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Swab teachers twice a week?
Teachers are immune and kids dont spread it. It'll be fine!
Had my first 'mass gathering' experience since restrictions eased today. The salubrious environs of Wetherby services. I sat and people watched outside while Zoe grabbed some food. I would say easily 95% compliance with mask wearing which was way higher than I expected. What really interested me though was the demographic of the 5% - almost without exception they were 30-something white male gym bunnies.
This amused me:
Robert West, a professor of health psychology at University College London, agreed. “Putting a brake on further easing of the lockdown will probably not reduce infection rates but it may slow the speed with which they rise,” he said.
“The government needs to grasp the nettle and recognise that it needs to follow Scotland’s example and use the next few weeks to get to zero Covid-19 before the autumn – and then things can start to ease safely,”
They’ve known all along what they need to do. They’ve just got no desire to actually do it.
Their priorities are different
Hence locking down far too late and easing lockdown far too early.
I predict they’ll start acting towards make the full return to school buildings safe a few weeks after the term starts.
Anyway, shielding is over vulnerable folk, get back to work… you can trust your workmates not to have spent the last few weeks doing anything that will put you at risk… and don’t ask about the contact tracing app…
What really interested me though was the demographic of the 5% – almost without exception they were 30-something white male gym bunnies.
Interesting - masks seem to be almost a fashion item among that demographic round here. Quite a few parents without masks but kids wearing them when I had to nip into town this morning.
Zero Covid is not going to happen. Second lockdown is not going to happen either. So what to do? Which brake do you release?
Schools will be going back. Transmissions will increase. Cases will increase. Deaths will increase. But the vulnerable will now be better protected by testing. My personal prediction is a modest second seasonal wave, mixed in with influenza, but a zero sum game: lower influenza will be offset by increased COVID19. If you want a number, less than 30k excess deaths over the winter.
I hope you're right TiRed, we need it to be.
It's starting to affect me at work (supermarket home deliveries), seeing all these vulnerable adults being too scared to go out after months stuck inside their homes. What should be their place of happiness and security some now see as a prison. A few have had literally no actual human contact through the whole of this. One has us deliver the shopping into their garage, put the frozen into an old chest freezer and the rest in a coolbox. They then won't touch any of it for 24 hours. They're living alone too and the neighbours have told me that not a soul has been let inside that house since the end of March. They are not well and have various health issues that are normally not life-limiting but mean that if they get sick it's pretty much curtains.
We desperately need proper guidance and leadership leading up to the winter and I don't see it anywhere in Westminster. I fear a big upswing in infections come the end of autumn.
Zero Covid is not going to happen.
A political choice.
Second lockdown is not going to happen either.
A political choice.
There should be no need to talk about a second “lockdown” (we haven’t had a lockdown anyway, there has been not a single day where I was told I couldn’t leave me home, or had to justify why I was leaving it)… the government made it clear that it would relax measures once we had the virus under control, and had track and trace measures in place including a tracing app (they were too scared of using the “isolate” word, but we knew what they meant)… they then changed their mind and relaxed measures before any of that was achieved and in place. The balance of restrictions and deaths that we have coming up later this year should always be seen in that light… they have made the situation we find ourselves in this summer, and that directly effects what this winter will bring, and limits their choices in how to respond to it greatly.
https://twitter.com/alexselbyb/status/1289689256617750528?s=21
I run a little barber shop in a very white, reasonably affluent area on the edge of Bradford so I get to listen to lots of people everyday. Things that stand out at the moment, apart from the obvious 'its the asians wot dunnit' are...
There aren't enough deaths anymore so people are becoming suspicious of whether its a big con?
Far more people than I could ever have imagined actually believe in conspiracy theorys. Combine this with the governments mixed messaging and you have disaster.
Our few Polish customers tell us that their Polish family and friends believe its all about control.
All in all its a bit scary, I never realised how many crazy people there were out there. It seems that until the death rate rises again nobody is listening. This lockdown has basically just frightened those that were already behaving even more and had no impact whatsoever on anyone else.
My own personal fear is the schools. As Tired said, families with more than one sibling in school means that in reality the whole school is a bubble surely?
