Why do we make the assumption that cases and deaths will be correlated as they were in March? France has had cases in the thousands for well over a month now, yet deaths are still barely triple figures. Other European countries are similar. Compare this to the Spring and there is a big difference.

Mask usage in France is also very high (you have to wear them in most workplaces, even) yet I don’t see much evidence of this having any impact on cases. Ditto Spain, etc. Anyone care to explain?

JP

Cases have been increasing since the 2nd week of July onwards. Therefore R has been greater than 1 for 2 months+. They should have been tweaking the restrictions months ago to get R<1 to get infection levels down before Schools/Unis went back.

Actually just to correct myself, the increase could be explained by the increase in testing, however hospital admissions have been increasing for at least 3 weeks which still implies R>1 for at least the last 4 weeks.

Anyone care to explain?

Social distancing is more effective than mask wearing.

Cases have been increasing since the 2nd week of July onwards. Therefore R has been greater than 1 for 2 months+.

SAGE has been saying R was less than one for almost all of this period, until the last few weeks.

SAGE are incompetent idiots of course, but they are supposed to be the experts, and the group was specifically set up to advise the govt about the science of the epidemic. The modelling is supposed to be “world beating” and I assume that is meant in the genuine, non-ironic sense.

Also, I’m not sure exactly where Harding got her target of 500,000 tests by END OCTOBER but I’m assuming the scientists played a part in that and she didn’t just pull a number and time scale out of her arse. Modelling study after modelling study predicted a 2nd wave over WINTER.

**** idiots the lot of them.

Why do we make the assumption that cases and deaths will be correlated as they were in March?

Because nothing has changed much except much more testing so the case numbers between now and then are not comparable. France has seen a big uptick in deaths but the doubling time has been slowed by social distancing measures

Anyone care to explain?

New cases were much higher just before confinement but unreacorded as Covid because there were no tests for the masses. A ball park figure of 100 000 a day in France. Mask use, home working, reduced public transport use… are all helping slow the post confinement rise but the rise is still there.

It’s still a highly contaigeous disease and there are still enough people taking almost no precautions to spread the virus, in France and pretty much everywhere else in the world.

Prior to lockdown, cases were unknown because of testing. Post lockdown, there are a lot more cases being detected, but total cases are still unknown. What we DO know is that hospital seeking behaviour and deaths are closely linked. That is what I have posted previously, along with some simple neat-term predictions. In March there was no Pillar 2 testing, so almost all cases were hospital cases.

Now onto R. I don’t believe it is knowable and changes in behaviours are so varied that precision is pointless. I do, however believe in doubling times, as I did last time around. The space of possible parameters that can describe the observed epidemic are so wide as to be effectively unhelpful.

So, we’re (still) in the dark.

So, we’re (still) in the dark.

Only if what you want to see is precision, wee can see enough to know what is happening.

And what is happening is, according to the BBC graph, hospital admissions have risen to 227 compared to an April peak of 3000. With doubling every 7-8 days, if we continue unchanged then in about a month we will have seen 4 doublings. 4*2*227= 3632. So we need to act now if we are to avoid that and hard lockdown again.

Btw, what’s been happening in the States and is there anything to learn? Didn’t they open up faster than us and sort of let things rip?

Oh, hello! pic.twitter.com/uut1mCksjF

— Roseanna Cunningham 🦣🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇪🇺🇺🇦🖖 (@strathearnrose) September 19, 2020

Genius. How to dampen down demand for the testing you have failed to deliver… new fines, up to £10,000 for risking spreading the virus to others, if you’ve taken a test. So… if you think you have it, and you consider yourself to be at low risk of being effected by it seriously yourself… don’t get a test, and don’t risk the large fines.

Yup, and you know that their obsession with behavioural nudging means that this is the calculated aim or at best, a perfectly acceptable outcome.

TiRed wrote this earlier:

Excess mortality of up to 30000 deaths (half the first wave) should be anticipated

And going back to the national archives for past years:

https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20160105170926/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/subnational-health2/excess-winter-mortality-in-england-and-wales/2014-15–provisional–and-2013-14–final-/stb-ewm.html

An estimated 43,900 excess winter deaths occurred in England and Wales in 2014/15; the highest number since 1999/00, with 27% more people dying in the winter months compared with the non-winter months.

i.e. this coming winter will be back to normal, and quite a lot better than 1999, when we did nothing at all.

URL not working for me, but it looks like you’re comparing the winter excess mortality* for a single year with an estimate for excess deaths** this winter above the average expected for the time of year. Apples and oranges.

Short version… no, TiRed is not estimating that this winter will be normal.

[ * compares summer and winter mortality rates ]

[ ** estimate of number of deaths this winter beyond what has would be expected when looking at past winters ]

Edit: you’ve added a graph… thanks… we don’t want another winter like 1999, looking at that… it didn’t look “normal”.

