Three in 10 Britons have stayed at home to avoid Covid in the last month and more than 40% have worn a face mask as fears about the virus persist, a survey suggests. MailOnline has the story.
The U.K. is currently in the midst of a mild fifth wave that has seen infections rise for the past month, with 2.7 million people carrying Covid in the most recent week – even though deaths and ICU admissions have remained flat.
An exclusive poll for MailOnline found 29% of people have stayed indoors at some point since cases began rising to avoid catching the virus, while 42% have worn a covering. Almost half observed social distancing rules that have not been in place since February, while two-thirds said they had sanitised their hands.
Just 16% of people, around one in six, had not taken any precautions in the last month, according to the survey of 1,500 Britons by Redfield & Wilton Strategies.
NHS bosses expect the latest wave to fizzle out naturally in the coming weeks, without the need for any onerous public health measures.
And MailOnline’s analysis of official data suggests the latest wave is plateauing, with Covid hospital admissions and cases both slowing down.
But that has not stopped individual hospitals, GP surgeries, care homes and some schools from reintroducing face masks and social distancing in recent weeks.
And across Britain’s towns and cities, a growing share of the public appear to be wearing masks in shops, supermarkets and on public transport. Retail bosses have warned that Britain is becoming a nation of hypochondriacs.
Luke Johnson – a serial entrepreneur and Chairman of Gail’s bakery – told MailOnline: “Recent research shows Covid is now no more lethal than influenza, thanks in part to vaccines and natural immunity. Society has never tested widely or shut down for flu – we have learned to live with it. We must do the same with Covid.
“We need to stop the irrational fear and get the disease in proportion. For the vast majority of those testing positive for Covid, they are asymptomatic or have cold-like symptoms. Unless we want to become a nation of hypochondriacs and suffer a much lower standard of living, society needs to stop testing, put Covid in the past, and regain its ambition.”
Worth reading in full.
The wave (which should probably count as the sixth, after spring 2020, winter 2020-21, Delta, Omicron BA.1 and Omicron BA.2) does appear to be peaking. Reported infections have levelled off in the last week or so (even allowing for the reporting lag).
The ONS Infection Survey today reported a new jump in infections, to 5.3% of the population in England, but note this was for the week ending July 7th, which according to the chart above appears to have been the peak.
The slowing trend is clearer in Scotland.
Hospital admissions are flattening off (bear in mind that only around a third of ‘Covid’ admissions are mainly ill with Covid).
Covid ICU admission have crept up a little, but nothing alarming.
Deaths may also be easing off, though the reporting lag needs to be allowed for in the most recent days. Note that around 60% of ‘Covid’ deaths are registered with Covid as the underlying cause.
What baffles me is with every wave it’s clear that Covid behaves exactly the same way, rising and peaking to around the same level in the same time period before falling again, regardless of what interventions are imposed. Yet lockdown zealots continue to claim that their various restrictions are necessary and effective for ‘controlling the virus’ and never seem to adapt their beliefs to the evidence.
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Seems like nonsense to me. Out and about locally in shops and down in London on tubes and trains mask wearing is max 5%, often less.
All that needs to have happened is for someone to have worn a mask, or kept their distance, just once any time in the past month, for them to be included on the list of those having taken “precautions”. This might have been because somebody specifically requested them to do so, not because it’s a regular habit. As I’ve also observed, your 5% is probably much closer to the mark for those who are regular “mask-wearers” or “antisocial-distancers”
Everyone wants to be a Hiroo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiroo_Onoda
For some people, the war can never be over until there’s no more fighting, even if they’re the only ones doing the fighting.
This survey doesn’t even remotely reflect conditions in Reading town centre. But considering that it’s really a survey about what an unknown group of people selected as answers to an unknown set of questions, that’s hardly surprising. The typical non-Chinese mask wearers here would be overweight housewives also otherwise radiating a strong sense of self-rightousness. These will probably insist that they’ll be masked in their respective coffins just to show the world how right they are about everything for a final time.
There’s also no COVID wave in England, just a wave of ONS guesstimates derived from methodically unsuitable probing of random, small subsets of the population. Eliminating this public disservice would be an excellent opportunity for shrinking the state a little in a productive way.
We get a few frightened sheep, masochists and concentration camp guard types wearing masks out and about here in Leeds, but it’s no more than 5-10%. For the rest, well, they think it’s all over, but I do worry about them folding again if/when they’re “advised” to mask up and protect others.
“but I do worry about them folding again if/when they’re “advised” to mask up and protect others.”
Yes I think that’s a big worry too although I believe there will be more dissenters if/when there is a next time. Autumn will be interesting.
Wether this is a BS article or not I like to think that the spineless masses are taking responsibility for their madness. As such no lockdowns or mandates would be necessary so leaving the sceptics to go about unimpeded
Typical survey with people answering what they think they should say rather than what they actually do. 40% may say they are wearing a mask but in my recent experiences I reckon 5% (at most) are.
I don’t know who these covid cretins are, but i’m up at St. Andrews today with about 15 thousand others and there are zero restrictions no masks anywhere and everything is completely normal. I guess the bed wetters did us all a favour and stayed away.
