I read a thread like this and it just makes me sad. At the moment I would think twice about going to a different city, nevermind a different country. The rules are changing so often in different city's in the UK, god knows what is happening in different city's in other countries, as well as the countries changing rules as they attempt to control the spread of this virus.
Talk about power grabs, tyranny just makes my mind boggle. No country in the world wants to voluntarily take the actions they have had to try and control the spread of this thing. Because of the financial implications of what has happened, no one is doing this for no reason.
The, "I may have had, because I was sick x months ago, and I am OK statement". That people have been sick and have not had the option to be tested is scandalous. My friend and his wife were sick end of Feb, and they don't know whether they had it. So far, so like everyone else, other than the fact that he works in the Care industry. He was questioned as to why he chose to self isolate for two weeks by his employers.
His answer was that he didn't want to take the chance of potentially passing on Covid, if that is what he indeed had, and killing, or making people's bad health conditions even worse. He has not been able to get a text to see whether he has had Covid or not.
Talking about numbers of deaths from other causes as some kind of comparison is just ridiculous. I know someone who said, "but 30k die from Flu each year!" And my reply to that was yes, maybe, and that is without anyone taking any precautions beyond the most vulnerable being offered a Flu jab. Nobody normally wear mask, social distances, clean themselves as often as they do now, yet will all that what people should be doing now, people are getting infected and dying.This is killing more people despite all the precautions people have take, including a lockdown for the entire country.
To the OP, it briefly crossed my mind to visit Venice or Rome once they started to open up Italy, as I have been watching live webcams since the lockdown in Italy and Spain to see what the effect was first hand, so to speak. Seeing Police and Army on the streets, and literally no people in some of the busiest tourist spots in the world, emphasized how seriously they were taking their lockdowns. Once things started to ease in Italy, one of the Venice webcam sites was encouraging people to visit saying will never be as affordable as now. That was when I had the thought about visiting, because to see somewhere like Venice virtually empty, and the canals all calm was an attractive idea, but then reality kicked in. How many shops would be open to get basic provisions. What would the rules be about moving around freely around a city, or Italy itself, and how would I know if the rules changed whilst I was there!
That was not taking into account any quarantines too. I could quarantine if I had to when I would come back, as my job has been affected partly by the virus to not have any work atm, but when I got there!
But what if I got the virus! There was no guarantee that I would survive, or have no long term health problems. Yes, you hear of people not knowing they have had it, or minimal symptoms, but people are dying from it, and some that don't are feeling the effects months afterwards, and may have associated problems for the rest of their lives. Whatever the age, no one is 100% guaranteed to have no effects from this. Putting oneself into a foreign country while this is going on just seems mad to me, and I can't believe I even contemplated it. :banghead:
I read an article about last night about the author Michael Rosen, and his encounter with Covid, and he seems to be very lucky to be alive. But he has effects of the illness many months after. Yes, he is in his 70's, but does anyone know the age of when this virus couldn't have an effect like he has had! I don't think so.
For anyone who has got this far, sorry for the long post, bit it just gets on my nerves when people minimise/trivialise or try to ignore what is a serious thing happening to the world, and likely to get worse. I would love to put those that don't believe in the seriousness of it, or even that it exists ffs, in one place and let them live their own lives together to see what happens, unfortunately this thing is infectious, and we all have to rely on each other to do the right things. Even if you don't believe it is real, or as serious as it is, because you could be wrong, follow the rules eh!. I'll always err on the site of caution with risk of death.