Forum menu
Guardian reporting the first recorded death in England was on the 28th February.
Was it previously March the 6th?
Does the fatality list only include those who die in hospital?
If yes, there must be lots of others who sadly didn't make it to hospital.
I thought that used to be the case, and since Tuesday outside deaths included too.
Does the fatality list only include those who die in hospital?
If yes, there must be lots of others who sadly didn’t make it to hospital.
It might not yet, for Scotland, assuming that all hospital deaths are tested.
From next week, the daily figures will also start to include all deaths where the virus is officially "suspected" to have been a factor, even if it has not been confirmed by testing.
Ms Sturgeon said this would increase the number of deaths on record, but would not speculate about how significant this could be.
If this is different in the other countries then it might help explain why Scotlands figures are relatively low.
they are confirming their herd immunity idea and wanting everyone to get it
Not everyone needs to get it for herd immunity.
Now for some good news. If Italy is recording 6-700 deaths per day, this time next week, then they have reached the peak of their epidemic. That is important so I thought I’d share it. This firms up my prediction of the duration of the U.K. epidemic and all others. You can wait for that...
I’d did predict the upswing this week too in the U.K. :-(.
TiRed - thanks for your continued posts.
Your use of ... suggests bad news to come; I guess each day's numbers help you to refine your model.
I would also guess that what's going to be reported over the next 5/7 days is already happening.
How are you defining peak?
Molgrips - we simply don't know how herd immunity will work with this virus, it could work out that you are "immune" but still able to be a carrier and infectious.
I don't think anyone knows, but if that happens then it won't be fun
@TiRed - I've been reading your posts with interest, but missed the one on the duration; what are your models suggesting?
My analysis, as of yesterday's data, predicts a peak in the UK epidemic in the first week in May. The interval of uncertainty, what really matters, is from mid-April to Mid-June. Sorry, but that is prediction uncertainty for you. Over by September.
Peak is defined by fitting an epidemiological model to the data. Near-term predictions are data-driven. When the near-term and peramatric models "lock onto each other", then I am happy to call the peak, because I can then track much more accurately. Italy has reached that point. No other EU country has yet to do so (they are all still growing almost exponentially).
Well I don’t read the spectator :D, but the Guardian has been up in arms about spot checks on roads and people being told to go home.
any links or sources, can’t recall any opinion pieces being up in arms about spot checks at all?
I might have missed this earlier but @TiRed what is your background and why are you so good at this?
Do you work in epidemiological modelling?
we simply don’t know how herd immunity will work with this virus
Funny how a few weeks ago it was then it wasn't on, then it was never a thing - it was spreading rumours, now it seems it might be back or maybe not.
Who know's if the Boris Johnson is seriously planning on taking the country down that route. A lot of organisations to have tendencies to return to pet projects - having been knocked off kilter for a while the policy gyroscope appears to levelling up again. As people like to point out - you can't kill an idea.
I have reservations about the passport - at best we get small number of deliberate infectors or forgeries. If that risk hasn't been identified and quantified then the whole thing is flawed from the start. At worst it has the potential to eventually create an infect : protect split similar to leave remain in the population. Choke enough people and eventually they will do anything to fight for air. As the nudge unit keeps pointing out - you have to take the population with you. Worked nicely in the nudge world of Brexit. Nudge the herd to stampede and it just keeps running. Well that's a cynical interpretation on events for the morning. Of course this could be total bxllxxs.
Here you go: 30 second search 🙂
I only publish within my expertise (not clinical practice, nor political). I will do my best to translate technical findings into plain English, and I won’t publish alarming informatino without context. I’ll also answer any question within my expertise as best I can.
Daren Austin PhD, Senior Fellow, Clinical Pharmacology, GlaxoSmithKline and formerly Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow in Mathematical Epidemiology at Oxford and later Imperial College.
Have you ever watched a. Tv show called breaking bad..
I have been using his modelling to help make decisions at work. Fellow employees who are moronic with their lasse fair attitude to viral control
Local shop, tiny, 1 person out for a run could cover every single item of stock with spores, yet they cannot be arsed to make a sarnie at home. So instead they wander over, buy some french bread thats on display, some meat or cheese and then make up a baguettes and ram it down their necks
No hand washing, no wiping down of packaging. Divs
Guardian reporting the first recorded death in England was on the 28th February.
This makes you think. If anyone recalls from my flying grumbling thread I was very suddenly ill mid feb with a flu like illness, took about 7 days to recover. No one else had the flu at the time, and although not a guarantee I’d had a flu jab in October last year. It's sudden appearance was a shock.
