The Coronavirus Discussion Thread.

I know of 4 people with positive tests.

One died, one has just come out of hospital and another was symptomless (all from the same family)

....our local greengrocer was on a ventilator with it too. I believe he's actually home now but not exactly 'recovered'

Anyone who has posted on this thread Know anyone who has tested positive for covid 19 ?

Yes.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-52742519

Oh look, the great British public using their common sense, just as Iain Duncan Smith said.
(I know it's the same link as further up there ^^, just for reference).

but the longer this goes on the more people won’t have any job to go back to. Meanwhile huge numbers have forgotten the whole reason for the lockdown so whats the point in continuing.

True. But my concern is that a rush to get some back to work a few weeks earlier than was wise will result in the virus hanging around at levels that mean others can’t return to work for ages, if ever. Getting the staff of Tory sponsors (Wimpey etc) back to work last week may mean some in hospitality etc will be unemployed, as their work places have to stay closed longer. Also, the rush to get ‘back to normal’ has given people the message the ‘lockdown’ is over… agreed. Again, their behaviour may mean some industries will now stay closed long enough for more jobs to be lost.

Oh look, the great British public using their common sense, just as Iain Duncan Smith said.

Pretty sure it was very busy in Cornwall too judging by what friends that live there said.

Two factors made n. Devon worse. It’s a lot closer for a day trip from places without a beach & woolacombes decision to keep carparks closed caused carnage in the whole area.

https://twitter.com/barrytobebarry/status/1263128633935384583?s=20

I can’t think of anywhere I’d less rather be than in a crowded resort full of ignorant f@@@@@s right now.

I'm not sure Portie counts as a resort

Those porty pics are not representative. I walked past mid-day and it was fine. Folk about but lots of space. Most of the >2 people groups are families too.

There's also a certain question over people who live in remote/touristy areas who couldn't economically survive long term complaining about the "tourists" showing up. The whole "local health service will get overwhelmed" argument might well be a cover for an "us vs them" and this "our area" mentality for people who enjoy the benefits of intra-country movement... when it suits them.

Those portobello pics look like your typical weekend or day of nice weather. In that situation I can’t see how you can keep social distancing with how small it is.

I’ve just listened to my local news talking about care homes taking between 2 and 5 weeks to get CV test results back! 5 weeks!!

Then it clicked with me the disconnect between stats reported on the daily press conference and the graphs on gov.uk.

Today, they reported 2500 positive tests. Sounds a lot.

Then think about results taking 2-5 weeks in some cases.

GOV.UK CV page

The graph there shows positive tests by SPECIMEN DATE. It shows we are down to 500 new cases/day now.

Pretty sure it was very busy in Cornwall

maybe in parts. I surfed widemouth last night with maybe 20 in spread across the main beach  and black rock.  walked the coast path today around Trebarwith. Not quiet but certainly not rammed. Main car park was less than a quarter full but that doesn’t make headlines.

Anyone who has posted on this thread Know anyone who has tested positive for covid 19 ?

Yes. My gran and she died from it.

The graph there shows positive tests by SPECIMEN DATE. It shows we are down to 500 new cases/day now.

As it takes a number of days to get the results tests by specimen date will not give an accurate picture over the last few days as most of the tests taken in the last 24-48hrs will still be pending results. Also can’t believe results take 2-5 weeks, surely that is 2-5 days.

Pretty sure it was very busy in Cornwall

A lot of the pics I have seen in the media of “crowded” beaches/parks have clearly been shot with telephoto lenses which have the effect of bunching everything near and far close together, so making things look a lot more crowded than they actually are.

No, it was a quote from a care home owner that results took between 2 & 5 weeks!😳

Mudmuncher - my 500 positive tests was a projection of the line from its last accurate date on 13 March (have a look at the graph I linked and you’ll see 5-600 positive tests/day is accurate.)

https://stateofit.com/UKContactTracing/

South Devon beaches seemed to be pretty empty compared to some of the honey spots on the north coast.

The whole “local health service will get overwhelmed” argument might well be a cover for an “us vs them” and this “our area” mentality for people who enjoy the benefits of intra-country movement… when it suits them.

I've seen lots of pictures of 'idiots' taken at such an angle to look like they are crowded in to outdoor spaces with some fairly unpleasant commentary.

I can't help but feel that some people are using Covid-19 for some fairly extreme nimbyism/we dont like outsiders/us and them type nastiness.

