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So am I allowed to drive 100miles to see my mum?
You can go 264 miles!
and now we’re being told that “from Monday” we can meet family which means this weekend will be wall-to-wall family gatherings.
What was the point of that? ScotGov are relaxing lockdown as of tomorrow.
You can already do that, if you are prepared to meet outdoors and maintain social distancing, which shouldn’t be too hard in this weather.
Who knew!!
Most things back to normal in France as of 2/6. It's up to us now not to be stupid, and wear masks if the local authorities so decide.
So watching the brief today how does Boris get to decide when other people do or don’t answer question
There might be an argument that the third or fourth time the same question is asked, most of the ground has been covered.
And then the notice about being allowed to drive to places, that was announced / leaked a few days in advance which lead to hordes of people flocking to beaches and beauty spots and now we’re being told that “from Monday” we can meet family which means this weekend will be wall-to-wall family gatherings.
Hey mate, waddya doing on Monday night? Fancy joining us in our vast new lockdown hot-tub for an evening of socially-distanced beer and footsy? I'd say the weekend, but you know, rules...
ps: our neighbours are psychic, they predicted the new rules and implemented them four days in advance. Who knew?
So watching the brief today how does Boris get to decide when other people do or don’t answer question he is basically censoring people.
World King.
Still at 400 deaths a day and lockdown is being relaxed?
How does that compare with other badly hit countries?
Who knew!!
Everyone who read the rules 😄
Very concerned that deaths and infections seem too high to my non expert brain for further social easing. Should have waited two weeks to see if the schools changed the numbers.
Don’t you need the actual daily deaths not the reported deaths? Those 400 reported today could go back a couple of weeks. I’m not sure where the actual data is though
https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-daily-deaths/
If you go here you can see the daily deaths for today are about 70. The other are historical deaths. You have to go through all the data and collate the information they don’t seem to tally it. So daily death rate isn’t as high as reported.
Edit doesn’t mean those deaths for today won’t increase over the next few weeks to get today’s true figure.
If you go here you can see the daily deaths for today are about 70. The other are historical deaths. You have to go through all the data and collate the information they don’t seem to tally it. So daily death rate isn’t as high as reported.
that also means there are COVID related deaths today that are not in those 70
With most deaths being reported in about 3 days, there is no real reason not to just use the daily announcements as an estimate of how things are going (though there is a clear weekly cycle in reporting to be aware of). This small delay is no big deal compared to the 2-4 weeks delay between getting ill and dying!
Today being worse than this day last week isn't a good sign at all, though it is only one day and might be a blip. If Friday and Saturday are high too I'll be worried.
(yesterday's number was also up on a week ago, but would have been bumped up by the BH)
I've pretty much given up taking daily figures too seriously in this tail phase (we hope) for most countries as they all suffer from reporting system anomolies. Totting up mid-week to mid-week gives a smoothed view. My unexplained anomoly for today is 3325 new cases in France today after a week around 300 new cases a day.
Our kid's school has just announced they are not reopening next week.
Head Teacher says that R is as high as it's been for near on a month, has seen nothing to suggest otherwise. Doesn't want to put staff / kids / community at risk.
Has BoJo done a Trump? Basically push the hard decisions to a local level who can then take all the flak for the continued negative impacts of lockdown.
Edit: the return to school plan was staged. A 2 week delay effectively ends the school year for a chunk of pupils. Every week thereafter ends the year for more kids. I'd say if they're not back by 2nd week of June it's all over as the school would have to decide which kids to disadvantage.
Has BoJo done a Trump? Basically push the hard decisions to a local level who can then take all the flak for the continued negative impacts of lockdown.
Yeah was always going to happen, shifting blame is the only hope Johnson has
This seems to adjust for deaths by country well
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps
Does look like UK has higher residual deaths after the peak than other countries
Most things back to normal in France as of 2/6. It’s up to us now not to be stupid, and wear masks if the local authorities so decide.
Are office workers going back to working in offices or still working from home where possible?
Working from home still recommanded in France.
Ed, higher number of reported cases today because they used numbers from the mobile app.
Following on from the excess mortality earlier, I did some comparative analysis for the elderly. About half of all excess mortality is in the 85+ age group in England and Wales. I thought I'd compare that with Sweden and it's neighbors. Based on z-score from euro-momo, I think the plot below says enough. This is ONLY for the 85+ age group (half of our deaths). I'm feeling very upset by this.
