[Bored chemist]

it is for God to decide who lives and who dies

If that's true, then He will. He is, after all, God. That's kind of the point of being God- you get what you want.
So your own ideas make your post irrelevant.

[Bored chemist]

If medico's can assist with vaccines then all to the good but lockdowns are no good as everyone must be herd immune in the end.

You do not seem to understand what "herd immunity" means.

The version put forward by lazy politicians says that we hide all the vulnerable people away for a while, and let the virus rip through those who will not be harmed by it.

However, we do not actually have a mechanism for identifying those people.

Imagine, for a moment that someone came up with a test to see who is susceptible.
And we took all those people and isolated them.

And then we shot them all, or, at least the vast majority of them.

Would that be the right thing to do?

[alancalverd]

it is for God to decide who lives and who dies

....thus saving the taxpayer vast sums of money wasted on road safety, clean water, fire, police and ambulance services....all of which are blasphemous at best and sinful at worst..

[acsinuk (OP)]

My point is we cannot stop the mutation of new variants or new viruses.  Medico's must respond immediately but the risk of infection to vulnerable people will always be there until everyone in the whole world has been exposed to the virus and their immune system overcome the infection thus global herd immunity is achieved.   .  We must not live in a world full of fear and enforced isolation.  We want freedom as a personal right.

[Bored chemist]

My point is we cannot stop the mutation of new variants or new viruses.  Medico's must respond immediately but the risk of infection to vulnerable people will always be there until everyone in the whole world has been exposed to the virus and their immune system overcome the infection thus global herd immunity is achieved.   .  We must not live in a world full of fear and enforced isolation.  We want freedom as a personal right.

You forgot to answer this, which is a pity because it's relevant.

Imagine, for a moment that someone came up with a test to see who is susceptible.
And we took all those people and isolated them.

And then we shot them all, or, at least the vast majority of them.

Would that be the right thing to do?

[charles1948]

If medico's can assist with vaccines then all to the good but lockdowns are no good as everyone must be herd immune in the end.

You do not seem to understand what "herd immunity" means.

The version put forward by lazy politicians says that we hide all the vulnerable people away for a while, and let the virus rip through those who will not be harmed by it.

However, we do not actually have a mechanism for identifying those people.

Imagine, for a moment that someone came up with a test to see who is susceptible.
And we took all those people and isolated them.

And then we shot them all, or, at least the vast majority of them.

Would that be the right thing to do?

That reminds me of the H.G Wells' movie "Things to Come".  In it, people were afflicted by a new plague called, I think, the "Wandering  Sickness".  This made people stop whatever they were doing and walk about in a wandering zombie-like manner, spreading the plague.

To combat this, one of the main characters in the movie, who was called I think "The Boss" issued a general order to all citizens , that anyone spotted exhibiting such symptoms should be immediately shot.

This successfully expunged the plague.

[alancalverd]

Medico's must respond immediately but the risk of infection to vulnerable people will always be there until everyone in the whole world has been exposed to the virus and their immune system overcome the infection thus global herd immunity is achieved

Like ebola, eh? Or polio, or smallpox, perhaps? Measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, typhoid, tetanus, cholera?

Are you hoping to be the next Tory Health Secretary, by any chance? (I doubt it - you seem to be literate).

[evan_au]

we cannot stop the mutation of new variants

We can certainly slow down the generation of new variants by reducing the raging number of active cases.
- By the usual methods of masks, social distancing, contact tracing and quarantine.
- But some countries are happy to let the variants multiply, under the delusion that this will improve the economy

Let a hundred variants bloom

We want freedom as a personal right.

You may plead for illness and death for yourself.
- But if you are in a hospital ICU, gasping for breath, I am sure your priorities will change
- And if you are unable to get into a hospital ICU because it is already full, I am sure that will also change your perspective

But those who want death and illness for others aren't treated with much respect
- If they are elected politicians, they are likely to suffer at the next poll

[alancalverd]

But those who want death and illness for others aren't treated with much respect
- If they are elected politicians, they are likely to suffer at the next poll

Let's discuss this after the next elections! My money is on the UK's corrupt and incompetent mass murderers getting safely re-elected because the alternative is SOCIALISM in England, UNION in Scotland, or NATIONALISM in Northern Ireland. Bogey words mean more than common sense. 

[acsinuk (OP)]

Quote from: Bored chemist on 09/04/2021 13:01:57
Imagine, for a moment that someone came up with a test to see who is susceptible.
And we took all those people and isolated them.
And then we shot them all, or, at least the vast majority of them.
Would that be the right thing to do?
Well, that would solve the worlds over population and climate change problems but is an over the top  measure as the cruise ship Diamond Princess found about 20% were infected but only 0.3% died           
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_on_Diamond_Princess     
 The fact is that if only 0.3% of the population, mostly elderly people will die and not the 5%  predicted by WHO
  But we must have a vaccine quickly to inject into NHS staff and emergency/council/supermarket workers to protect them whilst the rest of us voluntarily will avoid close contact with others.  No dragonian lockdowns or testing are needed.

