covid-19

Yes and many of those were done. :rolleyes:

The eat out scheme was about encouraging responsible behaviour too. Sitting down for a meal socially distanced, not cramming into a crowded bar. Many bars reoriented themselves to be more food led and more socially distanced as a result.

Hospitality needs trade and needs cash. Getting people to sit down and have a meal then leave is better than encouraging drunks to go on pub crawls.

As for bars there is no real distinction in licensing between a bar and a restaurant. Hence why when the government did try and say only with a meal for Tier 3 the media went crazy over Scotch Eggs. Because any bar can start serving meals and now it is a restaurant - there is no difference in licensing terms! Licensing is about the ability to serve alcohol, not the ability to serve food. You try to define what is a bar and what defines it needing to be closed.

Nightclubs were made to stay closed.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

Yes and many of those were done. :rolleyes:

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Please give me a list showing which of those measures were mandatory shortly after the July 4 easing of regulations.

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The eat out scheme was about encouraging responsible behaviour too. Sitting down for a meal socially distanced

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It encouraged very large numbers of people to do something that greatly increases risk of transmission: hanging out indoors with people outside your immediate bubble—frequently in poorly ventilated venues—for a long period of time, obv. without masks. There was minimal social distancing, but, even if there had been, it would've been nearly as dangerous. This foolish policy made a substantial contribution to sustaining community transmission all over England.

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Hospitality needs trade and needs cash. Getting people to sit down and have a meal then leave is better than encouraging drunks to go on pub crawls.

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You'll have to weigh these purported gains against the negative economic impact and the cost in lives lost and people saddled with disability due. You could probably have just given that money—and more—to businesses, and still come out far ahead.

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As for bars there is no real distinction in licensing between a bar and a restaurant. Hence why when the government did try and say only with a meal for Tier 3 the media went crazy over Scotch Eggs. Because any bar can start serving meals and now it is a restaurant - there is no difference in licensing terms! Licensing is about the ability to serve alcohol, not the ability to serve food. You try to define what is a bar and what defines it needing to be closed.

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You don't have to; you can simply state that physically distanced table service for food is all right in the restaurant area of an establishment, while hanging out at the bar—or just drinking alcohol—is not. You can also restrict group size, maximum number of patrons, and opening hours, mandate outdoor dining. All measures would have a much greater impact on bars than on restaurants.

There is no legal distinction between "restaurant area" and "bar area". The two are one and the same for many venues. Easy enough for a venue to say all of its area is now a restaurant area.

Telling people they have to be seated deals with that as well as anything else can.

Here I am, reading arguments about all the aspects of the UK response, realising over there they handled almost every aspect worse... Seriously, the criticism on the UK test and trace program may be valid, but over here it was essentially stopped for a while because they were overwhelmed. The app worked (no missing info at least), but in my case my friend got sick on Monday evening, tested Tuesday, results on Wednesday, and then I got the app notification on Thursday morning. Of course I was already informed since it was a friend, but that was some delay. And since back then test and trace was essentially overwhelmed, I was never contacted beyond the app notification. And since test capacity was limited, I was never tested as I didn't have symptoms (only asked to stay inside for 10 days, which I did). The instructions on what to do were clear at least, i suppose.

.. though on the bright side, closing all non essential stores in December seems to have had some effect as the numbers are dropping for positive tests, and hospitals did not reach capacity while the numbers appear to have peaked.

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Originally Posted by Flixy

Here I am, reading arguments about all the aspects of the UK response, realising over there they handled almost every aspect worse... Seriously, the criticism on the UK test and trace program may be valid, but over here it was essentially stopped for a while because they were overwhelmed. The app worked (no missing info at least), but in my case my friend got sick on Monday evening, tested Tuesday, results on Wednesday, and then I got the app notification on Thursday morning. Of course I was already informed since it was a friend, but that was some delay. And since back then test and trace was essentially overwhelmed, I was never contacted beyond the app notification. And since test capacity was limited, I was never tested as I didn't have symptoms (only asked to stay inside for 10 days, which I did). The instructions on what to do were clear at least, i suppose.

.. though on the bright side, closing all non essential stores in December seems to have had some effect as the numbers are dropping for positive tests, and hospitals did not reach capacity while the numbers appear to have peaked.

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From memory are you Dutch? The Dutch response does seem to have been a bit odd recently.

I certainly can't comprehend what they're thinking regarding vaccinations. The UK is likely to have done at least 2 million before the Dutch have done even their first. :confused:

Yep, Dutch.

I think I posted before about the vaccination fuckup here, but long story short, they planned on wrong assumptions, and ignored signals that the assumptions were incorrect, and only far too late changed their plans.

The good news is that, with the UK smashing the vaccine rollout race, international comparisons are -back-, baby!

I'm struggling to think what sort of assumptions could be that badly wrong they couldn't be fixed before next week, short of not having bought the freezers.

