Two months after the pandemic led to a tidal wave of restrictions worldwide, many countries and many states here in the US are starting to open up, some slowly and some quickly.
What is the status in your state or country? Here in Kansas, actions by our legislature this week means the entire reopening process is now up to the counties. The county I live in is one of several to allow everything to open up with no hard limits on group size (as the restrictions were downgraded to recommendations). Cities in Kansas do not have the ability to make public health laws, so Wichita is seeing almost complete normality in time for Summer. Even then, many local businesses are now writing their own precautionary rules such as limiting capacity (even though they technically donāt have to).
However, a lot of people in this forum are still under some restrictions (in terms of what businesses can do, what can be open, what they can do in terms of activity ectā¦) and some are still under a stay at home order. what are things like right now where you live, and will things get better soon? How are you passing the time?
Iām in Scotland and yesterday restrictions were slightly eased. We can now meet small groups of people outdoors, at 2 metres distance, up to 5 miles from our homes. I think itās a maximum of 8 people. So basically one family could join another family in their garden or something. Some outdoor type things are opening back up.
The restrictions in England I think have been relaxed somewhat more than that and not by muchā¦ despite the fact there have been more deaths this week than last week and England seemingly leading the world in deaths per million of population. Despite this England seem to be pressing ahead with plans to reopen schools on Monday. In Scotland schools will remain closed until August.
Iām still working 5 to 6 days a week in an āessentialā industry (shorthand for hard work at low pay). Would love to be just hanging at home, or be able to afford to go out to eat.
In general, the stay-at-home provisions were temporary - just a way for government and society to get ahead of the disaster. Obviously many/most of our leaders had zero intention to do anything proactive (except perhaps to sell their stocks). So, overall, an extraordinarily wasted opportunity to show some maturity as a civilization.
From what Iāve read, it is possible to be reinfected, and recovery may come with permanent organ damage. Wish I lived in a nation that provided health care to its citizens as opposed to āaccessā to private health insurance because the effects of this is going to be around for decades and we will all pay for it.
In Staffordshire UK, the lockdown is supposed to ease a bit on Monday, however, covidiots flouting the rules notwithstanding, a lot of people I talk to on forums etc feel itās a bit soon and will be self-policing for going out. As my wife is at risk and Iām heading to the wrong side of 60, we are cautious. Though it will be nice to at least meet up with friends outside for a chat, itās going to be a while before either of us get to pursue our hobbies properly again. My wife does art ad craft and I play guitar. Music venues and pubs are probably going to be one of the last places to open, so restricted very much to inside.
On the upside, getting plenty of time to catch up on all the Blender videos Iāve been threatening to watch for years.
Gotta say, so far, being a āfirst worldā country isnāt doing us any good, over 38,000 dead. Weāll be taking things very carefully until weāre happy the numbers are low even when things are opened up.
From Argentina. The newly-assumed government quickly took control and did things right here, with strict quarantine and financial aid for all sectors. This has given time to take action and equip hospitals with more ventilators. But we have a weak economy here, a lot of pressure from the economic sectors to get out of quarantine, and external debt that complicates things more than ever.
As someone in the high risk category Iām still in self imposed isolation. The UK covidiots were out in force at the weekend so expect a new peak in about 3 weeks. People are behaving like the pandemic is over and returning to normal behavior. The lockdown has never been properly observed and has been openly flouted by some for weeks.
After most of my clients cancelled business I thought it was going to be a challenging period, well, the phone has been ringing off the hook and weāre now too damn busyā¦
Cheer up @Luis_Riera it might never happen, best regardsā¦
People are fed up that is the problem. Everybody is used to freedom. And few crisis except for those who lived forty years ago during the cold war, perhaps understood disaster better then. But like with anything, some will care, and some wonāt.
The problem isnāt the virus as such, it is the long term financial crisis that looms after.
