Boris in hospital:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52177125

That’s not good….. Thought it was taking a while for him to ‘recover’.

I hope the staff have the correct PPE to protect them from that odious man

Thought it was taking a while for him to ‘recover’.

Me too. Chris Whitty, as well. He’s not been on TV much since he got the symptoms. I wonder if he’s got a bad dose too.

The stress/hassle/lack of sleep of the last weeks can’t be good for either of their immune systems.

Good case study for not shaking hands with people……
so you think he has had any meetings with rees mogg? We can hope

The stress/hassle/lack of sleep of the last weeks can’t be good for either of their immune systems.

Boris doesn’t exactly scream ‘healthy’ tbh, he’s been heavy for years, wouldn’t surprise if he’s diabetic.

I seriously hope he’s okay though.

So that leaves Dominic Rabb in charge then, we’re **** worse than we thought possible

Who takes over while Boris is out of action?

Eins Extra reported from a hospital in Freiburg earlier. They went through how they’d saved a couple of the patients, notably one of the doctors who’d been infected. Not only had they used a ventilator, they’d also used a machine to artificially oxygenate the blood while her lungs were not working. They might be able to produce more ventilators quickly but once the sytem is stressed it’s clear that not everybody can benefit from some of the more sophisticated treatments being used on the worst cases they think they can save.

A German specialist commented on the triage approach in Germany which is very different to the total number of years that can be saved appraoch in Italy. The German philosphy at present is to take each case on its merits and give priority to the people they think they can save using a host of criteria, not just age.

More good news out of eastern France about the number of new cases reaching hospitals. In Italy too. Confinement is achieving the objective of keeping the number of cases manageable, stay isolated, stay healthy, people.

@Edukator am assuming that is the ecmo machines.
Have even less of those than ventilators however what’s the betting Boris gets one if he needs it

Boris in hospital

Thoughts and prayers…

Boris doesn’t exactly scream ‘healthy’ tbh, he’s been heavy for years, wouldn’t surprise if he’s diabetic.

I seriously hope he’s okay though.

agreed, as much as I think hes a serial bullshitter & muppet of the highest order

hes always been overweight, heavy drinker (& coke habbit whilst mayor, allegedly) smokes cigars, not sure about cigarettes tho? but high blood pressure, diabetes & heart disease were biggest comorbities in severe vs non severe patients

https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30136-3/fulltext

Boris doesn’t exactly scream ‘healthy’ tbh, he’s been heavy for years, wouldn’t surprise if he’s diabetic.

Yeah, Journos are often drinkers as well IME, which isn’t good for your immune system. I’d like to think Chris Whitty might have looked after himself a bit better but who knows. I think we can manage without Boris for a while. In contrast, I hope Whitty’s back in the game ASAP.

Have even less of those than ventilators however what’s the betting Boris gets one if he needs it

A ~55yo bloke who’s about to be a father who happens to be PM probably ought to be fairly high on the list for medical help. I don’t think that’s unreasonable. (…and that assumes there’s currently a shortage of ventilators which I don’t think there is.)

Financial aid from the EU to repatriate stranded Brits

https://www.ft.com/content/1bf986e6-ae9c-4afe-975c-0e51997ea3c4

Journos

Columnists

The issue for Boris is that even if he ends up on a ventilator, the survival rates are not exactly great.
better than not having a ventilator admittedly

A matter of when not if as regards an mp being admitted. The only surprise is who. Mind you, as already stated, the health factors are not good.

An unrelated question. Is nightingale operational yet?

An unrelated question. Is nightingale operational yet?

I thought there was something in the news yesterday saying it was planned but they still had capacity in the existing hospitals. It’s likely to be in this next week.

It was pretty obvious something wasn’t right with Boris, I know he liked to go AWOL but apart from a couple of tweets he was pretty quiet. (perhaps I shouldn’t of phrased that in the past tense)

Hydroxychloroquine (may or) may not turn out to save the human race, regardless of what the orange american thing may say

As said before, studies are tiny, few in number, flawed (the Marseille one has been criticised heavily on social media and in more formal print https://www.isac.world/news-and-publications/official-isac-statement ) and contradictory (one recently from Paris in more poorly patients showed “no benefit” – again small study though)

The possibility of combining hydroxychlorquine and azithromycin as some have proposed carries risks and there MAY have been at least one death attributable to the treatment already (isolated case report but the toxic effects are pretty predictable)

There are proper, big trials taking place that hopefully will answer some of this but a drug that hopes to prevent serious illness in a handful of mildly symptomatic patients is going to need a BIG trial because a lot of those folk will improve spontaneously anyway and we don’t know what predicts the course of disease in all cases.

Whether treatments work in pts who are already significantly more ill is probably going to look easier statistically but standardising or controlling for all other aspects of care is going to be tough

Sorry – have a good week, all. Here’s hoping to see some good, persistent evidence of tailing off in London’s death rates (admission rates supposedly calming down a bit).

Now that there are enough recovered patients to provide enough blood there’s a French study using injected blood plasma with Covid 19 antibodies. No results yet.

Some good info tonight guys, thanks, and look after yourselves and your loved ones. 💙

Now that there are enough recovered patients to provide enough blood there’s a French study using injected blood plasma with Covid 19 antibodies. No results yet.

I’m sure I’ve read that means nothing – that’s not a vaccine – a vaccine would still be >12 months away.

