Why do people think we are in a pandemic ?

The answer is that this new strain of highly contagious corona virus has the capacity to kill hundreds of thousands of people in the U.K. and millions worldwide if it is not contained.

If the government had gone along with the herd immunity model, the resulting number of deaths would be politically unacceptable.

Even with the current restrictions we could be looking at 60,000+ deaths according to The University of Washington.

It’s true what you say about poverty resulting from the economic effects having dire consequences, so it’s a balancing act between the two. Let’s hope that the government get it right.

Meaning of the word pandemic~
(of a disease) prevalent over a whole country or the world.
The world is covered in this sht, NOT just the UK. That is why it is called a pandemic. If it was only in the UK it would be an epidemic.

One medical report I read from Italy was that 10% of those infected had to go into the ICU so if you just ignored the virus and everyone went back to work then we could potentially lose 10% of the population to it as we don't have anywhere near 5/7 million (maths might be off) ICU beds 

Because those millions were spread out over a flu season that lasts 9+ months, they weren't concentrated over a period of weeks that created a mad rush of patients into a system not capable of handling that many at once and at the same time, causing mass infection of the people most-needed to battle the illness, the medical providers. Lockdowns and people keeping their distance are PROVEN from past pandemics to work in minimizing the overwhelming of hospitals.

Because unlike seasonal flu, the Coronavirus is a global pandemic by its very definition. A global pandemic, not a seasonal epidemic 

Think of it in historical terms. The plague was common place throughout Mediaeval Europe, the Middle East and China with epidemics springing up in villages, towns and urban areas and armies regularly, but when all the circumstances came together , such as over population, poor hygiene, changing weather patterns, famine and war it created the perfect storm in the form of the BLACK DEATH. 

Some city states and kingdoms were taken by complete surprise like Venice  and were quite frankly overwhelmed, others with more warning tried to prevent horrible smells, medicine, religion , closing borders. The kingdoms like Poland, used quarantine measures and they got it right! Managing to maintain the plague at epidemic levels. 

A similar thing is happening , albeit on a smaller scale now. With countries trying to react to a global pandemic and hoping they made the right decision 

Common influenza is a pandemic too, dumbass.  

If a virus is active in a town or region, it's called an outbreak.  If it goes nationwide or hits multiple locations on a continent, it's an epidemic.  If it crosses an ocean, it's a pandemic.

'Why do people think...'

That line tells the whole story, they don't think, period.

The infection ability of covid-19 is extremely high and shealth. That means, you may be infected if a carrier passing by you. It also take about 48 hours to 21 days for you to develop symptom of the disease, during that period, you can also be able to infect about 4 people nearby you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coronavirus_disease_2019 
Unfortunately, there is no medicine directly for that desease, so far, medical sector is using suppressor to stimulate our immune system to response. Unfortunately, that virus can cause an over response of our immune systems which is killing our own organs. The only way is to prevent instead of healing. By keeping social distance of 1.5 meters, you get less chance to be infected. If impossible to keep 1.5 meters, you should wear a face mask. Note: face mask is not able to replace that 1.5 meters but better than none.

The origin of that desease was an infection from bat to human. Hence, you near to keep 6 meters from any nests of bats. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat 

I have had a vaccine every year every since they became available. Many people thought that they weren't expecting to get it so didn't bother. I am sure that, in the past, many of those people were among those who died. Unfortunately there is no vaccine against covid-19 so we are all at risk.

They went into panic mode and caused mass hysteria. There were 9000 deaths in the UK in 2019 from flu and that's never mentioned. What are they covering up people are now starting to ask.