My estimate (It’s a guess really) is 30k deaths above a typical influenza year. I’ve also simulated projections for different relaxations of contacts. The conclusions are Covid deaths of up to 80k, with a typical value of about 40k. The 2014 epidemic is included in my (but not ONS) reference range for weekly deaths.

Now the bit The media ignore; uncertainty is so high that precision is impossible. Preparation is therefore vital for a reasonable worst case.

Compared to March, we have some flying instrumentation now, but prediction beyond six weeks is still largely a futile exercise.

i.e. this coming winter will be back to normal, and quite a lot better than 1999, when we did nothing at all.

Already said, but not what he’s said. And 1999/2000 was a really bad flu year, through Christmas and New Year especially.

What were the excess deaths for 1999/00 and 2014/15 ?

And what was the cause of the spike in 1999/00, and was it followed by a “second wave”, or just a return to the average?

From your graph… flu rates were high [ Influenza Like Illness incidence ] in 1999, so strongly assume that was the problem that winter… but 2014 looks like something else… remember why we have winter fuel payments?

thanks… we don’t want another winter like 1999,

First wave of the milenium bug

oldnpastit, don’t go down the route of assuming this virus is just like flu… most of the mistakes made early this year by people who should be far more knowledgable than you are or I were based on using that single wrong assumption when planning for what was coming our way.

So, we’re (still) in the dark.

I think you just have to read the signs. The “leaked” idea that the government were considering a national lockdown is really them ‘testing’ the idea with the public and press and warming the plebs up to the idea.

My guess is they’ll carry on with the mixed messaging, telling public sector workers they should be back in the office and prop up Costa, that pubs are safe spaces and you can get a test any time you need it, that increased infections are the fault of under 30s but don’t matter so long as they don’t hug their Nan.

They’ll hold off calling a lockdown until they believe we’re right on the cusp and then Boris will hit us with another ill timed, bumbling, Friday evening announcement I reckon, they might try to leave it as late as 02/10/20.

They’d probably prefer to go longer to try and get it to coincidence with already booked half-term leave…

Now sit back and watch all my predictions miss spectacularly…

Now sit back and watch all my predictions miss spectacularly…

Those are the rules of the game I’m afraid. At every point I always ask “how wrong could I be?”. My above predictions are what I consider reasonable. The worst case scenario is probably twice as bad. It’s very easy to take an exponentially bad prediction and let the media run with it. There is a reason I don’t do that side of communication.

Whats thought to be the current death rate? Reason I ask is I just looked up West Berkshire cases, 558 diagnosed so far and 133 deaths, I’m guessing “a few” undiagnosed cases are about, obviously I’d like to know the number of cases since mass testing started, but you know numbers and journalists!!

Remember, it’s important that “the public” stay put if they suspect they have the virus… “the public”…

Update pic.twitter.com/C0O2l8FwV1

— James Felton (@JimMFelton) September 19, 2020

Never forget…

‘He made those who struggled to keep to the rules feel like fools and has allowed many more to assume they can now flout them. The prime minister knows all this and has chosen to ignore it.’

Savage brilliance from @maitlis #newsnight pic.twitter.com/1tX879ICqZ

— Jonathan Lis (@jonlis1) May 26, 2020

Luckily the grown-ups are here to take over the Corona/Brexit crises.

Death rate remains unknown. But the ratio of admission rate to death rate is about 10%. It was higher (worse). Ratio of cases to admissions is the problem!

There is a very large age dependence to mortality. Less than 45 and the rate is roughly nil. Above 85 and it’s 25%. Mortality doubles every 10 years from age 45.

At the epidemic peak, all-cause mortality was double normal background rate for every age group above 45. The absolute rate is still pretty low for male, slightly overweight, middle age cyclists – about 20 per 100k/week against a normal background of 10 per 100k/week.

You are unlikely to die of covid, but likely to hear of someone who has from an acquaintance.

Fair enough if we have to have another lockdown, I’m fine with that (maybe shouldn’t have needed to come to that, but TiRed and others have suggested all along it was likely).

How will it be enforced more effectively this time? Proper hard and fast rules on exercise duration and distance? Adequate resourcing to police it? Personally, I have no problem with teaming up a copper with members of the armed forces and give them the power to arrest and hold someone while the copper does his job, I know others will start worrying about martial law and military rule, that’s fine to have a different opinion to mine.

The media not continually showing footage of vox pops interviews with people clearly not social distancing as though it’s acceptable. Online forums not full of people looking for some wriggle room, or concentrating on making a political point about the flaws in the rules as though every other piece of legislation by every other government has been perfect?