Denmark, Norway and Finland have z-scores below 2, which means they have no more deaths in the 85+ age group than would be expected for any year. Sweden have excess and the UK is the highest. I could have added Spain and France, but you get the idea...
I was just looking at the same on euro-momo… Cold War Steve was spot on.
Thanks Chris. How are people getting onto the app? Self reporting? If so how do we know they are confirmed cases and if they are have they already been reported? Anyhow it's reassuring that the blip is a change in reporting rather than a 10 fold jump in a day.
This is my analysis- death rate was up by 50% in the 15-44 group, doubled from 45-84 and trebled for 85+. There is not a huge difference between males and females after adjusting for the fact that you are more likely to die if you are male at any age (note the log-scale)
BTW, the kink in the epidemic at about 14 is where social distancing starts to have an effect.
If looking at the graphs of eldery deaths make you angry, these two good pieces of journalism from today will have you livid:
Cheers tired, you can see why whitty was concerned about R rate going up again
The fact that testing numbers weren't available, and that test results STILL aren't being shared at a local level where they are actually useful, is also a problem
I could see this lockdown relaxation being temporary, I'm not sure they can even manage the local lockdown plan will work without test data being available & track & trace being run by Servo does not inspire confidence.
How many tests do they need to turnaround in an adequate timeframe to claim success?
As I read it tests are still only for people with symptoms, so the same number of tests as now. Contacts of people with symptoms will have to isolate, they are not being tested. I was surprised, but I think the logic is that they could still be incubating for 14 days and would test negative until the end of incubation. But 14 days is the upper end of the possible incubation period. Also incubation will start from the date of contact - how far back are contacts checked?
I assume there's some get out for medics treating covid patients, or they'd be back in isolation as soon as they're out. So that must be based on their PPE. Does anyone else wearing the same level of PPE have a get-out?
Is anyone watching Question Time?
The Social Care Minister is putting on a wonderfully inept display. FFS
Contacts of people with symptoms will have to isolate, they are not being tested. I was surprised, but I think the logic is that they could still be incubating for 14 days and would test negative until the end of incubation.
Contacts who are told to isolate will be tested only if they themselves show symptoms. At this point, anyone in their household will then start a 14 day isolation period. The thing that's confusing me is - how many times might you be asked to self-isolate? It's also possible you could have had the virus already and therefore no be a risk.
Ah, helen whatley wheeled out again in an attempt to defend the indefensible.
Another walking example of the Peter principle and an illustration that an oxbridge education does not guarantee competence.
In the current gov it could easily be argued that oxbridge education is an ironclad guarantee of incompetence, duplicity, piss poor performance, an inability/unwillingness to acknowledge the undeniable facts.
Look at the cabinet, their education, performance and then assess their competence.
Oxbridge or not, she's useless
Correction: worse than useless
Okay, ya. FFS
If you are contacted as having been close to someone with covid, you could just pretend to have symptoms to get a test? Saves a possibly unnecessary 2 week isolation
Everyone who read the rules
Cant be ****ed I'm sticking to old fashioned common sense!!
Serco, 8 quid an hour, recruits feeling confused, a training pdf to read then take a test, life and death decisions. Need someone to run it? Got a mate who's an MP, one of us, and his fragrant wife, bright as a button, posh with a name to go with it, even has her own computer and she fancies having a go at it, can't see a problem. It's not going to be anything at all like G4S security staffing at the Olympics, oh no sirree, that was completely and utterly different.
This release provides initial data from the COVID-19 Infection Survey. This survey is being delivered in partnership with IQVIA, Oxford University and UK Biocentre
Related article
https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/health-52837593
About 7% of people in England have been infected with coronavirus, antibody tests on a random sample of households suggest."Herd immunity is not worth worrying about" at that level, say experts involved in the Office for National Statistics study .
I read the death rates and see the reports about care homes and I'm gobsmacked by the people who still defend BJ and the governments handling of the pandemic. How many people have to die before it's treated as a scandal? Thank god they put a protective ring around care homes of the number of deaths could have been shocking. This country...
For those worried about Serco running things I'm not really sure why. While I was at AWE Foulness they were responsible for staffing and running the Proof and Experimental establishment that shared the island. And yes they lost everyone who knew what they were doing and yes they did employ one person, but only one, with a previous conviction for membership of the IRA and yes he was cutting the grass in the magazine and yes the magazines contained thousands and thousands of rounds of artillery shells and explosives and propellants but hey everyone can make one small mistake.
