Coronavirus

[Donnywolf]

It's just as well the weather is poor, if it was hot and  sunny I think there would have been real problems at the pubs.

As it is Saturday night might be dodgy. Young people are obviously sick of lockdown, that's why there are all these illegal raves and block parties popping up.

.... and they know statistically they are in one of the lowest categories for catching it - and even if they do 99.9 % of them will "just get over it"

To them (I am guessing) it is the same risk assessment they make if they take drugs - some will die or be severely ill but it probably wont be them

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

We had to get the little one tested yesterday, as he's I'll. Quite amazing how efficient the process is.  Test slot within an hour and results came in overnight, super impressive.

[wilts rover]

Why was a 'Lifestyle' company with no trading history, assets or employees awarded £25 million of taxpayers money to provide PPE?

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/07/02/lifestyle-company-with-no-employees-or-trading-history-handed-25-million-ppe-contract/

[ravenrover]

We had to get the little one tested yesterday, as he's I'll. Quite amazing how efficient the process is.  Test slot within an hour and results came in overnight, super impressive.

Come on don't leave us on suspense ...... is he OK?

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

We had to get the little one tested yesterday, as he's I'll. Quite amazing how efficient the process is.  Test slot within an hour and results came in overnight, super impressive.

Come on don't leave us on suspense ...... is he OK?

Thanks for asking, he is miserable. His test was negative though he seemingly has something else, we've all been a bit off it for a day or so, he's got the brunt but at least we can leave the house. 

Test within an hour then 13 hours from test to result, can't grumble at that.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Another one to whom the rules don't seem to apply.

https://mobile.twitter.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1279375311499558914

He's just got back from the USA and should be self-isolating for 14 days.

[drfchound]

We had to get the little one tested yesterday, as he's I'll. Quite amazing how efficient the process is.  Test slot within an hour and results came in overnight, super impressive.

Come on don't leave us on suspense ...... is he OK?

Thanks for asking, he is miserable. His test was negative though he seemingly has something else, we've all been a bit off it for a day or so, he's got the brunt but at least we can leave the house. 

Test within an hour then 13 hours from test to result, can't grumble at that.

A good quick response bfyp.
Glad to know your youngster is ok.
I wonder why no one has agreed with you that the test result coming through so quickly is a good thing.

[BillyStubbsTears]

We had to get the little one tested yesterday, as he's I'll. Quite amazing how efficient the process is.  Test slot within an hour and results came in overnight, super impressive.

Come on don't leave us on suspense ...... is he OK?

Thanks for asking, he is miserable. His test was negative though he seemingly has something else, we've all been a bit off it for a day or so, he's got the brunt but at least we can leave the house. 

Test within an hour then 13 hours from test to result, can't grumble at that.

A good quick response bfyp.
Glad to know your youngster is ok.
I wonder why no one has agreed with you that the test result coming through so quickly is a good thing.

Agreed on all points.

[Filo]

Department of Health are not going to tweet daily figures anymore after today, is this an attempt to give an impression the virus has gone away?

[wilts rover]

I have said it before but I think it is always worth repeating:

Mushrooms - kept in the dark and fed on s***

[BillyStubbsTears]

In fairness, they are now publishing far more detailed daily data.

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-information-for-the-public

Two things jump out though from that data.

1) Getting on for 1/4 of the "tests carried out " are not actually carried out.

2) Still, for nearly 5 weeks, they have not announced how many INDIVIDUALS have been tested. Which is the No1 important info. Hard to believe that they have no way of establishing this, nearly 5 months into the outbreak.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

I guess there are multiple reasons. People request a test but don't use it? Batches sent to places but not in the right volume? Tests done incorrectly - given you have to do it yourself or for a Child which is not easy.  Or blatantly how they statistically log it?

Clearly many individuals will have more than one test.  What surprised me was how easy it was to even get a slot, suggesting the demand isn't that large, which deserves credit. The important thing now is anyone can get a test, suggesting to me testing isn't really an issue right now which is a great step forward.

Based on my own experience it was all far easier and effective than anyone in the media etc appears to make out, I can't see how that can be criticised.

More concerning is the inability of the general population to follow the guidelines on distancing, which does not bode well.