Anyone know if there has been any studies with coenzyme Q10 and CV19.. Its had beneficial findings in one or two small studies of pneumonia recovery and it’s benefits in old people..

Here’s the recent paper showing no benefit in a small sample BTW:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0399077X20300858

I’m sure I’ve read that means nothing

Well if the technique works as well as it does with several other viral illnesses it will save a lot of lives. The idea has been around since the 19C, the study is to find out if it works with Covid. I didn’t use the word “vaccine” for a good reason.

Without trying to sound melodramatic you don’t go to the hospital in the evening as a precaution. Hope he’s ok.

Can someone please explain to me why diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart desease increase the risk so much?

Is it because as your lungs fail your heart has to work faster and is more likely to give up if you have the aforementioned afflictions? Or is it somethings else?

Poor bastard. For all his flaws, remember that he almost certainly picked this up ‘in the line of duty’ as it were. I hope he gets better soon but make no mistake this is an ominous sign.

High blood sugar impairs your immune response, and even the very best diabetics will tend to run a little higher than a nondiabetic. Also there’s some crossover stuff with poor circulation.

For me, I’m youngish and healthyish and my control while not amazing is not awful, so it shouldn’t make a huge difference (though it will make some). But especially in older patients who lived a long time with more primitive insulins and control regimes where good control was so damn hard (or people in, say, the US, where cost can make good control hard), that’s more of an issue. And anyone who’s had imperfect diabetic control for a long time will tend to be generally less healthy.

Well if the technique works as well as it does with several other viral illnesses it will save a lot of lives. The idea has been around since the 19C, the study is to find out if it works with Covid. I didn’t use the word “vaccine” for a good reason.

They’re tried it in China. If treatment was as simple as that I can’t believe the world wouldn’t have worked it out by now.

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/coronavirus-covid-19-can-plasma-recovered-patients-treat-sick

Hope I’m wrong!

For all his flaws, remember that he almost certainly picked this up ‘in the line of duty’ as it were.

He was being reckless when we had enough knowledge from other countries to act. All that “I shock the hands of everybody” boasting etc. I really hope he comes through this, but his jokey lack of seriousness early on was a mistake for all us, not just a risk for himself and his loved ones.

What I have been told, it gets serious on the 8th day.

I’m conflicted, Boris being poorly is tickling my schadenfreude proclivities but Raab as a backup PM is scary. The man who didn’t realise that so much trade went thru Dover when he was Brexit secretary doesn’t inspire confidence

Boris is running a high temp for such a long time makes me think he’s got a secondary lung infection. Not good whichever way and whilst I absolutely not a fan I hope he gets better pretty soon.

Now that there are enough recovered patients to provide enough blood there’s a French study using injected blood plasma with Covid 19 antibodies. No results yet.

I’m sure I’ve read that means nothing – that’s not a vaccine – a vaccine would still be >12 months away

They’ve reported good outcomes from China (usual small studies etc etc) and it worked at least a bit even against Ebola, ’til they got some better tools for the job.
Not quite the same thing (pretty close, mind) but we still give (more) “purified” antibodies to some patients against other disease – varicella and rabies for 2 examples

God, I hope we’re looking at this in the UK

Poor bastard. For all his flaws, remember that he almost certainly picked this up ‘in the line of duty’ as it were. I hope he gets better soon but make no mistake this is an ominous sign.

I think theres some pretty serious questions to be asked about why Parliament didnt go ‘virtual’ the minute Nadine Dories was diagnosed, several times ministers & aides have been pictured in close contact

Did Matt Hancock just wipe his hand on his arse rather than use a tissue? pic.twitter.com/UGQeefmuxs

— Dawn Foster (@DawnHFoster) March 28, 2020

scottish CMO has just resigned for an arguably less serious infraction than that ^^

It also raises the issue of whether we should be ignoring the WHO advice about isolating for 14 days,
small study here showed people with severe lung problems shedding virus at 11 days after infection

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.05.20030502v1.full.pdf

I’m sure I’ve read that means nothing – that’s not a vaccine – a vaccine would still be >12 months away.

It is passive transfer of human-generated polyclonal (lots of types) antibodies against the virus. Antibodies hang around for a few months in your system – that’s why we are here, and babies are not wiped out at birth (they cross the placenta using a receptor known as the Brambell receptor, which keeps them in the body so long too. The FDA approved serum replacement as a named patient therapy a week ago.

Passive vaccination is the dosing of an antibody to protect. At the moment they have to come from past patients. One day they WILL come from a bioreactor.

Active vaccination is when you give someone the bit that sets off their immune system to make their own protection. One day we MAY have one of those vaccines too.

Hope Boris is OK. Remember, you won’t go “straight to ITU”. He might just need supplementary O2 to get his SATS up. And 8-days is seems thereabouts based on my week.

I think theres some pretty serious questions to be asked about why Parliament didnt go ‘virtual’ the minute Nadine Dories was diagnosed, several times ministers & aides have been pictured in close contact

Considering the Queen was having her weekly meetings with Boris until recently, we’re remarkably lucky to hear her soothing tones reassuring the nation in these challenging times!

whaaaaaaaaat ?

US churchgoer says she will continue to defy social distancing because she is 'covered in Jesus' blood' https://t.co/kMpPAXGgDn

— The Independent (@Independent) April 5, 2020