Seems like this would be the quickest way to understand whether we might have significant community transmission already?
I'm assuming they must be looking at this now
I had my pcr test this afternoon after +ve lft and a grim 24hrs of symptoms , I wonder if they will sequence it and get back to me, I believe the extra restrictions are that my entire household has to isolate?
Had my booster today. And the flu jag.
I had an almost immediate bad taste in my mouth - metallic/chemical. Other than that. so far, so good.
Pre booked or walk in ? Did they offer teh flu vax as an add as you were there already ? or was it a pre-booked double . ?
"Pre-booked", as in, invited. They're not doing walk-ins locally yet, still getting through the 50+ age groups. They're doing the flu jag at the same time.
We know masks work
How?
Apart from the fact that medical workers, especially those in theatres and ITU have been wearing masks for decades, and don’t appear to suffer the sort of issues you’re banging on about.
Then there are people who work in all sorts of facilities where mask wearing is compulsory for health reasons due to work conditions, not to mention vast numbers of Japanese who’ve been wearing masks when out in public for many, many years.
My main point is, millions of people manage to wear them with little inconvenience to themselves, while managing to stay healthy, so what’s your problem, exactly?
There are over 160,000 hospital beds in the UK.
You wish 😀
Less than 100k for general and acute care in England. The proportion of filled ITU beds was higher still.
Some form of hybrid care, like everyone else uses (certainly so in Europe) would be for the best
Agree completely.
Hope you are feeling better soon Kimbers (and be interesting if we get told which variant from now on).
I gave the total number of beds for the UK (160,000 - I got the number from Stastia, FWIW). Working with the numbers just for England - the gov website gives a peak value of 33,000 people in hospital with Covid (cue usual discussion about whether that includes people who tested while being admitted, and those who caught it while in hospital), in Jan 2021. That's 33% of general and acute beds (98,000), or 28% of all beds (120,000). Still some way from "half of all patients were being actively treated for Covid in Jan 2021".
Apart from the fact that medical workers, especially those in theatres and ITU have been wearing masks for decades, and don’t appear to suffer the sort of issues you’re banging on about.
These comparisons to surgeons are getting very silly. I'm talking about the fact that my kids see almost all other people's faces covered by masks (not forgetting that I'm in Wales, where it's been mandated that everyone in a public building must wear a mask), including at nursery pickup/dropoff. If they were in secondary school, they would see everyone's faces covered by masks, every day. How does that in any way relate to a surgeon wearing a mask during surgery, to protect open wounds from droplet infection?
not to mention vast numbers of Japanese
Huge numbers of Japanese people have also bought used panties from vending machines. What's your point?
The signal to noise ratio isn’t great right now though.
Don't worry, I'll leave you in peace soon enough, to pontificate for a few hundred more pages on just how many jabs we all need before it's time for another lockdown.
Eh, that comment about Japan wasn't helpful. Oh well.
To our Welsh contributor, why do residents of Asian countries routinely wear masks in cold/flu season or whenever a new virus emerges or a known one re-emerges?
A clue - based on experience they know that mask wearing, as part of a range of preventive measures, helps.
WTF does a poster's access to private health care have to do with that they post?
Pontificating? Someone who knows what they're talking about and understands the subject matter is infinitely preferable to an internet random with no relevant knowledge or experience.
Do you have that knowledge or experience? Immunologist? Virologist? Medically qualified?
If only the forum allowed selective blocking.
You have placed yourself in the pointless, useless and unfunny category.
At least chewkw provides some entertainment value.
deleted - what’s the point in engaging?
I'm so over the mask debate. Trump and some other "leaders" have much to answer for.
Truth is that there are people that will simply not wear a mask*. Not saying that actually applies to twrch as I think he does wear them but simply believes them to be of no/ little value? Full on anti mask types tend to only change their opinion when they or a loved one are directly impacted to a devastating degree.
There is no escaping the fact that most attitudes are now set in stone this far into the pandemic. For good and bad.
On a brighter note, thanks for all the latest info being posted by people, feeling a little less worried by Omicron now. Cautious as always but a little less worried.
* It must genuinely suck not to be able to wear a mask due to medical exemption as you are lumped in with the other lot.
