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. Since we can’t be with our own families it’s ok to be with loads of other families, including GP’s & a chief superintendent of the local police.
Turns out the rule of 6 only applies if you’re poor, from the bame community or don’t have a LinkedIn profile, who knew?
So the discussion is actively encouraging people to not stick with social distancing and mix with other households, or is that just your interpretation?
There's nothing actually wrong with people sitting around in their front gardens and chatting across the fence, or even walking along the road to have a socially distanced chat with Fred and Freda at number 10. It will probably do a lot of good to be out the house for an hour and interacting with someone else.
It doesn't have to be a drunken free for all with kissing under the mistletoe. The trick is to avoid the dicks who want to do that. And if you live in a street full of dicks, spend Christmas Day on Rightmove!
a decree made by Serco managment
There's lots of tin foil hat going on with regard to track & trace - lots of people are sending in swabs from their dog, puddles or not swabbed at all on YouTube yet getting positive results back. The accusation is that its basically made up / based on a postcode lottery for some other agenda. I'm trying really hard to stay away from it - sorry for posting it here - but its going to start becoming "news" soon I suspect.
This is useful:
From the Spectator - SAGE Reasonable Worst Case planning paper.
Apparently leaked by a SAGE member - presumably unimpressed with gov inaction.
Headline is 85,000 Covid related deaths July '20 to March '21 - forecast as reasonable worst case.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/classified-covid-in-winter-2020-a-worst-case-scenario
The accusation is that its basically made up / based on a postcode lottery for some other agenda.
I'd almost prefer that to be the explanation as opposed to the more likely poor systems/sheer incompetence, given the amount of public money spunked at the whole thing.
wadbags
like it
There has to be a change in strategy but the government has shot its bolt on the private sector and regional lockdowns and recent history shows that any policy change will be too little too late. This is not good.
They have backed themselves into a corner with the lack of support for The North haven't they. Any help above the current levels when London etc go into lockdown again and they will be crucified. It' almost like they genuinely believe it won't happen to their area so they haven't figured it in to their plan.
It will be interesting to see how they dig themselves out of that little conundrum, no 3-word slogan will cut it!
The accusation is that its basically made up / based on a postcode lottery for some other agenda.
Worry about the hard endpoints. Hospital admissions are doubling every 10-21 days. Ventilation is doubling in line with admissions. Regardless of positivity, there is an epidemic of hypoxia and associated pneumonia, at odds with conventional influenza.
Very roughly 30-100k infected/day, 1-3% admitted to hospital a week later, 1/6 die a week later, predicts 300-1000 admissions/day and 50-167 deaths/day. How do those numbers stack up? I have models too! IFR is about 0.16-0.55% Influenza is 0.14% This is not influenza - if it was we might expect 100k deaths once all 66M have had the infection. A Reasonable Worst Case is 0.55% or about 400k deaths after all have been infected, perhaps halve this for more aggressive management. In the UK, 600k people die annually. So COVID19 adds about half a typical year's death to the total. Managing this over 24 months would be 12500 extra deaths/month - about double the normal rate as per April.
Let it rip...I see no evidence of immunity blunting resurgence. Gupta should look at the data rather than the media reaction.
Teachers talk far more than students
Has this person been to a school.
A class of 24
Nope, they havent.
Macron said yesterday that at current levels of infection, France is looking at 400k excess deaths.
He's seen the above sum - France and UK are basically the same.
Im just going to hang around here to see if TiRed gets the same slating that everyone else who suggested "let it rip" did.
I think he was referring to those who say 'let it rip', such as Gupta, who he thinks (correctly) should be looking at the data.
Who is Gupta?
Professor Sunetra Gupta - an epidemiologist from Oxford University, who is trotted out by news outlets to put forward the idea that we are much further along the road to herd immunity than the data suggests, and should therefore not bother with piffling stuff like lockdowns.
Soobalis : That is not what Tired is saying, he is stating "let it rip: in reference to the crank Dr Gupta and the notion of achieving herd immunity,
edit : I see martinhurch got in before me.
