Not at all. In fact, I'm just back from my local Health Centre after having an annual asthma review. I also have a dental appointment for this coming Friday, admittedly only because I need 'urgent treatment. Perhaps you should move to the Grampian Board? And your 'red rag to the teachers' didn't work on me. What they are doing has very little to do with their unions - and it's so far from doing very little that it's not funny. Both my wife and daughter have been teaching online every day - with the ocassional respite of rostered hours at school with the children of key workers. After school ends for the summer this week, they then have the tasks of preparing for next term - not just the normal one plan, which can be onerous enough, but two plans - Plan A for a full time return to school and Plan B for continued online teaching. They will both be praying that don't also have to have Plan C ready - for part time teaching of small groups of children on a rotational basis, effectively having to prepare for two classes each week. Added to that, they have to completely clear their classrooms, bring everything home to be stored until deep cleaning has taken place, and then take it all back again. The parents of both classes have been really appreciative of their efforts - I've never seen so many thank you gifts of pot plants, coffee mugs, flowers and boxes of chocolates before. Well, not since I retired...
I wonder why Westminster politicians aren't subject to this sort of public scrutiny? https://video-ams4-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v...=fa0ed8e832fae1acf5ad47829d9d933c&oe=5F1F43E9
This is what I get if I access our Drs website. Coronavirus Update Coronavirus has been confirmed within the Practice area. In order to protect the health of both patients and healthcare workers, we would request that you only visit the health centre if absolutely necessary. We are currently unable to offer routine appointments. For non-urgent medical advice, please click on the online consult link on our website. You will receive a response within 2 working days. If you require urgent medical attention, please call the Practice and a GP or Nurse will call you back. They may arrange a video consultation. We are only carrying out urgent blood tests and other procedures at present. All prescriptions are being sent directly to local pharmacies. We can arrange for prescriptions to be sent to Bannerman at either Well Place or High Street or Strathallan Pharmacy in Bridge of Allan. If you do not nominate a Pharmacy, your prescription will be sent to Bannermans, Well Place (opposite the Health Centre). Visit NHS Inform for the latest guidance on coronavirus COVID-19, including symptom checker, self-care and social distancing. If you have severe COVID-19 symptoms and need further advice call NHS 24 on 111 — not the surgery. At this time please do not go to the surgery, unless your are advised to do so by a member of the Practice team. Isolation Notes are available online from NHS 111, if you are self-isolating and need a note for your employer. We have provided other useful links which you may find helpful, while self-isolating. Before it was basically don't phone us call 111. While I don't expect they are doing nothing (I will ask my Dr neighbour). I do feel they could put in place some sort of restricted appointment system now with proper precaution. Likewise with teachers I know they are working hard in difficult circumstances, it's the lack of willingness to go back to school that I find irksome as apart from missing out on education, there are a lot of children actually suffering at home with less than caring parents. Lots of other workers are resuming work with proper safeguards, why don't the teachers do the same? I feel the teaching unions are being particularly obstructive. Maybe I am over reacting, but not wanting to cause offence.
I guess the difference may well be that 'Coronavirus has been confirmed in the Practice area' - we are thankfully quite free of it up here, so possibly can afford to be less strict in adhering to the recommended guidelines. As to teachers, I don't see the unions as being particularly obstructive at all - and they certainly aren't instructing teachers to stay away from schools. You probably inadvertently hit on the problem in saying "other workers are resuming work with proper safeguards". Yes they are - but Councils have told school staff that there is no money for proper safeguards - ie PPE. One of my sons works in Retail in Aberdeen - he has worked right through the lockdown period & his employer has provided PPE for all staff as well as making necessary structural changes to the shop floor. The same thing has happened in our village - and doubtless everywhere else - where we only have two shops that have remained open throughout. What has also helped is the willingness of customers to follow the guidelines as well - that simply will not apply in a school setting. Classes are set up to cater for between 20 - 30 pupils and it's near impossible to have each 'socially distanced' or sitting in their own little bubble of a workspace. The days of chalk and talk are long gone & the current education system is geared to learning through play, through exploration, through hands-on activities, through collaboritve learning groups, through small group discussion, with learning partners who peer assess each other's work as well as work independently at their own pace. For this to happen, teachers have to be constantly roaming the class when not providing instruction. It's virtually impossible to go back to the days of bums on seats for the whole of a school day. I'd even disagree that they are missing out on education. If nothing else, children are more resilient and determined these days than they are given credit for. In this area we have had, and still have, a relatively high proprtion of non-English speaking children. I've seen them start school here at varying ages, unable to speak or understand a word of English, spend two to three years learning the language to a level that allows them to particpate fully in class life - and then progress in leaps and bounds. Six months out of a school is a dawdle really, and generally has little to no adverse affect on them, especially when they are participating in what is essentially home education. All in all, I totally get why many teachers are reluctant to get back into the classroom - they've seen what happened to the likes of NHS workers elsewhere, who received no PPE but were expected to turn up and do their jobs regardless. But I'm fairly confident that the government here won't allow such a situation to arise.
I think the major problem of having kids at home for 6 months is not the lost education (they may even benefit in that respect) but the lost social contacts over that period - for a child of a certain age spending too much time alone with only their family can be a traumatic period. Once all this has settled down we will be able to analyse exactly which professions have had the highest infection rates for the Coronavirus - in Germany it appears to be building workers, and those working in meat processing and in abattoirs. There also appears to be a higher rate amongst social workers and amongst those working freelance. The police have also been over proportionally hit. On the economic side my heart goes out to all those freelancers who are struggling to survive this period - those who depend upon audiences for their living (but don't play for Man city) such as less well known musicians who depend on live concerts - we know a circus family close to us who are really on the breadline. How will those sorts of professions survive all this ?
