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Definitely agree. On reflection it's an error of thinking to assume because they haven't previously they won't in the future as this virus is already showing. Showing my own prejudices badly there. Chat in the GP forums that we might not be able to say "it's just a virus" ever again...
I think we are all learning a lot from this. And def challenging our own preconceptions on a lot.
Am a virologist working in pharma and this has made me reassess my views repeatedly.
the only thing we know is that with these little buggers is that they can and do change rapidly
Do Germany, South Korea and China not count as governments?
Not potential UK governments as of the last election, no. I think that's what MCTD meant.
I believe UK testing capacity is now 10k a day with plan to increase to 25k a day but testing is only 1 part of the combined test,track,isolate procedure needed. Best use of resources will be key.
Our regional lab was expecting to test 500-1000 samples per day, however I believe they've chosen a platform which is capable of no more than 200 even if it's run 24 hrs per day.
Our hospital is sending 40 per day to them, any extras will be sent to Manchester. I believe they are already over capacity though and there's already a back log.
There'll be plans in place I'm not party to though.
I have seen the mention of these hypothetical leaders. But yet when we have other leaders to compare ours to - Merkel vs Trump - can we not simply state that Johnson followed the Trump model initially then realised Merkel's was right after all? That to me seems purely fact without castigating other potential leaders who aren't in power
Were China lying about the true scale, did western governments completely drop the ball despite having all the data or have our governments been lying and always knew a disaster was coming?
The west dropped the ball. China might be covering up a second wave but they were pretty open about the disease after the initial fumbling in early January. We didn't listen to what Chinese experts were saying and assumed that we could cope - hence the complacency.
Do Germany, South Korea and China not count as governments?
Well, Sweden seem to be following our lead as well. I'm not saying our government did the right thing, but if they were listening to British based experts, I'm not sure any other British government would have gone against them.
Anyone heard from Franksinatra?
Jaw dropping levels of stupidity. A scene no doubt repeated across the UK
*waves*
I'm doing okay. Night three on COVID ward tonight and, honestly, I've been to a pretty dark place but hopefully turning the corner now. There have been some false hope before so will see how tonight goes before proclaiming myself to be over the worst of it.
It is a properly horrible illness, it is not an Internet argument, stat or headline. It's just a grotty, foul indiscriminate illness
Can we pin your last paragraph to the top of the forum?
Glad to hear you're hopefully on the up 🙂
Lots of talk now of late May, early June at the earliest, the fact that most businesses, people and the country could be bankrupt in less time than that will be what drives the way this is dealt with after April!
@franksinatra hope you get well soon.
My dad (in his 70's) was admitted last Friday with breathing issues - prior to that he had a cough for 3 weeks, and aches for 1.5 weeks - in the last few days before he was admitted he was sleeping lots (like proper flu). The breathing issues came on then, along with coughing up gunk.
He has just tested positive for it. I've also had similar symptoms but not breathing issues (I've been isolating for about 3.5 weeks now).
If it gets to the lungs, it's the breathing issues that seem to make it differ from general cold / flu...
Currently on oxygen, but said he's feeling a lot better each day which is positive.
What a nightmare this is, not being able to be near loved ones :/
Lots of talk now of late May, early June at the earliest,
If that turns out to be the case then welcome to the start of the next Great depression.
Good to hear you feel like a corner has been turned, keep us posted too.
We’ll only worry if you don’t.
My analysis of this study using predictions for each patient of their HCQ concentrations on the days they did not measure, show a highly statistically significant response. Tha analysis in the paper is naive, but they very kindly gave a table of all the raw data. My analysis is much more robust. I would – and I’d take a 1200mg loading dose on Day 1
Pretty mucky data, all the same TiRed (and still a really small sample - and don't forget the withdrawals if we're going all ITT). I'd prefer to "reject" the two asymptomatic patients, probably analyse the URTI separate from the LRTI, and also (esp in the HCQ only arm) there's a pretty good correlation between longer delay to staring therapy and negative swabs - this could well relate to later presentation implying more minor disease - or even later presentation meaning they're closer to resolution anyway (also quite a lot of folk think there's 2 points at which swabs are +ve, with a dip inbetween so we may not be seeing "real" resolution)
I agree on loading-up though. That stuff has a lonf half-life. Encouragingly, the recovery trial will use a substantially bigger load than 1,200mg
Edukator mentioned the French have been looking at this. But it also appears Australia is trialling a Tuberculosis vaccine, less to act as a vaccine but to boost the immune system.
I haven't seen the paper described by scaredypants and TiRed - what's the breakdown of the loading dose seeing as it's a combination therapy? The chloroquine derivative is a pretty well tolerated drug isn't so, so I'm not surprised they're loading an even higher dosage. Isn't this causing massive issues for lupus patients though?
Not a medic, just have a graduate degree in Biomed - 5 years in pharma and currently studying stats.
Pretty interesting time to me a mathsy/biosciencey person - suddenly all my old school biology graduate colleagues/former colleagues don't groan when I tell them I'm studying stats.
I feel like this might be a fleeting period in my life when I'm vaguely cool again.
Lupus patients are definitely starting to have issues with supply.
am hoping my cousin can switch to Benlysta as I know that doesn't have any supply constraints.
sadly it isn't right now that is going to be the issue, it is the ban on api that most countries have put in place that will stuff the supply chain
If it's any consolation Graham it makes me cross eyed with rage.
Drugs are of strategic importance, we shouldn't be in a place where we have to rely on a couple of the countries for the API.
Not sure of the ethics of say, stuffing young/working age lupus patients for 80 year old retirees either.