This is a really clear explanation of Coronavirus is spread and how ventilation and facemasks effect the spread.
how the coronavirus is spread through the air
Indeed - irony doesn't come across well on t'internet. There is an honest debate to be had about managed rates of infection, but to get there, I would not want to start from where we are in the North.
a decree made by Serco managment
There’s lots of tin foil hat going on with regard to track & trace –
I was just suggesting that this rule was made thinking only about the test centres as a separtate unit. Without regard to the wider situation and the problems that lack of toilet facilities could cause in regards to people having to use other facilities becaiuse of distances traveled. Therefore spreading the virus.
So my NHS contact tracing app has apparently just pinged me a message, but when I open the app, I can't see any messages or warnings 🤷♂️
Is there a screen hidden somewhere I can't find?
If there’s nothing on the home screen of the App then ignore it @morecashthandash, it’s something to do with the the way the app logs contact activity but doesn’t mean you have to do anything. Will see if I can dig out a link I have on it.
https://faq.covid19.nhs.uk/article/KA-01252/en-us?parentid=CAT-01029&rootid=
Link as promised @morecashthandash
@morecashthandash Check the notification logs if you're on Android, I had to google "how to" for my Xioami last weekend when I had "close encounter" tab appear but then nothing inside the app.
The app had an update a little earlier today and https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-54733534 said the score threshold to get an isolation notification has been reduced.
https://healthtech.blog.gov.uk/2020/10/29/how-the-nhs-covid-19-app-is-making-the-most-of-cutting-edge-global-technology/ says the score threshold has reduced from 900 to 120, partly from above, but also because the app now more smartly counts time spent at different distances from an infected party.
Thanks guys - I assumed anything important would be on the home screen, but I wouldn't rely on that hunch
I'm afraid to say that ripping is what it is doing, and wailing about it on the internet or anywhere else isn't changing that. We lost. End of.
Looking on the bright side, we'll be on the downslope by Christmas - for infections at least, deaths will take longer to decline. And who knows what will happen with waning immunity and reinfection. Best case, seasonal reinfection and it won't be as bad next winter. Vaccine for the most vulnerable and it might not be too bad.
The other point I'll make is that half of us won't get it (this time round) so you can aim to be in that half if your situation allows! Commiserations to those in high-contact situations who can't do a lot about it.
I’ve found the app posts up notifications that then aren’t available until he actual app itself. On the iPhone once you’ve swiped those notifications off I can’t see you can get them back again. It looks like daily it sounds you a notification telling you it’s assessing your risk and the slightly after one (hopefully) saying you don’t need to isolate. Hopefully the update gets rid of ghost notifications.
we’ll be on the downslope by Christmas
It'll still feel like XC skiing rather than downhill, though. And by then, the cold wind of Brexit will be straight into our faces.
Looking on the bright side, we’ll be on the downslope by Christmas
Why do you say that? What is going to make it go down?
Hospital admissions up to 1400 now.
Another long talk by Dr John Campbell. It's got some especially long words which caused my brain to seize up.
He referenced this article, about T-cells for SARS-Cov-1 still working 17 years on, and animal betacoronaviruses also working against SARS-cov-2.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2550-z
I have no idea what that means, apart from maybe the government should forget about a vaccine and just get everyone a very licky labrador.
Why do you say that? What is going to make it go down?
The much maligned herd immunity, aka we will "all" (ok, half) have had it by then. Ballpark.
Yes I know SAGE said it will go on all through the winter. They are wrong. Again. Well, we could potentially make it go on through the winter if we took tougher action but there isn't much sign of that yet.
Ooh. Oxford on to Tier 2. Heading my way. Time to personally lockdown tighter. Glad I had my meal out last night (a lot further south).
the government should forget about a vaccine and just get everyone a very licky labrador.
This government would get 3 poodles and a dachshund and charge us a billion pounds.
Just off a call with PHE in work, view stated that deaths won’t peak as high as back in the first wave but will be lower and longer, I.e. stretch out in to the new year.
