Corona Virus main thread

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

19 hours ago, Barbe bleu said:

I do want to be pedantic or argumentative in this, if only because I really like and respect  your posts KG but.... if the UK and NZ were equally exposed why were they able to lockdown after us and still avoid all but a smattering of outbreaks?

I would take issue with the categorisation of cities.  The city of Auckland may be larger than Manchester or Birmingham proper but it can't 'compete' on key metrics with the conurbations as a whole. I'm not sure it would even meet the west Yorkshire urban area in terms of population or density.  And of course the level of mixing (the really key criteria) in Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch is going to be absolutely tiny when compared to that in London where something  like 20 million people are in the greater London area or its hinterland

In terms of ports of entry wellington Airport is indeed an international airport but it almost exclusively serves Oceania. In 2019 about 60,000 overseas visitors from outside the continent  entered NZ at wellington.  By comparison about the same number of passengers came into Heathrow from Milan (a key city in all this) in December 2019 alone.   And its worth mentioning that pretty much all big UK airports fly to Milan (and some to Wuhan if I recall correctly too).

 According to Wikipedia wellington does indeed have a large train system and 900,000 journeys are made on it each month.  There were 1.8million journeys on the London tube (excluding overground and dlr services) each day in June 21.  The Newcastle metro system welcomes around 3 million passengers a month. I dont know how crowded wellington trains are in comparison but it's clear to me that we mix, a lot.

And that is before we begin to talk about housing standards in the UK. I am sure sonyc can tell us about uphill battles against overcrowding and poor conditions from his work experience.

Honestly there is no 'fair comparison' to be made in epidemiological terms. Good luck to NZ , even if they have abandoned zero covid they have done what they needed to do. 

 

 

You have replied fairly and defended your argument well but I was using my points in comparison as a lead into my summation that there was a similarity, not identical, which ended when our Government made an assumption whereas I believe Ardern used probabilities.

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

15 minutes ago, KernowCanary said:

Oliver Cromwell is another one worse than Boris. Just like this floppy ****, he cancelled Christmas.

Maybe, but I think we have to disqualify him on a technicality 😀

Bit pedantic I know, but as Lord Protector he was effectively both Head of State and Head of the Government but never, as far as I'm aware, actually Prime Minister in the conventional definition of that role.

So Johnson still holds the 'worst ever PM' title IMO.

Oliver Cromwell could be a good shout for UK's worst ever Head of State although there is some stiff competition for that title 😀

[Barbe bleu 812]

1 minute ago, keelansgrandad said:

You have replied fairly and defended your argument well but I was using my points in comparison as a lead into my summation that there was a similarity, not identical, which ended when our Government made an assumption whereas I believe Ardern used probabilities.

Oh I agree about assumptions. I suspect that there was a big assumption that it would take a long time to get a vaccine and therefore that containment and then lockdowns would merely delay the inevitable.  I think  equally big assumptions were made in how care homes operate.

NZ was in a very enviable position when we were locking down and you are probably right that they looked at the probabilities and concluded that there was a fairly good chance of them achieving zero covid and if they failed at least they might get close.

There is no question in my mind that NZ got it right.  I hear that the zero cocid policy distracted a bit from their vaccine roll out but I can't imagine (or at least hope) the price will be too bad as I am sure they will have got jabs to those most in need of protection.

 

 

 

 

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

5 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

You have replied fairly and defended your argument well but I was using my points in comparison as a lead into my summation that there was a similarity, not identical, which ended when our Government made an assumption whereas I believe Ardern used probabilities.

I'm baffled as to why @Barbe bleu is obsessing about completely irrelevant questions like why were they able to lockdown after us, other than as distraction from inconvenient truths - everyone knows that the virus reached different countries on different dates.

The absolutely key factor is how the governments reacted at (or even before) that point. The Italians, for example, didn't react at all until people were dropping like flies and only then did other European governments start to react with the UK being particularly slow - as I'm sure you remember even the Premier League, unbelieveably, were more on the ball than Johnson (sorry no pun intended just couldn't think of another polite way to put it )

As you quite rightly point Ardern used probabilities - strong probabilities, based on knowledge of previous pandemics and some pretty simple maths around just how contagious and deadly Covid-19 was - and she took decisive action based on the precautionary principle (something the UK never employed). I believe she locked down when NZ had only a dozen, or it may have 20, cases but it was a tiny number.