Think we need new 4 word slogans to make the message clearer – Don’t Be A Dick, and Don’t Take The Piss.

Well, my lass has woken up with a temperature and cold symptoms, and while it’s unlikely to be Covid (snotty), into self-isolation we all go. Shame – nice weather outside for riding.

After berating the lack of testing locally, got one booked in the next town this afternoon!

The absolute rate is still pretty low for male, slightly overweight, middle age cyclists – about 20 per 100k/week against a normal background of 10 per 100k/week.

You are unlikely to die of covid

You sayin I’m fat!!!!

The Good Law project have now initiated action for the gov to disclose details of proposed Operation Moonshot.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/sep/18/government-faces-legal-action-over-moonshot-covid-testing-project

Here’s their Letter before Action which requests a response by 4pm on Tuesday 22nd September.
https://goodlawproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/2020.09.17-Pre-action-Letter-to-GLD-Re-Project-Moonshot-redacted-_Redacted.pdf

How about an update from Open Democracy; some of the content was already known but there is now information about a previously unknown CV19 contract for Serco.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/serco-lands-another-45m-for-failing-covid-test-and-trace-scheme/?utm_source=rss&utm_campaign=edpicks&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=Editorpicksrss&utm_campaign=RSS

Finally, has anyone else seen this?

@Privatecarfree
You might like this…
Our PM's half-brother, Max, is on the board of the company providing the £100 billion "moonshot" tests… pic.twitter.com/LueybpNESl

— WE NEED TO BAN RUBBER CRUMB NOW (@Against_3G) September 18, 2020

Personally, I have no problem with teaming up a copper with members of the armed forces and give them the power to arrest and hold someone while the copper does his job, I know others will start worrying about martial law and military rule, that’s fine to have a different opinion to mine.

wow, a bit of an over reaction to a few people sitting in a park in a group bigger than 6. A few people may start worrying about martial law because that easy what it sounds like. Just for a second imagine how that would go down. You already have groups of the public who are disproportionately targeted by the police (and fined during covid) so what you are suggested is we let the army follow them around too…. because thats gonna end well.

@joepud – I was talking about enforcing another proper lockdown.

I’m open to your alternative suggestions as to how the resources can be found to make a better job of it next time. Covid Marshall’s maybe?

Covid Marshalls? What a good idea…

My current contract is up soon. Maybe I’ll be Covid Marshall next – will there be a uniform?

Don’t Be A Dick, Don’t Be A Dom, and Don’t Take The Piss.

Don’t Be A Dick, Don’t Be A Dom, and Don’t Take The Piss.

I like it!

@joepud – I was talking about enforcing another proper lockdown.

I’m open to your alternative suggestions as to how the resources can be found to make a better job of it next time. Covid Marshall’s maybe?

I don’t have an alternative but I don’t need one to know putting the army on the streets to “hold someone while the copper does his job” is a bad idea. Just what job are the police doing taking people home, arresting them… giving then a kicking. I mean lets just give the police guns after all we need to enforce a “proper lockdown.” A nation wide lockdown is so bad for peoples mental health lets just think about that for a minute.

We have policing by consent in the UK. Generally people buy into the authority of the law and follow it. It’s something the over privileged idiots we have in charge do buy into and so don’t get at all.

To get people to comply requires leadership – explain why it’s needed, provided the tools through test and track, payments for those that need to self isolate and a clear strategy – that’s what most of us want and will willingly comply with.

How will it be enforced more effectively this time? Proper hard and fast rules on exercise duration and distance? Adequate resourcing to police it? Personally, I have no problem with teaming up a copper with members of the armed forces and give them the power to arrest and hold someone while the copper does his job, I know others will start worrying about martial law and military rule, that’s fine to have a different opinion to mine.

I get the frustration with some of the poor compliance with lockdown / social distancing rules but jeez that all sounds a bit mad. Getting compliance with any law requires it to have a high degree of general support (this would have **** all general support). If you try to enforce something that doesn’t have general support and is inherently difficult to police it’ll all go to ruin. You’d also run the risk of reducing compliance as the more outlawed you made stuff the cooler it’d be to try an get the round the rules.

I think during the first lockdown the degree of compliance and behaviour change was frankly amazing. It’s the middle period where it’s dragged on and things have slipped for a lot of people. With a bit of effort and nudging in the right direction I’m sure we could do a lot to get it under control without wrecking the country and unleashing the Stasi to crush folk straying too far on a bike ride.

Tomd… I agree. I also think that sections of the media are prodding people’s fears with exaggerated covidiot stories. Actually playing both sides and simultaneously pandering to the conspiracy theorists.

But my experience is still one of high compliance with the (increasingly confused) rules and general good will.

Maybe I have too much of a positive view of humanity generally…