Schools do their best to stop mixing between different classes and year groups but as soon as the kids are out of the gate they meet up in their usual social groups.
I've found the "kids aren't infectious" line quite irritating in the way I found the initial "masks are pointless" line irritating. Slowly it's being recognised that kids are transmitting the virus and the age at which they are both at risk and a risk to others is now down to the very youngest:
as soon as the kids are out of the gate they meet up in their usual social groups.
They're doing that right now, not being at school hasn't effected that.
But when they go back to school you can add their class group to their social group, and given the cross over between the various class, social and family groups of kids much of a school can potentially be contaminated by one point of entry. So in answer to mugboo's final paragraph question the best answer is yes.
Edit: in one French Lycée 40% of kids tested positive for antibodies, given what we now know about the number of false negatives in the antibody tests it's likely that over 60% of kids had had the virus. The school was the main vector of transmision in the community.
Far more people than I could ever have imagined actually believe in conspiracy theorys. Combine this with the governments mixed messaging and you have disaster.
This has been an eye-opener for me. Genuinely thought that level of idiocy was an American thing but I reckoned without good old British common sense.
I agree with TiRed - zero Covid is pretty much impossible to achieve, certainly from the position we are in now. That's the fault of decisions made by our politicians a few months back now.
I think realistically a second "lockdown" can't be done either. Not without martial law to support enforcement. The Police didn't have the resources - or the direction - to enforce the first one. There's no chance of another one working without serious civil disobedience and disorder, which may well cost more lives directly and indirectly than TiReds forecast up there.
For those of you wanting to go to the pub/gym, best get there before the schools go back.
There's a lot of people talking up the civil disobedience angle. Fretting about limited compliance was also used to justify not taking action initially, whereas in reality people were well ahead of the govt on that. I'm not convinced that the population is quite as sociopathic as it might appear from election results. Of course the govt has been doing its best to whip up hatred and division.
I've been impressed with general levels of compliance in most places I've been this Summer and I don't think we'll go back to the R levels of late February and early March when people packed into ski-resort gondolas, bars and night clubs, and then went back to their respective jobs/universities/schools. The non-compliers seem to be congregating in places that the compliers would avoid: the high density tourist hot spots where people go because they are popular with people of their age group.
There's a 200km long sandy beach north of Bayonne but the young festive types are crammed into a few popular beach bars and commercial streets and the corresponding few kms of beach. Most of our local clusters now concern 18-35 year-olds. An age group that understandably doesn't worry too much about the virus. But this time when they return to work/uni/school they'll have to wear a mask and won't be shaking hands with everyone they meet.
Behaviour has changed, R will never reach the levels of March.
I’m not convinced that the population is quite as sociopathic as it might appear from election results. Of course the govt has been doing its best to whip up hatred and division.
I agree with the general population being ahead of the government and compliant. But there's an increasingly vocal minority if idiots ready to break the rules and cause trouble if the Police try to take action, and another lockdown, even if only at the previous level, will push more people towards that if their mental health and financial security get stretched any further.
I don't think there will be another general lockdown at the previous level. It was overflowing hospitals and the risk of images of overflowing exhibition halls of dying people that promted the last one and I don't see us getting back to that.
Mugboo thanks for those comments. Very insightful. What is more than evident is people are actually happy to comply with relatively severe restrictions when they can see the benefits. Of course the linkage of action and effect for that sacrifice are eventually lost. Worse, the timeframe between intervention and effect is surprisingly long (about two weeks), relax now and nothing bad happens, but in a month’s time cases will climb.
As I have always said, we know what happens when things are normal. The trade-off to be chosen is how normal for what level of transmission, cases and deaths. Witty has been trying to give that message.
Personally, schools going back will be a given and things will be managed accordingly elsewhere. Commuting and office usage will remain low. I don’t see good news for the entertainment industry either. Outdoor activities, with the exception of sports events can and have returned to normal. It’s not a disease you catch outside. Unless perhaps you are in a close crowd on a cold day.
We are more ****ed than I thought. If R were to go up by about 0.5 in Sept (ie to about 1.6 from the current 1.1) then the next wave would be a lot worse than the last one.