This business of 6 people now being allowed to meet outside. Is that a medical decision because the risk has reduced. Or is it a political decision to keep the public "happy"?
This business of 6 people now being allowed to meet outside. Is that a medical decision because the risk has reduced. Or is it a political decision to keep the public “happy”?
As always, it's a mix of the two. Risk has reduced. A full lockdown is not permanently sustainable as it starts leaking around the edges. Best to ease it off with some rules.
As always, it’s a mix of the two. Risk has reduced. A full lockdown is not permanently sustainable as it starts leaking around the edges. Best to ease it off with some rules.
it has def started easing off locally (Derbyshire). Pretty confident we are the only ones of our neighbours to not break lockdown rules. They have only had small gatherings in the garden though in the last week (as will be allowed next week) so a small concession may keep momentum and stop more serious breaches occurring.
Scotroutes
Contacts who are told to isolate will be tested only if they themselves show symptoms. At this point, anyone in their household will then start a 14 day isolation period. The thing that’s confusing me is – how many times might you be asked to self-isolate? It’s also possible you could have had the virus already and therefore no be a risk.
About 7% of people in England have been infected with coronavirus, antibody tests on a random sample of households suggest.
At 7% lot's of people will have had the virus and potentially would be able to return to a normal life and on top help those who haven't yet there seems no drive to do this?
Rather than actually testing its being left to self diagnosis and guess work.
Herd immunity is not worth worrying about” at that level, say experts involved in the Office for National Statistics study .
Only for a country as a whole. A single school or place of work might have 90%+ (especially a school where we expect a huge asymptomatic percent) and that then extends to their families who could be tested but aren't.
Lockdown pretty solid in our Derbyshire village. Seen one group of 3-4 teenagers this week who were obviously not a household, but on the whole I've been impressed how even the "usual suspects" have kept to it
Easing the lockdown is not about keeping people happy it's about transferring the burden of responsibility to the public so that the G are not blamed for whatever deadly fiasco crops up next. This will never become a scandal because the press, and Starmer, will not effectively hold this government to account and the people have been trained to think in three word slogans and insults and can be relied on to hoist their own petard (because they don't know what it means, ya).
I’ll say it another way to be blunt. There are 60 million people in England and Wales, and of these, 1.8% are over 85. The excess deaths in this age group currently stand at 28373. So the epidemic has killed one in 34 of this population. By contrast in some other countries there have been no additional deaths in this age group. None. Ring of steel?
The first responsibility of government is to protect its citizens.
Twitter post from Prof Francois Balloux:
"Recent preprint reporting that 24/24 (100%) people form Singapore infected by SARS-1 in 2003 have pre-existing T-cell immunity against #SARSCoV2, but more surprisingly 9/18 (50%) with no exposure to SARS-1 also possess T-cells targeting #SARSCoV2.
One take home message is that infection with coronaviruses induces strong and long-lasting T-cell (cross-)immunity. T-cell immunity is likely a far more important for our immune response to #SARSCoV2 infection than antibodies, in line with other recent reports.
Intriguingly, none of the known viruses in circulation in humans looks like a good candidate for the T-cell immunity to #SARSCoV2 in those with no prior exposure to SARS-1. This might suggest that other yet unknown coronaviruses could have been in circulation in humans."
Also the a few people who might be worth following on you tube mentioned in the BMJ:
https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m1563?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_term=hootsuite&utm_content=sme&utm_campaign=usage&fbclid=IwAR1QN5tPQBbnuFa1jl4YCqdNFLoRq3XrE0eKgkOOL7oZuSvig_pz5ZzpXEA
(John Campbell is superb IMHO, not listened to the other two yet.)
It is also possible that some other pathogen or common peptide induces a T-cell response which cross reacts. Cellular immunity reacts to a small peptide sequence expressed, not a whole virus. The cross-reactivity to SARS-COV-1 is not surprising as genetically they are similar.
I still fail to see why one would not also mount and antibody response. Influenza shows milder infections due to cross reactivity of past infections, and also immunity if you have a good response to the live attenuated vaccine (if the correct strain).
And yes John Campbell is excellent. You don’t need lots of graphics, just a clear understanding and appreciation of what is known and what is not.
. There are 60 million people in England and Wales, and of these, 1.8% are over 85. The excess deaths in this age group currently stand at 28373. So the epidemic has killed one in 34 of this population. By contrast in some other countries there have been no additional deaths in this age group.