I've been very fortunate in that we live somewhere fairly rural - so for the duration of lockdown I've spent a lot of time mooching around outdoors, enjoying the spring. It's been like a slighty weird holiday, to be honest.
Had I been cooped up in a city centre flat for two months, and the government (were I in England) then said I'm allowed to travel to exercise, you're damn right I'd be pootling off somewhere nice for some outdoor exercise and fresh air!

For balance, I did 50 miles of mountain biking in Calderdale last Sun which included getting back to Brighouse along the canal from Hebden Bridge, which is 15 miles (this section I used the road sometimes too as its very popular in places).
While there were plenty of people out and about enjoying a beautiful day I didn't see any groups that weren't family groups and I didn't see any big groups of mountain bikers either.

I did see lots of e-bikes though.

My little corner of Brighouse has been very well behaved, so I might be living in a little self contained bubble. The only obvious spreaders I've witnessed are large groups of teenage boys in the woods sharing weed.

Definitely alot more traffic though so they are going somewhere. The only shops I've been to are Toolstation and a big local Timber merchants and both were set up very safely for customers.

https://stateofit.com/UKContactTracing//blockquote >

Hmm so not much work to really fix it then 🙂

(Sneaky edit - Not being ironic .... )

I don’t think the developers have done that bad tbh within the issues of Bluetooth and not using the tracing api,(which is now being pushed out on iOS updates).

I’ll be interested to see the version using the tracing api.
Gonna be pretty code lite 🙂

 

Yes I agree with Dan, the headline figure of daily reported cases are actually spread across a huge timeframe, most are from the last 2 weeks but some go as far back as Feb. English confirmed cases have been below 1500 per day for some time and look on course for around 500 per day this week.
Is that the same system used in other countries though?

Note- The gov.uk graph only covers England as data isn't available for rest of UK.

I’ve seen lots of pictures of ‘idiots’ taken at such an angle to look like they are crowded in to outdoor spaces with some fairly unpleasant commentary

Remember that London park that was overwhelmed by 3000 people early in the lockdown? 'More Or Less' on R4 looked at the situation ( one of their team was there on the day having a run ) and ran the numbers - 3-4 people per acre, which confirmed the anecdotal report from the team member that it was quieter than normal. There's a few bits of bs in the media.

Currently only 4% of the daily results are positive.
We’re wasting a lot of that capacity.
A more targeted approach would be a lot more effective in reducing all cases.

I agree with you but can't help celebrating that low figure. The tests are already targetted to some degree in that suspected cases are tested even if there's currently little done to check every possible contact that person had.

4% positive is lower than the admittedly more targetted German and French testing systems were getting at the peak of the epedemic in areas with the lowest levels of new cases. I'll interpret it as most likely good news about the current levels of new infections - low.

The media are focussing on a few telephoto lens enhanced instances of crowding in the open air which is pretty low risk. In general though people have changed their habits for the better and even if lockdown is easing we aren't seeing the pre-lockdown conditions that lead to rapid spread - packed pubs and nightcubs, busy restaurants, crowded work places, packed public transport with no masks, packed mosques (churches are raely packed apart from a few evangelist churches), crowded schools.

Once again the media is contrarian - having told us for weeks that there was nothing to worry about when there was, they're now pointing a finger at the public when the public isn't taking huge risks and there's a lot less to worry about.

Looks like the police are busy sending people home - welcome to common sense Britain.

Who saw this coming? Oh everybody.

https://twitter.com/NewquayResponse/status/1263338388410728448

Or, we wait a bit until track trace and test is viable.

That sort of sense won't hit the timelines - it's all about the timelines. The Government has talked a good game but then complete go off plan in the delivery. Wasn't it all about only when the five tests are met then suddenly it's all about hitting the date - the most important one seems to be slaughter day the 4th of July. You'd have to marvel at the sense of opening up the whole country on a Saturday. It's a date that really settles the Guided by Science or Sunk by Spin argument. Hasn't anyone twigged Cummings already played the Independence Day card with Brexit? We will no doubt see Boris declare independence from the tyranny of the virus speech. I'd be for putting it back to the following Monday but seeing what happened with VE Day there would just be more mixed messaging spun out.

If the assumptions about reducing current infection rates are correct, it sounds great news. But with that kind of lag in test results, how the hell do we judge if the relaxation of lockdown and VE Day mixing have had an effect in order to consider further easing?

The graph there shows positive tests by SPECIMEN DATE. It shows we are down to 500 new cases/day now.

Thanks for pointing me at that, yes, there is a lag, but it's the most encouraging thing I've seen for ages and I'm clinging to it!