Its nearly a month now since the UK approved the vaccine, that should have indicated to the Dutch they could be getting some soon you would have thought?

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

I'm struggling to think what sort of assumptions could be that badly wrong they couldn't be fixed before next week, short of not having bought the freezers.

Its nearly a month now since the UK approved the vaccine, that should have indicated to the Dutch they could be getting some soon you would have thought?

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Afaict they hadn't sorted out the logistics for the Pfizer vaccine, instead focusing on getting the AZN vaccine out through regular flu vaccination system.

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Originally Posted by RandBlade

There is no legal distinction between "restaurant area" and "bar area". The two are one and the same for many venues. Easy enough for a venue to say all of its area is now a restaurant area.

Telling people they have to be seated deals with that as well as anything else can.

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Sure, so you can mandate seated eating at a table, with 2m distance, small parties and small total number of patrons, with restricted hours, etc, etc. Clearly you could've answered your question yourself. Now, which of the measures I listed in my previous post were mandated shortly after the restrictions were lifted on July 4?

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Originally Posted by Aimless

Sure, so you can mandate seated eating at a table, with 2m distance, small parties and small total number of patrons, with restricted hours, etc, etc. Clearly you could've answered your question yourself. Now, which of the measures I listed in my previous post were mandated shortly after the restrictions were lifted on July 4?

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Seated at a table I believe was the guidance at the time yes, distanced at '1m+' was there too, as was having a reduced number of patrons due to social distancing is another. So 3 off the top of my head.

From your others outdoor serving was allowed from before 4 July (for "takeaway") so was also staggered from the other loosenings.

Not restricted hours earlier on as the idea was to have social distancing so cramming people into reduced hours makes that counter-productive in theory. That changed later on as people were staying in and not following the rules in later hours - but that got widely condemned by many for the same reason that it was cramming people into the same time window making distancing harder.

https://www.tiktok.com/@memepower323...60256796249345

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Originally Posted by Aimless

Afaict they hadn't sorted out the logistics for the Pfizer vaccine, instead focusing on getting the AZN vaccine out through regular flu vaccination system.

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If only. As usual privacy fetishism played a role. Another problem is that there simply is no central agency with the necessary authority. Usually decentralized works great. Turns out that it's not so great if you need quick responses. The discussion is mostly about who should vaccinate whom. There was a serious discussion if you could have hospitals jabbing their own staff. It was kind of surreal.

I've been exposed :\

But I'm getting paid time off till Monday

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Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer

I've been exposed :\

But I'll getting paid time off till Monday.

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Same, just got the notification through the app. A little surprised about the date, only was near one person that day and it wasn't her.

1,325 Covid-19 deaths recorded in the last 24 hours in the UK. The highest yet.

Incredible. Heartbreaking. Completely out of control.

Georgia hit 10k cases for the first time. Students returning to campus in a week.

The UK will now require a negative covid test to enter the country, a mere 344 days after the first UK case.

You'd be doing the world a favor if you required an exit test instead.

New York mucking distribution up in spectacular fashion.

Georgia is vaccinating 12k people per day. Which is far below New York's pathetic rate.

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Originally Posted by Loki

Georgia is vaccinating 12k people per day. Which is far below New York's pathetic rate.

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What do you expect from a blue state . . .

:o

Georgia has administered 135,605 first doses (1.3% of the population), accounting for 23% of total first doses shipped

New York has administered 200,000 first doses (1.0% of the population), accounting for 17% of total first doses shipped

Meanwhile Texas...

Texas has administered 541,512 first doses (1.9% of the population), accounting for 36% of total first doses shipped

Not sure where you're getting your numbers from. NYC alone administered 170k vaccines (NYC has a smaller population than Georgia). The rest of New York State has administered even more.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/01...-get-a-vaccine

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Originally Posted by Loki

Not sure where you're getting your numbers from. NYC alone administered 170k vaccines (NYC has a smaller population than Georgia). The rest of New York State has administered even more.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/01...-get-a-vaccine

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TX is slightly behind NY both wrt % of population vaccinated and wrt % of doses administered:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...ine-doses.html

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Originally Posted by Loki

Not sure where you're getting your numbers from. NYC alone administered 170k vaccines (NYC has a smaller population than Georgia). The rest of New York State has administered even more.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/01...-get-a-vaccine

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https://time.com/collection/coronavi...cines-updates/

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Originally Posted by Lewkowski

https://time.com/collection/coronavi...cines-updates/

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The info they're drawing on hasn't been updated for several days wrt NY. NY has administered > 540k doses.

Vaccine figures updated. Going to be going daily, not sure if that's from today. 2.6 million doses given out so far across 2.3 million people.

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The Welsh are the only ones disproportionately very slow. No idea why. Welsh government is Labour and Liberal Democrat ran, hopefully they can catch up soon.

Click through for thread that will definitely make you happy I would not lie to you :) :) :)

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