Every country in the world, except China of course, was in that situation when they only had a tiny number of cases at some point last year but only a minority took decisive action at that early point and all of those that did have massively outperformed the UK, the US and most other European countries as well. The responses were not all the same, as indeed neither were the socio, economic or geographic factors.

Again @Barbe bleu is talking complete nonsense with his key metrics on population density, volume of travellers, density of transport systems, blah, blah blah, because although they might constitute a extremely weak argument in NZ, they completely fail if we switch the comparison to South Korea or Singapore or Taiwan or of course China - according to BB and his key metrics all of those countries should have suffered much worse than the UK but in fact they all did spectacularly better than the UK.

Nor is it all about the lockdown, but the successful countries did have several common factors and all of them had leaders who took early, decisive and effective actions. The UK, the US and frankly most Western countries did not. Some did better than others, and the UK was one of the worst, but all of them were massively adrift from the really successful ones.

One of the other common factors which most, if not all, the really successful countries was a very effective test, track and trace system either already in place or implemented very speedily. The UK has completely wasted over £26 billion, I’ll repeat that – wasted over £26 billion on a system that was delivered months too late and has never actually worked anyway. A Select Committee report last year said there was no evidence that it had achieved anything whatsoever in containing the spread of the virus. The recent Select Committees went even further and said it may have had a detrimental effect!

The thing is none of these things are a surprise or things we’ve only just found out about, they were all known about last year. The track and trace fiasco (track and trace scandal would be more accurate) is something that the Government were repeatedly told by a wide range of experts – IT, Public Health, the NHS themselves – that their approach was fundamentally wrong and that they should have been building upon our already existing public health track and trace capabilities. The Government, presumably out of pure ideology, ignored all the experts and proceeded to completely b*lls it up. So whereas governments all around the world were able to quickly deploy working track and trace took several months and were running with a shambolic mess built on a totally out-of-date version of Excel spreadsheets and a massive army of ‘tracers’ who had no experience and little training in the job and no access to the key public health or NHS systems that they needed to do the job properly.

No amount of whitewash from Johnson, or @Barbe bleu, is going to cover up all the facts that are now in the public domain, as the Select Committees have already demonstrated. Of course it will be far worse when or perhaps if the Public Enquiry ever happens. Johnson is clearly going to continue to play for time and delay it for as long as he possibly can but it will be interesting to see how much longer he can hold the line. Whilst its true that there was remarkably little challenge to him at the Conference, his personal ratings are now below those of the party and his currently look likely to drop further. That’s not a situation that the Tory party normally tolerates for very long – I know a lot of people think that Sunak is the next up but I still think that Jeremy Hunt is quietly but carefully getting ready to wield the knife. Don’t like him but it has been very interesting over the past year or so how he has played a very cleverly balanced game of being the loyal backbencher and yet quite regularly pointing out in the nicest possible way where the government have gone wrong – quite impressive in a way 😊

 

[Barbe bleu 812]

CM  You may be the very first person in the entire history of epidemiology that has claimed that population density , living conditions and social mixing have nothing to do with the spread of disease! Honestly,  have another think about how ridiculous your argument sounds.

Although I have said that S Korea/Germany is the model I think we should have more closely followed as it emphasised contact tracing in the early days (something we have never  done for a respiratory disease by the way) I am not sure that East Asia is a good comparitor for us.    Nations there did things very differently (compare measure taken by Vietnam, S Korea, China (!) and japan) but have all done well.  And before resorting to the intangible it's not some nebulous 'decisive leadership' that achieves suppression - the virus doesn't get convinced by rhetoric not to spread.   Besides,  it's not clear that somewhere like Japan that basically did nothing, or certainly not as much as the UK,  actually benefitted from this type of leadership.