[Donnywolf]

Is there any point in Marr interviewing Han-cog

Dozens of questions - statement of facts (using Govts own figures) - views of eminent scientists all put to Han-cog and all refuted as being wrong / misinterpretted etc etc

Releasing people from Hospital into Care Homes has now been been nuanced as "we didnt know about the infections possibly being spread by asymptomatic patients"  rather than the Govt let thousands of people be discharged into Care Homes without testing to see whether they had the Virus

The way stuff is being "spun" here they will give themselves a huge pay rise due to competence shown in face of such "terrible" adversity

[BillyStubbsTears]

Fascinating insight into what Govt policy was on CV-19 back in March.

The head of the NHS has said this morning that they were braced for 2 million patients and 660,000 needed ICU treatment.

It's not


It's not rocket science to back calculate that you'd only get these numbers in the absence of a lockdown. So it appears that the NHS was planning for a situation in which the Govt decided not to lockdown.

[River Don]

One point Whitty and Valance kept making was that they didn't want to lock down too soon because they feared people would become fatigued and begin to break the rules too soon.

For the last few weeks, I think we have been seeing that fatigue. Whether or not it's a good idea to loosen up so much when many are desperate to go out and socialise I don't know...

But perhaps there is a chance their strategy might have been right.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RD.

I made that mistake back in March.

The mistake in understanding I made was thinking that it wasn't possible to have a hard lockdown to suppress the virus. I thought the only possibility was a soft lockdown over a very long period, to keep the peak levels down. And that is why, in early March, I supported the idea of delaying lockdown until it was absolutely necessary.

I didn't understand the possibility of radical economics, underpinning the economy and allowing us to have a hard lockdown and more rapidly grind down the virus, without destroying 10 million jobs.

That was a mistake by me because I didn't know what the range of possibilities were.

That is not an acceptable excuse for Govt and its advisers.

They CHOSE not to consider an earlier hard lockdown. And that was a collosal mistake. It wasn't a balance. It was a mistake, pure and simple.

The mistake was that delaying lockdown let the virus become more widespread and therefore the lockdown had to be kept on hard for LONGER.

Germany, Denmark, Austria and others locked down 2-4 weeks earlier than us in their timetable, and emerged from hard lockdown after a shorter time in lockdown.

Our delay was without question a major strategic mistake.

It made sense only if you were looking at a 12 month or so lockdown-lite to lower the peak, not a 2-3 month lockdown-hard to suppress the virus.

Whitty and Valance saying that back in March is more evidence that the policy then was HI, with long-term lockdown-lite to reduce the peak.

In the bigger picture, there is no way that we can come out if this with the worst death rate, longest lockdown and biggest economic hit in Europe, and conclude that our strategy was right.

[wilts rover]

One point Whitty and Valance kept making was that they didn't want to lock down too soon because they feared people would become fatigued and begin to break the rules too soon.

For the last few weeks, I think we have been seeing that fatigue. Whether or not it's a good idea to loosen up so much when many are desperate to go out and socialise I don't know...

But perhaps there is a chance their strategy might have been right.

A touch of historical revision going on there. Never mind too soon, they weren't going to lockdown at all.

Which is the the 'strategy', Sweden, Brazil & parts of the US have followed with predictable results. It was the path we followed until 12 March when it was reinforced to Johnson that this could lead to 500000 deaths.

Johnson had said on 3rd February other countries imposing a coronavirus lockdown was a an opportunity for the UK and up until 12th March 'no one thought it would be acceptable politically to shut the country down'.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-britain-path-speci/special-report-johnson-listened-to-his-scientists-about-coronavirus-but-they-were-slow-to-sound-the-alarm-idUSKBN21P1VF

[River Don]

One point Whitty and Valance kept making was that they didn't want to lock down too soon because they feared people would become fatigued and begin to break the rules too soon.

For the last few weeks, I think we have been seeing that fatigue. Whether or not it's a good idea to loosen up so much when many are desperate to go out and socialise I don't know...

But perhaps there is a chance their strategy might have been right.

A touch of historical revision going on there. Never mind too soon, they weren't going to lockdown at all.

