Corona Virus main thread

[Aggy 755]

24 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Agreed, it was never intended to let the disease run its course without delay but Johnson quite explicitly explained that his strategy was to build herd immunity by allowing the virus to spread though the population until herd immunity had been achieved - even though no one knew (and still don't as far as I'm aware) what percentage is required for that, estimates seem be anything from 60% (widely believed to be too low) to 95% (some believe less would be sufficient).

The delay element was purely to slow the natural spread of the virus to a point at at which they believed the NHS would be able to cope - arguably they got this wrong as well, not just because they left it too late but because it seems to be emerging that the very seriously ill patients, even if they survive, are requiring much longer treatment in ICU than was expected, so our capacity is still woefully over-stretched.

But all of this is bye the bye really, the basic strategy of building herd immunity by allowing the virus to spread through the population rather than by vacination, is crazy bordering on criminal. Of course we don't have the vaccine yet so until that is available the only viable strategy is containment as practiced successfully in China, Taiwan, Singapore, Souht Korea etc and to a greater or lesser extent in Europe - I read the other day that the Faroe Islands have tested 10% - 10% of their entire population, 184 cases found, 131 fully recovered, only 1 person in hospital and no deaths. All triggered by a vet, for crying out loud, who said it was the simplest thing in the world to switch his lab which primarily tested for virus in salmon to providing Covid tests on humans, and a political leaders who listened to him.  If a vet in the Faroe Islands can crank out a 1,000 a day (and has been for weeks - their restrictions are starting to be lifted from 20th April) you have to wonder why it has taken the combined resources of the UK government and the NHS weeks and weeks to ramp up (just) to five figures but here's a clue - they started in January when the only thing on Johnson's agenda was to bong or not to bong Big Ben.

Am I missing something here? It’s “crazy bordering on criminal” to allow the virus to spread through the population naturally rather than by vaccine and the only viable strategy is containment.
 

But then you speak highly of the Faroe Islands. You say the Faroe Islands have tested ten percent of their population (so around 5,000 people) and found 184 positive cases. So 184 positive cases identified out of a population of nearly 50,000. That means they can only be sure that 0.36 per cent of the population have had it. And they’re lifting their restrictions in two weeks. So what’s their plan then? To vaccinate the remaining 99.64 per cent of the population in the next fortnight, or to allow the virus to spread through natural means, foregoing containment?

[Essjayess 307]

8 hours ago, Mark .Y. said:

So, for all the looking at the numbers that we do, would it be fair to say that the most reliable indication of where we are in the cycle of the virus is the number of hospital admissions per day ? Perhaps a 3 day rolling average would smooth the numbers a little ? 

Seems to me that there are so many variables for everything else that this number falling would give us the first indication that we are getting the spread of the virus under control.

Does that sound reasonable to people or have I missed something that might adversely effect that number ?

Each bar that Worldometer add  for graphs such as daily deaths are done in 2 day increments...i think soon, to save graph space, they will adjust those to a 3 day bar. To get any near as  one can reliability on any chart or graph, you really need to look at weeks rather than days. Personally, if i look at the Italy graphs for daily deaths and daily confirmed cases, i check back to March 21st..i would agree by looking that far back that those two stats have stabilised...others could look at the last few days...see a slight downward  dip...and conclude that Italys deaths and confirmed cases are on a downward  slope..but personally i would prefer to see that for a few weeks not days to say yes its for sure  on a downward trajectory.

[ricardo 7,395]

11 minutes ago, Peanuts said:

 

If you look at the various stages of social distancing measures taken across Europe we were behind almost every other country. Again it wasn't that our scientists had some special knowledge, instead it was a political decision to delay.

We locked down on the same day as Germany and Holland and on medical advice so hardly a political decision. I know some are desperate to find a scapegoat but following the advice of the CMO isn't one of them.

I would like to have seen action taken earlier, especially with flights coming in from Italy and China but I'm not the CMO and I don't have to be responsible for the result. In hindsight we can argue with the timing but not with the powers that be being guided by the experts that were in place.

[ricardo 7,395]

13 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

No they haven't, that is precisely the point - they've been led by amateurs like Cummings and modelling 'experts' rather than medical experts.

That doesn't come from me - that came from the select commitee which has a majority of Tory MPs and is chaired by Jeremy Hunt, so I think we can exclude them from any so called anti-government bias.

Well if you can find evidence that the CMO was over ruled you are welcome to put it forward.

 

[ron obvious 1,502]

14 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

No they haven't, that is precisely the point - they've been led by amateurs like Cummings and modelling 'experts' rather than medical experts.

That doesn't come from me - that came from the select commitee which has a majority of Tory MPs and is chaired by Jeremy Hunt, so I think we can exclude them from any so called anti-government bias.