An additional 0.5 just my guess for a "what if" calculation, but something of that order seems plausible since we are pushing 1 already with all the advantages of summer weather, schools shut, furlough still ongoing and lots of businesses running at half capacity.
The pre-lockdown R value was 2.6 in the UK. so it wouldn't be as bad as the last time even with a .5 increase. A high proportion of the most vulnerable have already been exposed in care homes and have either died or will have some kind of immunity. Equally a lot of front line workers have already been exposed and will no longer be a vector.
You need to explain your working with more than just a speculated increase in R value, thecaptain.
Why should he explain his working when you make so many unfounded claims in one post?
Such as, Kelvin? You need to read the "cancel culture" thread, it's what you've been trying to do to me for months - and failing.
Number of care home already infected:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/impactofcoronavirusincarehomesinenglandvivaldi/26mayto19june2020
Numbers of front-line health care workers already exposed:
https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/covid-19-how-many-healthcare-workers-are-infected/
Pre-lockdown R value
The non-compliers seem to be congregating in places that the compliers would avoid: the high density tourist hot spots where people go because they are popular with people of their age group.
We’ve just returned from a week in the lakes - a very mixed bag. Some places were great - appropriate social distancing measures, good compliance. Others less so, e.g. the Spar in Ambleside, with no restrictions on numbers entering, no one way, and for every person wearing a face covering there was someone not bothering. We were a bit shocked in general at how many people didn’t bother with distancing or face coverings.
Edukator, From that link "According to modelling published by Imperial College London at the start of April, the R value stood somewhere between 3 and 4.6 in Europe before lockdowns came into effect. "
The earlier SAGE estimate (up to mid March) was 2-2.5, this was part and parcel of their error with the doubling rate. It was actually probably around 3-3.5 in the UK. It's a bit of an imprecise science defining and estimating it, as it also depends on other unknown parameters (such as the incubation time of the virus). The true doubling rate of 3 days versus SAGE's estimate of 5 days is the important point.
So R going up to something in the region of 1.5-2 would be better than that, but still ****ing horrible with deaths going up into the thousands per day, that was my point. Though my simple modelling doesn't take account of the older and more vulnerable protecting themselves, so it may not end up being quite as grim as it looks. Though we were supposedly protecting care homes last time round, and see how that worked out. Ooops.
My "working" is a SEIR model that I've written about a lot (blog and twitter), there is nothing remotely dodgy or even unconventional about it (the code came straight from an epidemiologist) and in fact it's essentially very similar to the one underpinning the research quoted from that article (Flaxman et al), which was published in Nature a couple of months back. I just happen to know how to fit models to data a lot better than many epidemiologists seem to.
Models are useful tools but as TiRed has pointed out when postin his the further into the future you go the less reliable they are. TiRed has posted some grpahs on here that have held up very well short term (except the first American one which was actually quite a good prediction for New York but not for the US as a whole).
Any sustained R value greater than 1 will ultimately result in thousands of deaths a day, that's the nature of exponential curves. It has to be sustained though and wherever you look at post lockdown R values in Europe they tend to rise for a while and then drop below 1 again. There was panic about Germany when R numbers looked alarming but in fact were from such a low base and in such confined areas it didn't take long to isolate those infected.
I'm more inclined to look at whether the test and trace is working than trying to model from the current level with far too many variables to make modelling practical. I used to write models myself - models work well with a high number of samples and a low number of variables. We currently have a fairly low case rate and so many factors influencing the variables that I realy wouldn't know where start if asked to produce a model today.
the Spar in Ambleside,
Brave person even attempting to go in there. You are truly at the mercy of all the crowds who pile through that area. Booths in Windermere at a bare minimum!
That's why I didn't produce a model, I used the standard one that underpins a lot of the more complicated approaches. An R value marginally over 1 would not result in thousands of deaths a day, but knowing how far over 1 we could go without a major health catastrophe was not clear to me a priori.
I suspect our TTI is not working at all well, because its primary purpose is to shovel money out the door into the private sector rather than to achieve any useful health outcomes. They haven't even published the central statistic of how many new cases were already isolating (because they had been identified as contacts prior to becoming ill themselves), which is the only useful measure of the system.
My “working” is a SEIR model that I’ve written about a lot (blog and twitter),
Be interested to read, if you feel able to share?