Concerning the second infection was far worse than the first.
we will “all” (ok, half) have had it by then. Ballpark
Thats going to mean a shit load ( ball park) of deaths isnt it?
It's a simple area under the curve analysis. Spring was a very high peak but only for a few weeks, what we're now facing is many hundreds of deaths every day for possibly months. The projected death toll looks far higher in the curves published.
Ooh. Oxford on to Tier 2. Heading my way.
Derbyshire as well. All of us rather than just Glossop bit over the hill.
Not that it'll make the blindest bit of difference to me. Haven't been anywhere other than Sainsbury's for ages. 🙁
The much maligned herd immunity, aka we will “all” (ok, half) have had it by then. Ballpark.
We won't, but that's because of policy intervention rather than letting it rip. The relatively slow (dare one say) controlled burn (definitely not boom and bust - except that is what we have now) through society may, sadly, run at a rate not dissimilar to loss of immunity. From epidemic so far, we can rule out immunity of less than 3-6 months. After that, I am afraid all bets are off. @thecaptain I would welcome any comment on correlations between your dynamic estimated R, and the rate of loss of immunity in the SEIR model.
which caused my brain to seize up.
Some Biology from that Nature paper - from someone with not a single Biology qualification#... 🙂
Viruses are relatively simple things - they are made from a few blocks, a bit like standard Lego bricks. They are really software not hardware and the Lego are subroutines if you like - surprisingly few of them in fact. You need a shell to keep the bits in, you need a few enzymes to get production going and you need some RNA as the machine code program to execute. That's about it. Different viruses also have bits on the surface to stick to the host cells. For SARS-CoV2 this is called the spike protein, and it sticks out and binds to a receptor on many cells called ACE2 (Angiotensin Converting Enzyme 2 - angio = blood, tensin = pressure/tension, so the enzyme normally chops up a molecule to regulate stuff that controls blood pressure).
Now there are only so many Lego blocks, and nature likes to use them many times. What the paper and talk show is that if you have been infected previously by an earlier coronavirus, then your immune system is primed to recognise certain Lego blocks that might be reused. For the 2003 SARS, the virus is about 70% identical to the current one, a lot of similar Lego blocks. Especially the spike (our antibody came from a 2003 SARS patient). For other coronoaviruses, some Lego blocks in the hard case and perhaps the inside engine (polymerase) are the same.
When you present these Lego blocks to the immune system, the immune system fires off and does what it should. Bits of the Lego get chewed up, put on the surface of special cells and other immune cells get going to multiply and stimulate even more cells to kill infected cells, release signals to encourage recruitment into infected tissues, produce antibodies. It's all pretty amazing actually.
Anyway, the paper shows that having seen past Lego parts, your cells have a good chance of recognising the current bad boy. Whether that means you are protected is a moot point and has not been tested clinically. If you recognise the hard shell, does that matter? Who knows? If you recognise the spike, probably good news, especially as that is the target of the Lilly and Regeneron antibodies which work. Remdesivir is an antiviral and blocks the function of the Lego block polymerase that's normally inside the case, by jamming up it's action when the case is opened - nothing to do with immunity.
[tl:dr] If you have seen nasty stuff in the past, you may recognise it again. Whether that protects you from infection is not known. Some bits will definitely be protective and if you had SARS, you're likely covered for the sequel. Labradors are hairy beasts, don't lick them!
#Dropped it to study O'Level Geology instead. Sorry A_A.
Labradors are hairy beasts, don’t lick them!
You sick bastard, who in their right mind would lock anything hairy and dribbling!?
😳
Hopefully the update gets rid of ghost notifications.
I'm afraid to say those ghost notifications have forced me to delete the app. I was getting them every 3-4 hours, one saying I may need to isolate then another right afterwards saying it was a false alarm and to ignore it. Every time it would use my text message tone on full volume regardless of whether the phone was on silent, volume down or even the app closed completely. Normally I would just put up with it but it was seriously disrupting my sleep patterns to the point where I'd wake up 10-15 minutes before it was due then go back to sleep. It's being reported as an issue with certain builds of my phone, Samsung S10, on the geeky forums so I'm keeping an eye on those and once the issue is resolved I'll reinstall it.