Edit:
Don’t worry, I’ll leave you in peace soon enough, to pontificate for a few hundred more pages on just how many jabs we all need before it’s time for another lockdown.
See, this bakes my noodle far more than what you are directly saying about masks. Much of what you are advocating makes another lockdown more likely, yet have the temerity to make it sound like others are the ones that actually want it to happen. Incredible.
For one, the ever-increasing use of scary hospital and medical scenes being used to “educate” (or maybe even nudge) the public into the dangers of disease, goes so far against all they were taught about the need to humanise healthcare that it almost brought them to tears telling me about it.
What? I don’t buy that for one second and what are you even trying to get at. How does it go against what they were told about humanising healthcare?
My opening gambit was to suggest that maybe, we would have a better outcome if every form of care was not 100% focussed on avoiding the theoretical risks of Covid.
Well it’s not. Maybe you should ask your close relative about that, if they exist.
Fair enough, how about half of critical care beds? And hope no one you know needs one. The number of beds in the NHS is, I believe, a state secret (seriously) and can flex significantly. But if your staff are all off sick, and patients are stacking up then access is limited. Here’s the Nuffield view, where they increase critical capacity to 150%.
I think it is self-evident that the NHS has come under unprecedented pressure, notably prior to vaccination roll-out, with a further smaller surge with emergence of a Delta strain. Provision of healthcare is not my expertise, development of new therapies, which hopefully will further reduce this pressure, is. And that day job offers the healthcare as a benefit. But when there’s no healthcare, private or public it doesn’t really matter (the local private hospitals were all requisitioned for covid treatment at the epidemic peak, if you didn’t know).
I don't need to be a virologist or some other expert to comment on my subjective experience of life under Covid, and specifically how it has affected access to and quality of healthcare (which has been the topic of almost everything I've said). Somehow the merest mention of masks has set everyone off.
WTF does a poster’s access to private health care have to do with that they post?
It's just very interesting, that one of our most frequent commenters on the subject of Coronavirus does not have to worry at all about the state of the healthcare that most of us have to use. I wonder how much that is also true, for those who make all the decisions about what is best for us?
I think it is self-evident that the NHS has come under unprecedented pressure
Yes, but as always, not due to absolute numbers of Covid patients (nor even absolute numbers of patients - bed occupancy has been significantly below average since March 2020). It's a combination of staffing policies (which are dominated by Covid guidelines and procedures), care bottlenecks as services were reduced, working conditions, and yes, some Covid patients, with the issues that a new disease causes. We had a pretty good handle on the reality of what Covid could do fairly quickly. After all, our initial response to the pandemic was to empty the hospitals of everyone possible (sending large numbers of elderly back to nursing homes), in preparation for a surge of patients of all ages (which never happened).
why do residents of Asian countries routinely wear masks in cold/flu season or whenever a new virus emerges or a known one re-emerges?
I don't know. Apparently a combination of culture, airbourne pollution, and some idea that surgical masks stop viruses. It's worth noting that it's more common to wear a mask if you display symptoms of a disease. Yes yes I know that Covid has a very high chance of being asymptomatic, but then again, being vaccinated reduces your chance of symptoms, making you more likely to be asymptomatic.
Much of what you are advocating makes another lockdown more likely
Really? Practically everyone who is at any kind of risk of a bad time with Covid is vaccinated, and a very high percentage of everyone else is too, and the advice of an internet stranger has the power to bring on another lockdown? I suppose the follow up question is - when will we ever stop wearing masks, if this isn't enough?
FWIW, it's my personal opinion that the risks of Covid have been massively over-blown (although risk is still present), along with our response to it. We are now stuck in something closer to a mass hysteria. I'm sure you'll all be falling over each other to present examples of people who did have a bad time with Covid, but the overall death statistics (and more specifically, the age- and health- related breakdowns) are quite clear. I'm sure the next argument is that we need to "protect the NHS", but that has been the entire thrust of what I've been saying today. We have "protected the NHS", and somehow it's doing worse than ever (and also compared to other countries that have had a comparable time with Covid). Again, in my opinion, the excessive focus on Covid has caused numerous and severe side-effects with healthcare in the UK - the huge backlog of health issues, the compounding effect of health problems adding up as they are not treated, and the fact that the NHS is a horrible place to work at the moment.