An R value marginally over 1
Agreed, I'm trying not to get too picky I'd appreciate others doing the same. You're generally talking in terms of .5 intervals/rises 1, 1.5, 2 2.5-3.5 etc and I'm thinking in those terms not 1.000001.
Anyhow time will tell. Bookmark the page, I'm predicting that none of the European countries that have already had a lockdown will get to thousands of deaths a day because society has adapted to the presence of the virus:
Masks indoors
Nightclub closures
Indoor contact limitation
Home working
Crowd limitation outside
mask wearing, inter-class contact limitaton and year group separation in schools
AWARENESS
We're in for a roller coaster ride but we've already done the initial climb and big drop. Bookmark the page. The last time I said that I was right. 😉
This has been an eye-opener for me. Genuinely thought that level of idiocy was an American thing but I reckoned without good old British common sense.
The difference is that Brits will just grumble about it whereas that demographic in the US will become militant and bang on about freedom and such.
I’m not convinced that the population is quite as sociopathic as it might appear from election results. Of course the govt has been doing its best to whip up hatred and division.
I don't think it is either but the messaging is coming from the court of the cockup king Cummings. Unfortunately we seem to in a situation where Boris has weeded out all dissenting voices and so there is no reality filter on the pronouncements. He sees the world through his own prism.
Read something in the indy about the cabinet office having a Covid unit - which I'm guessing is Cummings under cover for Gove. Great the problem is still deluded enough to think it's the solution. Wasn't it Cummings who was pro if you fail you go? As ever the rules don't apply.
First step on sorting out seems to be a whole heap more gravitas and clear message re-enforcement. I have wondered if we will look back on people who were nothing to see all back to normal as Covid deniers. Much like climate change now.
the Spar in Ambleside,
Brave person even attempting to go in there.
With hindsight it wasn’t the best choice!
I’ve just finished our weekly family Zoom catch up. My nephew (lives in N Midlands) was seeing a friend a couple of weeks ago, who casually dropped into the conversation “by the way, my dads got Covid-19 - he’s having an assessment tomorrow to see whether he needs to go to hospital“. I mean FFS. The “friend” lives with his dad and a lodger (a barber). The “friend” hasn’t been tested. The barber has (but continued working whilst waiting for the result, which was thankfully negative). My nephew was tested but had to postpone returning to the office whilst waiting for the results. I’ve found the last few months something of an eye opener concerning the health of our society.
A high proportion of the most vulnerable have already been exposed in care homes and have either died or will have some kind of immunity.
Depends how you define "high proportion of the most vulnerable".
THE most vulnerable were the people told to "shield" , due to the danger to them, usually due to underlying medical conditions with their immune system or lungs. Not the same as over 70s advised to stay in due to age.
There were around 2.2 million shielding in this country, That is critically extremely vulnerable people, and over half of them were in the 18 to 69 age group.
I can't really see how any of these people have "already been exposed in care homes".
Or how any could "have some kind of immunity", especially considering the immune systems of the people involved. Some may have died, but that's unlikely to be due to the virus as they were shielding.
And shielding ended yesterday.
It's back to work for this lucky lot tomorrow.
Such as, Kelvin?
Thanks for the links to back up claims of wide spread infection Ed (I never doubted that)… now how about your claims that those previous infections earlier this year means protection for those groups later this year? That is just a hope, a prediction… I share your hope but we should not plan based on it. We can not treat previously infected carehomes, hospitals and other care and medical settings as if they are protected by some form of institutional herd immunity. We do not have the evidence to safely act in that way.
Not sure why you got so snarky about my defence of another poster. Sorry If I offended you by doing so.
Not sure why you got so snarky
Becuase you've been super critcal and agressive towards me for months and it's wearing a bit thin.
now how about your claims that those previous infections earlier this year means protection for those groups later this year? That is just a hope, a prediction… I share your hope but we should not plan based on it.
It's more then a hope, there is obsevational evidence and experiemntatal evidence:
You are quick to be critical without Googling to see if I might have a point, Kelvin. Where does this grudge come from ? Did I unwittingly wind you up a few months ago. Be nice to know because you aren't like this with (most) other posters.