Indeed!! You can’t have a TTI strategy with 2 weeks for a test result.

Remember back at the start we were only testing 1-2000/day.

I’d rather we did 50k/day properly than splurge 100k tests poorly to meet an arbitrary target.

Looks like the police are busy sending people home – welcome to common sense Britain.

wish they’d do it a bit more in normal times. Cornwall is infested with the ‘van life’ crowd.

In Wales, we are still not meant to leave the house apart from for essentials and excerize and we are not meant to drive unless necessary so car parks are closed. When we went for a walk yesterday arvo, at my local beach there were about 40-50 cars parked on double-yellowed verges so people could go to the beach and sit around drinking cans. In terms of social distancing, between groups distances seemed compliant but the groups did not look in any way to be single households. Probably naive of me but I was a bit shocked as up until yesterday there were no cars and at most a handful of families actually walking on the beach whenever we've walked down.

wish they’d do it a bit more in normal times. Cornwall is infested with the ‘van life’ crowd.

Move then.

I don’t think the developers have done that bad tbh within the issues of Bluetooth and not using the tracing api,(which is now being pushed out on iOS updates).

Oh, that is true. But it is also the point. The obviously wrong decision was made at the outset. Coding around that decision is just people proving their smarts and wasting time. Not their time, our time.

'infested'? That's a bit Hatie Kockpins isn't it?

Science time!

Published in Cell, but explained here https://www.statnews.com/2020/05/21/coronavirus-hijacks-cells-in-unique-ways/

Basically SASR-COV-2 stops your body's immune system from releasing the stimulatory anti-viral signals (called interferons), but not the signal to bring in the heavy cellular artillery (cytokines) leading to inflammatory response. Interferons are the signals that give you the "flu-like symptoms". I didn't not have any temperature. I did have the cytokines.

Southampton hospital are testing inhaled interferon as a treatment with Synairgen

https://www.uhs.nhs.uk/AboutTheTrust/Newsandpublications/Latestnews/2020/March/Southampton-researchers-trial-inhaled-therapy-for-COVID-19.aspx

Very interesting. That sounds like quite a simple treatment for the serious cases?

wish they’d do it a bit more in normal times. Cornwall is infested with the ‘van life’ crowd.

Saving this for the answer to the next environmental thread where people ask why Brits feel the need to holiday abroad when we have lots of nice things at home.

Just give it a few years for the 4G (or 5G) netweork to catch up, when every "WFH" surfing enthusiast spends 6 months working in their vans at the beach with one eye on the surf line.

It’s WFA now 🙂

Oh, that is true. But it is also the point. The obviously wrong decision was made at the outset. Coding around that decision is just people proving their smarts and wasting time. Not their time, our time.

I’d blame the customer 🙂

But I’m not disagreeing,my initial thoughts were mmmhh battery Life’s gonna suck, which sorta renders it a bit useless.

The site is melting down, but Scottish govt. just uploaded their plans for phased return.

Summary of my area: Schools, early years and childcare - 4 phases of return, teachers can now use buildings, outdoor nurseries open next week, more childcare over summer, a blended/part time return from August 11th for schools, ey, university etc, finale phase no date set but basically good hygiene.

For recreation, more sports and recreation added from next week with a 'stay reasonably local please' request.

Work

Travel

my initial thoughts were mmmhh battery Life’s gonna suck, which sorta renders it a bit useless.

Also those that travel around a lot for work or pleasure, and/or do so on public transport - the ones most likely to benefit from such an app, are those least likely to have an opportunity for a mid-day recharge.

Another alternative view - article by Sunetra Gupta, Professor of Theoretical Epidemiology at the University of Oxford who wrote the 'other' report we remember from back in March.

https://unherd.com/2020/05/oxford-doubles-down-sunetra-gupta-interview/

Best to read the whole thing but maybe this is the summary:

“In almost every context we’ve seen the epidemic grow, turn around and die away — almost like clockwork. Different countries have had different lockdown policies, and yet what we’ve observed is almost a uniform pattern of behaviour which is highly consistent with the SIR model. To me that suggests that much of the driving force here was due to the build-up of immunity. I think that’s a more parsimonious explanation than one which requires in every country for lockdown (or various degrees of lockdown, including no lockdown) to have had the same effect.”

(I'm not endorsing it merely sharing it, and obvs an academic is going to want to defend their prediction so there's potential for bias.)

I suppose its possible, but she has to turn theoretical epidemiology into hard epidemiology at some point with some evidence to support it apart from some similarities between the death curves between countries with varying levels of lockdown.

