just don’t agree with it.

I’d imagine locking down a town makes no sense as the people who were infected probably don’t all live there and have been in contact with people who also don’t live there.

I’m in North Kildare so this affects me as much as you. I don’t like it, I’ve a pain in my hole with it but I understand the logic of why they’ve done it and I’m also pretty sure that the motivation is nothing more than trying to keep the public as safe as possible. It’s unfair but it’s not anyone’s fault - you can’t negotiate or reason with a virus.

Sesshoumaru

ChikiChiki wrote: »

Counties is the best way to do it quickly when needed. Planning and coordinating an alternative will be a nightmare.

Sure there are leaks in this current plan but it's the best way to enforce quickly a rapidly evolving situation and get increased testing in place.

Looks to me like planning to enforce at county level will be a nightmare.

Draw a circle around a town, identify all the roads in and out that intersect that circle - how hard is that? By doing it at county level this is guaranteed to lose support of those in border areas, which just weakens the support in the general populace for lock downs anyway. Big stupid mistake by the government.

DeanAustin

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

Looks to me like planning to enforce at county level will be a nightmare.

Draw a circle around a town, identify all the roads in and out that intersect that circle - how hard is that? By doing it at county level this is guaranteed to lose support of those in border areas, which just weakens the support in the general populace for lock downs anyway. Big stupid mistake by the government.

Do you know that all the infected people are living close to this town(s) and that all the people they’ve been in contact with are also within that area?

ChikiChiki

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

Looks to me like planning to enforce at county level will be a nightmare.

Draw a circle around a town, identify all the roads in and out that intersect that circle - how hard is that? By doing it at county level this is guaranteed to lose support of those in border areas, which just weakens the support in the general populace for lock downs anyway. Big stupid mistake by the government.

Very few people caught up in the Timahoe breakout live there. They are dispersed in all directions. Even into Meath I would say. If you draw a circle from Timahoe based on the distance employee's have spread out half the country would be in lockdown.

Theres no exact science to manage this. Only reducing risk and getting it under control. This will be the first of many local lockdowns.

Sesshoumaru

DeanAustin wrote: »

You do understand it. You understand what they have implemented perfectly. You just don’t agree with it.

I’d imagine locking down a town makes no sense as the people who were infected probably don’t all live there and have been in contact with people who also don’t live there.

I’m in North Kildare so this affects me as much as you. I don’t like it, I’ve a pain in my hole with it but I understand the logic of why they’ve done it and I’m also pretty sure that the motivation is nothing more than trying to keep the public as safe as possible. It’s unfair but it’s not anyone’s fault - you can’t negotiate or reason with a virus.

I'm not an anti vaccine conspiracy theory nut job. I've been following all the rules from before day one. I also don't question our politicians motivations for this either. I'm perfectly happy to supported localised lock downs and I believe our politicians are motivated to keep us safe.

I'm questioning the intelligence of their plan.

ACitizenErased

eigrod wrote: »

Can those people just turn up or are they being referred?

Have to be referred

Sesshoumaru

DeanAustin wrote: »

Do you know that all the infected people are living close to this town(s) and that all the people they’ve been in contact with are also within that area?

That's where contact tracing is supposed to come in. Do I personally know? Of course not! How could I have that information? Do you know all these people live in the locked down counties? Of course you don't! There is no intelligence to this plan.

Sesshoumaru

Lets just pick a border that was drawn up hundreds of years ago - yeah that will do! Stupidity.

ChikiChiki

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

That's where contact tracing is supposed to come in. Do I personally know? Of course not! How could I have that information? Do you know all these people live in the locked down counties? Of course you don't! There is no intelligence to this plan.

All contacts wouldn't be traced at this point. In the words of Dr Michael Ryan, upon a breakout you have to act now and fast to contain even if it means making mistakes. Trial and error.

Zebra3

ChikiChiki wrote: »

Any suggestions on a better way to impose local lockdowns?

The boundary has to be set somewhere and it's unfortunate that Leixlip falls within that.

Town by town.

It's not difficult.

Better than hitting economies that have no connection to the areas concerned.

DeanAustin

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

Lets just pick a border that was drawn up hundreds of years ago - yeah that will do! Stupidity.

It’s not stupidity. You may not agree with it and there may be other options but there is a logic to it.

We don’t have the following data to hand:

1. Where do the infected people live?
2. Where do the people they have been in contact with live?

I also have never tried managing populations before. So you’ve got to consider the above two points and also make this easy to understand for the general population.