Could you provide a link please? I can't find anything

[Barbe bleu 826]

18 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Agreed, it was never intended to let the disease run its course without delay but Johnson quite explicitly explained that his strategy was to build herd immunity by allowing the virus to spread though the population until herd immunity had been achieved - even though no one knew (and still don't as far as I'm aware) what percentage is required for that, estimates seem be anything from 60% (widely believed to be too low) to 95% (some believe less would be sufficient).

The delay element was purely to slow the natural spread of the virus to a point at at which they believed the NHS would be able to cope - arguably they got this wrong as well, not just because they left it too late but because it seems to be emerging that the very seriously ill patients, even if they survive, are requiring much longer treatment in ICU than was expected, so our capacity is still woefully over-stretched.

But all of this is bye the bye really, the basic strategy of building herd immunity by allowing the virus to spread through the population rather than by vacination, is crazy bordering on criminal. Of course we don't have the vaccine yet so until that is available the only viable strategy is containment as practiced successfully in China, Taiwan, Singapore, Souht Korea etc and to a greater or lesser extent in Europe - I read the other day that the Faroe Islands have tested 10% - 10% of their entire population, 184 cases found, 131 fully recovered, only 1 person in hospital and no deaths. All triggered by a vet, for crying out loud, who said it was the simplest thing in the world to switch his lab which primarily tested for virus in salmon to providing Covid tests on humans, and a political leaders who listened to him.  If a vet in the Faroe Islands can crank out a 1,000 a day (and has been for weeks - their restrictions are starting to be lifted from 20th April) you have to wonder why it has taken the combined resources of the UK government and the NHS weeks and weeks to ramp up (just) to five figures but here's a clue - they started in January when the only thing on Johnson's agenda was to bong or not to bong Big Ben.

If you are right that the plan was always to allow a delayed forward through the population why does the plan explicitly say that phase one was "contain"? Why did we bother with the quarantine on the wirral or trying to work out where the guy that went to Singapore went after his ski trip?

 

Perhaps the plan will be to reduce it so much that we can recommence phase 1 but this is only speculation.

 

To answer the point about levels at which herd immunity will be achieved  60- 66% is the general consensus although we discussed one study that would suggest 83%.  David Icke and lord lucan might have suggested 95%

In January the WHO was suggesting herd immunity would be achieved at 28-60% https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/23-01-2020-statement-on-the-meeting-of-the-international-health-regulations-(2005)-emergency-committee-regarding-the-outbreak-of-novel-coronavirus-(2019-ncov)

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

47 minutes ago, Van wink said:

How long do you think it will take to achieve herd immunity by vaccine?

I've no idea, most of the researchers that I've heard interviewed have expressed a hope that we'll have one next year without necessarily expressing a great deal of confidence that it will actually be achieved - which is why Johnson's strategy of letting the virus spread throughout the population was crazily irresponsible for everyone but especially for the most vulnerable for whom there is absolutely no protection available now or even the near future.

Johnson has got it all the way along, didn't do anything at all for far too long and then ignored what the WHO were saying and other governments were doing - he took a gamble which has disastrously backfired. Some apologists may still be clinging to the 'it was all on the best scientific advice' story but that story is already falling apart and when the real post mortem on the crisis starts it will be shown to be another myth.

Let's face it, even the Premier League was more clued up than Johnson - I think that is about as daming as it gets.

[Peanuts 150]

1 minute ago, ricardo said:

We locked down on the same day as Germany and Holland and on medical advice so hardly a political decision. I know some are desperate to find a scapegoat but following the advice of the CMO isn't one of them.

I would like to have seen action taken earlier, especially with flights coming in from Italy and China but I'm not the CMO and I don't have to be responsible for the result. In hindsight we can argue with the timing but not with the powers that be being guided by the experts that were in place.

Scientists provide data, analysis and advice but what the government decides to do is always a political decision. Note I'm not using the phrase 'political decision' as a pejorative, it is right in a democracy that decisions are taken by politicians and not scientists.

My concern is that we keep hearing from the government how they are 'following the scientific advice' as if to abdicate themselves of responsibility for the political decisions they are taking.

[Mello Yello 2,293]

I personally think that small clusters of this awful Virus were established within many areas of the UK (predominately in the Capitals and larger cities) well before Christmas 2019......Then later it took a more expansive foothold......But, it's only my personal thought....

[Mello Yello 2,293]

7 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

I've no idea, most of the researchers that I've heard interviewed have expressed a hope that we'll have one next year without necessarily expressing a great deal of confidence that it will actually be achieved - which is why Johnson's strategy of letting the virus spread throughout the population was crazily irresponsible for everyone but especially for the most vulnerable for whom there is absolutely no protection available now or even the near future.

