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UK population told that ‘herd immunity’ is the only way to cope with crisis


dufus

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The UK has not introduced strict social distancing measures like the EU

Britain-Virus-Outbreak.jpg?f=16x9&w=1200

 

The UK’s plan to combat coronavirus is to slow the disease but not to stop its spread, a response that clearly diverges from that carried out by many of its European counterparts and badly-hit countries like China and South Korea.

 

The British government’s chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance told BBC radio on Friday that the new measures were a "big intervention" and that the thinking behind it was to try and prevent Covid-19 coming back more aggressively in the autumn.

 

“If you suppress something very hard and then if you release those measures, it bounces back,” he said.

 

Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday advised those with a persistent cough or a fever to self-isolate for seven days, told schools to cancel trips abroad and urged people over 70 not to go on cruises.

 

But the government has stopped short of imposing strict social distancing measures seen in France and Italy, where the whole country has been put on lockdown, because it does not want the population to tire of them.

 

Sir Patrick said cancelling major sporting events such as Saturday’s Six Nations fixture in Cardiff, which will attract a crowd of up to 75,000, would not stop the spread of the virus.

 

"The most likely place you are going to get an infection from is a family member or friend in a small space, not in a big space," he said.

 

“It’s eye-catching to stop those [events] but it’s not to say we would not do it in the future.”

 

Around 60 per cent of the UK population will need to contract the virus, which has been declared a pandemic, to get “herd immunity” from future outbreaks, Sir Patrick said.

 

sauce

 

 

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That is a very misleading title to the thread. It is not what we are being told, and it is only one part of a scientifically lead strategy our government is implementing.

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When the dust has settled the world needs to take a good look at what strategies worked, what failed, and come up with a better approach than the mish-mash we've seen. Imagine the even worse mess we'd be in if the mortality rates had been like Ebola or MERS...

 

I'm pessimistic though, most likely governments will just collectively breathe a huge sigh of relief and put it on the too-hard list. :(

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