Recliner wrote:

So what purpose do you think the masks worn by the public are meant to
serve?

To reassure the lemmings that their government is "doing something."

Arthur Conan Doyle wrote:
Recliner wrote:

So what purpose do you think the masks worn by the public are meant to
serve?

To reassure the lemmings that their government is "doing something."


Hardly.

Unlike in most other countries, masks are neither supplied not mandatory
for the public in the UK. The government has always made clear that they
were of no benefit to the wearer, and of limited benefit to others. It's
always insisted that medical grade PPE was reserved for health care
professionals, not the public.

In this respect at least, the government has been unusually honest, clear
and right.

In message , at 22:05:09 on Tue, 19
May 2020, MissRiaElaine remarked:

I'd still like to see your medical qualifications.

It's actually more of an engineering (& material) qualification that's
needed; also English Comprehension, to be able to understand the
official advice.

If you don't have any, shut up, you're as bad as the idiots wandering
around my local Morrisons.

Understanding how PPE (or even not-really-PPE) works is almost
completely disjoint from being able to dish out the correct amount of
medication.
--
Roland Perry

In message , at 01:35:15 on Wed, 20 May
2020, Recliner remarked:

Unlike in most other countries, masks are neither supplied not mandatory
for the public in the UK. The government has always made clear that they
were of no benefit to the wearer, and of limited benefit to others. It's
always insisted that medical grade PPE was reserved for health care
professionals, not the public.

I think they are issuing FFP3 masks to essential public sector workers,
who aren't strictly speaking "health care professionals".

And the funny thing is, those disposable 'surgical masks' we presume are
arriving on P2F's may not even be FFP2.
--
Roland Perry

The surprise is that stations like Oxford Circus and those others
you've cited are not in the most busy group. To me, living in Leyton,
it's not surprising to learn that Wood Green, North Acton and Leyton
are three of the busiest. (The others listed are all interchange stations
which hugely increases the footfall).

Leyton Underground Station - and I have done the count several times -
has in the off-peak periods about 25 passengers every three minutes
coming onto the westbound platform with a similar number
alighting from trains in the opposite direction. In the peak periods
the numbers are much higher. (These figures are of course pre-Covid 19)

When I travel off-peak south of the river on National Rail services, I'm
always startled by how few people use the trains.

"Recliner" wrote in message
...
tim... wrote:


"Recliner" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 19 May 2020 09:45:14 +0000 (UTC), wrote:

On Tue, 19 May 2020 08:25:34 -0000 (UTC)
Recliner wrote:
The 2m thing is like a religious prohibition: vaguely based on a
sensible

I hadn't thought of it like that, but it certainly matches peoples
behaviour.
Wierdly - assuming my local supermarket is typical - that behaviour is
forgotten in the aisles. Presumably because its almost impossible to
observe.

Tempting though it may be, most experts say we should not look for
individuals. Superspreading events are determined by a complex mix of
behavioural and environmental factors.

I wonder if its complex in reality. I imagine its the sort of people
who
wipe
their nose with their fingers then go and then go and touch a dozen
items
in
every shop they visit and hardly buy any of them just leaving them on
the
shelves nicely infected. Ditto when they touch the handles in buses and
trains.

In London, cases of coronavirus have dropped dramatically since the
lockdown. The superspreading events that were once spreading the virus
so
widely have now stopped.

I doubt they've stopped , far more likely IMO is that a significant
proportion
of the population have caught the virus without knowing it and are now
immune.

I think it's true that in London, most of the mobile population is now
either immune of not susceptible to the disease. I was in Waitrose
today, and everyone seemed more relaxed. Few of the staff were
bothering to wear the face shields they're supplied with, there was no
special sanitising of the trolley handles, and people got quite close
to each other in the aisles. There was also almost no queue to get in.

The few people with or susceptible to the disease in London are in
care homes or hospitals, and the task now is to stop it getting back
into the wider population.

though we are still getting 3,500 new cases every day

You're out by three orders of magnitude. The number of new cases a day in
London is probably now in single figures:

I mean in the whole country, and it's not the quantum that's the problem,
it's the fact that it has barely moved downwards from the peak, after 6
weeks of Lockdown (AIH it did yesterday)

I've argued before that a regional change in the rules is unfair and
unworkable, so the London number alone is IMHO not relevant

tim

"MissRiaElaine" wrote in message
...
On 19/05/2020 16:55, Basil Jet wrote:
On 19/05/2020 15:50, Sammi Gray-Jones wrote:
On 19/05/2020 15:13, Recliner wrote:
So what purpose do you think the masks worn by the public are meant to
serve?


They are a placebo, pure and simple, there to *make* the wearer think
that they are safer.


Of course masks make you safer. A mask over your mouth and nose isn't
going to save you if you are a nurse with people coofing into your
eyeball all day long, but if I'm in a supermarket and a virus floats
along and lands on my mask instead of my lips, it saved me and my family
from dying.