You have a decent argument but dismissing the current lockdown as “stupidity” just undermines that argument.

Wanderer2010

smelly sock wrote: »

Im not racist but this is true. Certain cultures and minorities dont give a ****. They show an ignorance and petulance toward the directions for face masks etc.

Hang on now, there are just as many Irish people out there having house parties and not wearing face masks as any other cultures you mention.

Why arent the meat factories actually being closed down immediately once a cluster is identified? Seems the greedy money hungry owners couldnt care less as long as the cash is rolling and a token "deep clean" is enough to satisfy the HSE and on with work as usual the next morning? The lack of threat from these institutions is probably behind a lot of non-compliance. I mean, how many pubs have actually been closed down for not following guidelines and have had their licenses revoked?

DeanAustin

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

Hang on now, there are just as many Irish people out there having house parties and not wearing face masks as any other cultures you mention.

Why arent the meat factories actually being closed down immediately once a cluster is identified? Seems the greedy money hungry owners couldnt care less as long as the cash is rolling and a token "deep clean" is enough to satisfy the HSE and on with work as usual the next morning? The lack of threat from these institutions is probably behind a lot of non-compliance. I mean, how many pubs have actually been closed down for not following guidelines and have had their licenses revoked?

By all accounts, there have been extensive measures implemented in meat factories. Stop polluting the discussion with supposition and hyperbole.

Sierra Oscar

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

Lets just pick a border that was drawn up hundreds of years ago - yeah that will do! Stupidity.

What else do you expect public health officials to do like? No one is saying the restrictions are perfect.

Keeping in mind the urgency of this and the time constraints, do you expect officials to sit down and start mapping out boundaries townland by townland? What criteria would you use? How would you communicate your decision to the public effectively?

Of course it’s much more straight forward to announce measures for areas that people are immediately familiar with and can be implemented straight away - i.e. county boundaries.

Sesshoumaru

ChikiChiki wrote: »

All contacts wouldn't be traced at this point. In the words of Dr Michael Ryan, upon a breakout you have to act now and fast to contain even if it means making mistakes. Trial and error.

Then I'm sure as all resources are being thrown at this, the area of lock down will be quickly refined down over the course of the next few days? No? Didn't think so. IMO my point still stands, no intelligence to this plan.

We're like a cancer patient still getting chemotherapy when the cancer is localised and can be cut out with a scalpel. The mistake here is having an arbitrary larger lock down area with weak enforcement. We should be smart and surgical about this with maximum enforcement.

If you look at the border between Offaly and WestMeath it runs down the middle of the road in places.

Graham

Wherever you draw the lines, there's always going to be places just either side of them.

County lines allow for some sort of buffer zone I suppose. It will be interesting to see if more localised lockdowns start to be applied.

tabby aspreme

DeanAustin wrote: »

It’s not stupidity. You may not agree with it and there may be other options but there is a logic to it.

We don’t have the following data to hand:

1. Where do the infected people live?
2. Where do the people they have been in contact with live?

I also have never tried managing populations before. So you’ve got to consider the above two points and also make this easy to understand for the general population.

You have a decent argument but dismissing the current lockdown as “stupidity” just undermines that argument.

A relative and a friend of mine work in O Briens, and Irish dog foods ,one commutes 30km, the other 50km, both live in Kildare one in an urban setting the other rural, you cannot limit the lockdown to specific towns.

DeanAustin

DeanAustin wrote: »

By all accounts, there have been extensive measures implemented in meat factories.

Do you believe any of them are effective without a complete redesign of the slaughterhouses and processes.

Zebra3

Graham wrote: »

Wherever you draw the lines, there's always going to be places just either side of them.

County lines allow for some sort of buffer zone I suppose. It will be interesting to see if more localised lockdowns start to be applied.

County lines allow no buffer for people in unaffected areas like Maynooth, Celbridge and Leixlip from Timahoe.

Why are people in those towns with no problems being left exposed to people from where the outbreak is?

DeanAustin

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Do you believe any of them are effective without a complete redesign of the slaughterhouses and processes.

Honestly, I’ve no idea. I know nothing about the industry and I know little about this virus. But painting owners as pantomime villains who have completely disregarded public health to line their own pockets seems a bit simplistic.

Wanderer2010

DeanAustin wrote: »

By all accounts, there have been extensive measures implemented in meat factories. Stop polluting the discussion with supposition and hyperbole.