It's probably time to show myself out.
I just want to end my posts in this thread tonight on a lighter note.
Tell me I'm not the only one that had a childish little chuckle when out of the blue earlier TiRed's post included comments such as "increases it’s cleavage" in reference to omicron? I know it's a technical term and entirely on topic but still.
I'm sorry, and I'm not proud of myself but particularly coming from TiRed, I had a well needed chuckle.😁
It’s probably time to show myself out.
Your best post.
Don't forget to close door on your way out.
I hope you recognise the inherent paradox in this comment:
the risks of Covid have been massively over-blown (although risk is still present), along with our response to it.
Without the response, do you honestly think life expectancy would not have reduced further?
PoopScoop - no, I chuckled too.
Every time I fly into French airspace, the first ATC agency I contact is called "Brest Control" I'm ashamed to say I smirk every time I say it. I give myself extra points if they ask me a question and I get to respond with " Affirm, Breast Control" Life needs these moments.
Mask wearing has been mandated on air travel for a long time now. We are now allowed to offload those who refuse, although I can't query them if they state they are exempt. The whole "Medical Exemption" thing gets me, mainly because it is so abused. The genuine sufferers get tarred along with the "Sunflower lanyard from eBay" mob.
I have casually asked an "Exemptee" If he was exempt from all masks? Then what he would do in the event of a decompression when the O2 masks come down from the ceiling? Unsurprisingly he agreed he would put the O2 mask on. His medical condition must have been quite unique to only suffer from masks that helped others, not himself.
Tired, what happened with the "significant slump" November cases predicted by the governments modelling ?
Covid cases should slump in November by around 85 per cent to just 5,000 per day by Christmas even without Plan B restrictions, according to modelling seen by the Government.
The whole “Medical Exemption” thing gets me, mainly because it is so abused. The genuine sufferers get tarred along with the “Sunflower lanyard from eBay” mob.
That's the real loss here, those genuine cases have got lost in the noise about the anti-maskers.
Still struggling to see how anyone can see the excess deaths from Covid and now the knock on impact to other care, and still question if a small effort is worth making.
does not have to worry at all about the state of the healthcare that most of us have to use
As it happens, you couldn’t be more wrong, but whatever. I’ve made more use of the NHS (long covid) in the last 18 months, than I have at any time in the previous 30 years.
And I agree about the status of our healthcare and the COVID outcomes. The U.K. has had a relatively poor outcome compared to peers, our excess mortality has been higher, and at times quite remarkable.
The “excess” focus on covid is really about the potential for excess use of resource. Strokes, cancer, heart attacks, diabetes, etc, are all linear and hence proportional to population number. This makes them much easier to plan for. Infectious diseases have long been the highest concern on government risk registers (over anything else you can think of) because they are nonlinear - one leads to two leads to four…
At least now, we have effective interventions that have reduced the rates of hospitalisation by about four times and deaths by ten times. This means that we are very unlikely to see another lockdown without complete immune escape - and I don’t believe that this is omicron. We will also presently have means of mass treatment. But for some perspective, without those measures, over last Christmas, our actions led to 30k additional deaths compared to our European peers. That’s double a “bad flu year”.
It’s probably time to show myself out.
Don’t be silly, bring some facts. I’m always keen to debate. The facts are, however, pretty grim to be honest. Why not start with pregnancy risk for covid? You know that 5% of all women of childbearing age are pregnant at any time? Or the other immunocompromised and cancer patients. Or the general poor health status of the nation? COVID found us and our healthcare system out. Of tha I think we agree
FWIW, it’s my personal opinion
You know, this is purely anecdote, but whenever I meet one of my patients that for whatever reason won't wear a mask, or hasn't been vaccinated, invariably they start with this...To the point that my reception team lead and I have a side bet running. The thing is, mostly it isn't, it's someone else's opinion that they've lazily adopted as it suits.
COVID found us and our healthcare system out.
Hallelujah brother. I suspect that the wrong conclusions will be made by politicians who're obsessed by "market forces" though
Question for those in the know
How much does a virus have to mutate before it's classed as a new virus in its own right rather than a variant of what went before?