We give up. You carry on believing that. We're following the advice given
to us by a medical professional who we know and trust. You follow what the
media says and may your God go with you.


what advice is that

to wear medical grade PPE

or a cloth mask that can be bought from Amazon (or wherever)

tim



--
Ria in Aberdeen

[Send address is invalid, use sipsoup at gmail dot com to reply direct]

"MissRiaElaine" wrote in message
...
On 19/05/2020 16:49, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 15:50:21 on Tue, 19 May
2020, Sammi Gray-Jones remarked:

So what purpose do you think the masks worn by the public are meant to
serve?

They are a placebo, pure and simple, there to *make* the wearer think
that they are safer.

Rinse and repeat. They don't make the *wearer* safer.

But they make them *think* they're safer.

well that's worse then, isn't it!

Wearers take greater risks, they are more likely to catch the disease
because of the risks, they then place more other people at risk than
otherwise would have been the case

tim

tim... wrote:


"Recliner" wrote in message
...
tim... wrote:


"Recliner" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 19 May 2020 09:45:14 +0000 (UTC), wrote:

On Tue, 19 May 2020 08:25:34 -0000 (UTC)
Recliner wrote:
The 2m thing is like a religious prohibition: vaguely based on a
sensible

I hadn't thought of it like that, but it certainly matches peoples
behaviour.
Wierdly - assuming my local supermarket is typical - that behaviour is
forgotten in the aisles. Presumably because its almost impossible to
observe.

Tempting though it may be, most experts say we should not look for
individuals. Superspreading events are determined by a complex mix of
behavioural and environmental factors.

I wonder if its complex in reality. I imagine its the sort of people
who
wipe
their nose with their fingers then go and then go and touch a dozen
items
in
every shop they visit and hardly buy any of them just leaving them on
the
shelves nicely infected. Ditto when they touch the handles in buses and
trains.

In London, cases of coronavirus have dropped dramatically since the
lockdown. The superspreading events that were once spreading the virus
so
widely have now stopped.

I doubt they've stopped , far more likely IMO is that a significant
proportion
of the population have caught the virus without knowing it and are now
immune.

I think it's true that in London, most of the mobile population is now
either immune of not susceptible to the disease. I was in Waitrose
today, and everyone seemed more relaxed. Few of the staff were
bothering to wear the face shields they're supplied with, there was no
special sanitising of the trolley handles, and people got quite close
to each other in the aisles. There was also almost no queue to get in.

The few people with or susceptible to the disease in London are in
care homes or hospitals, and the task now is to stop it getting back
into the wider population.

though we are still getting 3,500 new cases every day

You're out by three orders of magnitude. The number of new cases a day in
London is probably now in single figures:

I mean in the whole country, and it's not the quantum that's the problem,
it's the fact that it has barely moved downwards from the peak, after 6
weeks of Lockdown (AIH it did yesterday)

I've argued before that a regional change in the rules is unfair and
unworkable, so the London number alone is IMHO not relevant


We already have regional variations in the rules, and will see more as
schools start going back. It's not only fair and workable, but is
inevitable.

The virus arrived first in London, which you might regard as unsporting
behaviour on its part, but nobody told it your rules. It had longer to
spread in London before the lockdown started, so London got hit harder and
earlier than anywhere else. It had a higher peak of excess deaths, and then
an earlier decline in new cases. The virus has now almost burned out in
London, but not in the north of England or Scotland, which are a few weeks
behind on the curve.

In fact, their curve was more squashed than London's, so they may need a
significantly longer total period of lockdown before the virus runs its
course. Remember, the lockdown isn't a cure; it's just a way of prolonging
the agony, and only justified to avoid overloading the NHS, which it did
very successfully, even in London.

On 19/05/2020 21:09, MissRiaElaine wrote:
On 19/05/2020 16:55, Basil Jet wrote:
On 19/05/2020 15:50, Sammi Gray-Jones wrote:
On 19/05/2020 15:13, Recliner wrote:
So what purpose do you think the masks worn by the public are meant to
serve?


They are a placebo, pure and simple, there to *make* the wearer think
that they are safer.


Of course masks make you safer. A mask over your mouth and nose isn't
going to save you if you are a nurse with people coofing into your
eyeball all day long, but if I'm in a supermarket and a virus floats
along and lands on my mask instead of my lips, it saved me and my
family from dying.

We give up. You carry on believing that. We're following the advice
given to us by a medical professional who we know and trust. You follow
what the media says and may your God go with you.

The medical profession wants to keep the cost of buying their own PPE
down by reducing the public competing for it and driving prices up, so
they are hardly unbiased. It is obvious that wearing a mask makes the
wearer safer.. it would defy the laws of physics if it didn't, so you
throwing your toys out of the pram is not enough to make me change my mind.

--
Basil Jet recently enjoyed listening to
The Greg Foat Group - 2012 - Girl And Robot With Flowers