Edit have you forgotten you wrote this:
kelvin
SubscriberWhy should he explain his working when you make so many unfounded claims in one post?
Posted 3 hours ago
Reply | Report
without bothering to quote what you were rubbishing.
Anyhow all claims made over the last pages were founded with links now to back them up.
We are more **** than I thought. If R were to go up by about 0.5 in Sept (ie to about 1.6 from the current 1.1)
Now you know why everyone is a little concerned. In all honesty, the school contribution is not absolutely known, it’s derived from models of influenza transmission.
The null hypothesis is simply that children really aren’t much different to adults. People WANT them to be, but from a transmission perspective, that’s hard to refute. It is true they have much lower morbidity and almost no mortality. But preventing their parents and grandparents catching it is a priority.
Witty is trying not to alarm, but the situation isn’t really great. I don’t think we will have serious overwhelming of healthcare, nor a high excess mortality. Probably a bad flu year. But I expect local lockdowns, contact restrictions out of school and mass pooled testing.
And thecaptain is right about fitting models. What matters most is how estimated parameters are correlated. At the start of the epidemic it was not possible to estimate R together with infection generation time. But doubling time was simple (plot the data!). Now we have great data but multiple reasons for the trends (lockdown/immunity/reduced pathogenesis...). Models are helpful but they are not truth. They help me with paring down what might be true. They also help with what-ifs.
I regularly sit by myself on a grass slope overlooking a couple of little shops down the road from me. A co-op and an independent.
There is definitely a certain demographic that tends not to wear masks.
Interestingly, I'm in that demographic!
Middle aged/older, white males.
The best compliance seems to be by their female opposite. Middle aged (any ethicity) women almost invariably wear masks to go into shops.
Quiet fascinating to watch. Interestingly, young males aren't too bad in their compliance with masks. That was the group I expected to be the most blase but glad to be proven wrong.
The difference is that Brits will just grumble about it whereas that demographic in the US will become militant and bang on about freedom and such.
Apparently the Germans were having some protests yesterday about their restrictions. So much for stereotypes
Mask wearing here seems pretty universal, except shop staff, most seem not to wear them (I know they don't have to). Given that I reckon less than 10% were wearing them before i think thats pretty impressive. Most even seem to be wearing them properly, be interresting to see if the trend continues.
Anyway no antibodies for me which I expected, just done the home test kit, got picked at random to take part. All very easy except getting the blood into the sample window. Good to see part of government trying to get a grasp of the facts rather than just making it up.
I have wondered if we will look back on people who were nothing to see all back to normal as Covid deniers. Much like climate change now.
I’m sure there’ll be plenty of belters about, take this little nugget about face masks;
Could this all be a sneaky ploy to get us to submit to wearing burkas (which I guess count as face coverings/masks/or some other euphemism)? Back door Sharia law!
I really want to believe it’s not a serious post.
Any thoughts on Russia starting its immunisation program in October. The expert on BBC news was inferring there was no way they could have tested it properly for efficacy or safety. The Oxford team are only just entering phase 3 trials now.
without bothering to quote what you were rubbishing
Apologies.
I was referring to your assertion that past spread of the virus through carehomes and medical staff offers protection for those in carehomes in future, and means that health care workers won’t be a ‘vector’ in future. We don’t know if those infected earlier this year will have immunity going into the winter… and should act as if they do not. Even if those individuals do have long term immunity, that does not mean that we should act as if institutions effected in the past somehow have herd immunity… the science does not back that up yet, and we, as a community, should be acting to protect both those in carehomes and those working in health. To lean on the idea that they are protected in any meaningful way because of past infections in their institutions would be foolish.
Mask wearing here seems pretty universal, except shop staff, most seem not to wear them
In my wee galloway town if you dont wear a mask then you dont get into shops (signs saying No Mask?-No Entry) and thats how it should be, theres been a few hissy fits from the tourists who believe they have a god given right to do whatever they like but by and large everyone is behaving, only been one scuffle from a gammon bloke who attempted to barge into the wrong shop without a mask, got physically thrown out and told to **** off
At the start of all this we were getting quite a lot of figures for mortality rate, different effects for age etc. There doesn’t seem to be too much emphasis on this right now which is odd, given we must now have better data.