I understand where you are coming from, and can, just about, see why you might think the surgery is having a cushy time. I'm speculating, but I suspect the main problem the surgery has is the waiting area. If people turn up with any suspicion of the virus, the waiting area is just (to quote a cruise liner) a large petri dish. The advice not to go to the surgery with symptoms is national instructions. I can tell you that in one surgery, so many people ignored the instructions , long before the surgery could get ANY PPE they had to physically shut the surgery - which was awful - for everyone, but in the circumstances just about the only choice they had. A GP surgery is not an A & E department. It would have helped if the govt. had taken any notice of the practice run (2017?) , but no.
Our Health Centre instructs people not to come into the waiting room - but to bring their phones and wait in their cars in the car park until called. It works well, but I'm not sure how those who don't drive, or couldn't be driven, manage - home visits possibly.
My GP told me in no uncertain terms 12 weeks ago NOT to come to the surgery under any circumstances. My routine blood tests and other reviews were all postponed. Last week I had a telephone appt which worked well... I think if necessary I would go in and they have two sides to the surgery now... Non Covid and Covid... BUT you still have to enter via reception and waiting area
Before GPs were allowed to open their surgeries here, one enterprising doctor in the nearest small town obtained some crowd barriers and set up outside on the pavement. Nothing too personal of course, but people did get their blood pressure checked and prescriptions for medication. The surgeries have been open for several weeks now, but masks must be worn, and Mme tells me that all the windows to the outside were wide open.
Things are becoming pretty relaxed here when it comes to surgery or hospital visits - the municipality of Engelskirchen (where I live) no longer has any known cases of Corona, though it is more difficult in some other areas. To be honest doctors waiting rooms have always been a good place to pick up diseases of all descriptions, and if you want to get ill then go to a hospital. The lockdown is being slowly relaxed here but it is a very regional thing - what is allowed here may not be allowed in other areas - Germany's decentralization has allowed for a very mixed approach. Even the hardest parts of the lockdown were not really hard for me having a large garden to tend and living in a small village stuck on a hill with other like minded hillbillies. In Cologne it was a nightmare with so many people stuck in high rise appartments and not able to get out - and if they had kids in those places it must have been hell. There are so many people around wanting to get back to doing normal things like going to restaurants, pubs, theatres, cinemas, concerts etc. but will there be any left after all this - or will whole branches of the entertainment industry go under ?
Today I ventured down to the city of Limoges for the first time since the lockdown was imposed on us. Going to a different department I was not certain how they would differ in approach to the safety measures still in place here. I found that they are being quite strict over the wearing of masks in the stores and garden centres, no mask and you are refused entry. Security were there at the entrances to enforce it and to spray your hands. Many items on the shelves are not to be picked up by the customer, you have to call an assistant to take it down and to the cashier. Card payments only are accepted and there is further sanitizer at the check out for hands and card readers. Floors are marked out to prevent people getting too close, and queuing at tills has been rearranged. I didn't go into the restaurant today, but know that all of the cutlery is now wrapped in cellophane bags, the same with bread rolls. Instead of helping yourself to vegetables which involves handling spoons an assistant will put on your plate whatever you wish. Glasses, very necessary, are washed at the highest temperatures, then also wrapped. All of this preparation and alteration will have cost money, lots of it, but business is operating and the car parks were as full as normal for a midweek day. Masks are not comfortable when the temperature is around 30°C, but everyone had them inside, even if they removed them when they got outside. Everything felt safe and to have that feeling is reassuring. I still feel safer though when I am down my fields and don't see a soul.
Life in Cologne is getting back to a little bit of normality - in theory restaurants can open but you have to fill out a form with your name, address, telephone number and the time of arrival and departure. In practice many restaurants have only opened outdoor areas. Street life is nothing like it was in the city, which is something of a relief at times - locals can visit the cathedral, and other important historical buildings here without being crowded out by tourists - the same applies to the museums. Small religious meetings are now allowed observing the 2 metre rule, but singing is not allowed yet. The mask ruling still applies to all public transport and to shops. My wife has decided she wants us to visit her son in Berlin in 2 weeks time which will mean four and a half hours in the train with a mask on - something which I'm not looking forward to one bit !
please log in to view this image Nice thoughts from Sarah Vine, wife of Michael Gove. Is it sarcasm? Not sure that readers of the Daily Mail would know quite what to make of it.
Given SH's assertions about China... I note that our 'allies' the US have bought up just about all the worlds supply of remdesivir for the next three months.... just great eh.....
Thanks for all your input to my Doctors comment, it does seem there is not much consistency across the country. You would think that if they want to down play the pubs opening the media would stop calling it super Saturday!
The Prime Minister’s father has ignored the Foreign Office travel warning to visit his holiday home in Greece. But how did he get there as flights from the UK are banned by the Greek government? He found that if he went via Bulgaria he could get in that way. Rules for the Johnson/Cummings brigade are clearly to be broken when it suits them.
The joys of being a city dweller. We have nothing of that height in our village - in fact, with just the three floors, our house is the tallest building here.