Sadly though the production of api for the generic or old (cheap) medicines will always go to the cheapest provider. But yes causing supply chain issues through protectionism is idiotic. But less of a consequence for them as they don't want or can't afford the ones we produce in the developed world
Ming, they played his speech at the ice hockey game on the radio earlier - with an accompanying translation. Words failed me as well.
rayban: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0924857920300996?via%3Dihub
HCQ is LESS toxic than chloroquine overall but neither is a clean drug. Most of the established use outside of malaria prophylaxis is for chronic conditions allowing for it to accumulate over weeks to steady-state.
There's quite some list of adverse effects but they're largely predictable and docs know what they're looking for. Much less experience at high doses (the lups dose is rarely over 400mg daily; the Marseille paper used 600mg. Recovery is going to load around 2g, split over the 1st 24hr and then drop down
Half-lives are over 24hr, hence the wish to load-up for a rapid effect
grahamt - I feel for your cousin. Shitty times
Words fail me
Don't read up on the Brazilian leaders opinions then. He should be ****in shot tbh.
Report on BBC News yesterday of a Russian doctor saying it was ok to go to church and mingle as you couldn't be infected on a church 🤦
dark age medicine :/
Does anyone actually believe we'll come out if this with sub 20k people lost?....
Found this very informative
This Leading COVID-19 Expert From South Korea
We’ve already signed away our freedoms, albeit temporarily, to combat a virus. Amazing how,
seemingly, easy it has been for us to discard our civil liberties over this.
Hmm For the common good, sacrificing a load of people so just not to inconvenience yourself seems a tad selfish.
Not easy but the right thing.
If I were to use an analogy using medieval instruments of torture, I’d wager that the thumbscrew on society have been thrown away and were now on the rack.
Yet, it appears that there are swathes of people who still must think this will be over by Whitsun Bank Holiday and everything will swing back to normal.
The increase in online sales is quite staggering, was all this money under mattresses? It certainly wasn’t in savings accounts. Well, I suppose we can rest easy knowing that despite the actuality of restricted liberties and the portent of death, the financiers and lenders are offering immediate credit card limit increases and preferential ‘corona’ interest rates for personal and business loans.
All for something that requires total faith and belief for it to be real. Along with the omnipotent human being, one of the greatest scams in, dare I say, human history.
was all this money under mattresses?
No, but a significant proportion of it would have been going into paying Childcare, after school clubs, holidays, kids at uni, commuting costs, etc. All of these are now gone. My now removed childcare costs are more than my (expensive) mortgage.
The increase in online sales is quite staggering, was all this money under mattresses?
I'd imagine it's the money that people aren't spending in town in clothes shops, restaurants, coffee shops, tourist attractions and the rest of the places that are closed.
Last year we worked out that we averaged £600 a month on eating out/going for drinks..... I'm a musician and my girlfriend is a wedding coordinator so business isn't exactly booming currently.... luckily the complete removal of our social life is mitigating a fair chunk of the losses!
Why not quote me in full, dudeofdoom?
Cherry picking that line to make me appear selfish and callous. I was a actually questioning what our lives would be like if a "recovered" UK, in any way, resembles China post (allegedly) coronavirus.
Anyone know why other countries are throwing resources at disinfecting roads? There was even a video on the the Beeb of street signs being scrubbed down in Italy! Surely there is very little chance of picking up the virus in this way?
Did I imagine a news report aboit potentially further restrictions being imposed, with further details to be mailed out to 33 million households?
Why mail? Especially now, this just seems to be another mode of transmission, plus adds a form of delay.
Is it just to prevent mis-reporting and misinterpretation by having one single, hard copy source?
If the letter is the one I saw on a reputable source (cant remember which, no reason to not believe it though) then theres no policy change. I think the letter can only be designed to provide less clarity and more confusion!!
Page 1 - heres a list of the things you're allow to do
Page 2 - heres some guidance on how to do some things not on page 1
Honestly you couldn't make this stuff up. We're all doomed.
Why not quote me in full, dudeofdoom?
Cherry picking that line to make me appear selfish and callous. I was a actually questioning what our lives would be like if a “recovered” UK, in any way, resembles China post (allegedly) coronavirus.
I quoted the bit that irked me most as I disagree that we easily gave up our rights.
I’m not concerned about point scoring what I’m concerned about is not holding our ‘lockdown’ for long enough to make a difference and banging on about people losing rights is only likely to stir things up.
If I’ve misinterpreted your post then I profoundly apologise 🙂
Always worrying when the people who actually know what is happening (as opposed to the average punters like us) start killing themselves.
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold"
Intestertingly the ‘scum’has an interesting opinion piece today.
Hysteria has forced the UK into lockdown, crashed the economy and will kill more than coronavirus
Only took one week of a semi lockdown and they’re banging on about getting people back to work just like Fox is in the US.
Morning folks, another day in the rabbit hole
Hopefully everyone is feeling fit and well or on the way back to health.
Looks like it might be big week. Think it's fair to say myself and my fellow deck chair arrangers are very grateful for the hard work being done by the key workers, volunteers and everyone else keeping this thing moving. Also thanks to the stats and science people for taking time out to give us some insights.
Take care, be kind, remember it's the little things that make a difference.
Intestertingly the ‘scum’has an interesting opinion piece today.
There's been a concerted push of that message through the usual suspects opion pieces this weekend. Latched on to the flawed 'Imperial study says only 5700 deaths!'. I have found it interesting how quickly it has found it's way back to here on the last few pages.
However, unlike Brexit, they won't be able to find a rogue economist who agrees with them:
https://twitter.com/JustinWolfers/status/1244294419492343808
Always worrying when the people who actually know what is happening (as opposed to the average punters like us) start killing themselves.
None of us have any idea about the poor mans state of being before Covid19 to attribute anything to anything.
