Alert level just reduced to 3 btw.
China waited 6 months to tell the WHO about Covid and many economies (including ours) are now collapsing as a result.
We had enough heads up from China here, our government sat on the info while the PM was having his multiple extended holidays. The people of Italy and Spain should be livid though. We’re talking 6 weeks, rather than 6 months, though.
On the app front – other countries have reportedly had the same issues
Perhaps we could have learnt from that (even if it wasn’t entirely predictable by anyone with any understanding of iOS architecture) and have already switched and delivered (as Germany have).
Covid was on STW threads in early January with enough information to make decisions. Don't blame the Chinese, Europe had enough information in good time and didn't react.
Alert level just reduced to 3 btw.
On the briefing yesterday I saw daily CV hospital admissions were at 490 UP from 458 the week before, handjob made some vague reference to downward trends but this is the first time in a long while there has been a rise. Seems like a great time to reduce the alert level!
Until the FR and NFR for the MMP are published its speculation.
If you want to build a secure, reliable system that is going to be used by millions of people and is handling sensitive data about medical status and location, there are a whole raft of obvious requirements that you have to satisfy if you want to deliver something that actually does the job properly. You don't need to see published requirements to work that out.
I'm not claiming any special knowledge here. Anyone who works on large scale IT projects would instantly look at this and say it is a huge job, and it's a system that has to be delivered and supported, not just a standalone app that works in isolation on individual phones.
The BBC covered some quite serious doubts on the Harvard "August" theory.
However, we seem to have traces of the virus in Europe in December, but no indications of deaths over here at the point? Did it get worse over the winter somehow? Would any samples from "pneumonia" deaths have been taken and could be retested?
It's possible that early strains were less virulent in both infectiousness and outcome. That's the only way I can make sense of the "early COVID" theories.
It's not one virus, it's multiple strains and multiple introductions. How many is moot, but more than one introduction, definitely. Might have been here earlier, might not have got into a nursing home, might have been confused with influenza (mild season this year)... I was pretty ill in December after sitting next to a Chinese lady who coughed all the way to London on a flight home from Prague. Who knows? I definitely had it in April and was very poorly. Was I primed for viral enhancement? I don't find the theories about immunity helpful. But I think perspective is helpful - and coronaviruses do not impart lasting immunity and reinfect people roughly every two and a half years. We are a quarter of the way through the first cycle.
The most significant change is the nature of reporting from the not-helpful "R is somewhere under 1" (maybe 0.7-0.9) to the epidemic is shrinking at 3% per day. OK the population struggle with compound interest but I think they'll get the picture. Down up or the same.
It’s not one virus, it’s multiple strains and multiple introductions
Thanks for making that clear, I got grief from Outofbreath for using "strains" a few weeks back.
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-53105642
Apple said: "We don't know what they mean by this hybrid model. They haven't spoken to us about it."
There’s a bit more gaslighting in there by David Bonsall (got to keep that BBC balance) to offer the suggestion that everything is Apple’s fault really… but it’s still clear the spin that Matt Hancock’s was given to read out was just that… spin… fantasy… bullshit.
Top quality rant from Dr John Campbell about Vitamin D:
No swearing at all, so Hambini fans will be disappointed.
UK Government only about 5 months behind the curve on this.
As my son pointed out this morning though to me, it's not Vitamin D deficiency, but getting news from social media that is correlated with Covid19 death.
Combined with the Harvard Med School analysis of traffic movements at Wuhan hospitals late summer last year everything is now pointing to a huge cover up by China:
China waited 6 months to tell the WHO about Covid and many economies (including ours) are now collapsing as a result.
I'm sorry but 'everything' is not pointing to a huge cover up of 6 months, now it's possible that it arise sooner & China don't like to share info, but that data is circumstantial at best & while it bears looking into, it's by no means conclusive.
Evidence that it arrived in Europe in December is stronger & looks likely, tho whether those cases seeded the outbreaks here is not proven, but even then scapegoating China for mistakes that other governments may have made really doesn't help
Also regards the app, yep other countries,including Germany had problems with a centralised version earlier, so switched as we are now, but the government said that they had it working fine on iPhone on the IOW , but we now know it was only picking up 4% of iPhone users!