Johnson has got it all the way along, didn't do anything at all for far too long and then ignored what the WHO were saying and other governments were doing - he took a gamble which has disastrously backfired. Some apologists may still be clinging to the 'it was all on the best scientific advice' story but that story is already falling apart and when the real post mortem on the crisis starts it will be shown to be another myth.

Let's face it, even the Premier League was more clued up than Johnson - I think that is about as daming as it gets.

Don't you like the PM then?.....

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

15 minutes ago, Aggy said:

Am I missing something here? It’s “crazy bordering on criminal” to allow the virus to spread through the population naturally rather than by vaccine and the only viable strategy is containment.
 

But then you speak highly of the Faroe Islands. You say the Faroe Islands have tested ten percent of their population (so around 5,000 people) and found 184 positive cases. So 184 positive cases identified out of a population of nearly 50,000. That means they can only be sure that 0.36 per cent of the population have had it. And they’re lifting their restrictions in two weeks. So what’s their plan then? To vaccinate the remaining 99.64 per cent of the population in the next fortnight, or to allow the virus to spread through natural means, foregoing containment?

I'm not sure if you are being deliberately obtuse or just plain stupid.

Their plan, I assume, is to continue to do what the other successful countries have done, what the WHO has repeatedly advised and what they are already doing - test, test, test and if they find a case treat and trace .

Given the level of testing they've done and the controls they've applied to people entering the country then I imagine they have a pretty good handle on how many new cases are likely to emerge and that number is probably very small indeed.

[ricardo 7,395]

5 minutes ago, Peanuts said:

Scientists provide data, analysis and advice but what the government decides to do is always a political decision. Note I'm not using the phrase 'political decision' as a pejorative, it is right in a democracy that decisions are taken by politicians and not scientists.

My concern is that we keep hearing from the government how they are 'following the scientific advice' as if to abdicate themselves of responsibility for the political decisions they are taking.

In that case it would make no difference if they took the advice or not because they would always be wrong.

[ron obvious 1,502]

14 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

No they haven't, that is precisely the point - they've been led by amateurs like Cummings and modelling 'experts' rather than medical experts.

That doesn't come from me - that came from the select commitee which has a majority of Tory MPs and is chaired by Jeremy Hunt, so I think we can exclude them from any so called anti-government bias.

 

14 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

Could you provide a link please? I can't find anything

Bump

[Aggy 755]

1 minute ago, Creative Midfielder said:

I'm not sure if you are being deliberately obtuse or just plain stupid.

Their plan, I assume, is to continue to do what the other successful countries have done, what the WHO has repeatedly advised and what they are already doing - test, test, test and if they find a case treat and trace .

Given the level of testing they've done and the controls they've applied to people entering the country then I imagine they have a pretty good handle on how many new cases are likely to emerge and that number is probably very small indeed.

Try again. You said the only way to deal with the virus was by containment. But then you said they’re lifting their lockdown. Just because they are “testing testing testing” doesn’t mean the virus will stop spreading in the meantime does it.

So while the entire population is walking around freely, not in lockdown, and they can only be sure that 0.36 per cent of the population has caught the disease, and while there is no vaccine, what is happening?  Answer - the virus is spreading  naturally. Which you said was “crazy, bordering criminal”.

So are the Faroe Islands government crazy bordering criminal?

[Van wink 2,994]

8 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

I'm not sure if you are being deliberately obtuse or just plain stupid.

Their plan, I assume, is to continue to do what the other successful countries have done, what the WHO has repeatedly advised and what they are already doing - test, test, test and if they find a case treat and trace .

Given the level of testing they've done and the controls they've applied to people entering the country then I imagine they have a pretty good handle on how many new cases are likely to emerge and that number is probably very small indeed.

So are you proposing lifting restrictions?

[Barbe bleu 826]

17 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

I've no idea, most of the researchers that I've heard interviewed have expressed a hope that we'll have one next year without necessarily expressing a great deal of confidence that it will actually be achieved - which is why Johnson's strategy of letting the virus spread throughout the population was crazily irresponsible for everyone 

So I guess that your preferred strategy is lockdown until we achieve local extinction or near extinction and then have incredibly rigorous border and social controls until such a time as this is extinct throughout the world?

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

13 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Well if you can find evidence that the CMO was over ruled you are welcome to put it forward.

 

Leaving aside that we don't even know what exactly advice the CMO provided prior to the decision or indeed whether his advice was followed - what we do know is that the government sought advice from a range of experts, as you would hope.