@jonl - you also must have superpowers to get the search to work
Anyway Darren with 1 "r"... he's a crank
😜
Yeah, the search engine is crap. Use site:singletrackworld.com after your key words in Google and you have an STW search engine that works.
Do you work in epidemiological modelling?
I'm a geek. But I have had 25 years of training for this, first doing Epidemiological modelling with the Imperial group (we were at Oxford), and for the past 20-years doing other types of (more complex statistical) modelling in my day job looking for new medicines. I just took my day-job skills and past knowledge and mixed them together. Writing it up now, so then I can go public on Monday on a preprint server. The Italy projection is very pleasing, so I wanted to share it.
Matt Hancock just posted "two weeks to peak". I have support for that, but it is early days and I stand by my projection.
don't know if this was posted before but an interesting report on the balance between excess deaths due to the virus vs deaths due to the subsequent economic harm
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51979654
I talked about the Venn diagram having substantial overlap before, but apparently Neil Ferguson suggests up to 2/3 (remember, about 50K people die every month 'normally'), whereas a 6.4% decline in the economy will create the same impact due to poverty, life expectancy, etc.
I'm glad it's not me that has to balance that equation. I'm not glad it's Boris, Gove, et al. I wonder if they've still 'had enough of experts'?
Another update from the (actually) snowy Nordics...
Yes, it snowed last night, covering the crocuses and early daffodils with a decent layer of that damp kind of snow that clogs up your shoes and melts easily.
As people have said, we are still being allowed to individually assess the risks of our actions and, to me, that's a mistake. People in Stockholm, at least to me, appear to be quite selfish and self-orientated and are almost carrying on as usual. I had an e-mail last night about an after-work for people that could "make it to an uncrowded pub". Given the role of the inviter, I'm disappointed and will not be going. As another example, I was out walking the dogs yesterday and saw a woman wearing a mask, coughing her way up a hill and dragging her kid to school. Maybe this is the fault of the messaging, by people thinking that "kids can't catch it" rather than "everyone can get it, but kids are far less likely to die from it"?
Having talks with some of my neighbours (that are taking this seriously) there seems to be thinking that next week will be when we see a jump in the upward trend in both cases and deaths and this might be when the lockdown starts in earnest. If that is the case, then it will likely be too late; I thought I saw a headline that 50+ people had died in care homes, but cannot find the link. I guess that we will have to wait and see.
I still have no luck finding dried yeast for baking.
@TiRed - thanks for your work. It's good to get some info from someone with knowledge and insight. 👍
The Govt have been doing a pretty good job at counterfactual analysis to date.
EDIT: if you can share your paper on Monday I'd like to read it
https://twitter.com/BethRigby/status/1245979880795365378?s=20
Anyone know what's going on with the numbers in the graphs and tweet above. The graph doesn't align with the numbers in the tweet, and the numbers in the graphs don't align with the numbers the government is issuing each day. I thought it might be NHS England only, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
I have reservations about the passport – at best we get small number of deliberate infectors or forgeries.
The passport is currently a fantasy. Likewise the promised increases in testing. Right now we don't have a reliable test for anti-bodies or even certainty over immunity levels in those who have had the virus already.
This is a government which has lied repeatedly about everything in a situation where making shit up simply won't work.
From what I read there was a nasty flu also making the rounds around that time.
It's not like all the other viruses in town have watched COVID-19 ride down main street dressed all in black and run away. Everything that we would normally have to deal with is still out there. All of which makes it really hard to know whether you have COVID-19 or just something with similar symptoms. It doesn't help that the way it presents seems very variable.
Italy has reached that point. No other EU country has yet to do so (they are all still growing almost exponentially).
France left its exponential line a week ago, TiRed. It's been a slowly rising line over the last week and pretty much a straight line for the last 4 days. The number of new cases is falling despite increased testing, the number of hopital admissions is rising very slowly and the number recovering means hospital staff are more and more confident they have the resources to cope with the peak - so they aren't expecting it to be much worse than it is now. The numbers recovering or dying are almost equal to new admissions. One day doesn't make a trend but four days can break a trend.
China progressively locked down with measures similar to France from 22/1/2020 and the curves rolled over by 17/2/2020; there were virtaully no new cases from 17/3/2020 - apart from in Hubai. In Hubai the lock down didn't initially work and even stricter confinement measures were needed.
I think most of France is going to do as well as most of China but there will be some areas such as 93 that will continue to be a problem and where even stricter Wuhan style measures would not go down well.
If I were supremely optimistic and stupid enough to make it public forever on a mountain bike forum I'd call peak in France for Sunday 5/4/2020 +/- 3 days. So I have.