Germany's is running now, ours is 4 months away & already saying it won't have the features government said we're essential a few weeks ago
Top quality rant from Dr John Campbell about Vitamin D:
Bit funny that he criticises folk that say "knew all along" about HMZ but then says"knew all along " about Vitamin D.
Bit funny that he criticises folk that say “knew all along” about HMZ but then says”knew all along ” about Vitamin D.
Yeah, I noticed that. He does go on to say that HMZ had no clinical trials with Covid19 to back it up, whereas Vitamin D did have all sorts of good evidence against respiratory diseases, even back in January.
Nobody, and I mean nobody, knew anything “all along”. Some perspective is always useful here. It’s a new pathogen. It looks a lot like a previous one which caused relatively few cases and was eradicated before much was learned about it. It uses the same entry protein (ACE2 and furan cleavage. It is more transmissible and eradication may prove much more challenging than last time.
For some people it does not activate their innate immune pathway very well, and these people may have a cytokine storm and poor outcome. Antivirals may help with early symptoms and progression. Immune suppression helps with the cytokine storm. It is pathogenic in the elderly but not children, but perhaps little more than influenza and other coronaviruses.
After that, all bets are off. I avoid anyone preaching with hindsight, but his Previous basic explanations have been fair.
I've been taking 4000iu of Vit D3 for the past couple of years (i have secondary progressive MS) along with 1500mg of slow release Vit C and 2000ug of Vit B12 and im dumdfounded as to why Vit D3 has not been pushed right from the start of the covid outbreak, If i've known about the beneficial effects it has on the immune system through what ive learned and read over the past few years then it is criminally negligent of the government/public health service/NICE to drag its heels over this issue. Back in february (As i mentioned on this thread 4 months ago) i bought 6 bottles of 2000iu Vit D3, 6 bottles of 1500mg Vit C and 6 bottles of 1000ug Vit B12 to give to my brother, his GF (she's rather big and works 10hr shifts in care home, never sees the sun), my mother and my 2 closest friends.
Its no surprise we have so many deaths in this country, my own doctor tried to advise against me taking 4000iu of Vit D.
So, Germanys R rate is now 1.79. A week or so after they allowed them to Holiday with Spain...
Outbreaks also in Australia and of course China.
Worrying times.
There will always be outbreaks until a vaccine.
Remember we are a permanent outbreak at the moment. 100 extra wouldn’t even dent our numbers.
Kryton57
SubscriberSo, Germanys R rate is now 1.79. A week or so after they allowed them to Holiday with Spain…
The number of additional cases which has caused this rise, is a couple of hundred. Germany had fallen to the 00 mark for new cases a day, now they're up at 5-600 over the last few days. So their alarming spike, is less than half as bad as our normal, and their extra cases, are about the same as our daily deaths.
Well ok but, we’ve seen how virulent this thing is. And also Spain’s opened its doors to the Brits this morning... So that’s Brits as we are and Germans with a spike all lathering themselves up over the same sunbed. Before a splash in a pool.
Gulp.
Nobody, and I mean nobody, knew anything “all along”.
Plenty of studies into Vitamin D and respiratory diseases.
I'm still amazed that even today, PHE's advice is that there's "not enough evidence".
By now, there's been plenty of time to do any additional research to find or disprove a link one way or another, what exactly have they been doing all this time?
Not the sharpest knives in the block I fear.
Well the pools chlorinated and unless your licking the sunbed you should fine(ymmv).
They’ll be set up distanced and probably disinfected regularly and your outside.
The choice is yours to make taking into Account your risk category and aversion to risk 🙂
But thinking its another day in shagalouf possibly not quite yet 🙂
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28202713/
12% reduction (95% confidence interval 4 to 19%) in acute respiratory infections with Vitamin D supplement (obviously not mortality) in a meta analysis of 25 studies of 11k subjects. Then there is the question of dose and duration, control for skin colour and latitude, pathogen, etc... Sure it’s worthy of study, but I’d agree about there being no “overwhelming” evidence.
But thinking its another day in shagalouf possibly not quite yet
Quite. We’ve a keen eye on our go to Menorca spot for a last minute bargain after we cancelled previously. The Hotel has posted up a series of measures which are; socially distanced bars and restaurants, 50% occupancy, staff with PPE, everyone wears masks in common areas, rooms are deep cleaned, sun beds unavailable before 10am as they go through a clean down process.