I can’t place why East Asia has done so well but diet, culture, climate, genetics and past exposure to related viruses could all play a part. I doubt we'll ever know.

CM you seem to think that by pointing out the weaknesses of international comparisons I am saying that the UK government should not be criticised.   I am not saying this, I have never said this, and I absolutely have criticised this government.   I just don't feel the need to reach for weak comparisons to back my criticisms up.

Best we stop talking to each other now though.  It is apparent that we have no respect for one another and this is a football forum.

[How I Wrote Elastic Man 1,181]

10 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

CM  You may be the very first person in the entire history of epidemiology that has claimed that population density , living conditions and social mixing have nothing to do with the spread of disease! Honestly,  have another think about how ridiculous your argument sounds.

I haven't read everything in the thread, so I have maybe missed something, but I think population density is not a huge factor, depending on how you perceive it 

For example, USA - very low population density - very high covid rates - many big cities but lots of empty country 

Even in Iceland covid numbers have been quite high for a couple of months now, but two thirds of the population live in one, well spread out, conurbation

It's the social mixing  that spreads a virus. And people nearly everywhere like to mix

[Aggy 752]

35 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

 

CM you seem to think that by pointing out the weaknesses of international comparisons I am saying that the UK government should not be criticised.   I am not saying this, I have never said this, and I absolutely have criticised this government.   I just don't feel the need to reach for weak comparisons to back my criticisms up.

I find discussions about which countries responded “better” extremely pointless.

It’s a bit like saying Paco Domingo responded “better” to promotion than Farke because his side is 5th and Farke’s is 20th. Even if we agree whether to judge “better” on points, league position, goals scored, financial stability or something else completely, to make it a worthwhile comparison you’d have to figure out a way to balance out the difference in standard between the prem and the Andorran top flight, the different number of teams in the divisions, the money opposition clubs have compared to the promoted club, the ‘starting’ standard of the playing squads comparative to opponents before the transfer window, the standard of the training facilities compared to opponents, the attitude of the boards, the attitude/number of fans, the opponents they’ve played so far this season, the fact one has only played 3 games and the other 7 games etc. etc.

The only question that’s particularly relevant is whether a government could have done something “better” in its own country.

[Barbe bleu 812]

12 minutes ago, How I Wrote Elastic Man said:

I haven't read everything in the thread, so I have maybe missed something, but I think population density is not a huge factor, depending on how you perceive it 

For example, USA - very low population density - very high covid rates - many big cities but lots of empty country 

Even in Iceland covid numbers have been quite high for a couple of months now, but two thirds of the population live in one, well spread out, conurbation

It's the social mixing  that spreads a virus. And people nearly everywhere like to mix

I'd agree with that.   Density is very clearly a factor in spread but its really mixing that counts.   An area with a lot of visitors from  infection zones who are then forced into close contact with a lot of people who are highly mobile over a large and well populated area is going to be highly exposed.   That's why I gave the example of london.   The greater London area and its hinterland has about 20 million people, many of whom stand on each others feet in a poorly ventilated tube whilst mixing with lots of visitors just off aircraft from milan and China.   Its going to hit London like a train and then onto the other conurbations that are comparatively close.   

Again this is not to say that our government is free from blame: I bet we all wondered why travel advice against skiing wasn't given, only to say that we are us and that they are them

 

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

56 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

CM  You may be the very first person in the entire history of epidemiology that has claimed that population density , living conditions and social mixing have nothing to do with the spread of disease! Honestly,  have another think about how ridiculous your argument sounds.

Hardly, you appear to be doing so yourself - apparantly according to you comparing UK unfavourably with NZ is unreasonable because their population density is lower than ours, whilst at the same time comapring UK unfavourably with South Korea, or Singapore or Hong Kong is unfair because their population density is much higher than ours. Kind of makes it awkward to determine what the significance of population density is in this context but whatever it may be it certainly isn't the relevant factor that you hoped to use the distract from the failures of the UK response.