Which is the the 'strategy', Sweden, Brazil & parts of the US have followed with predictable results. It was the path we followed until 12 March when it was reinforced to Johnson that this could lead to 500000 deaths.

Johnson had said on 3rd February other countries imposing a coronavirus lockdown was a an opportunity for the UK and up until 12th March 'no one thought it would be acceptable politically to shut the country down'.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-britain-path-speci/special-report-johnson-listened-to-his-scientists-about-coronavirus-but-they-were-slow-to-sound-the-alarm-idUSKBN21P1VF

I don't think I'm revising anything but I am going from memory.

In the run up to the lockdown, maybe the 10 days before it happened Whittey and Vallance were talking about how it was essential to get the timing right and they phased in the restrictions. In the event it happened quickly, maybe over a 3 day period. At least that's how I remember seeing it on TV.

Prior to that it may well be that they didn't intend any kind of a lockdown but I don't remember that being discussed in the TV conferences.

[River Don]

BST

Looking back I think I had a similar view to you. What threw me was, I trusted the scientists the government was putting in front of the cameras. I knew the virus was very virulent, I thought things out to be locking down straight away and that flights from China and SE Asia ought to be halted.

Then Whitty and Valance came on TV suggesting an early lockdown would not make much difference. Then they explained their approach of flattening the peak and extending the period the virus would be active to allow hospitals to cope.

It seemed reasonable and I bought into at that time because it seemed the scientists had it modelled and were giving it their best shot with the backing of the government.

It was only later that doubts emerged in the public sphere about how these decisions were made and who was influencing scientific advice and the words 'herd immunity' came up.

[drfchound]

RD, it is so much easier to know what should have happened when looking back, with the benefit of hindsight of course.

[wilts rover]

That's correct hound.

Maybe if we had been able to see what other countries who experienced the outbreak before us were doing and learnt from them?

If only the government had had the foresight to carry out an exercise to see what would happen and how well prepared the country would be if a pandemic broke out?

What hindsight did South Korea, New Zealand, Vietnam or Germany have that we didn't?

It wasn't hindsight that led our response - it was Dominic Cummings and herd immunity.

[River Don]

RD, it is so much easier to know what should have happened when looking back, with the benefit of hindsight of course.

On this thread I was posting more should be done to contain the spread by Feb 26. I'm sure I'd been saying it for longer than that, there are earlier posts in this thread where I was highlighting how alarmingly virulent and dangerous the virus was, whilst it was still only a Chinese problem.

[BillyStubbsTears]

RD, it is so much easier to know what should have happened when looking back, with the benefit of hindsight of course.

I'm not sure what you mean by that Hound, but I'm sure you have thought it through, rather than just chucking it in as another passive/aggressive insult.

By 15-16 March, we knew that pretty much every country in Europe was choosing to go into a hard lockdown. We had in-laws in Italy all but crying in video calls with us saying that we must be mad not to learn the lessons from them and lock down ASAP. We as a country chose not to do that. We chose to lockdown later in the timescale of our epidemic than any other European country.

We were discussing this at the time in this very thread. So, frankly, I haven't a clue what your "hindsight" comment means. Perhaps you could explain?

[BillyStubbsTears]

BST

Looking back I think I had a similar view to you. What threw me was, I trusted the scientists the government was putting in front of the cameras. I knew the virus was very virulent, I thought things out to be locking down straight away and that flights from China and SE Asia ought to be halted.

Then Whitty and Valance came on TV suggesting an early lockdown would not make much difference. Then they explained their approach of flattening the peak and extending the period the virus would be active to allow hospitals to cope.

It seemed reasonable and I bought into at that time because it seemed the scientists had it modelled and were giving it their best shot with the backing of the government.

It was only later that doubts emerged in the public sphere about how these decisions were made and who was influencing scientific advice and the words 'herd immunity' came up.

RD

I agree that Whitty and Valance did argue that too early a lockdown would be counterproductive. I remember hearing that and being in agreement at the time.

The problem was that argument ONLY works if your policy is not to suppress the virus (as we eventually chose to do) but to accept that everyone is going to get it, and attempt to flatten the peak.

If you are going to try to suppress the virus, delaying is insane. Because every 3-4 days you delay, the number of infections double.