West Yorkshire in Tier 3 from
Monday. Back in the big league where we belong! 🤣
RM.
P.S. Sad face really but can’t say it’s unexpected with the latest numbers.
Do France have a lower threshold for admitting people to hospital with COVID? They have double the daily admissions as UK but fewer deaths. Or is it a demography thing?
More beds.
From epidemic so far, we can rule out immunity of less than 3-6 months
Did you mean "more than" 3-6 months?
Thanks for clarifying.
Did you mean “more than” 3-6 months?
No less, there would be a more dramatic reinfection rate with shorter immunty. The dynamics are not consistent with such short immunity.
^^ Thanks matey, got my head around it now.
Er hello.
You won't have seen me post here, but I've read with interest.
You may have seen me rail against Ebikes, consumption, big polluting vehicles etc over the years.
I'm not completely ignorant, for my whole life I've been interested in the natural world. I did a degree in environmental sciences and have always worked outside in farming and now gardening. Of course I'm an avid mtber which is why I'm here.
So here's the scary bit, I'll tell you what I think. I'm pretty sure it's how I genuinely feel, but it's not conventional so do I question it:
For too long humans have defied nature. We've pushed the boundaries of survival far beyond natural limits. We're living far beyond the age we should.
Nature abhors aborations and will seek to resume balance. Laws of natural selection and survival of the fittest keep populations of all species healthy and viable. Here we are presented with a classic example of a balancing act by nature that will select out the less healthy and older members of a society to maintain the health and ability to survive for the more viable specimens, I.e. the ones that will reproduce.
I watch with despair the rape and abuse of our planet and even more importantly the destruction of all the species we co habit the planet with and it really angers me.
I often find myself stating that I'd ideally see all humans wiped away in one (hopefully quick and painless way), but people just laugh and think I'm joking. I don't think I am.
Please, please don't attack the hell out of me, I'm a sensitive soul. I've held off commenting on this thread for about 5 months now.
Just wanted to put forward the point of view that this is a completely natural act and we could just take a deep breath and live with it. Life is full of pain but also full of joy. How many non covid things have we all had to endure? Life can be brutal but this is just one thing amongst many.
doughnut - I, for one, will not be having a pop at you.
Your view is perfectly valid - other than seeing all humans wiped away.
I'm afraid that yes there is an element of 'you reap what you sow' with zoonotic diseases. Scientists have been predicting things like this from the time i was doing my masters and there are various books written on this.
the sad reality is that where you put more people in contact with wild animals you get cross species infections. It was just a matter of time before one really broke out.
As for can we do something about it, yes no question. And also we will see some massive advances in medicine off the back of this. Medicines will routinely be getting to market faster.
so I am looking on the positives as much as I can but it is going to hurt everyone in some way to get there
The changes we have seen in data management and clinical trials will not go away and will only benefit in time.
No less, there would be a more dramatic reinfection rate with shorter immunity. The dynamics are not consistent with such short immunity.
I thought you might have meant "more than" as well @TiRed so thanks for the explanation, it makes sense once I've considered it!
Frankconway. Thanks.
The way I see it, all species will multiply to the maximum extent they can. We're not unique. Microbes are a nightmare for it: multiply like hell to exploit a food source then die in great numbers when it runs out.
Unfortunately humans are too bright. We'll take every living thing out in our battle to survive, hence we've got to go!
There is hope in the way that wonderful individuals find solutions to so many complex problems, so I'm not totally sold on mass destruction, but watching the majority of the population of the world say **** you, me first, and sadly I'm equally part of the problem despite knowing the ramifications of my actions, leads me to the conclusion that we'd be best as a fossil layer.
Just wanted to put forward the point of view that this is a completely natural act
It probably isn't. Unless you like batburgers. AS for natural selection of the fittest, humans have spent an age resisting this and biotechnology is the result. Things are moving at warp speed. This is a soluble problem, but time is required.