CM you seem to think that by pointing out the weaknesses of international comparisons I am saying that the UK government should not be criticised.   I am not saying this, I have never said this, and I absolutely have criticised this government.   I just don't feel the need to reach for weak comparisons to back my criticisms up.

Think I covered this in my earlier response, and I'm afraid that repeating untruths doesn't make them any truer.

 

[Well b back 3,186]

Hi @Barbe bleu you said I suspect that there was a big assumption that it would take a long time to get a vaccine and therefore that containment and then lockdowns would merely delay the inevitable. 

That was from part of the report and as many will know I find this totally in the land of the fairies. Approx 4 years before Jenner said they were ready for what they believed would be the next Pandemic, unless I have completely misunderstood they had a vaccine ready which our and other governments not only refused to invest in they laughed at it, so when we got to April 2020 over a weekend they received the make up of the virus, and as always planned changed their vaccine into a ‘ COVID vaccine. By early May the NYT and the Serum Institute of India were reporting millions of doses would begin to be prepared. Our government eventually invested in mid May and were also going to invest in a major development where we could manufacture 100’s of millions of doses ( another Johnson fantasy ). I have pulled some actual in time quotes from the COS thread with dates, that make the claim the government didn’t think they would work astonishing beyond believe.

28/4/2020 NYT wrote

On Monday, the world's largest vaccine maker, the Serum Institute of India, said it would not wait for the trial to end and was preemptively making 40 million doses to save time in case it worked.

30/4/2020

Astrazeneca signed a deal

11/5/2020

'Great progress' made, says Vallance

More on the efforts to develop a coronavirus vaccine. 

Sir Patrick Vallance, chief scientific adviser to the UK government, says there has been "great progress" in the search for a vaccine and the chance of creating one that works is getting "higher".

But he reiterates the PM's comment that this is not "guaranteed".

Prof Whitty says he is "very confident" a solution will be found.

By mid May when we invested heavily we stated

16/5/2020

Coronavirus jab could be ready 'as early as September' as UK leads way for cure

19/5/2020

Jenner advised unlike reports the rhesus monkey trial worked and prevented serious disease ( this was the aim of an effective vaccine stopping the spread was never thought realistic ).

26/5/2020

China already saying they were close, but worrying side effects to their first shot

27/5/2020

Despite investing a billion dollars the US begin to throw mud at Oxford, stating other vaccines were going to be much better.

30/5/2020

Coronavirus: 99% confident that COVID-19 vaccine will work, says Chinese firm

The Beijing-based biotech company is currently building a commercial plant with the objective of delivering 100 million doses.

5/6/2020

BBC caught up and finally report AstraZeneca is close.

11/6/2020

The world outside the U.K. report

The last stage of testing for Moderna’s vaccine would begin in July, an NIH official says, followed by candidates from AstraZeneca and J&J

By the 23/6/2020 the world were reporting that several vaccines were really close, but they will not be ready in September but October. Russia were so confident it worked they stole it and renamed it Sputnik.

By the end of June the world were confident we were there just that we needed phase 3 results, but these were being slowed by the lack of virus at that time ( that changed August ).

By September the reason we were saying a lock down was needed was to get the virus down and then vaccinate, so as I said it is cloud cuckoo land for the government to say they had not a lot of confidence in a vaccine working.

 

 

 

 

[KernowCanary 214]

They were not even going to lock down in the first place!. It was only because members of the public kept sending Boris free-use stock photos of a pair of hands with blood on them that did it, amongst other pressure tactics.

I hated lockdown, I hated the clapping, the virtue signalling, every sodding commercial referencing the ‘demic, hated working from home, hated missing my friends, hated missing my holidays as well as Canaries trips and all the lockdown gimmicks, let alone pathetic gimmicky news items supposed to lift morale and articles called “Fun things to do in lockdown”, which always entailed suggestions like cooking, watching a film, taking on a new hobby or writing a song about it and posting it on YouTube hoping it goes viral, alongside the idea of taking up reading.

SAD, SAD, SAD!!, nothing against reading for example, but those articles just made morale and mental health worse for me.