[Bored chemist]

Quote from: Bored chemist on 09/04/2021 13:01:57
Imagine, for a moment that someone came up with a test to see who is susceptible.
And we took all those people and isolated them.
And then we shot them all, or, at least the vast majority of them.
Would that be the right thing to do?
Well, that would solve the worlds over population and climate change problems but is an over the top  measure as the cruise ship Diamond Princess found about 20% were infected but only 0.3% died           
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_on_Diamond_Princess     
 The fact is that if only 0.3% of the population, mostly elderly people will die and not the 5%  predicted by WHO
  But we must have a vaccine quickly to inject into NHS staff and emergency/council/supermarket workers to protect them whilst the rest of us voluntarily will avoid close contact with others.  No dragonian lockdowns or testing are needed.

By "susceptible", I meant those who would actually die.
Do you think it would have been acceptable identify them and then, to line them up and shoot them?

[acsinuk (OP)]

No, it would solve the overpopulation and global heating problem but is morally unacceptable.  Education is the answer. 
Look at the stats        https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/population-by-country/
Notice that the countries with civil wars and unrest are over populating as they need peace and not military regimes.
India has a population of 1.3 billion 20 times that of UK so even if they loose 20,000 people a day that would percentage wise be less severe that us loosing a thousand a day.
 People should just accept that pandemics are serious and not the governments fault. 

[alancalverd]

Problem is that the old are not the problem. They are going to die anyway, and have worked and paid for what they consume, so they are morally entitled to enjoy their lives. It is the young who consume without payment and will burden the world with their presence and emissions for the next 70 years.

Countries have no importance in geography,  physics or epidemiology- they are defined by arbitrary political boundaries that are not recognised by any other species or phenomenon. The population density of SIngapore is 20 times that of India and of India, only 1.4 times that of the UK. Is Singapore overpopulated?

However pandemics are definitely the fault of government. You can choose to control an infectious disease like ebola, or eradicate a disease like smallpox, or ignore a crippling and occasionally deadly disease like COVID because it would be Bad for the Economy to impose quarantine for a couple of weeks. The fact that Singapore has only 0.3% of the population infected, against 6.6% of the UK, suggests that the blend of malice, corruption and incompetence that defines British government, has a lot to do with it.

[Bored chemist]

Do you think it would have been acceptable identify them and then, to line them up and shoot them?

No,

Then why do you think it acceptable to kill them with a virus?

Because that's what you are proposing every time you talk about "herd immunity"- whether you use the term or not.

People should just accept that pandemics are serious and not the governments fault.

I don't think anyone (not even Jolly) has accused Boris and his friends of genetically engineering and releasing covid.
So nobody is saying that pandemics are the government's fault.

That would be silly.

What people are saying, because that's what the evidence shows, is that a government decision to not maintain stocks of PPE etc was a bad decision, and one  for which they are entirely to blame.

Boris walking round a hospital shaking hands with patients is clearly Boris' fault.

Boris deciding that maintaining lockdown over Xmas would be too unpopular- even though the scientists told him it was the sensible policy-  was clearly Boris' fault.
And the spike in deaths that resulted directly from that decision are down to the government.

[alancalverd]

Who signed the order to discharge infectious patients into nursing homes?

[Bored chemist]

Who signed the order to discharge infectious patients into nursing homes?

Boris either signed it, or appointed the person who signed it.

[CliffordK]

How do you intend to obtain herd immunity from ebola? Or malaria? These diseases are endemic in wildlife.

Malaria is a Human-Only disease.  There are no other hosts.  Mosquitoes simply spread the disease, but the entire reproductive cycle of the Malaria Plasmodium Protozoa is in humans. 

It is interesting that the human immune system can clear the disease, but at the moment can't prevent re-infection.  Yet, people that survive in Malaria endemic areas develop enough immunity that they typically only develop mild disease.

If one could develop a vaccine booster that was good for say 6 months, and could vaccinate the entire human population in a region, the disease could be locally eradicated by interrupting the reproductive/infection cycle.

[acsinuk (OP)]

Deaths are now under 10 per day but the numbers of cases that are positive is still around over 2000 which is a concern although very very few are having to go into hospital.
Could it be that people that have been vaccinated are able to test positive although not be infectious to other people as they pass on the immunity the vaccine has given them.?
It could be we should stop testing, except for foreign travel, as the results could be misleading

[Bored chemist]

they pass on the immunity the vaccine has given them.?

That's impossible.

It could be we should stop testing, except for foreign travel, as the results could be misleading

Did anyone mention to you that this is a science forum?

[evan_au]

Could it be that people that have been vaccinated are able to test positive although not be infectious to other people as they pass on the immunity the vaccine has given them.?

Recent tests have shown that mothers who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 pass on immunity to their infants via breastmilk. So, yes, it is possible to "pass on" immunity while breastfeeding.
- Unfortunately, this technique is not scalable to the general population...

I have heard some figures that suggest a vaccine with 90% efficacy at preventing COVID-19 infection (eg the mRNA vaccines) reduces the viral load significantly, and approximately halves the number of people who will be infected if a vaccinated person does come down with COVID-19.
- So one person being vaccinated does reduce the risk for unvaccinated people (provided the unvaccinated people only come into contact with vaccinated people)
- But in reality, unvaccinated people come into contact with a lot of unvaccinated people, allowing the virus to continue spreading through the community.
- It is estimated that with current vaccines, we need to reach something like 80-90% vaccination rates to inhibit spread of the Indian variants and allow a return to pre-COVID "normal".