These experts were drawn from a range of scientific (and not so scientific) disciplines, and we also know that the Select Committee expressed great surprise that so few of those experts came from either a medical or public health background. They didn't go as far as saying that medical advice was ignored but they definitely inferred, if not actually suggested, that other considerations took priority.

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

12 minutes ago, Aggy said:

Try again. You said the only way to deal with the virus was by containment. But then you said they’re lifting their lockdown. Just because they are “testing testing testing” doesn’t mean the virus will stop spreading in the meantime does it.

So while the entire population is walking around freely, not in lockdown, and they can only be sure that 0.36 per cent of the population has caught the disease, and while there is no vaccine, what is happening?  Answer - the virus is spreading  naturally. Which you said was “crazy, bordering criminal”.

So are the Faroe Islands government crazy bordering criminal?

OK, you are just being deliberately obtuse - fair enough.

[ricardo 7,395]

6 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Leaving aside that we don't even know what exactly advice the CMO provided prior to the decision or indeed whether his advice was followed - what we do know is that the government sought advice from a range of experts, as you would hope.

These experts were drawn from a range of scientific (and not so scientific) disciplines, and we also know that the Select Committee expressed great surprise that so few of those experts came from either a medical or public health background. They didn't go as far as saying that medical advice was ignored but they definitely inferred, if not actually suggested, that other considerations took priority.

Experts with different viewpoints, perhaps they should toss a coin. In the end surely the CMO is the one responsible for deciding the best course of action and what advice is given to government. If there is any evidence that this advice was over ruled for political reasons you might have a point to criticise but I din't see it yet.

Edited April 10, 2020 by ricardo

[sonyc 5,518]

39 minutes ago, ricardo said:

We locked down on the same day as Germany and Holland and on medical advice so hardly a political decision. I know some are desperate to find a scapegoat but following the advice of the CMO isn't one of them.

I would like to have seen action taken earlier, especially with flights coming in from Italy and China but I'm not the CMO and I don't have to be responsible for the result. In hindsight we can argue with the timing but not with the powers that be being guided by the experts that were in place.

Various dates of actions here (with source) ....all linked back to the date of the 3rd reported death

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

12 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

So I guess that your preferred strategy is lockdown until we achieve local extinction or near extinction and then have incredibly rigorous border and social controls until such a time as this is extinct throughout the world?

Where did I say any of that???????

Just for clarity, we don't have a solution - not now but we might have had a very much smaller problem on our hands now if we'd had competent government and leadership starting back in January when the WHO were warning of a potential pandemic.

[How I Wrote Elastic Man 1,187]

is there a tracing app available in the UK yet?

[ricardo 7,395]

3 minutes ago, sonyc said:

Various dates of actions here (with source) ....all linked back to the date of the 3rd reported death

I wonder what is significant about the third death, why not first or fifth or 10th?

[sonyc 5,518]

Just now, ricardo said:

I wonder what is significant about the third death, why not first or fifth or 10th?

I guess it is simply a benchmark?

[ricardo 7,395]

4 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Where did I say any of that???????

Just for clarity, we don't have a solution - not now but we might have had a very much smaller problem on our hands now if we'd had competent government and leadership starting back in January when the WHO were warning of a potential pandemic.

I think you mean waiting for the WHO to call a pandemic which should have been obvious to all in February but was not called until March 11th.

[Van wink 2,994]

I think we are in total stamping foot and I hate the government territory here.

[Mello Yello 2,293]

Y'know......I blame it all on that Bill Gates bloke.....David Icke's got him sussed......

[ricardo 7,395]

Anyone seen the David Icke interview?

 

[Aggy 755]

20 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

OK, you are just being deliberately obtuse - fair enough.

No, I must be being stupid as is your other suggestion. So humour me and answer my previous question.

And if your answer is going to suggest the Faroe Islands government is acting on health and scientific experts’ advice that they are now able to lift restrictions, perhaps you could at the same time post that link to the select committee’s comments about what experts the British government did or didn’t follow.

 

Edited April 10, 2020 by Aggy

[Creative Midfielder 1,996]

2 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Experts with different viewpoints, perhaps they should toss a coin. In the end surely the CMO is the one responsible for deciding the best course of action and what advice is given to government. If there is any evidence that this advice was over ruled for political reasons you might have a point to criticise but I din't see it yet.

I don't believe that is the case and certainly not what happened - advisors advise, governments decide - that is the way it is supposed to be and I think that quite rightly in such a major crisis the government will have sought/received of range of advice from a range of different disciplines and no doubt differing opinions will have been expressed. That is all as it should be but I don't think it lies with the CMO to decide on the best course of action that is the government's job.

You seem to assume that they decided to follow his advice, I think they probably followed other advice but neither of us really know.