Still, despite all that, I still knew it needed to happen, as hospitals would have been an awful lot more overwhelmed than they were last year and would have been a lot more deaths than there have been. It should have been a lot more earlier and even when the alarm bells rang early, such as the Italian news agency footage of hospitals, floppy toff head still dithered.

If this was a war and he was PM, we would have been the most invaded country in Europe.

Edited October 13, 2021 by KernowCanary

[Yellow Fever 3,739]

From 1st hand memory at the time the real question was not could a vaccine be made but how effective it would be. All the vaccines it turns out are far more.effective than we could of possibly hoped for.

Without a shadow of doubt Johnson just couldn't grasp until the catastrophe was upon us the seriousness of the situation. Worse he repeated it in the following autumn.

Nearly won his very own Darwin prize.

 

[Well b back 3,186]

2 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

From 1st hand memory at the time the real question was not could a vaccine be made but how effective it would be. All the vaccines it turns out are far more.effective than we could of possibly hoped for.

Without a shadow of doubt Johnson just couldn't grasp until the catastrophe was upon us the seriousness of the situation. Worse he repeated it in the following autumn.

Nearly won his very own Darwin prize.

 

Everybody was Kung Flu fighting do, do do, do ,do,do

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

4 hours ago, Barbe bleu said:

Oh I agree about assumptions. I suspect that there was a big assumption that it would take a long time to get a vaccine and therefore that containment and then lockdowns would merely delay the inevitable.  I think  equally big assumptions were made in how care homes operate.

NZ was in a very enviable position when we were locking down and you are probably right that they looked at the probabilities and concluded that there was a fairly good chance of them achieving zero covid and if they failed at least they might get close.

There is no question in my mind that NZ got it right.  I hear that the zero cocid policy distracted a bit from their vaccine roll out but I can't imagine (or at least hope) the price will be too bad as I am sure they will have got jabs to those most in need of protection.

 

 

 

 

My in laws live in Levin in the North Island in a retirement village. They received their injections quite a while after we did in the UK. There seemed to be a delay although I don't know the reason. They were aiming, as you say, for zero covid, first. Strange because they have a very similar free at source health system and were well equipped to handle it.

I do believe they had a great many anti vaxxers just like any other country and freedom of speech is welcomed openly. But I do believe they sat on their laurels a bit too long before realising this is a stubborn virus.

 

[Barbe bleu 812]

12 hours ago, Well b back said:

Hi @Barbe bleu you said I suspect that there was a big assumption that it would take a long time to get a vaccine and therefore that containment and then lockdowns would merely delay the inevitable. 

That was from part of the report and as many will know I find this totally in the land of the fairies. 

I'm  not sure why you would say that.  

I think by around May confidence in the vaccine was high.  There were some disappointments when the monkeys with high dose were still infectious but overall it was looked on with great hope.

But confidence in May doesn't translate into confidence in March, and that is the critical time for the lockdown analysis; the point when containment had failed and we realised that SARS2 wasn't going to go away like SARS1 and we looked at what we should and should not do next.

In March we had the genetic code mapped but that was it.  The two major types of vaccines we have ended up with were new, barely tested, technologies and there was  no guarantee they  would (or indeed could) work, even if the right antigens had been identified. And the idea of a completely new vaccine being delivered into arms within a year was entirely without precedent.   There must have been pessimism on timescales in SAGE that weighed against lockdown.

An honest answer to the question "how long must we lock down for if we are to open up to a mass vaccine programme " would probably have to be "if we find a working vaccine (and its a big if) it likely won't be for at least a year or two."

I think you under estimate just how much of an achievement the vaccines really are.  The delivery timetable  and efficacy is simply incredible.

 

Edited October 14, 2021 by Barbe bleu

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

1 hour ago, Aggy said:

I find discussions about which countries responded “better” extremely pointless.