This is truly shocking in those terms. Consistent failure to act promptly in the early stages by this government has made the crisis far worse than it needed to be. That's the message that needs to be shared and publicised.
I don't subscribe to the far right, kill the plebs conspiracy theory. I just think that they are a bunch of dithering self serving incompetents with no grasp on every day reality for the population outside their own little bubble.
It is also possible that some other pathogen or common peptide induces a T-cell response which cross reacts. Cellular immunity reacts to a small peptide sequence expressed, not a whole virus. The cross-reactivity to SARS-COV-1 is not surprising as genetically they are similar.
I still fail to see why one would not also mount and antibody response. Influenza shows milder infections due to cross reactivity of past infections, and also immunity if you have a good response to the live attenuated vaccine (if the correct strain).
So many questions. Wonder how many will ever be answered, and those that are answered won't necessarily make it into the media in the years to come. Very frustrating, I wanna know now!
And yes John Campbell is excellent. You don’t need lots of graphics, just a clear understanding and appreciation of what is known and what is not.
Yup, staggering how effective pen and paper can be.
Only for a country as a whole. A single school or place of work might have 90%+ (especially a school where we expect a huge asymptomatic percent) and that then extends to their families who could be tested but aren’t.
French serological studies on a cluster centered on a school in l'Oise say that even if the kids are asymptomatic the adults they contaminate in their families are not and that's the problem. Not all the kids contaminated their famillies but some did. Happily none of the 600 people tested died in that cluster, 26% of the people tested were positive and 40% of the pupils and staff at the school IIRC - still not enough for herd immunity..
At 7% lot’s of people will have had the virus and potentially would be able to return to a normal life and on top help those who haven’t yet there seems no drive to do this?
Rather than actually testing its being left to self diagnosis and guess work.
I agree. If a working, cheap, plentiful and meaningful antibody test was available then scheduling that might reduce the lockdown period for many folk.
Easing the lockdown is not about keeping people happy it’s about transferring the burden of responsibility to the public so that the G are not blamed for whatever deadly fiasco crops up next. This will never become a scandal because the press, and Starmer, will not effectively hold this government to account and the people have been trained to think in three word slogans and insults and can be relied on to hoist their own petard (because they don’t know what it means, ya).
ScotGov and Nicola Sturgeon are in on this too, yeah? They are well known for colluding with the Tory Govt at Westminster right enough.
Easing the lockdown is not about keeping people happy it’s about transferring the burden of responsibility to the public so that the G are not blamed for whatever deadly fiasco crops up next.
Oh behave.
I remember following the first May BH weekend and the VE celebrations that people cried that a second wave was coming because of the crowds of people at beauty spots/in their streets not distancing.
3 weeks later, plenty of time for the supposed increase to start to show its face and what do we have - falling average infection rates.
I was amused by the Welsh First ministers response to the question'Why aren't you following Englands approach?' which was 'Why isnt England following everyone else?'
@TiRed - that 1 in 34 statistic is shocking!
The first responsibility of government is to protect its citizens.
The first responsibility of this government is to protect itself.
FTFY.
By the end of the epidemic it will be one in 30. We’re about 6/7 of the way through (this wave).
single school or place of work might have 90%+ (especially a school where we expect a huge asymptomatic percent)
Can you explain why you would think a school would have 90%+ having had covid?
The stats on the deaths of elderly people and people with "pre-existing medical conditions" are very disturbing and it is compounded by the reaction from many people, one of "well they were going to die soon anyway".
This simply isn't true. The Institute of Actuaries blog article from April eloquently debunks this.
https://www.actuaries.org.uk/news-and-insights/news/what-difference-word-makes
Shit, two positive tests at the local docs after nothing within 20km for weeks. Speaking of one of the cases (with the limits of medical secret) "Elle s'est promenée un peu partout" - she went all over the place. By the end of confinement there were no cases locally, a couple of weeks of people moving around and we're contaminated again. 🙁
ScotGov and Nicola Sturgeon are in on this too, yeah? They are well known for colluding with the Tory Govt at Westminster right enough.
Im currently inclined to think ScotGov are more excluded than in on.
@TiRed - re your 6/7ths comment.... When will this phase be complete?
All through this I've heard rumours of the NHS preparing for Peak 2 in June and Peak 3 in November. Those plans look a bit inaccurate as of today.
Did you consider modelling these next peaks?
Anyone know what the different R numbers are for Scotland, Wales, England and NI ?