The reality is nothing like what these polls suggest, since even though one may have taken a precaution perhaps once in the month leading up to the survey, it does not make you a regular hypochondriac who would willingly fling yourself into fast moving traffic to avoid a fleeting encounter with a mildly infected person.
But still, SPI-B and the government’s insidious mind-control campaign worked a little too well: I still on occasions glimpse drivers muzzled up in their own cars, those who would hide their smile for eternity for a bit of imagined health security.
And even though Covid’s estimated severity has dropped to roughly that of the flu, it still has this ominous stigma attached, where it’s mere mention sends shivers down the spines of some when it’s really just a bit of the lurgy in most cases.
Currently in Airedale Hospital, near Keighley with my daughter who fell down a hill during break time and may have broken her wrist. I was dreading entering the hospital fearing it would involve unpleasant mask nonsense and had mentally prepared my lines, but happy to report that overall masking around the hospital is at roughly 50%, staff and visitors. Lots of masks being worn under the nose, not tightly fitting, pulled down to talk / because wearer hot etc.
Top Trumps Covid Lunacy Rating 4
In essence, they’re just talismans. We may live in modern times. But our minds still work in the same ancient ways.
Wish your daughter a speedy recovery! She’s obviously not a boring moron because they are all safe and sensible and never even go near hills or inclines of any kind as there’s a 0.0013% chance of getting hurt.
Similar. I had to go to the doctors this morning and given what has been put out by the MSM I was expecting some unpleasantness particularly re masks.
Blow me down not one masked member of staff. “Morning Sharon” said I, “nice to see your face again.” What a smooth talker.
There is still a screen at the reception desk battling the incoming Covid Airborne in that area of the sky between about three feet six inches and seven foot but I can only imagine that all other Covid bandits outside this limited air space have given up.
Shocked I was.
That’s good to hear. What wasn’t so good to see was a new permanent-looking building called ‘CMDU’ – Covid Medicines Delivery Unit.
Or ‘Completely Manufactured Dystopia Unit’ as I renamed it in my head. Daughter’s arm is broken; we were there for almost five hours
Sorry to hear about the broken arm. Hope it heals well – a typical event at school holiday time. I remember going to hospital with one of my children to check the progress of his broken arm. The clinic was stowed out with children with various limbs in plaster. All causalities of school holiday mishaps.
You’ll get an insight into the NHS…
I don’t agree I’m afraid. I have seen very little mask wearing while out and about shopping etc, just a few diehard mask wearers who will probably never go away. Our social lives (such as they are) are continuing as normal and events and functions locally are in full swing. I know no one with covid (and, tbh, anyone who knows they’ve got covid is obviously a keen tester, because as far as I can see it is indistinguishable from a cold) and no one in my acquaintance talks about covid anymore. In fact, the only place from which I hear about ‘a covid wave’ is the media
Give it a rest.
Four associates, all NHS staff, off with the C1984.
All fully perforated. In fact the only people I know reporting covid are the fully perforated. Funnily enough they still enjoy testing on a regular basis.
As I’ve said many times this would all be extremely funny if it wasn’t also killing people and destroying lives…
It’s interesting. I’m in a large school most of the time and teachers are ‘getting it’ constantly apparently but the kids don’t seem to be….
Will, the relevance of the last paragraph is very telling. Until something drastic is done to break the embedded behaviour pattern, the lockdown zealots are putty in the hands of those who stand to lose if the whole palaver is repeated. It isn’t just the virus which has Antibody-Dependent Enhancement aka Vaccine enhanced Disease! If the virus is now a retrovirus, part of the genotype, the zealots have given away free will in exchange for conditioned reflex.
Its hard to believe that having gone through the last two years you would have thought the government would have learned something, but oh no, it is likely that if they listen to Bill Gates and the WHO we are heading for yet another authoritarian episode this winter.
This is bullshit media fear mongering. I see about two people a day wearing a mask around us and we live on the edge of a city and frequent some big supermarkets.
In reality, there is a small number of people who have caught the habit, some of whom I come across in supermarkets. They are all victims of poor education to the extent of believing that they do any good.
Today, on a day out on the Watercress Railway between Alton & Alresford (near Winchester), I noticed one person using one (who was a volunteer worker on a sales stand), and that was it. No one else at all.
There’s no evidence of increased “Covid theatre” down here in Dorset. A few people are still wearing masks in shops and occasionally you see one in the street but the vast majority are mask-free and seem to be getting on with their lives.
Yeah those “lock downers” and “stay at home’rs” who just have time to drop into Asda to do their shopping. The government has created a “skivers charter”
Tim Spector and his readers are in the coronophobic camp I’m afraid. I stopped logging on the Zoe app some time ago but it’s depressing how Tim is now ramping up the hype.
My local chemist has so many notices on the door (ALL of which are out of date) that I have told them it’s a health and safety issue as you can’t see whether anyone is coming in or going out. They still insist on the ridiculous rule of only having one person in the shop at a time. When challenged all the bloke could say was they had been told to continue “the stupid nonsense” by their head office. I might as well have been talking to a lamppost for all the response I received.
I just wondered, does anybody know what ever happened to the common cold? It seems to me that if you catch any the traditional symptoms it is instantly slef-diagnosed as Covid. Is it possible that Covid has finally seen off the common cold and its 200 or so variants?