Or does that never really happen?
and if it does happen how far away from being classed as a new virus in its own right is omicron?
as i regularly find myself in disagreement with kelvin, i thought this was worth a quote/repeat
There are plenty of other interesting and useful posts and contributors, I’m not suggesting TiRed’s posts are the only ones worth reading. The signal to noise ratio isn’t great right now though.
but im having to think of it as the noise to signal ration currently, just sits better in my head that way round
It's a little technical but you want pango
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phylogenetic_Assignment_of_Named_Global_Outbreak_Lineages
The rules for a new lineage are here:
https://www.pango.network/the-pango-nomenclature-system/statement-of-nomenclature-rules/
Basically, you align the amino acid sequences for samples and look to see how similar what you have tested is to previous reference strains. If it looks "mostly similar" and has similar epidemiological features, it's a substrain. If it doesn't align (some drop out acids), has lots of mutations and has different clinical features, it's a new strain.
A single mutation could be a new strain. The first was D614 mutating to G. That increased transmission and the new strain replaced the Wuhan reference almost immediately. UK variant (Alpha) dropped some acids at position 67/70 and changed at N501 to Y. It's part science and part art.
Influenza has two surface antigens and these can undergo huge changes on an annual basis (H and N proteins - hence "H1N1 strain"). Coronaviruses do not change their coats to the same extent. Instead they mutate at individual points on the surface spikes.
Your best post.
Don’t forget to close door on your way out.
Poor show @frankconway
How much does a virus have to mutate before it’s classed as a new virus in its own right rather than a variant of what went before?
I'd also wondered this. And related, why it's generally assumed that a new variant will tend to displace the existing, or not spread. What is stopping both co-existing ?
It’s a little technical but you want pango
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phylogenetic_Assignment_of_Named_Global_Outbreak_Lineages
/blockquote>Thanks - that deals with whether a virus is a substrain or a new strain of sars-cov-2 , but what I was getting at in my original question is, is it possible for a virus to mutate so much that its no longer classed as a sars-cov-2 virus?
and if that is possible , how far is omicron from being a new virus?
Apologies If I'm using the wrong terminology above.
What is stopping both co-existing ?
Darwin
Fittest will outcompete. But local pockets (e.g., regions or even countries) can harbour independent strains without competition. When you get an introduced new fitter strain, it tends to outcompete the others. There have been three such events in the UK; D614G, Alpha (November 2020) and Delta (April 2021). Omicron _may_ be not as fit as Delta, but we shall see. It took off in South Africa when Delta was very low. Whether it can push aside UK Delta and substrings is unknown.
New variants may not displace others, but of course, you detect cases and type them. Countries do not do this uniformly (UK is the world leader here). So we might be missing strains that are not outcompeting but pop up and down. You see this in the UK with Beta and a few others.
A very very mild but very transmissible strain would be good news if it keeps out a severe but less transmissible strain. It might still be bad news for the elderly/immunocompromised, but this is a form of vaccination using Live Attenuated Virus. Current COVID LAVs have not been impressive.
how far is omicron from being a new virus?
A very long way. SARS-COV-1 has 30k nucleotides and is about 67% similar to SARS-COV-1, It forms a different strain of the "sarbecovirus" family. MERS is further away still but still a coronavirus. This paper is worth a quick read for taxonomy of SARS viruses and influenza.
Although the media says it has a LOT of mutations, this is relative and I am most definitely not a Taxonomist!
A very long way. SARS-COV-1 has 30k nucleotides and is about 67% similar to SARS-COV-1, It forms a different strain of the “sarbecovirus” family. MERS is further away still but still a coronavirus. This paper is worth a quick read for taxonomy of SARS viruses and influenza.
Although the media says it has a LOT of mutations, this is relative and I am most definitely not a Taxonomist!
thanks - appreciate your info on this.
Don’t forget to close door on your way out.
Doors don’t do anything, you can still open them to get through. I refuse to use them as they do nothing.
Not wanting to be the harbinger of doom, but I wouldn't be surprised if there was a lockdown in the New Year, Omicron or not.
Not wanting to be the harbinger of doom, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a lockdown in the New Year, Omicron or not.
Don't worry, you're only a mild familiar of doom-lite; people on this thread have been predicting another lock down since the summer televised Euro football.
