Moral or other question regarding visits into lower COVID tier area.

[Paul_B]

We're in a tier 3 area but actual infection rate we live in is as low as neighbouring tier 1 area (North Lancashire to South Cumbria). This should mean that actions the tier 1 habitants can do carry the same risks as if we do it too. For example visiting public gardens or parks over the border in South Cumbria.

Tier 3 restrictions only advises residents of tier 3 areas from visiting lower tier areas. This is advised not compulsory based on what I've read on the government site.

As I see it the tier areas are set by large scale areas when they can identify infection rates in a smaller scale area. It's easily possible to split Lancashire into tier 3 areas , tier 2 areas and tier 1 areas. This I believe should have been done based on transparent sets of criteria. If they had we could then take our leisure time in the areas just over the border we prefer, without any sense of breaking rules. I can travel just about 5 miles with a good car run to pass into Cumbria and tier 1, that's two tiers lower than ours. Going the other way I take half an hour or so to get up into what is a high infection rate area, possibly longer journey.

So would you feel it morally or in another way wrong to go over the border into a tier 1 area for an outside, socially distanced gathering with close family?

 

[Toddy]

Yes.

Your immediate area within the Tier3 might be low, but since you and your neighbours, and children, are living within that area and presumably shopping, working, going to school within that area, that doesn't mean that your immediate residence gets a free pass.

I live in Lanarkshire. I know no one who has the disease or has had the disease, yet our county is now most likely to be moved into the highest tier tomorrow. My immediate village is a very safe place, but shopping, schooling, etc., is mostly done outside the village.
So we'll just be good a while longer and hope folks actually do isolate enough to stop the damned disease spreading.

M

 

[Van-Wild]

Yes it is wrong.

The biggest reason why it has been so darned difficult to control the spread of C19 in the UK is largely down to people doing what you suggest, ie; disregarding Gov Restrictions put in place to protect us all.

It really is simple.

1. Follow the Gov Restrictions
2. Wear a mask in public
3. Dont be selfish



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[Stew]

Yes it is wrong.

The biggest reason why it has been so darned difficult to control the spread of C19 in the UK is largely down to people doing what you suggest, ie; disregarding Gov Restrictions put in place to protect us all.

It really is simple.

1. Follow the Gov Restrictions
2. Wear a mask in public
3. Dont be selfish



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Well put. I was thinking of how to word it But you’ve done it nicely.

 

[TLM]

IF the government regulations and guidelines are effective and not just for the show. One must remember that that the last link in the chain giving them is a politician.

I am saying this because we just had a minor government scandal here in Finland. It became apparent that the order not to use masks in the spring was more than half way politically defined.

 

[Broch]

I'm glad I didn't respond last night; others have put it better than I would have when I first read your post.

Yes, stay in your area. Unfortunately, England has left the door open; Scotland and Wales have been far more clear. We live in one of the lowest infection areas of the UK but we're in total lockdown to help overcome this!

 

[MartiniDave]

If you were living in a tier1 area, how would you feel about people from higher risk areas coming into your area?

 

[John Fenna]

Around here we are prepared to shoot on sight - well, shoot VERY strong black looks... at the very least....

 

[Duggie Bravo]

Absolutely stay in the Tier 3 area and do not travel.
My parents live in a Tier 3 area, they are going to continue to visit their caravan, because it’s in the same Tier 3 area, I haven’t bothered to look m, but I would suspect that one location has a higher infection rate than the other.
I had the discussion with them earlier in the year, it obviously fell on deaf ears.
I won’t be visiting them anytime soon.


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[rancid badger]

Exactly what Van Wild said.

 

[sunndog]

My GF lives in a tier 3 area so I don't think I'm allowed to visit but a mobile hairdresser is allowed to visit, who visits god knows how many households in a week because it's for work.

I question the effectiveness of these stealth lockdowns

 

[Paul_B]

Hypothetical question. If there were no such things as counties and county boundaries how would you suggest they mark the boundaries of a tier system like England has? It is the heart of my question because right now they've placed the tiers using the county boundaries ignoring the differences within counties.

The idea behind tiers is to impose restrictions where they're needed and not where they're not needed to control the rise in infection rates whilst minimizing the economic costs. If they can measure infection rate to local areas right down to small town possibly even village size then why don't they use that detail in placing tier boundaries? What they've done to Lancashire that could have put tier 3 across England North of Birmingham and had the same effect as what they've done to Lancashire.

