I havenât tried to absolve them of anything. I just havenât judged if what they are doing is right or wrong yet, we donât know the outcome of this
If you take the line the virus is a cod etc, etc, then yeah everything looks wrong.
If you take the line that this is a serious national health emergency, it might look different.
See this is a perfect example of the blame only going in one direction. Yes NPHET made the recommendations, but they have neither the authority or power to implement upon them. The government have received those recommendations and acted upon them. NPHET are only responsible for recommending based on the current health emergency. They think the health service needs protecting. Government have implemented their recommendation. But somehow the government are absolved of this and itâs all NPHETâs fault
Itâs possible a few lines of code went missing and that 90% is 9%. Or that Norma has her fingers in her ears under the desk and hasnât been contacted by many schoolsâŚ
As you will read yesterday, I firmly blamed the HSE and Government too. I have also consistently said I do not blame NPHET for March/April.
The rest of your post is pure twaddle. NPHET did no such thing. They reacted to criticism in September on it. Weâve gone through this already, you can make up as much shit on it as you like. They were set a goal and didnât even go for it, I would say they ignored it most likely, much like that nuisance of a Living with Covid plan they tried to railroad from day one.
This is my issue with NPHET over the summer months. If you say âwe donât trust people in pubs. It doesnât matter about social distancing, contact tracing etc. Pubs are pubs, we donât think they should openâ- thatâs not really good enough when you know that will lead to more house parties. Similarly on the green lists, they wanted mandatory quarantines for travellers as it was easier so the Government fudged the list and introduced weak movement checks for all travellers. Itâs just putting forward what looks like perfection to you rather than actually working practically within the system.
We know what the fundamentals are; social distancing, good hygiene, masks (where possible) and contact tracing of environments. We canât get rid of all risk but have to work with sections of the economy that are important. With something like nightclubs, I donât see why anyone has an issue with them being closed (or they can operate as something else if they want) and compensated. The likes of Copper Face Jacks could literally have a few hundred cases a night from if it operated normally.
I donât believe NPHET did the proper surveillance. I think a lot of their restrictions and advice to the government on businesses was based on personal biases and not looking practically at doing things right. If it had been the case on pubs and restaurants that NPHET had said, âcan we wait a few weeks between opening the two. We are concerned about enforcement and also ventilation, we want to see how it goes in restaurants firstâ. That wouldnât have been an issue for most people. Instead we know they really never wanted pubs open. We now know that they were making this stuff up and werenât really doing the hard monitoring needed. They are a 40 person talking shop for the most part.
Iâm not sure where this comes from. I literally have criticised the Government for months for handing over power to NPHET. It is without question the worst aspect of this.
That doesnât mean that NPHET do not deserve criticism for how they approach things.
These arenât mutually exclusive.
The issue you have here is that NPHET get more criticism on the likes of TFK than in the media or public, where they really get an easy ride.
Now I dont get bogged down in media press releases and reports and I dont think Iâve watched a single RTE talk show about this whole thing, but NPHET are acting like they are in charge in all of this. I dont have time to go find the quotes, but I do recall Ronan Glynn saying something along the lines of âwe cant open the pubsâ as if these were their calls, not recommendations. The daily media meetings with Tony Holohan and them being the focus, not the government. Now maybe the government were at fault for handing over the keys to NPHET, but at the very first sign of some sort of resistance to their suggestions 2 weeks ago, there was nothing but cloak and daggers about leaks and how relationships were breaking down and NPHET, under recommendations for stage 3 just jumped to stage 5 two weeks later and effectively held the government to ransom. NPHET are quick enough to hold their own media press releases without the government present or notified, so to say they are only making recommendations is very dismissive of what they are actually doing. Now like I say, that could be the fault of the government for letting them do this, but they certainly are the ones calling the shots here, even if they are not supposed to be.
Tims point about it being personal I somewhat agree with. They have an issue with alcohol, and pubs have been one of the majorly hit workforces in the country. I understand it is the bane of health officials, but I think the pub trade is suffering due to this, without any reasoning or logic when things were opening up again. The coincidence with bank holidays emphasised this.
The office of the Taoiseach is the highest office in the country. Varadkar handed the keys to NPHET early on in this. There should be a member of Government at every single NPHET press briefing/conference. There isnât. They are happy to let NPHET run the lead on this. Itâs a buffer for them.
At the first sign of a shift in public opinion, Varadker fucked NPHET and Holohan under a bus, further strengthening NPHET. A rise in cases, Martin hadnât a fucking leg to stand on.
NPHET are a bunch of pointy head scientists. They are being forced to play politics because of a weak government. Maybe they do have an agenda with alcohol, but to assume 40 people pushing an agenda for personal reasons is illogical in my opinion. Is it therefore safe to assume that Government have a personal agenda against the publicans, because they actually implemented the restrictions?
NPHET have a single mandate. Protect public health in an emergency. The government are mandated with the rest. Their weakness is appalling.
Not a whole lot Iâd disagree with, but the optics to me that as soon as someone disagreed with NPHET, they threw a big strop over it all. Similar to the government, a lot of these departments act like fucking spoilt children as soon as someone goes against them or questions them. Granted, the GAAs request back when attending sporting activities were to be stopped of proof from NPHET was cringey, but yer man Nolan came out with a glib response of âwe need to save livesâ as if anyone who goes against what is recommended by NPHET just want people to die. Its an undercurrent generally, dont wear a mask, youâre a murderer. Or any sort of questioning of recommendations or restrictions mean you want old people to die.
The government are appallingly weak, but NPHET are the ones calling the shots and they should be making recommendations. Like I say, I dont know if it is the government not willing to be the ones accountable or NPHET overstepping their remit, but either way, NPHETs recommendations have only one very narrow and specific goal, whereas it should be looked on in a greater manner.
In saying that, weâre not the only ones in this shit show. What happened in South Australia with the 4 babies denied surgery because of covid boundary restrictions and they subsequently died is an utter disgrace.
I blame the government too. NPHET made the recommendations and the government implemented them. You seem to think that because they are just an advisory group that they shouldnât be held up to scrutiny. Thatâs nonsense. They are supposed to be about public health but they seem to be solely concerned with Covid at the cost of all other health issues.
they are the emergency response team. we are in a pandemic. The pandemic response is their primary mandate, I would assume. This latest level of restrictions is an attempt to keep other medical services running for the winter in parallel to the covid response.
they are operating in the prism of a global crisis. Every decision they make is going to have an adverse affect on peopleâs social lives, mental health, income etc. But that same thing would happen anyway because we are living in a pandemic. People canât live the same way they did 12 months ago, by nature of what we are going through. They are trying to sticky plaster with restrictions/opening up to manage both sides of it. In my opinion the balance is too heavily towards the restrictions and not enough towards opening up. The cost of that is heavy, the cost of the other is heavy. Too early to judge which is right and which is wrong.
In my opinion level 3 deserved another couple of weeks. But we are coming in to winter. They think the health service could come under pressure and they donât want to have to eat in to the surge capacity and stop other sick people getting treated
Nolan is a dick. I stopped paying attention to him months and months ago. Heâs more comfortable with numbers than people. And some would argue he isnât great with the numbers either.
I personally donât like Holohan either. Heâs too much of a politician.
Glynn, whom I scorned early on in the crisis for his whiteboard drawing, actually was quite reasonable in how he communicated to the public, he always displayed empathy to the other impacts of the asks/recommendations. Holohan is a lot more blunt. Almost ignorant.
Every nation in the world (bar the areas in the East who were set up for this due to previous outbreaks) has struggled similar to ourselves.