Meat factories are a genuine source of these new clusters, and they consist of in many cases foreign workers who are working very closely next to each other, thats even been said by people who work there, that 100% social distancing just isnt possible, given the nature of the work that goes on there.

I find it very surprising that the owners can get away with simply doing "a deep clean", which is a fuzzy description anyway, and then open as usual the next morning. They clearly couldnt give a fcuk about public health as long as the meat is rolling out the door, and since I have yet to see any teeth from the HSE and these agencies that threaten "severe sanctions" on businesses who flout the guidelines, i dont blame them for not caring.

ChikiChiki

Sesshoumaru wrote: »

Then I'm sure as all resources are being thrown at this, the area of lock down will be quickly refined down over the course of the next few days? No? Didn't think so. IMO my point still stands, no intelligence to this plan.

We're like a cancer patient still getting chemotherapy when the cancer is localised and can be cut out with a scalpel. The mistake here is having an arbitrary larger lock down area with weak enforcement. We should be smart and surgical about this with maximum enforcement.

It may well be refined. We don't know. This is the first local lockdown that's had to be imposed and we'll learn from it.

It's not a simple solution and evidently a lot of people will be pissed off no matter what decision is taken.

Sesshoumaru

DeanAustin wrote: »

It’s not stupidity. You may not agree with it and there may be other options but there is a logic to it.

We don’t have the following data to hand:

1. Where do the infected people live?
2. Where do the people they have been in contact with live?

I also have never tried managing populations before. So you’ve got to consider the above two points and also make this easy to understand for the general population.

You have a decent argument but dismissing the current lockdown as “stupidity” just undermines that argument.

I expect better from our government. Some personal information about me - my other half is from Hong Kong, so I was being personally lectured on this and getting information way before any lock down in this country on how Hong Kong has been handling it. All I'm saying is, there is no vaccine currently and even the people behind the most promising vaccine candidates say there is a possibility we may never have an effective vaccine. So we need to learn to be smarter and faster about this.

If we did take county borders as the starting point, then we have to move faster with contact tracing and be a bit more intelligent and dynamic about where the lock downs actually occur. But all I see from our government is a well intentioned monolithic approach. We could be dealing with this for years, we need to be better. That is all I want to see.

Cilldara_2000

DeanAustin wrote: »

By all accounts, there have been extensive measures implemented in meat factories. Stop polluting the discussion with supposition and hyperbole.

Whose accounts? Where?

At the least all these clusters in meat factories since the start of the pandemic right up to yesterday's indicate that whatever measures have been taken were inadequate.

We also have these accounts, granted almost three months old by now, that there were no measures and staff had to pay for their own PPE: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/may/14/everyones-on-top-of-you-sneezing-and-coughing-life-inside-irelands-meat-plants-covid-19

DeanAustin

DeanAustin wrote: »

Honestly, I’ve no idea. I know nothing about the industry and I know little about this virus. But painting owners as pantomime villains who have completely disregarded public health to line their own pockets seems a bit simplistic.

You are naive. It isn't just a problem with slaughterhouses in Ireland but elsewhere too. The German meat processors were just as feckless and hotspots are around their factories.

LuasSimon

The problem is the minimum wage sweat shops in Ireland’s meat factories but rather than just close them until they conform the government protect Larry Goodman and other backers by closing three counties of Kildare , laois and Offaly instead .

normanoffside

John O.Groats

Agent Smith wrote: »

Is that a photo of a 1940`s concentration camp? if it is it`s absolutely disgraceful that you should even try to make a comparison between that and the situation in the midland counties. You should hang your head in shame.

Darc19

DellyBelly wrote: »

I've seen the name Larry Goodman mentioned by a few people. Don't know him but see he involved in the meat business. By reading what people are saying here he comes across as a particularly nasty individual. Looks like he'd sell his grandmother if he thought he'd make money out of the deal.

Funny thing is that he has nothing to do with any of the facilities that have caused this lock down.

But some people get their views from rag tabloids and mimic fools such as Paul Murphy and his type and anyone earning decent money is not tolerated despite Murphy coming from a well off background and fee paying education.

Goodman is a big operation. His company makes about 2%-3% net profit.

Compare that to the profits of Apple, or penny's, or tk maxx and its miniscule, but because his operation is huge, it's a large amount in physical cash.

Still miniscule in comparison to some others.