To mask or not to mask

[Cockney Sparrow]

<< I am fairly sure that many people re-use masks, >>

Usually dunk mine in boiling water after use.

If you were of the "what problem?" tendency, you might then use the water to make tea? (The mask might do as a filter for coffee......).

[Prommer]

Ewww... Fresh face and fresh tea for me, please!

[Prommer]

Some data...https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641989

[Bryn]

Some data...https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58641989

I rather doubt the figures in that report would get through More or Less unscathed.

[Frances_iom]

why not - my own experience is that it is only the older folk still wearing them - yesterday evening Euston to Waterloo I would reckon 50% or less compliance - on train from Liverpool even less - catch is the union leaders have form in pushing anything that requires less work by staff - I'm surprised they haven't requested that tube drivers work from home (if you can kill Afghans from a chair in USA then driving a train remotely should be easy).

[french frank]

why not - my own experience is that it is only the older folk still wearing them - yesterday evening Euston to Waterloo I would reckon 50% or less compliance - on train from Liverpool even less - catch is the union leaders have form in pushing anything that requires less work by staff - I'm surprised they haven't requested that tube drivers work from home (if you can kill Afghans from a chair in USA then driving a train remotely should be easy).

Unsurprising. Restrictions mean you can't do something (booh!), no restrictions mean you can (hooray!). Simple (most people are).

[Serial_Apologist]

Very noticeable in Sainsbury's yesterday for the first time was the larger proportion of shoppers not wearing masks. Outside a notice made the unhelpful point that while it was no longer mandatory it would be helpful if the public continued wearing them. Two staff members said they had asked and been told putting out this notice was obligatory on the company, and expressed their worries to me.

[french frank]

Very noticeable in Sainsbury's yesterday for the first time was the larger proportion of shoppers not wearing masks. Outside a notice made the unhelpful point that while it was no longer mandatory it would be helpful if the public continued wearing them. Two staff members said they had asked and been told putting out this notice was obligatory on the company, and expressed their worries to me.

I noticed our small Sainsbury's had that outside. The Coop's (No Mask No Entry) is a hand-produced notice But, as I've said, it's not enforced which makes its message somewhat dubious anyway.

[muzzer]

The simple fact is that if cases go up massively and there are breakthrough variants then all these people going maskless in supermarkets and crowded indoor spaces such as tube trains and the like will be forced to mask up again by sheer force of public opinion. And if they don’t do so immediately they will do so when members of their family fall seriously ill. I hope and think it won’t come to this, but YMMV of course. But people are awful unless nudged, as this new era of Tory misrule is proving repeatedly.

[Serial_Apologist]

The simple fact is that if cases go up massively and there are breakthrough variants then all these people going maskless in supermarkets and crowded indoor spaces such as tube trains and the like will be forced to mask up again by sheer force of public opinion. And if they don’t do so immediately they will do so when members of their family fall seriously ill. I hope and think it won’t come to this, but YMMV of course. But people are awful unless nudged, as this new era of Tory misrule is proving repeatedly.

I heard on the radio this morning that today's Grauniad contains an interesting article by George Monbiot, pointing out how the Left in this country has misguidedly taken in some of the Far Right's false rhetoric around issues of personal freedoms. I think maybe some in this forum too? It was high time for this to be spotlighted.

[Frances_iom]

The simple fact is that if....

BUT this is hypothetical - lets wait and see then react - there is growing IMO a whole lot of public stupidity based on what if where the if may not be at all reasonable.
If we really want to avoid new variants let's follow New Zealand - everyone entering quarantines (and basically have to wait outside the country for a place to do so to become free) whilst they belatedly get round to vaccinating the country - it also reduces CO2 emissions as the half term holiday returnees who basically seeded the 1st epidemic will be blocked from a repeat performance.

[Dave2002]

why not - my own experience is that it is only the older folk still wearing them - yesterday evening Euston to Waterloo I would reckon 50% or less compliance - on train from Liverpool even less - catch is the union leaders have form in pushing anything that requires less work by staff - I'm surprised they haven't requested that tube drivers work from home (if you can kill Afghans from a chair in USA then driving a train remotely should be easy).

Like!

In the meantime in Scotland most people are still observing mask rules if there are signs in shops - and it is still I think a "legal" requirement if the location requires it.

[oddoneout]

I heard on the radio this morning that today's Grauniad contains an interesting article by George Monbiot, pointing out how the Left in this country has misguidedly taken in some of the Far Right's false rhetoric around issues of personal freedoms. I think maybe some in this forum too? It was high time for this to be spotlighted.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/22/leftwingers-far-right-conspiracy-theories-anti-vaxxers-power

[french frank]

I heard on the radio this morning that today's Grauniad contains an interesting article by George Monbiot, pointing out how the Left in this country has misguidedly taken in some of the Far Right's false rhetoric around issues of personal freedoms. I think maybe some in this forum too? It was high time for this to be spotlighted.

Very interesting article (thanks for the link, odders). Not sure I appreciate the jibe of 'the compromised, submissive doctrine that calls itself centrism' which is just an insult, even if those, possibly on both sides, hold that view: Monbiot shows that 'both sides' can be equally extremely wrong. Has his radical balance ever been achieved? Or even been clearly articulated? Are we just seeing that hypothetical(?) 'circle' where right and left actually meet and become indistinguishable in certain fields? Is what he describes really a left-right issue? My discomfort with the "centrist" liberals arises from my own personal collectivist, cooperative stance which places duties and obligations to others above individual rights and freedoms. Is Monbiot simply describing the "extreme left", or some of it, rather than the, er, middle of the road left (is there such a thing now?).

Where the belief in insane conspiracy theories comes from, I don't know.

[Frances_iom]

Having just returned to UK after a couple of weeks on the IoM I'm belatedly reading my issues of the Tablet - that of 11th Sept has a 2 page article by Adrian Papst (Professor of Politics at University of Kent) "How to renew the promises of liberalism" - he plugs his book "Postliberal Politic" stating that the liberal project has pushed individualism so as to be damaging to institutions etc thus destroying the bedrock of a social contract between people and their representatives.