"Nobody cares about Covid anymore"

Scare Byrne really let herself down during the Covid crisis. The show became unwatchable and she lost all her journalist credibility.

Bear in mind, there was no talk of variants until the vaccines were announced in November 2020.

Yep. Cases and hospitals reducing in the north east USA already.

Speaking of hospitalisations,down to 507 in hospitals with Covid this morning. Approx 100 drop in the last couple of days.

There's more in hospital on trolleys now than there are with COVID... The smart people were lying on a trolley saying they thought they had COVID to get a bed

The WHO aren't concerned about this new variant anyway

See, this is where I find it incredulous that health experts didn't think this was going to happen.

Now, in the absence of data I am only speculating.

I'm convinced our bed occupancy rate for 2020 was lower than any year previous (despite the hysterics in the media)...we have 11,000 beds in the system. We know we suffer from spill over during the winter months.

But in 2020, I'd say the occupancy rate during the May-Oct 2020 period was well below average. Irish people didn't get healthy all of a sudden. So that was always going to catch up with the health system. If an ordinary punter could see that coming, you'd wonder how the State didn't see it coming.

I'd have guessed it was higher than 20% but it'd only be a guess.

But even still, that 15-20% drop in bed numbers (which has probably never happened before) was always going to accumulate, added to how many people lived in a very unhealthy fashion during those very strange times, as well the fact we effectively grew our waiting lists from 500,000 to 900,000 (approx) in the same period.

Like I said, an ordinary punter could see the excess deaths, the increased demand on the health system coming, a lot of posters were castigated on here for predicting it.

To answer the OP I think most people have gotten back to normal now.

People we're scared in March 2020 due to the news and the Government's reaction.

As the weeks went on tough it became more difficult for people there was a real tense vibe in lots of households.

The government reopened the country and people kicked up about young people standing near one another queueing for a nightclub. What did these people think these people were going to do inside or there general attention was for the night.

Then along came the masks. I found lots of people didn't have much interest in these. They were pulled out of pockets/car doors and thrown on. You'd have ones lecturing people about masks and there own was dirty and ill-fitting.

Remember we nearly had invite granny over for Christmas but leave her in a room with the windows open.

Then the vaccine and people thought it was going to be end of it.

The fear in some elderly people didnt go away They were going to the shops/socialising in March 2020 to end up being housebound and not coming out anymore now.

However most people wanted to go back to Ireland 2019. Older people wanted to back with the Grandkids and going to the shops, activities, holidays,etc. Families wanted there old lives with holidays, outings, kids socialising, etc. Younger people wanted to go back to clubs, hooking up etc.(Just generalising but you know what I mean.)

Lockdowns suited people who were all loved up at home and never went anywhere or those who didn't socialise in the first place basically because it didn't effect there lifestyle.

Covid also allowed certain people gain a following on social media also and they liked the attrition.

They were mentioned extensively? Right then, did we get the Wuhan Strain or the Italian strain does anyone remember?

Yes, I do enjoy the 'just move on' narrative from the lads who cheered on every Covid restriction the NPHET proposed. Never mind the fact that we've added €50bn to the national debt over the 2 years - not exactly easy to move on from. We're going to have that as a drag on our kids standard of living for decades to come.

There should be a tribunal set up to investigate every decision made during Covid and lessons should be learned. First question could be why every pervious pandemic response plan was jettisoned in favor of copying what a totalitarian state on the other side of the world were doing - then we could proceed from there. Look at every bit of Covid-theatre and what the cost-benefits of them were.

Wow, how humans have behaved for thousands of years, and behaviours which society is basically built upon (socializing, communicating, seeing faces, coexisting with viruses etc) didn't change over the course of a few winters. Shocking stuff.

There's never been a variant that hasn't provoked an over reaction, even Omnicron spawned an hysterical reaction from Ministers in Nov 2021...despite the South African doctor who identified it repeatedly stated how mild it was..."increased transmission rate"...how many times have we heard that?

Wasn't one of those restrictions that there was to be no music in pubs?

Or sound on the tv....

It's shaping up to be more like the madness of the Summer of 85, the year of the moving statues!!!

Ya, there is merit in your point, we were one of the most vaccinated countries in the world in Nov 2021, and we were still restricted. Omnicron is the element that I believe freed us from the madness.

I'm genuinely sorry, I have told you before I won't engage with you.

I have never run away from any argument on here on any topic, you are the first person I have had to disengage with, you stated Covid is worse than Cancer, we all know your argument, it is a ridiculous one....and you consistently accuse others of posting falsehoods!!!! I can't spend time going to and fro with someone who actually takes a position like that.

We all know what released us from restrictions in this country, it was the mildness of Omnicron....you could argue vaccines helped, that is a position anyone could take...but it was the mildness of Omnicron that ended the restrictions here.