There now seems a huge difference in lockdown restrictions within the home nations.
Drakeford announcing there would be little lifting of restrictions based on the R number not decreasing..
Variations across England as well.
Such peaks are impossible to model, they are very strongly assumption-dependent - time to second peak, magnitude, degree of mixing after lockdown removed, all stochastic variables.
This peak will be over by July 1 based on current trends and simple log-linear extrapolation (and other methods). I'm interested in detecting evidence of further transmission at the lowest level possible (likely lower tier local authority). Prediction beyond 14 days is challenging and further peaks really just a guess.
If you do want me to guess, then I'll say that there won't be any significant subsequent peaks (>25% of current epidemic) due to behavioral changes, testing and quarantine of the elderly, and an understanding of how other countries have done better.
Thanks
If these R estimates are correct from Andy Burnham's Twitter, it beggars belief why lockdown is reducing significantly in England and some kids are are off back to school on Monday.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EZIrqy9WkAAfuof?format=jpg&name=small
If these R estimates are correct from Andy Burnham’s Twitter, it beggars belief why lockdown is reducing significantly in England and some kids are are off back to school on Monday.
In many areas, the schools are acting based on local information, as you would expect. Take the PR pronouncements from number ten with a pinch of salt.
Oh my, I’m so tired of this virus and everything connected with it…
Not as tired as those who got it, including TiRed.
For those who are tired of this I got a startling reminder of how things can be so different if you lockdown at the right time.
I had a video Teams meeting with two Danish colleagues and they were sat shoulder to shoulder on the video screen, it freaked me out
Well this is great. Our three year old is increasingly missing her friends and getting sad about it; and now a few of the local houses have obivously given up lockdown as there are a dozen small kids playing with a paddling pool in the front garden a few doors down. She's now asking why they can play and she can't 🙁
Appreciate this is a very small problem on the grand scheme of things but its just so frustrating...
Our three year old is increasingly missing her friends and getting sad about it; and now a few of the local houses have obviously given up lockdown as there are a dozen small kids playing with a paddling pool in the front garden a few doors down. She’s now asking why they can play and she can’t
The question is what is the risk of her being able to go out and play with the other kids, vs the the longer term risks from becoming upset, isolated and insular causing?
My worry is that the secondary affects of lockdown will cause more long term issues than the virus itself.
LOL - that’s been the situation where I live since lockdown. Funny thing is, the parents whose kids have all been mingling are dead against them going back to school because of the risk...
I've not yet seen or heard of any extra panicky kids as a result of the crisis in our extended work and social circles.
Some of the parents though..... 🙄
Some perspective: Four children under 15 have died to date, none of nursery age. The prevalence in children is, however, the same as adults. Influenza is more dangerous to them (except we are out of the season now). The unanswered question is how much do they contribute to the overall force of infection, and how might they spread infection to their elderly relatives.
Indeed, your* kids are very very safe to mingle… the only risk is that they might lose family members and other adults** dear to them… they are not really at direct risk of harm themselves.
*if no underlying health conditions
**don’t forget the staff at nurseries and schools
anagallis_arvensis
Can you explain why you would think a school would have 90%+ having had covid?
Why wouldn't it?
They only need a single child to be carrying the virus and take it home then mingle with other parents/kids. Lots of families including friends at Jnr's suspect they had it as well as teachers and TA's... lots of kids mingling
We just had a photographer round who's doing school photo's in a cardboard box she takes round to each kids house (apparently disinfected between kids somehow) - OH wouldn't let me ask how so it remains a mystery.
We provided our own box (75cm cubed) and as far as I know the only ones who did but still had to sign the paper disclosure handed over on a clipboard... (OH signed and went and washed hands immediately). No attempt at sterilising the clipboard as she rushed off to do another lot of kids.
On a slightly different subject ... this guy spat at someone with the evident intention of making them sick. They later died. Even if their death was not caused by the spitting (and how can we be sure?) is it now OK for people to spit at others with the intention of injuring them? If someone throws a brick at my head, but it luckily misses, is that fine?
I thought spitting at someone was assault nowadays?
That's another bad number today. Just a smidgin below last week, well within the margin of random error for the underlying rate being same or worse. Another 2k positive tests too. My spidey senses are tingling. I think we are on the way up again.
ElShalimo
MemberI thought spitting at someone was assault nowadays?
Always was in Scotland.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1475148/DNA-kit-traps-teenager-who-spat-at-bus-driver.html