Apart from a patch of high infection rate around Lancaster university North Lancashire from practically Fylde North is at the infection rate of tier 2 towards the South of that area and tier 1 North of that area. You have to get further south and east to get to tier 3 levels.

I guess I'm venting here but my point is they've applied the tier system to large scale governmental boundaries not to infection rate boundaries. Effectively ignoring scientific evidence. If the science by way of infection rate indicates no increased risk of travel between two areas either side of Lancashire/Cumbria border then why is the blind following of irrational restrictions right and choosing to follow evidence wrong?

I would rather the restrictions are unfair to all or not unfair at all? By that I mean a national lockdown or a fair and evidence based infection rate restriction system. My local town is in Cumbria my kid goes to school in Cumbria our life is as much I'm Cumbria as in Lancashire. It's why I feel this unfairness strongly. It's madness!

 

[Corso]

We'll all be tier 3 soon enough

This Virus isn't going anywhere

 

[Toddy]

Thing is @Paul_B that everyone's a special snowflake, and the County boundaries, or city limits, are the easiest, quickest and most effective way to do thie job.
It's not life long, it's a matter of weeks or perhaps a couple of months.

A little patience is a good thing, and if we all just live a little more simply then others get to simply live.

The NHS is already feeling the pressure, and flu season isn't here yet. I think a little forbearance is not an unreasonable expectation to ask from all of us.

M

 

[sunndog]

Thing is @Paul_B that everyone's a special snowflake, and the County boundaries, or city limits, are the easiest, quickest and most effective way to do thie job.
It's not life long, it's a matter of weeks or perhaps a couple of months.

A little patience is a good thing, and if we all just live a little more simply then others get to simply live.

The NHS is already feeling the pressure, and flu season isn't here yet. I think a little forbearance is not an unreasonable expectation to ask from all of us.

M

"Perhaps a couple of months"


What happens then, vaccine, herd immunity, virus gets bored and goes home?
I don't watch the news so may well have missed something.

 

[Toddy]

I have no idea. I cannot see the future any better than those who study pandemic spreads.

The last time we had a pandemic though, there was no vaccine available, and it was three years before things settled down.

What do I do is that 761 people died of this disease, in the UK, in the last week, and yet when we didn't move around, when travel was restricted to five miles from home, we were down to no deaths in Scotland.

You want to look the families of those 761 people in the face and say you're too special to abide by a few simple restrictions ?

I don't.

 

[Broch]

Sorry Paul, we can all argue special cases and I'm sure the groups that gather at parties and the like do as well. If we are prepared to sit tight here in Powys (in total lockdown) with very low number of cases throughout the county I don't have any sympathy with people wanting to travel around from areas that have higher numbers of cases.

What has been obvious in this area is that whereas the locals have generally kept up social distancing, remained polite in towns, and have been sensible out and about, the people coming in from outside (filling up the caravan sites around) have not. There's no social distancing when they meet at the pubs and social clubs - to the point in some cases where the locals have stopped going. I know that is a generalisation so apologies to the visitors that have maintained sensible attitudes.

 

[sunndog]

Hang on why am I being vilified here?
Have I said I won't abide by government guidelines?
Have I insisted my case is special?


No I haven't so excuse me if I let your righteous indignation slide on by
Look families of the dead in the eye...no need to go full WMD on me.
My original post might have been advocating tighter restrictions, hairdressing isn't essential work now is it

My question and implication was please don't put time limits on things when there are none.

 

[sunndog]

Sorry Paul, we can all argue special cases and I'm sure the groups that gather at parties and the like do as well. If we are prepared to sit tight here in Powys (in total lockdown) with very low number of cases throughout the county I don't have any sympathy with people wanting to travel around from areas that have higher numbers of cases.

What has been obvious in this area is that whereas the locals have generally kept up social distancing, remained polite in towns, and have been sensible out and about, the people coming in from outside (filling up the caravan sites around) have not. There's no social distancing when they meet at the pubs and social clubs - to the point in some cases where the locals have stopped going. I know that is a generalisation so apologies to the visitors that have maintained sensible attitudes.

Social distancing ended at the end of lockdown around here. They took all the spacing lines up from supermarkets ECT

 

[Billy-o]

I think we have to adopt the view that governments do not want to be voted out for over policing the Covid, reacting too strongly to the circumstances and possibly denting the economy more than necessary. True to form, in the main, they have brought in the bare minimum of precautions. We have to pick up the slack ourselves. Don't travel at the moment, keep yourself to yourself a little bit more than the government asks, and assume that the protesting anti-maskers are the irresponsibly biddable halfwits they appear to be.