The supermarkets need to shut too. This madness can’t continue. But what is the alternative? Put together boxes of essential rationed food and deliver them to people’s doorsteps?

Well apart from the free child care angle I expect there are many people would have difficulty grasping the idea that their work is non-essential.

Society is an integrated machine, it's difficult to remove many parts of it before the whole thing stops working.

Like the Chinese we might have to build a few new hospitals before the second wave - think how many jobs and skills that involves. 

That's Seacroft Tesco's. Not the most pleasant of places at the best of times.

I went to Waitrose in Otley yesterday and it was fine, pretty much a normal Saturday although a little bit low on fresh fruit and veg - still plenty though.

I’ve got friends at Filey beach and they’re reporting it as quiet

Seacroft Tesco is my local one, agreed not the most pleasant and I’m not surprised at the queues considering the clientele. I’ll be off to my local Waitrose tomorrow and hopefully it’ll be as pleasant as it normally is.

It's good to have some local knowledge for context, thanks.

Saw someone carrying toilet rolls on Friday and it turned out to be from the local cut-price supermarket in town. Went in out of curiosity to discover a queue of about 30-40 people trying to check out. It's not a large shop either.

Tesco Express had a reasonable amount of stock but no toilet paper; apparently what they received that morning was gone within 30 minutes!

I agree some people - OK  A LOT of people aren't taking this seriously.  I have a summer car (MX5) that has been stuck in the garage for months so  decided to give it a run out this afternoon.  Went up out the village  across White Hill towards Whitchurch in a loop and back home.

 At White Hill beauty spot I seriously couldn't believe it ! It was chock-a-block.  The car park was full and there were cars for about 1/4 mile by the side of the road.  -  I have NEVER seen it that busy in the 20 years I have lived in the village.  People were milling around in groups and chatting - no one seemed to be keeping 1 Ft distance between them let alone 2M.  I really despair. People are too dim for social distancing to work.  They  simply don't have the mental framework or discipline to deviate one iota from  following   through every random through that floats through their brain "I know Mildred, lets go for a nice walk  this  afternoon". Group think that 2000 times and you have a problem  if you don't have the wit to  deviate from your plan when you see 1999 other have the same idea - Of course none of the other 1999 have any intention of deviating from their whim either

I was quite shocked just now to see this post from one of our family friends, who we meet up with quite regularly. They live in North London, and she travels in to London by tube for work - though by the sounds of it, she caught it either from her father, sister or sister-in-law. She's mid-40s and doesn't have any specific health issues I'm aware of.

It certainly gives pause for thought. We are all at risk, this is not just a case of protecting the elderly. 

I have vomit phobia too Rob. Quite common. 

Vomiting doesn’t sound like a common symptom so don’t worry. 

I'm not sure it does me any good to read stuff like this. I'm trying to remind myself that lots of people have less severe symptoms.

Having two children has probably done something to cure it anyway!

There is plenty more serious to worry about with this illness, of course. 

My eye has just been drawn to a high altitude airliner heading west out of the window. There are definitely a lot fewer of them - normally the sky in this area is crisscrossed with them all day. FR24 tells me it’s an Air France 777 from Paris to Boston. I wonder how many people are on it!

As much as these personal accounts are informative, I think everyone reacts to this virus ever so slightly differently. 

I’m trying to take some reassurance from the fact that many people don’t have an experience quite as bad as Darren’s friend, at least I hope so. 

Trying to find RELIABLE, personal accounts seems quite difficult - has anyone found any less dramatic accounts of what it’s like to have COVID-19? Hopefully for some people it isn’t that bad. 

Some truly horrendous reports now emerging in the UK. Similar to what we've been hearing from Italy:

Three junior doctors at the same NHS hospital have contracted coronavirus, it is reported.

It is believed the professionals, each aged 30, are on ventilators and are being treated by colleagues at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow, northwest London

...

“It is beginning to affect a lot more young people. Some will get mild symptoms — but not all will, and what has happened to the junior doctors shows that.”

To add, it’s probably the case that accounts of what it’s like to have COVID-19 found online are likely to the ones which are more dramatic and unpleasant, especially those on news websites. 

Went for a run this morning. One of those lovely early spring days here where the air temp is around freezing but the sun is starting to have some warmth.

Extremely quiet, almost no traffic. More birdsong than usual, although that may have been wishful thinking. Almost everyone practicing good social distancing - as soon as I saw anyone I either ran on the road for a while or crossed over. Don't think I was within 5m of another person the whole time. It feels unnatural to move away from someone when you see them approaching but a wave and a "good morning" usually offsets this.

Meanwhile:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-house-returns-1.5506049

Govt. expecting social distancing measures here to last "months" and police in some provinces being given the power to issue tickets for people flouting the rules.

From the Lancet paper by the Chinese doctors who reported on one of the first clusters of cases:

Common symptoms at onset of illness were fever (40 [98%] of 41 patients), cough (31 [76%]), and myalgia or fatigue (18 [44%]); less common symptoms were sputum production (11 [28%] of 39), headache (three [8%] of 38), haemoptysis (two [5%] of 39), and diarrhoea (one [3%] of 38). Dyspnoea developed in 22 (55%) of 40 patients (median time from illness onset to dyspnoea 8·0 days [IQR 5·0–13·0]). 26 (63%) of 41 patients had lymphopenia. All 41 patients had pneumonia with abnormal findings on chest CT. Complications included acute respiratory distress syndrome (12 [29%]), RNAaemia (six [15%]), acute cardiac injury (five [12%]) and secondary infection (four [10%]). 13 (32%) patients were admitted to an ICU and six (15%) died. 

Vomiting not mentioned. Only 1 out of 41 with diarrhoea.

Trouble is there's a lot of other infections going the rounds. A lot of people with symptoms are convinced they've got it or had it, but there's no reliable way of telling for sure without being tested.

I'm going to try and do a run at 5:30am tommorow in the most secluded part of the neighborhood. It will still be darkish at that time but probably just light enough to see where I'm going.

I think it's hard to get something truly reliable. As you say every infected person will react to it in a different way. Some will get such mild symptoms that they don't really notice anything, whilst others will be hit more severely and require hospitalisation.

I think it's just a case of taking it day-by-day. Do what you can to prevent yourself and others in your house from becoming ill and using your wits and common sense. At the same time, it's important to not worry too much (as it weakens you after all). If you do catch it then it will just be a case of isolating yourself as much as possible and monitoring your symptoms, and if you require hospital treatment then it is what it is. At least if you can look back and say you did everything you could to keep yourself and your family safe, that's the main thing.