It’s a bit like saying Paco Domingo responded “better” to promotion than Farke because his side is 5th and Farke’s is 20th. Even if we agree whether to judge “better” on points, league position, goals scored, financial stability or something else completely, to make it a worthwhile comparison you’d have to figure out a way to balance out the difference in standard between the prem and the Andorran top flight, the different number of teams in the divisions, the money opposition clubs have compared to the promoted club, the ‘starting’ standard of the playing squads comparative to opponents before the transfer window, the standard of the training facilities compared to opponents, the attitude of the boards, the attitude/number of fans, the opponents they’ve played so far this season, the fact one has only played 3 games and the other 7 games etc. etc.

The only question that’s particularly relevant is whether a government could have done something “better” in its own country.

Completely agree Aggy, the objective has never been to create a pandemic League with promotion and relegation although the fact that we're on a Football Forum might perhaps influence the analogies used from time to time, even when discussing much more serious issues.

IMO your final sentence is the key one - whether the country could have done something 'better' in its own country. I'm not sure whether you agree or not, but I think the vast majority of people in the UK believe that there are quite a lot of things that could have been done better here and certainly that was the conclusion of the recent Select Committee report who expressed that view very forcibly indeed.

I also think that most, though clearly not all, recognise that some countries handled the pandemic massively better than we did. That is not to say that what they did could automatically be translated over to the UK but given that we weren't in the first wave, by the time cases were starting to build here there were already a number of countries around the world ahead of us timewise whose responses were producing markedly different outcomes. In seems nothing more than plain common sense when in attempting to handle a virus with limited knowledge that we would take a look at other countries that were already having some success. This was another very strong criticism in the recent report - the government knew that some countries were doing extremely well but didn't even take a look at whether what they were doing could work here or not.

In fact there was an almost pathological determination not to learn, not just from other countries but from our own mistakes of which there were many, and sadly we even repeated many of them - perhaps the most clear cut and obvious thing we could have learnt from other countries is that we should have locked down earlier last March.

IMO Johnson's dithering when it was obvious to pretty much everyone else that we needed a lockdown was pretty unforgiveable but clearly some would cut him some slack the first time. But what is surely utterly unforgiveable is that he repeated that mistake twice more last year. Track and trace was another example of where we could have done a lot better (and saved a huge amount of money) - a series of government mistakes that could have been easily avoided both by looking overseas or simply by listening to our own public health & IT experts.

I don’t think these discussions are pointless – in the wider context rather on a football forum 😂. ‘Doing better’ is not an abstract concept in this context if the government had done ‘better’, been a bit more  whether by learning lessons from overseas or its own early mistakes, or simply been a bit more competent then many thousands of lives would have been saved and the National Debt would have been quite a bit smaller – surely those impacts make it worth debating, and they certainly has a very direct impact on all our lives?

Edited October 13, 2021 by Creative Midfielder

[Van wink 2,994]

Now triple jabbed and flu jabbed, feel like a walking test tube. Obvious moral issue about having the third vaccine but if it adds protection for myself and more importantly those I care for them really no choice imo 

[ricardo 7,339]

28 minutes ago, Van wink said:

Now triple jabbed and flu jabbed, feel like a walking test tube. Obvious moral issue about having the third vaccine but if it adds protection for myself and more importantly those I care for them really no choice imo 

Still no communication from my surgery.🤔

[Van wink 2,994]

19 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Still no communication from my surgery.🤔

Is it 6 months since your second jab? ( sent you a pm )

 

Edited October 14, 2021 by Van wink

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

2 hours ago, Van wink said:

Now triple jabbed and flu jabbed, feel like a walking test tube. Obvious moral issue about having the third vaccine but if it adds protection for myself and more importantly those I care for them really no choice imo 

My 6 months is up on the 26th. So did you get prior notification or did they say go tomorrow type of thing? Our local vaccination centre has closed so I assume it is my surgery that will respond.

Had the seasonal jab last week at Boots.

Edited October 14, 2021 by keelansgrandad

[ricardo 7,339]

1 hour ago, Van wink said:

Is it 6 months since your second jab? ( sent you a pm )

 

Yes, this week. Thanks for the info, I will give them a few more days and then try to book one myself. I have already booked a flu jab with Boots pharmacy due to Surgery being so tardy.