There doesn’t seem to be too much emphasis on this right now which is odd,
Not really. At the beginning these facts were unknowns. Now they are not. Currently in England and Wales mortality is within historic range across all age groups.
SARS-COV2 increases mortality in people aged above about 45. The case fatality rate roughly doubles as age rises from 45 to 65 to 75 to 85 to 85+. Overall mortality is about 0.5%. But in the oldest age (2% of the population) it is about 20%.
Planning for future control will take age-based mixing into account. As will vaccination (like influenza now - children and 50+) for the same reasons.
Kelvin, I said in the context of predictiing future R- values:
The pre-lockdown R value was 2.6 in the UK. so it wouldn’t be as bad as the last time even with a .5 increase. A high proportion of the most vulnerable have already been exposed in care homes and have either died or will have some kind of immunity. Equally a lot of front line workers have already been exposed and will no longer be a vector.
You say I said something differnt and go on to criticise it in the context of protecting the elderly:
I was referring to your assertion that past spread of the virus through carehomes and medical staff offers protection for those in carehomes in future, and means that health care workers won’t be a ‘vector’ in future.
The changes you make are subtle but a serious misquote and change of context. You've gone from future R value potential to protecting the elderly (people can't die twice - those that have died can't be killed by the virus again, and the evidence says those that have had won't have it again or not as badly = lower R value) and then rubbish the words you put in my mouth about protecting the elderly - you added the "protection" bit.
You apologise and then launch into another unjustified attack with a misquote out of context and the you wonder why I appear "snarky". If you are going to quote use the block quote feature rather than quoting adding words that weren't there while removing qualifiers that were there.
Edit: to remove last sentence which may constitute negative use of the forum even if entirely accurate.
Being out and about around East Lancs and Greater Manchester this sunny weekend, it seems that the region has given Boris and little Matty a resounding two fingers to their ‘local’ lockdown.
Packed beer gardens and pubs. Yesterday I watched a huge hen party, complete with the obligatory inflatable cocks, piling into a curry house.
The pubs and restaurants are literally clinging on by their fingertips, so I totally get it why they’re not asking any questions. They’re desperate for ANY business, no matter what the government has got to say on the matter
As predicted with the totally farcical manner in which it was handled, Manchester collectively came up with their own punchy three-word slogan...
**** OFF BORIS!
It’ll be lifted on Thursday, I’m sure, now Eid’s out of the way and everyone’s just ignoring it anyway
another unjustified attack
Attack?! Cool down man.
I disagree that we can assume R will be restrained to any great extent because of past infections in carehomes and health staff. We still have no idea if any immunity from past infections lasts more than a few months. We also don’t know how much individual immunity contributes to reducing transmission rates within a group. And we also don’t know if people will begin to behave in ways that increase R that they didn’t, or weren’t allowed to, earlier in the epidemic. That is not an attack on you. My original flippant remark was an echo of your challenge on thecaptain, that was all. And I apologise again for the tone of that. It was rude of me. Sorry.
They’re desperate for ANY business, no matter what the government has got to say on the matter
Indeed. Shut pubs if it needs to happen, and support those economically effected by that action. But, keeping pubs open, and then mandate people only to go to the pub with people they live with, and not to mingle there with anyone outside their household… and either pubs and their customers need to break those rules, or the pubs are all but empty and can’t even break even.
Mrs Gove kindly enlightens us as to government policy, displaying all the sensitivity, empathy and compassion for all those who’ve died that we would expect
https://twitter.com/westminsterwag/status/1289895372676947968?s=21
We’re not trying to save her (from the virus), we’re trying to save other people from her (spreading the virus).
If the Gove-Vile household caught it, few people would shed any tears
Nasty people
What do the STW armchair covid19 experts have for me?
I'm making my escape to Spain and getting residency before the Brexshit hits the fan. Ideally, I'd go around the 23rd of August. Need to get out before another lockdown.
Should I be going sooner?
Cool as, Kelvin, and vigilant.