So, the fact that Whitty and Valance were talking about delaying mitigation measures as late as 16-17 March definitively demonstrates that the policy was not to attempt to suppress the virus with a hard lockdown.

And THAT is the historic error that has given us by far the worst deaths and economic outcome in Europe. The questions for the inevitable inquiry are "who decided this policy and did nobody in early March out forward the suppression argument?"

You are wrong about HI only coming up later, by the way. Balance was on Radio 4's Today programme on 13 March talking about it. I remember being shocked when I heard it at the time because this was a Govt adviser implicitly accepting that more Britons were going to die in 2020 from this virus than were killed in WWII.

https://mobile.twitter.com/bbcr4today/status/1238390547783528448?lang=en

[drfchound]

RD, it is so much easier to know what should have happened when looking back, with the benefit of hindsight of course.

I'm not sure what you mean by that Hound, but I'm sure you have thought it through, rather than just chucking it in as another passive/aggressive insult.

By 15-16 March, we knew that pretty much every country in Europe was choosing to go into a hard lockdown. We had in-laws in Italy all but crying in video calls with us saying that we must be mad not to learn the lessons from them and lock down ASAP. We as a country chose not to do that. We chose to lockdown later in the timescale of our epidemic than any other European country.

We were discussing this at the time in this very thread. So, frankly, I haven't a clue what your "hindsight" comment means. Perhaps you could explain?

BST, I am trying to understand how you could construe my “hindsight” comment to be an insult, passive or otherwise?

[BillyStubbsTears]

Because time and time again, people on here have pointed out what we knew at the time and what we discussed at the time.

You consistently decline to engage in that discussion.

I interpreted your "hindsight" comment as one that was aimed at dismissing these arguments, without actually engaging with them.

If I misinterpreted it, I wholeheartedly apologise.

[wilts rover]

It's worthwhile people reading these reports by Byline Times who have been studying the currently available SAGE minutes. They give more detail on who knew what when and what the government's intended strategy was. They show:

an ideological obsession with protecting the economy at the cost of lives – wealth before health

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/07/03/sagegate-part-one-treasury-and-downing-street-advisors-delayed-covid-19-lockdown/

a refusal to ever seriously consider trying to suppress the virus but instead only aim for ‘herd immunity’ – despite knowing it was likely to lead to at least 500,000 casualties

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/07/03/sagegate-part-two-how-herd-immunity-was-imposed-on-governments-science-advisory-group-on-dominic-cummings-watch/

compounded by where we are now - an insistence on rushing to lift lockdown restrictions prematurely and haphazardly, against consistent scientific advice

https://bylinetimes.com/2020/07/03/sagegate-part-three-cummings-and-johnson-defied-scientific-advisors-by-lifting-restrictions-without-robust-track-and-trace/

[drfchound]

Because time and time again, people on here have pointed out what we knew at the time and what we discussed at the time.

You consistently decline to engage in that discussion.

I interpreted your "hindsight" comment as one that was aimed at dismissing these arguments, without actually engaging with them.

If I misinterpreted it, I wholeheartedly apologise.

I should say that you have totally misunderstood what I was referring to.
My post to RD was a generalisation, he had been talking about Whitty and Valance suggesting that too soon a lockdown might not be a good idea.
My hindsight comment was with reference to that.
You have jumped to a conclusion in thinking otherwise.

As for engaging in discussions with you and some others, I gave up on that a while ago unless it is on one of the football related threads.

I respect the thoughts of some posters on here irrespective of their politics but all too often there is a persistent barrage from posters who have searched the internet for anything they can find to bash the government about.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

What we should remember is this is a long term thing.  So far the strategy health wise to lock down would be correct. What the correct outcome health and economy wise will be in the long term won't be known for years.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Hound

Then, as I say, I apologise.

The problem with you opting out of debate with people who you accuse of searching for stuff to bash the Govt with is that, implicitly, you also opt out of any discussions on criticism of the Govt that is well founded and clearly based on evidence.

You do, however, rush in to do a "yah-boo" thing when you think people have got evidence wrong. And when it turns out that you were wrong, you don't apologise. That's a frustrating approach to deal with, to say the least.