I don't know how you are going to model France now, TiRed, because they just added 884 deaths from outside hospitals to one day's total and they'll add them day by day form here on which will raise the curve in general from yesterday.
Like many in areas where confinemnet seems to be paying off I'm interested in how the end of confinement is going to be managed. Who's going to be let out to play first ?
Edit: to correct Chinese date errors.
Schools.
Everyone will go mad if they can't send their offspring back to the pits classrom.
about 50K people die every month ‘normally’), whereas a 6.4% decline in the economy will create the same impact due to poverty, life expectancy, etc.
I’m glad it’s not me that has to balance that equation. I’m not glad it’s Boris, Gove, et al. I wonder if they’ve still ‘had enough of experts’?
Considering this governments primary reason for existence is to drive through a Brexit that experts say will inflict that kind of damage to GDP over the next decade , you can see why the 'do nothing' strategy of the first 6 weeks was so appealing to this government
Schools.
Everyone will go mad if they can’t send their offspring back to the pits classrom.
AHH you've been speaking to my wife then? 😜
Now they have had to back off a bit = more cars on road.
Correlation does not equal causation, but even if it did, the increased traffic numbers were reported for Tuesday, when the announcement of the more unified line on policing was Tuesday night.
I'd actually be interested to see a comparison between Sweden and other countries, if nothing more than to see exactly how badly we are going to get screwed and roughly when.
I would love to believe that Regeringen has this covered and people will be responsible, but when you hear about field hospitals being created and made ready (and you see signs that a local stadium is being converted to one), you have to take a slightly pessimistic view.
Ed, no way we are going to be let out before 11th of May. 2 bank holidays weekend before that where people would go out and travel.
Older people will be the last ones out.
Interesting insight from my sister. She works in the world of organ transplantation (or did, all organ transplants have been cancelled so don't go be needing one any time soon) and is a dna/genetics expert. Apparently they are looking at genetic markers and there are some very significant correlations of those that are dying. We are all obviously genetic mongrels but there are many generalisations that can be made in the make up of different nations. It is no surprise that Germany has done better and Italy and Spain worse beyond government response and population behaviour. If your genetic makeup has strong correlations to the silk road it looks like you will do much less well. Also, some very marked racial differences within the UK victims when compared to the population at large that have not yet been shared publicly. Finally she has a friend from university working to generate a faster testing regime for a genetic predisposition to poor blood clotting. No one with a score of 5 (I've no idea what this means) or worse has made it out of ITU alive yet so when we get overwhelmed that will be one of the first things they look at when denying treatment. The irony is the lady doing the work has a special interest in it as she has an underlying genetic clotting issue herself and knows her own work will see her on the wrong side of the line if she were to fall in.
Grim times.
@Edukator - given the usual French attitude to the inhabitants of département neuf trois, I wouldn't be surprised if Macron just built a wall around it and left them to it.
Is there any hope for them?
Everyone will go mad if they can’t send their offspring back to the pits classrom.
Speak for yourself, great being home with my daughter, about the only positive of this whole thing. 🙂
There's a triage call if ever there was one.
edit: aimed at the balancing recession vs covid deaths post..!
Say what now?
see ninja edit.
also, re kids, serious I was not
(or was I?)
In other news my wife has someone in her team who has stopped social distancing and following 'the rules' as she is totally convinced that Covid 19 is a hoax - that is it all to do with the radiation from 5G and the global lockdown is a cover up. That is not even the original conspiracy theory (which was that 5G was suppressing the immune system making us more vulnerable to the virus) but a mutation of if doing the rounds that mouth breathers are falling for. These people are amongst us.
They furlough her today as she is worse than useless in a WHF work environment and no one has the capacity/stomach for sacking her for being a cretin (not just the 5G thing but her inability to be professional WFH).
Is there any hope for them?
The media have been reporting that after initial scrums outside supermarkets and close proximity in markets things have much improved so yes. It'll just take a bit longer for confinement to be effective as it wasn't as strictly followed inititaly. It's all about getting the message across by education rather than confrontation. So far so good. When people are directly affected it's easier to get them to cooperate, they need to know how to cooperate.
I don’t know how you are going to model France now
I don't. I model ALL global data and the models adjusts to predict France. Small increases due to changes in reporting methods will be "learned" by one of my models. Peak is still too early to formerly call in France, Spain and UK. Italy is nailed on though 🙂
Departement 93
Off-topic, but the reference is to a run-down suburb of Paris:
https://www.monsieurbonheurartist.com/la-trilogie-du-bonheur