That sounds a great holiday. 🙄
Quite. And add to that my paranoia won’t let me relax around that many people anyway.
on another note Mrs K has been selected for the random antibody home test. She’s going to do it.
That sounds a great holiday. 🙄
I was thinking that..
But on other hand, if you are stuck in a bedsit flat with no garden in some inner city suburb, the chance to get out in the sun, even in those circumstances, is probably quite appealing.
I'm not quite as desperate, so will be waiting until at least next year before I take an overseas break.
R-value approaching 3 in Germany.
Seems here that no one cares any more. Social distancing rules to be relaxed.
Was pretty offensive to someone who decided to use my front step as a seat to eat his ice-cream while his kids played in my garage.
I say played, one of the little shits was carving his name into the brick wall.
Re: German R value
Look at absolute and relative values, and also cases per capita. It's not as simple as just an R number
Seems here that no one cares any more
I popped out to a local shop to but Broccoli earlier today, wearing a mask and gloves. I was the only one with either on my entire journey, including the shopkeeper.
Looks like those tennis balls don't have magical covid resistant fibres after all....
Dimitrov tested positive after Adria tournament.
Re: German R value
Still highly suspicious that we were all encouraged to focus on “R” while people here were (and still are) dying in numbers higher than the whole of the EU put together.
I hadn't quite realised when they keep saying they're using Northern Ireland as their example for covid relaxations- schools, social distancing etc that NI had literally no new cases today, and they've been running with an average of 3 a day for the last week. They're about 3% the size of the UK as a whole so that's the equivalent of 100 new cases.
Or to put it another way, they're doing about 13 times better than the UK as a whole, and yet they're being used as the example and justification for the inevitable reduction of the social distancing limit to 1 metre.
Madness, absolute bloody madness.
While local news sites report the finishing touches are being put to a nightingale in the old homebase. 🙄
Nice to see the old 'leak it and see what the reaction is technique is still being used:
Don't build your hopes up too much people!
Makes the actual announcement pointless but it gives Boris his 5 minutes on TV of giving good news I suppose. Pretty much guaranteed that the 2m rule will be scrapped for 1m so that pubs can fill up more. I know a lot of businesses are going to be angry about the 2m rule being dropped as they've just spent a large amount of money rearranging their premises to cope, on signage and queuing systems. Be interesting to see if it's just for England too or if Scotland or Wales follow suit.
It will be just us lemmings in England. The independent SAGE grouping have cautioned against reducing the distancing measure. Meat processing plants appear to be places where the workforce are particularly vulnerable with one or two large clusters here.
I shall wax my board and await the second wave.
No doubt at some point those who want to holiday will come to our door. I will have to work and hopefully not catch the virus from them.
What time is Boris on TV? I need to plan my midweek ride to avoid it.
Well, Super Saturday or Independence day it’s being called, July 4 - the day we went back to almost normal, with the exception of a few rules for enclosed spaces to try to separate people or ventilate a cinema. Yet still we are at level 3?
I have a naturally paranoid personality, I’m not rushing to a cinema yet.
In other news, Farage received “special dispensation” to travel to the Tulsa rally in America. Wtf. Currently under investigation.
Did you not get the memo? The politicos are a special exception to all the usual virus rules.
Well I say rules, they're more like guidelines.
Bit like the pirate code.
Parlay!
Tennis players and Golfers have just proved the point, Djokovic the anti-vaxxer made a right arse of himself.
Im not really interested in going to the cinema or pub - Id like my son to be able to see his grandparents without being 1 or 2m away. Makes no sense as within our family none of us have gone anywhere public for months - however we cant see each other properly but there has to be a higher probability of catching it of someone 1m away down the pub! At least with my parents I know where they have been and trust them!
What is happening in other countries as far as seeing other family members? France is 1m distancing but how does it work within family units etc?
In the absence of any science contributions, here's a digression on easing the lockdown, gangs and Class A drugs.
none of us have gone anywhere public for months – however we cant see each other properly
Then I'd suggest you're being over-cautious.
Sounds like it will be another Good-Old-Good-News-Boris Briefing today.
Time to get to the pub and Support British Businesses by purchasing foreign lager.
Meat processing plants appear to be places where the workforce are particularly vulnerable with one or two large clusters here.
Or is it just they have been tested?