We'd a *fairly* tight, yet easy going, lockdown in Ireland, despite some of the online commentary here. We've a national pastime of "only in Ireland" type discussions... There wasn't much in the sense of Draconian enforcement of anything, but the vast majority just behaved sensibly and things seem to have worked fairly ok - all things considered.
We'd a couple of periods of national travel restrictions, limiting you to within 5km at the peak (other than for work, shopping and education) and to within your own county for a more extended time.
Most of the retail sector was closed, on furlough, but is now back open again and there's a work from home, if possible, request still in place.
Pubs, bars and clubs haven't been open normally since 15 March 2019, other than for outdoor stuff and takeaway pints (that's a thing now..)
The construction sector paused at the very peak of cases, but domestic EC work continued for essential stuff, with precautions in place.
There are fairly extensive income supports in place and a lot of programmes to retain and stimulate business, but still quite a lot of retail damage, including some of the UK and multinational chains that have just gone wallop or drastically cut back.
Education went into remote learning mode serval times, which was hugely disruptive for some kids and universities are still remote and likely to be vaccinated campus type setups this autumn.
We managed not to ever get to a meltdown crisis level in the health system, keeping ICU numbers below capacity, but it was close to it after Xmas when we had a short-lived surge.
At the moment the vaccine programme is going extremely rapidly. We've had over 90% uptake in most are categories, almost 100% amongst older folks and it's open for anyone 18+ at the moment and over 12 for vulnerable teens - that's just waiting for sign off from a safety point of view.
I've had two doses of Pfizer/BioNTech, but I'm just playing it a little cautiously, but feeling a lot more relaxed.
At present here retail is open, with precautions in place. Domestic tourism is open and booming. Outdoor dining and drinking is the norm, with huge adaptations to venues and streets to make it possible. Big events still aren't open, beyond a few experimental ones.
Our weather isn't always dry, so there's been a lot of installation of giant umbrellas, awnings and so on and also most cities and towns have jumped ahead on pedestrianisation and bike access etc etc
Masks haven't ever been mandated outdoors here, but they're required in retail, indoors in public spaces and in public transport. Some people wear them out and about but it's usually more so if you're in a city centre or something like that - use your own judgement. They haven't been politicised though, beyond a very small looney fringe that seems to mostly live in an online bubble.
Indoor dining and indoor pubs etc will recommence soon, but you'll need a vaccine cert to enter the premises (digital thing with a scanned QR code to verify its authenticity).
The big risk here at the moment is the Delta varient spreading from the UK. We've an open border, albeit with some checks and self isolation on inbound travel, but we've no real way of doing what NZ or Australia did in terms of zero covid with closed borders - our economy integrates deeply into neighbouring countries in the EU and the UK, and most of our goods travel by truck and roll-on / roll-off ferry etc. There's a bit of a race on to complete the vaccine programme before the end of August, to get ahead of the varient risks.
Intra EU travel has reopened, with digital covid certificates, since 19 July, so that's starting to look a lot more normal. I'm still in no rush to take a plane though. It's all just a lot of hassle.
Personally, other than the inconvenience factor, I've been very much unimpacted and all is well.
It's been a weird couple of years! Hope all is well with you and yours wherever you are.
Last edited by djk; 07/21/21 08:58 AM.