We’re living far beyond the age we should.
Theres an Attemborough presentation somewhere with a graph, which proves a notion that weve accelarated something like 1000 times faster than the rest of the planets natural evolutionary speed.
Ill see if i can find it.
@rollindoughnut I don't think your views are that outlandish, I'd like to see humanity return somehow to animalism. How we square that with our current culture is difficult to see, and I'm as guilty as the next person for not wanting my lifestyle or my kids lifestyles to be massively affected. We do have to change somehow to stop these pandemics occurring in the future and to balance our growth (decline?) with nature.
Unfortunately humans are too bright. We’ll take every living thing out in our battle to survive, hence we’ve got to go!
Non too bright. More than enough food. We throw food away. We use the land unproductively by pushing a fast-food, meat and sugar and oil -intense diet and lifestyle. Slash and burn short-termism is not ‘too-bright.
Unfortunately humans are too bright. We’ll take every living thing out in our battle to survive, hence we’ve got to go!
.. leads me to the conclusion that we’d be best as a fossils layer
Interesting debate, and probably a thread derail. But taking the bait....why would this intrinsically be a good thing?
Unfortunately humans are too bright. We’ll take every living thing out in our battle to survive, hence we’ve got to go!
Heh. You think this because you think it's unfair that humans should kill everything else (as do I). But fairness is mostly a human construct; without humans there would nothing would give a shit if everything were wiped out. So if humans did become extinct the only entities that might have appreciated it will be gone!
@rollingdonut I have had similar feelings in the past and particularly since the pandemic and deep down feel the human race needs to stop growing (no kids here) but with where we are now where do we draw the line with medical intervention and prolonging life?
I certainly wouldn't opt to not use antibiotics if I got an infection or have to deal with a root canal without an anesthetic so it would be an ethical nightmare deciding which diseases, injuries do we treat and which scientific advances do we make?
My other thought is that we can't turn back the clock. It's human nature to overcome adversity and we are a product of nature /mother Earth so maybe we shouldn't feel so guilty about what we are. I think we will carry on until our eventual destruction taking lots of species with us but nature is so much more powerful than us and will regrow and we will be a mere blip in the history of Earth.
Yes it is wonderful to see how plant life envelops abandoned structures. It is heartening how some of the Chernobyl area has become a sanctuary for certain species for example.
It's a real shame that species diversity is taking a pounding though. Many,many evolutionary lines have already become extinct through our actions.
As to the question of how much should we intervene on health, I agree it's an impossible decision. I struggle to see keeping old people alive who are suffering with multiple ailments and dementia for example as anything other than some kind of slow torture, but where do you draw the line?
why would this intrinsically be a good thing?
it would be a bad thing - we need to clean up our crap before we go!
Back to COVID, I can't help thinking the Labour anit-semitism report has come out at a very bad time, its going to dominate the news cycle till early - mid next week I guess; I'm sure the govt will string it along to mask their own failings. By the time the news outles are back to COVID we'll be a week down the line with limited change and looking at the graphs it seems like this is a critical week? [I'm basing this assumption of the importance of the next week on the similarity in numbers of hospital admissions between now and the start of the previous lockdown and that, looking at the graphs, it seems like the rate is accelerating although I've not dug into the numbers]
@rollingdonut while following this thread to find clarity amongst all the misinformation I too find myself thinking that we have contributed to the problem by keeping our old folk alive beyond their natural lifespan.
My Dad is 75 but taking a crazy amount of tablets everyday to sit in a chair on his own. My 87 yr old father in law is pyschically and mentally pretty good but is really very lonely (and a 10 hr round trip away) and wants to die. Approaching 50 and feeling fit and healthy I'd feel a lot happier about the future if I knew I would get to choose my exit.
If an alien David Attenborough was broadcasting from another planet he wouldn't be talking about an extintion moment would he? There will be quite a lot of us left after this.
I should add that I realise that it doesn't just kill old folk and I am completely on board with the ethos of this thread.