At what rate would the virus have to be transmitted to get from 0 to 50% incidence in a population of 60 million in just a few months?

Anyone who has posted on this thread Know anyone who has tested positive for covid 19 ?

Know several families who think that they've had it. My mates wife is in the NHS and several of her team have had it. A team colleague at work's father passed from it, and she then ended up on a ventilator. Another ex colleague is currently on a ventilator.

@TiRed

Thanks for the article.

I can't believe I'm reading biology out of my own will.

Sunetra Gupta

Again? FFS, will people not learn.
Attention seeker. Ignore.

Quite a good explanation of memory cells etc.

(Or I thought it was.)

Sunetra Gupta

Attention seeker. Ignore.

I don't doubt it, but please link to a credible source saying that so we can make up our own minds.

Also link to a credible source debunking something in the article?

At what rate would the virus have to be transmitted to get from 0 to 50% incidence in a population of 60 million in just a few months?

At the rate we were told it was being transmitted a few months ago.

We were told two months ago that 1% of the population had been infected. It was doubling every 2-3 days. R was around 4.

https://www.holyrood.com/news/view,up-to-50000-people-in-scotland-could-already-be-infected-with-coronavirus-c_15290.htm

with regards to that interview, the following is pertinent:

Observing the very similar patterns of the epidemic across countries around the world has convinced Professor Gupta that it is this hidden immunity, more than lockdowns or government interventions, that offers the best explanation of the Covid-19 progression:

It did not dawn on her, perhaps, that the reason they were so similar is that they followed the same actions - unrestricted exponential growth (doubling every 2.8 days in UK), followed by containment. Easy to speculate on "hidden immunity" - cross reactivity due to past Corona virus infections that one cannot detect. Maybe. Except there is also Antibody Dependent Enhancement, where instead of immunity, low levels of antibodies make infections WORSE by facilitating cell invasion via another receptor (Fc).

Frankly the serology in multiple countries, the Sweden experiment (where R is basically held at 1 and has remained so for weeks, with 7% seroprevalence not their predicted 40%), and the nature of the natural dynamics of epidemic growth points to the lockdown being a reasonable intervention in the absence of treatment or vaccination.

At the rate we were told it was being transmitted a few months ago.

We were told two months ago that 1% of the population had been infected. It was doubling every 3 days. R was around 4.

https://www.holyrood.com/news/view,up-to-50000-people-in-scotland-could-already-be-infected-with-coronavirus-c_15290.htm/blockquote >

...and is 50pc a crude estimate of a level where the virus peters out or is it more nuanced than that? Supposing 20pc of us had had it but they were the *right* people. We know it's been rife in care homes and hospitals. Perhaps it's run out of vulnerable spreaders and the rest of us just don't catch it and spread it that well.

Hopefully some of STW's more knowledgeable people might step up and link to some decent theories on why relaxing lockdowns across Europe hasn't resulted in a jump in infections.

 

Without any restriction of contacts and a wholly susceptible population (we can all catch it), infections double every three days. In most countries. If there is some immunity, the supply of new people dwindles and the infection cannot keep going. Variously that proportion is 1-1/R (so about 2/3). Now that assumes everyone mixes with everyone else. If we mix a bit less, then you have shorter transmission chains and not such a high proportion.

Relaxing lockdowns is not going back to where we were three months ago.

If you have N people in a room, there are N(N-1)/2 possible contacts. We've gone from 4 people in out house 6 contacts, to plus one more person outside. 6 + 4 = 10. This is a supertanker, so you will not see huge rapid spikes.

THanks Tired, I hoped you'd explain it all!

perhaps, that the reason they were so similar is that they followed the same actions

I'm going from memory, but weren't there differences: Italy's lockdown seemed to take an eternity to have an effect, while New York's worked overnight. ...and then there's Sweden.

the Sweden experiment (where R is basically held at 1 and has remained so for weeks, with 7% seroprevalence not their predicted 40%),

They did have a peak of deaths and it was around where everyone else's was. You're saying antibody tests suggest it didn't spread much in Sweden after all when you'd expect 40pc to have had it? So does that mean either that it's less infectious than we thought or that Sweden's social distancing measures were effective? Or something else?

lockdown being a reasonable intervention

Yup, no quarrel with that, I'd be doing the same if it were my call.

