Originally Posted by
Radgirl
why did those “at risk” not take themselves out of society?
In the UK because the government failed to inform or properly inform.
Not so, the correct messages were out there more than a week before lockdown, I followed them, planned, and prepared. Many, possibly most, people did not, some didn't listen, some actively worked against it, some woudl actively do the opposite of what Boris says on principle. The week I assessed myself as "at risk" and began, in effect, "shielding" (before shielding was officially put in place and weeks before I was actually notified I was on the list) a bunch of my neighbours were planning a "lets all catch covid" street party (lockdown thankfully intervened), and that is in a very middle-class highly educated professional neighbourhood,
knows what it was like on the council estates.
Problem was the government assumed that brits today are still stiff-upper-lip do-the-right-thing keep-calm women-and-children-first all-in-this-together, whereas in fact it turns out (entirely predictably really) that brits today have the collective intelligence and social responsibility of a bunch of lemmings going mountain climbing blind drunk after dark for an eye test. We were asked, nicely, well before lockdown, to be responsible, and restrict socialising and non-essential travel (i.e. the Swedish way), the result was massive crowds crammed into the pubs and the biggest crowds in decades at beauty spots like Snowdon.
The average 50 year old worker couldnt simply tell his employer he was not going to work even if he did have the training to call out the government's propaganda and wrong decisions.
Not strictly true, under English law you can (civilians at least) walk out of an unsafe working environment. My wife did exactly that in the week before lockdown having clashed with management over their "business as usual" attitude and lack of covid precautions in direct contravention of then govt. guidance and in fact their own head-office guidance. Having told her she was scaring people and causing panic, the following week they implemented practically everything she'd asked for. Too late for her, not job wise, she still in fact has same job, but because at that point she was already infected, mostly likely from work since we'd already stopped all social engagements. I have stayed covid-free,
because we were proactive and prepared.
I've had similar stories (with and without walk-out) from others, including health professionals, with a common theme that the other people were about a week behind the curve, in the end that's all the difference of opinion was. Trouble is, when you are on an exponential doubling every 2 days, a week is a long, long, way behind the curve.