[Well b back 3,186]

18 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Yes, this week. Thanks for the info, I will give them a few more days and then try to book one myself. I have already booked a flu jab with Boots pharmacy due to Surgery being so tardy.

It’s 6 calendar months less 4 days then the system allows you to book.

If you book a hospital setting you maybe able to get flu and booster at same time 1 in each arm, but it maybe different in Norfolk and the hubs do flu as well.

So to clarify if you were jabbed 5/4/21 you can book booster 1/10/21.

Hope that helps

[Van wink 2,994]

1 hour ago, keelansgrandad said:

My 6 months is up on the 26th. So did you get prior notification or did they say go tomorrow type of thing? Our local vaccination centre has closed so I assume it is my surgery that will respond.

Had the seasonal jab last week at Boots.

NHS sent  a link to a website where you could find  a number of different vaccination locations in the local area and you make make an appointment.

[ricardo 7,339]

35 minutes ago, Well b back said:

It’s 6 calendar months less 4 days then the system allows you to book.

If you book a hospital setting you maybe able to get flu and booster at same time 1 in each arm, but it maybe different in Norfolk and the hubs do flu as well.

So to clarify if you were jabbed 5/4/21 you can book booster 1/10/21.

Hope that helps

Mine was 7/4/21 but info says only NHS staff and care workers can book The rest of us, including clinically vulnerable must wait to be contacted.

[KernowCanary 214]

The one language gimmick that’s got on my t*ts more than the rest of them is those who refer to having our freedoms back, as “Freedums” and/or “Freedumbs”.

Its like whoever coined that spelling usage and those who take it on, are mocking people who are glad to have their’s back all while they love the idea of living under restrictions or being welded inside their homes while virtue signalling. The “Take to Twitter” brigade really have a lot to answer for.

Its just utter madness.

Edited October 14, 2021 by KernowCanary

[ricardo 7,339]

National

45,066  - 157

rate of increase of 13% over 7 days,  slowly climbing again

 

Local

Awaiting update

 

Vax ( vax percentages have been recalibrated to include 12-16 yr olds)

1st Dose      38,726             85.7% done                            Norwich numbers   74.7% 

2nd Dose     29,481             78.7% done                                                               68.1%

In Hospital

13-10-2021	7,024
12-10-2021	7,032
11-10-2021	7,021
10-10-2021	6,871
09-10-2021	6,701
08-10-2021	6,765
07-10-2021	6,790
06-10-2021	6,848

[Van wink 2,994]

Times

"Lateral flow tests are more accurate at detecting coronavirus than previously thought and positive results should be trusted, researchers say.

A team led by University College London has developed a new formula to test the accuracy of lateral flow tests (LFTs).

The tests are probably more than 80 per cent effective at detecting any level of coronavirus infection and more than 90 per cent effective with those who are most infectious when using the test, according to their findings, published in the journal Clinical Epidemiology

This level of accuracy is much higher than some previous studies have suggested and the authors say the tests are a reliable public health tool in stopping the spread of the virus."

 

 

[CANARYKING 634]

2 hours ago, ricardo said:

National

45,066  - 157

rate of increase of 13% over 7 days,  slowly climbing again

 

Local

Awaiting update

 

Vax ( vax percentages have been recalibrated to include 12-16 yr olds)

1st Dose      38,726             85.7% done                            Norwich numbers   74.7% 

2nd Dose     29,481             78.7% done                                                               68.1%

In Hospital

13-10-2021	7,024
12-10-2021	7,032
11-10-2021	7,021
10-10-2021	6,871
09-10-2021	6,701
08-10-2021	6,765
07-10-2021	6,790
06-10-2021	6,848

Not going away

[ricardo 7,339]

54 minutes ago, CANARYKING said:

Not going away

It will never go away but will become just another endemic respiratory disease that we have to face. There won't  be zero Covid any more than zero influenza or zero common cold.

[KernowCanary 214]

The BBC News website and their obsession with the phrase “It comes after”, really is starting to grate now.

All through this they have been nothing but scabs. Their “Big Night In” special made me want to have a big night out.

Edited October 14, 2021 by KernowCanary