Relaxation of Restrictions, Part XII *Read OP For Mod Warnings*

Has there been any further details or confirmation of the deal with Romania to buy one million vaccines . It was splashed on the news but I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere since

It is an unfortunate trait of Irish people that we do have an "I'm alright jack" attitude. Yes we will make all the right noises about how wrong it is and about how we should be doing more and blah blah but and then shrug our shoulders and move on. By right we should be out on the streets protesting and I don't just mean over this legislation I mean for protesting for better mental health services, better health services, etc. But if we were to do that we would be out every day of the week. We do need to hold our politicians to account and punish them when we get a chance its the only way that they will take notice.

In fairness the video I posted shows thousands. And the pics above are after dark, the bill was supposed to be signed in at 12.15

Maybe crowd had dispersed by the time these pics were taken?

Pretty obvious

Actually if you compare the video to those photos, there isn't much in the difference time wise. The same fruitcake with the Jesus flag is in the same place, the crowd is contained almost entirely within the junction in both the photo and video. The van waiting to go down the quays is still there.

The problem is that crowd size is virtually impossible to tell when you're standing in the middle of it. It always feels like there are way more people than there are.

that tweet is misleading and cut out a huge chunk on the bridge. Somehow given the accompanying text on the tweet , it doesn't seem like a reasoned report. clearly proven to be misleading in the 3rd reply which showed a video

I was there and there was defo a few thousand which was nice to see.

Nah there wasn't. Part of my job was dealing with traffic disruption caused by closure of road outside convention centre last night, so was monitoring the protest til about 11pm - I'd say 500 protestors would be generous, probably a lot less. For context, the Samuel Beckett bridge remained open with the crowd gathered in NE corner of the bridge not large enough to block it off, traffic was also able to drive all the way up to bridge before turning left onto Guild St and behind Convention Centre.

A large crowd would have blocked off all these roads by sheer mass alone - the small crowd, which wasn't particularly packed together but straggled out partially over Beckett Bridge, wasn't 'thousands'

I suppose that I would be tempted to ask you though — what exactly is a “measured easing”? It seems like a conveniently broad thing to support, but the term ‘measured’ to me would appear to suggest that you measure the easing versus the risk, right? So what is the risk now of, say, simply letting people sit in a pub or restaurant without engaging in this vaccinated distinction?

Ah yes. Look at all those countries around us closing indoor dining and bringing in discriminatory vaccine passport system. It's like if you gave child A one sweet and child B ten sweets. Then you give child A one more sweet and take one more sweet from child B and say to child B "sure you should be happier of the two of you, you've more than you had before and they have less".

Look at England for an example of a country not using vaccine passports... Of course they will most likely be locking down again shortly so maybe not the best example

In saying that, we are probably going to be back in Lockdown in September or October so why restrict ourselves until then?

it seems like a funny state of affairs with restaurants, staff can work there unvaccinated but couldnt eat there as a customer?

There's a big difference already between working in a restaurant and drinking/dining in one. The unvaccinated people working there are unlikely to be under 2m from each other or their customers without masks for long periods.. The customers on the other hand will be sitting at the same table and without masks on. From a safety perspective there is no comparison between the two

Annoying for the staff involved though admittedly

In Spain since June 26th it's been optional to wear a mask outside.

Sadly 95% of people are still fully masked up - some even doubly so - outside, in the hot weather - even walking alone.

It's good in a way because one knows immediately who is mentally ill, but it is frightening that so many people are.