From the top of my head:
Lockdown by end of august
Lockdown to coincide with schools going back
Lockdown by end of september
2 week half term circuit breaker
Lockdown by end of november
In the same way that someone usually wins the lottery, someone probably will be right at some point.
You're listing occasions where a "lock down" could have helped avoid our health service being overstretched. It's clear that the government (well, our PM really) won't take such preventative steps now. That doesn't mean that a future "lock down" can be ruled out... at some point it stops being a preventative tool to prevent the health service failing to treat critical cases, and becomes a response to the health service failing to treat critical cases. This government is "responsive" to public pressure, if nothing else. People dying in large numbers of Covid without access to hospital treatment would result in plenty of public pressure. Hopefully it won't come to that in January. I'm hopeful that it won't. My expectation is that it won't. But the confidence to rule it out outright doesn't seem well founded to me. A two week closure of pubs, clubs and restaurants etc (or curfew or other reduction in physical contacts) during the January slow down needs to be a possible tool for the government to use if it's needed.
Everything coming out of our Govt scientists is that "Get a booster - the high levels of antibody will offset the lowered effectiveness of vaccines"
My Booster was nearly 6 months ago under the CovBoost trial. Do I need to be concerned about my waning antibodies after 6 months post boost? How will having caught Delta in August affect this?
No communication from your trial? Some people are getting a fourth dose.
wow - so did you have 2xvaccs, then a booster in May and then CV19(Delta) in August.
i assume the booster was early, but even so that four 'doses' in under a year, potentially five if you get a 'standard' booster..... does that make you "covid proof" or "full of covid"
We have decided to err on caution at work - we work daily in multiple schools, with staff moving between them each week. We are winding back in-school and in-nursery delivery work, with a stopping of most delivery in a week. We are also ceasing our office use - it was limited, but we are now all working properly from home with office only to collect or drop off resources needed for delivery.
It is not panic, we are keen to a) not see staff enter Christmas holidays with CV19 or seasonal flu (etc) caused by being expected in school, and b) loosing a week or two delivery now 'buys' a month with our usual Christmas full closure.
Hard to make that call, but it is on balance the right thing.
We have managed to work right through the pandemic, in fact grow as an organisation, and avoided any issues that our work could have caused for staff and customers despite being in multiple schools and nurseries daily. This in itself is a near miracle.
The level of antibodies needed for protection for vaccines, which make a polyclonal response, isn’t really known. Their persistence in the body halves every two months as the cells that make them wane. Down to low levels levels. For super potent monoclonal antibodies the levels are known from prophylaxis studies. Although these may be higher with the new strain. It’s all too early for doomongering
Delta spread through vaccinated populations, but for the same number of cases as alpha, hospitalisations were only a quarter. I think omicron looks more like alpha, but there were no vaccines then - hence the concern.
Like any chronic therapeutic, repeat administration will eventually be balanced by elimination. Boosters raise antibody levels more than first doses. I’ve not seen data on fourth doses, but would expect the same. Infections will add even more.
Kelvin - not a lot as its all blinded.
Ive emailed for some details and apparently something is being published in the Lancet Friday.
As I understand it, 4th jabs are for those immunosuppressed, whose 3rd wasn't officially called a booster, just that their treatment was 3 jabs.
The other issue for me is that my booster doesn't show on my Covid Passport, as its still a trial and blinded. It won't be long until I need to show my boosted status o travel to certain countries for work. They did agree a few months back to unblind all placebo trialists, and offer them a booster, but we still don't know what booster we had.
EDIT: Thanks TiRed - that ties in with what I had previously understood.
4yo daughter woke in the night with a constant cough so no school and we've just been for a 'tickle test' as we call it. Test centre busiest I've seen it by a margin. All mum's with Little'uns. School cold and cough season in full swing I guess!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59426353
Moderna reckon less effective vaccine. Just guess work at this stage?
No, Covid is rife in primary schools at the moment. All thanks to Mr "Covid Secure" Williamson.
neilnevill
Free Memb https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59426353Moderna reckon less effective vaccine. Just guess work at this stage?
The vaccines are a little less effective against Delta too so it's really all about how much less effective. I get the impression no one knows that yet.
Fingers crossed on that one.