We still have no idea if any immunity from past infections lasts more that a few months
I agree but would qualify: Antibody levels decline with time, however the T-cell immune repsonse doesn't depend on antibodies and is thought to be responsible for fighting off the infection in some/many people in contact with the virus. The body's immune system can be "trained", that's what some types of vacine do and give long term protection. If antibodys don't provide long term protection then many vacine projects are doomed to failure. Stimulating immune response to Covid is the objective with people working on how to achieve that.
There's also anecdotal evidence that very few people are getting Covid twice and even those that are may simply be long hualers - one contributor to this forum has tested positive twice with a long interval (several weeks) inbetween. As with the monkeys subsequent infections are less serious even when they happen and the amount of virus excreted is lower so there will be less transmission - less numerous and less severe reinfections = lower R.
We also don’t know how much individual immunity contributes to reducing transmission rates within a group.
Here I disagree, it's the whole basis of either natural or vacine induced herd immunity. If enough induividuals have immunity the virus doesn't meet enough vulnerable people to circulate - there are graphic illustration on Youtube.
And we also don’t know if people will begin to behave in ways that increase R that they didn’t, or weren’t allowed to, earlier in the epidemic.
I don't think people are going back to les bises, hand shaking, shouting into other people's faces at close proximity in discos, sharing drinks/joints, cramming into chilly gondolas or any of the things that resulted in very high R numbers in places like Ischgul. All the changes in behaviour I aluded to earlier in the day on this thread will reduce not increase R levels. We are behaving in ways that have reduced the R potential not increased it.
Yesterday I watched a huge hen party, complete with the obligatory inflatable cocks, piling into a curry house.
This is Binners' classier version of the Rutger Hauer speech at the end of Bladerunner. 🙂
I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe...
He may have seen attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, but he’s never been to Rawtenstall on a Saturday afternoon 😳
"If you gotta go, go now or else you gotta stay..."
A Bob Dylan quote for you, fatmountain.
In my wee galloway town if you dont wear a mask then you dont get into shops (signs saying No Mask?-No Entry)
In the Lake District last week I didn’t see anyone challenged for not wearing a face covering. Not once. Anywhere.
Mrs Gove all death or glory - I wouldn't be overly surprised if there was a lot of moaning if she found herself on the path of the long termer. Perhaps if Mr G hadn't been part of the Cummings cohort playing an ideological game rather than treating it as a significant threat we might actually be in better shape as a nation to deal with this.
You reckon Edukator? Think you might be right....
I lived in Spain in 89-90, it took months to get the paperwork sorted. No idea how long it takes now but you don't want to run past 31/12.
I don’t think people are going back to les bises, hand shaking, shouting into other people’s faces at close proximity in discos, sharing drinks/joints, cramming into chilly gondolas or any of the things that resulted in very high R numbers in places like Ischgul
Damn, really gonna miss those chilly gondolas.
Oh in terms of Brexit? Yeah of course - I'm looking to go within the next few weeks and request a padron etc. I hope 3 months is enough even with Spanish bureaucracy.
Oh in terms of Brexit? Yeah of course – I’m looking to go within the next few weeks and request a padron etc. I hope 3 months is enough even with Spanish bureaucracy.
You'd be suprised.
Mrs Gove
I know they are doing it for effect, but imagine being this much of a ****.
it’s the whole basis of either natural or vacine induced herd immunity
Which isn’t always possible. Plenty of viruses that we live with have to be controlled through social and physical barriers to transmission long term, because there is no route to ‘natural’ herd immunity, and a vaccine isn’t available. The whole ‘herd immunity’ path just isn’t there for many viruses, and we don’t yet know if it will be for this one. The exit from this may still be improved treatment and/or concerted containment/isolation. We can and should try and aim for a/multiple vaccines, but we can’t plan for future spread of the virus based on a ‘natural’ herd immunity that may not be occurring yet, if ever.
I know they are doing it for effect
You’d hope so. But it might just be a genuine lack of empathy and intelligence.
There's always been the doubt that a vaccine can be had and how effective it might be and for how long, and if it will have to be regularly adapted to ever varying strains.
We can look at the evolution and spread of previous viruses. They tend to get less virulent as they mutate and the population develops resistance - so less people catch the virus and less get severe symptoms.
There may be no exit, just living with it. Long term it will probably just become yet another virus that becomes assimilated into the "common cold".