Economist's take on how Eat Out to Help Out has driven the rise in cases:
https://twitter.com/fetzert/status/1322078576133525504
It says tweet not avaiable? rough outline?
Yes, thanks, no idea why it didnt before
This maps closely patterns of restaurant visits which increased through Mon-Wed in August & then declined again from early Sept. The DID estimates suggest between 8-17% of all detected #COVID19 infections were due to the #EOHO scheme seeding the 2nd wave across the country. 5...
Rough outline - the "eat out help out" scheme take-up corresponds accurately with the starting off of covid wave 2.
It effectively seeded the second wave.
80% of UK cases come from a strain that first appeared in Spain in June !
https://twitter.com/rowlsmanthorpe/status/1322136294793904130
Always thought it was mad that the gov wasn't quarantining people coming back from Spain/Italy/China etc. The fact that they weren't even testing them at the airports is just criminal negligence surely?
Always thought it was mad that the gov wasn’t quarantining people coming back from Spain/Italy/China etc. The fact that they weren’t even testing them at the airports is just criminal negligence surely?
Not that I'm remotely defending the incompetent bellends we have in nominal charge of this country but did the tests actually exist then? Did the UK have any of them?
There was supposed to be some form of quarantine wasn't there? I recall pictures of coaches with a police escort taking a whole load of people from Heathrow to some "camp" (old military base maybe?) up near Liverpool for 2 weeks quarantining which even back then seemed rather insane to be transporting potentially infectious people around the country...
is just criminal negligence surely?
Just add it to the list.
but did the tests actually exist then? Did the UK have any of them?
It apparently first appeared in June. We certainly had tests back then.
I recall pictures of coaches with a police escort taking a whole load of people from Heathrow to some “camp” (old military base maybe?) up near Liverpool for 2 weeks quarantining
They were Brits who had been working in China - not general bods returning from holiday.
wasn't that for the people from the cruise ship or other places that had been evacuated? Certainly wasn't for most holidaymakers who'd made their own way back to the UK... people were just getting off planes & jumping straight into cars/taxis/tubes without being tested or even interviewed re. symptoms etcThere was supposed to be some form of quarantine wasn’t there? I recall pictures of coaches with a police escort taking a whole load of people from Heathrow to some “camp”
I think @frankconway has it, people who'd been working in Wuhan. I do remember that.
And yes, everyone else literally just getting off planes and straight onto trains, buses, the tube etc to wander anywhere they wanted.
For too long humans have defied nature. We’ve pushed the boundaries of survival far beyond natural limits. We’re living far beyond the age we should.
Nature abhors aborations and will seek to resume balance. Laws of natural selection and survival of the fittest keep populations of all species healthy and viable. Here we are presented with a classic example of a balancing act by nature that will select out the less healthy and older members of a society to maintain the health and ability to survive for the more viable specimens, I.e. the ones that will reproduce.
Very true, except for the concept of an intelligent nature doing this maliciously...
I am sadly a massive hypocrite, having had life saving surgery as an infant (which wouldnt have been possible 30 years prior) and being so blind (since my teenage years) as to be totally useless to any society prior to the invention of glasses.
While as a society we may be using technology to improve our health and lives immeasurably, but on a biological level we are hindering ourselves. There is almost no barrier or risk to reproduction in modern western society. How many people under say 35 or 40 do you personally know that have died?
Hence our spiralling population in the last half a century, which is thankfully starting to slow down, but not yet decrease.
Aside from natural infertility (and even that we have partial solutions to) anyone is capable of reproducing. there will be very little actual beneficial evolution of the species from here on out.
Reading the comments on my local news facebook is like a window into insanity. These conspiracy nuts telling me the numbers ate made up to scare people etc, who do they think is wanting to scare them and why? I'd ask them but dont want to get drawn into telling some random how stupid they are when I might meet them again at parents evening or something!!
When I see posts like that, they get put into my avoid as much as possible list, also known as plague rat list.
if they are thinking like that then i see them as being more likely to be carriers and risk of infecting me.