Thread by @zerocovidni

Today I am asking the @niexecutive, the @UKgovcomms who fund them and the @IRE_Govt who we have a leaky border with to consider my mental health. And that of many others. Almost two years now of no normal life. You may say ‘but we opened up, you can do everything’ - but do I want

to do everything when it’s not safe? No. Therefore I’ve forgotten what it’s like to casually call into a friend’s house, to work in an office, to travel, to have hotel breaks, to nip into a shop without a mask and make a takeaway tea and sip through the lid without cleaning it!

To try clothes on in a changing room. To eat out in a restaurant, inside where it’s warm! To hold my baby nephews, to hug and comfort a good friend. To have my husband able to visit me after surgery. To have in person meetings and appointments and feel safe. To be a leader in

kids clubs and to play instruments and sing live with others. This is the life that I miss. Some of it I’ve restricted myself. Some of it the govt have done for me. Some things I would want to change right now (husband at appointments,in person appointments), some of them I am

waiting til it’s safe(r). It did not have to be this way. Australia, New Zealand, many other countries experienced large pockets of normality between outbreaks, SAFE normality because they didn’t have cases. Our government made no effort even when it was within our sights to have

zero cases or close to it. It’s always been about keeping cases just low (high?) enough that there’s a bed left in the hospital. Well that’s really backfired as our hospitals are collapsing anyway, and we have suffered economically much worse than the countries who really got a

handle on this. Again, our govt saw the vaccine as the magic bullet that would get us out of this, but made no effort to suppress cases while we were waiting on it and look at where we are now? It’s NOT the magic bullet that they assumed. We still need to do something else. But

still the government refuses to implement plan B. Thank you @niexecutive for doing something, even if nowhere near enough. We are being thrown to the wolves and the scraps we are being offered is another booster. Booster data sounds promising, but as I shared last night,

vaccines are the second best way to protect ourselves - the best way is not to get infected at all (and therefore no chance of #longcovid) with the vaccines your backstop in case you’re unfortunate. This requires #CleanAir indoors, with mandated ventilation & hepa filtration.

This requires mask wearing for now. This might involve border measures once our cases are lower than our neighbours. It may require lockdowns briefly. I cannot do another year of THIS. And so many others can’t either. We need a break. Even if cases can’t stay at zero forever

(I think there are ways to do this but it requires global co-operation) it would be a respite to get to zero, to experience normality, and to allow us to ramp up the measures to keep them as low as possible.

#anychanceofaplan #itsnotover #wecanbezero #cleanindoorair #ventilation #filtration #LongCovid affects 10% evn mild/asymptom cases #oneinseven get #LongCovidKids #itsnotjustaboutdeaths #abandoned #shadowofmyself #clinicallyvulnerable give #asthmatics booster #asthmaticsatrisk

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