We're currently in a damage limitation exercise trying to find a compromise between health, economic and social impacts. Priorities will evolve, they already have with some governments choosing courses that favour one aspect or the other in response to medical, social or economic imperatives. I don't think there's the will for concerted containment and the window of opportunity has in any case passed - we're down to damage limitation.
It’ll be lifted on Thursday, I’m sure, now Eid’s out of the way and everyone’s just ignoring it anyway
Lifted? It's never even been imposed. Legislation to back up their guidance may or may not appear next week. I suspect it'll be mainly ignored by those they were targeting either way.
I suspect it’ll be mainly ignored by those they were targeting either way.
Anecdotal evidence would suggest it’s been comprehensively ignored by pretty much everyone, on account of it being a completely nonsensical load of old bollocks.
But then this isn’t about the government doing something, it’s about them making it look like they’re doing something so that they can subsequently deny all responsibility for it. It’s just blame-storming
Boris and chums obviously think we’re just a bunch of thick northern peasants.
Yeah, well not so thick that we didn’t all see straight through this bag of shite
So what's the odds on Cummings' Govt reversing the northern (not Eid related honest Guv) restrictions by Friday?
And where will the next set of restrictions be announced for? This could roll around the country… the PM’s “whack-a-mole” analogy suggests this is likely to be short spells of applying and removing restrictions on an ongoing basis for areas all over the country (but I’m guessing not London).
So what’s the odds on Cummings’ Govt reversing the northern (not Eid related honest Guv) restrictions by Friday?
They’d have done it on Saturday, but that would have looked a bit too obvious. They said they’d review it every 7 days, so it’ll be ‘as you were’ on Thursday
And where will the next set of restrictions be announced for
At a guess, I’d say the next place with a large population of brown people who fancy having a bit of a get together
Wherever it is you’ll still be encouraged to go out for a pint if you’re the right colour
Interesting the Andy Burnham's request to re-impose shielding requirements has been dismissed by downing street.
Another demonstration that johnson and his clown circus are completely divorced from reality - and the north.
More idiocy in the form of floating ideas via the media to gauge reaction:
- lockdown the over 50's...not enough police in the UK to enforce that one and guaranteed to lose swathes of tory support
- lockdown london and use M25 as some sort of border? more bollocks.
Neither of these will ever be heard of again.
What we should do is...test, trace and isolate - and repeat; that should have happened from mid-march.
Dump Serco.
Use and build on the expertise which we have in public health.
I will continue to use my common sense (not johnson's british version of common sense), avoid the great british public, practice good hygiene and ignore johnson and his clown circus.
frankconway
I will continue to use my common sense (not johnson’s british version of common sense), avoid the great british public, practice good hygiene and ignore johnson and his clown circus.
Absolutely, couldn't agree more.
Frank,
I think the government has been watching too many movies during lockdown.
The over 50's idea sounds like a remake of 'Logan's Run' and the Locdown London idea was surely inspired by 'Escape from New York'
Did anyone else see 'Apocalypse Now' on telly last night?
Locking London down was dismissed way back when it would actually have made a difference, so it stands to reason that they'll float the idea now.
@inkster - I watched X-Men Apocalypse last night. I think Cummings is Apocalypse
I'm hoping that Angela Rayner is Jean Grey. She's ginger, moody and may possess unlimited powers (if only Starmer/Xavier could train her to harness them).
So what’s the odds on Cummings’ Govt reversing the northern (not Eid related honest Guv) restrictions by Friday?
Well when you look at the governments own data there's only a couple of boroughs that have a small spike recently but the rest are flat, dropping or always low.
So I'd say highly likely.
Whats the next non white big event so we can plan when the next lockdown is and where?
In my wee galloway town if you dont wear a mask then you dont get into shops (signs saying No Mask?-No Entry)
In the Lake District last week I didn’t see anyone challenged for not wearing a face covering. Not once. Anywhere.
Not sure what response is best. In my local co-op they had a message on the tannoy saying that mask wearing was compulsory but there were many medical exemptions so don't worry if you see someone not wearing a mask and don't confront them. It would be a shame to stigmatise those with a genuine medical need. Its still pretty easy to keep a good distance from others in most situations.