Without any restriction of contacts and a wholly susceptible population (we can all catch it), infections double every three days. In most countries. If there is some immunity, the supply of new people dwindles and the infection cannot keep going. Variously that proportion is 1-1/R (so about 2/3). Now that assumes everyone mixes with everyone else. If we mix a bit less, then you have shorter transmission chains and not such a high proportion.

Yup.

Relaxing lockdowns is not going back to where we were three months ago.

If you have N people in a room, there are N(N-1)/2 possible contacts. We’ve gone from 4 people in out house 6 contacts, to plus one more person outside. 6 + 4 = 10. This is a supertanker, so you will not see huge rapid spikes.

Are you saying nowhere has relaxed the most effective elements of their lockdowns yet so the gentle relaxation so far has had no effect and they aren't seeing more cases??? (Presumably people are begin hyper careful too.) If/when they returned to normality (unless there's a vaccine) they *will* still get big spikes???

variously that proportion is 1-1/R (so about 2/3)

That's with R=3.

But if R drops to e.g. 1.5, you only need 33% of the population to be infected to reach that herd immunity.

Last time the government reported on it, we were actually at R=1, though I have no idea if that's still (or ever was) true.

But at what level is it basically "good enough" ?

Sweden's epidemiologist is back-pedaling as fast as Gupta will be. As is their modeller. They predicted 40% prevalence by May 1. Note I did not say that the Sweden "experiment" was a bad one. it's not unreasonable given their delay behind us and timing, but they have done worse than their neighbors.

Truth is, this is a moderately contagious respiratory disease, with high morbidity and mortality in the elderly (as per nasty influenza), but no treatment or protection other than behavioral changes, which we took. We took it in good faith for robust reasons based on robust predictions from multiple sources.

But if R drops to e.g. 1.5, you only need 33% of the population to be infected to reach that herd immunity.

But surely if that 'R' is being achieved by lockdown, social distancing, shielding etc then you have to maintain those measures. Don't we have to get to the % that is required for a R value that is the one that results from 'business as usual'?

I.e. >60% (?)

Truth is, this is a moderately contagious respiratory disease, with high morbidity and mortality in the elderly (as per nasty influenza), but no treatment or protection other than behavioral changes, which we took. We took it in good faith for robust reasons based on robust predictions from multiple sources.

Yup, there seems no doubt at all that lockdowns were a the right course of action for all kinds of reasons.

Many thanks, I think I've taken enough of your time. much appreciated, as always.

You either play the long-game for herd immunity - infect as many as possible with R > 1, and once you get to about 50% you start to exhaust susceptibles (until more are born or immunes lose their immunity). Or you keep contacts down and R < 1 and wait till it dies out naturally.

Sweden have maintained a roughly constant incidence of new cases so R = 1. But the LOW incidence means it will take a loooong time to get to significant prevalence.

If we have a vaccine, herd immunity will come from that, not infections. If we don't it will be track, trace and treat index and contacts. With no eventual population protection.

With no eventual population protection.

I.e. it just becomes a fact of life (along with the individual surveillance)?

Eek. Need that vaccine!

Sweden have maintained a roughly constant incidence of new cases so R = 1. But the LOW incidence means it will take a loooong time to get to significant prevalence.

Yup, so Sweden did something different to everyone else and peaked about the same time as everyone else. So what's the 'conventional' view on why that happened. Is there one?

So what’s the ‘conventional’ view on why that happened. Is there one?

Lower population density is going to be a major contributing factor, Shirley?

My view from the Sweden experiment is that if you relax lockdown, maintain some sense of caution and try and protect the elderly properly (especially in nursing homes), then R is about 1 for this disease. If we bring UK incidence down to similar low levels (by lockdown with R < 1) then do the same, we will also have R about 1, but infections will not blow up (because R is 1 not 3!). The key is to decide what daily level is OK (because at R = 1, that's what you will see every day).

Lockdown is very effective, but it is, of course, not sustainable.

Oh, and it's not population density - sorry. Sweden isn't really any different. You have to count the density where people actually live 🙂

My view from the Sweden experiment is that if you relax lockdown, maintain some sense of caution and try and protect the elderly properly (especially in nursing homes), then R is about 1 for this disease. If we bring UK incidence down to similar low levels (by lockdown with R < 1) then do the same, we will also have R about 1

Thanks that's clear and certainly explains what we're seeing.

Oh, and it’s not population density – sorry. 

Don't be sorry!

I am sorry for lazy conjecture...🙂

I seem to recall that rather than population density per se, Sweden has a higher proportion of single person households, which was thought might reduce transmission rates.

That may have come from an article about a month ago and be out of date by now.