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2 hours ago, Yellow Fever said:

I share your twitchiness VW. I can see lots of people who come up with all sorts of reasons why in some manner it's 'gone away' or we can or should ignore it i.e. 'Herd Immunity ' as per BB (that idea as a solution died last summer) or that it is in some undefined manner already 'endemic' by which I think they mean steady state. The summer pause was likely simply a Iull before the storm.

Simply for me its just a numbers game. We've all had flu (or very bad colds) at some point - sometimes more than once. Once we've all had Covid once or twice then we will be at 'steady state'. Not until.

 

OK, so we lockdown or take measures that increase social distancing; Infections will fall in line with the severity of the measures. But do we keep these measures in place until the end of time? 

Until we achieve Herd immunity all these measures can do is delay the point at which people get the disease.  Herd immunity appears to have become a dirty phrase but it is the end point that all epidemics reach.   They set in, they multiply and then, when the immunity threshold is met,  they become endemic.  If we are lucky R might fall below 1 for long enough in enough places that this thing goes goes the way of SARS 1 but after 18 months of trying that's that's big ask  and certainly unachievable without Herd immunity.

 If we were locking down etc because the reformulated vaccine was being  produced  and we wanted to buy a bit of time or we wanted to deflect hospitalisations away from the seasonal peak then there might be a point but there doesn't appear to be much evidence of that just yet.  

Is what you really mean 'we need measures now because i fear a seasonal effect that will push numbers up at just the time to coincide with seasonal pressure on the NHS. I would then welcome relaxation when the flu season is done'?

Edited by Barbe bleu

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Only 68% of EPL footballers have had two jabs. 81% have had one.

So out of 500 players, only 340 have bothered to get vaccinated.

Callum Robinson had had it twice and still will not have the vaccine.

I've fallen off my chair Brian

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I had a letter from NHS today re third Primary dose of Covid vaccine for those with severe Immunosuppresion. (ie me).

The letter says this is " the third of a primary vaccination schedule of three doses and is different to the booster vaccination roll out to the wider population"

Apparently I can just go straight to a walk in centre without a prior appointment. I shall head off first thing tomorrow👍

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National

43,738  - 223

rate of increase of 16.1% over 7 days,  slowly climbing again

 

Local

Norwich rate 402.3  up 52.1% (7 days) a big rise locally.

patients in N&N 

12-10-2021                 29
11-10-2021 31
10-10-2021 22
09-10-2021 19
08-10-2021 17

 

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

1st Dose      39,672             86% done                               Norwich numbers   74.8% 

2nd Dose     23,579             78.9% done                                                               68.3%

 

In Hospital

18-10-2021                         7,749
17-10-2021 7,398
16-10-2021 7,136
15-10-2021 7,114
14-10-2021 7,110
13-10-2021 7,061
12-10-2021 7,056
11-10-2021 7,039

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44 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

Only 68% of EPL footballers have had two jabs. 81% have had one.

So out of 500 players, only 340 have bothered to get vaccinated.

Callum Robinson had had it twice and still will not have the vaccine.

I've fallen off my chair Brian

where did you study maths? 405 have taken at least their first dose so will presumably go back for dose 2.

Callus Robinson represents an interesting case really... surely he will have very high antibody levels now so what is the benefit to him rushing to get vaccinated other than to avoid travel disruption?

It would be interesting to hear the view of a subject matter expert for this instance since it was widely considered that 1 infection is similar to getting 1 dose of vaccine for immunity and some countries even accept that for their pass... how about 2 infections?

Is he and indeed everyone that comes into contact with him going to actually benefit or is he just taking an unnecessary (allbeit tiny) risk of bad side effects by taking the jab now? I believe Kyrie Irving is using a similar excuse with his explanation but maybe only had 1 infection?

Just seems that blanket rules aren't able to really cover such exceptions.

Edited by Tetteys Jig

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1 hour ago, Barbe bleu said:

OK, so we lockdown or take measures that increase social distancing; Infections will fall in line with the severity of the measures. But do we keep these measures in place until the end of time? 

Until we achieve Herd immunity all these measures can do is delay the point at which people get the disease.  Herd immunity appears to have become a dirty phrase but it is the end point that all epidemics reach.   They set in, they multiply and then, when the immunity threshold is met,  they become endemic.  If we are lucky R might fall below 1 for long enough in enough places that this thing goes goes the way of SARS 1 but after 18 months of trying that's that's big ask  and certainly unachievable without Herd immunity.

 If we were locking down etc because the reformulated vaccine was being  produced  and we wanted to buy a bit of time or we wanted to deflect hospitalisations away from the seasonal peak then there might be a point but there doesn't appear to be much evidence of that just yet.  

Is what you really mean 'we need measures now because i fear a seasonal effect that will push numbers up at just the time to coincide with seasonal pressure on the NHS. I would then welcome relaxation when the flu season is done'?

Herd immunity for Covid is myth - was debunked last Spring and confirmed in the summer.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00728-2

Simply we would have to vaccinate everybody (including the refusniks) plus all the children

AND when vaccinated you would have to be incapable of further transmitting the disease - an assumption we now know to be false.

This has been the scientific consensus for many months now.

So the question becomes one of containment, vaccines, better treatments and managing hospitalizations within sensible numbers and resources.

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43 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Herd immunity for Covid is myth - was debunked last Spring and confirmed in the summer.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00728-2

Simply we would have to vaccinate everybody (including the refusniks) plus all the children

AND when vaccinated you would have to be incapable of further transmitting the disease - an assumption we now know to be false.

This has been the scientific consensus for many months now.

So the question becomes one of containment, vaccines, better treatments and managing hospitalizations within sensible numbers and resources.

While I agree with what you’re saying, this means we have to accept measures like lockdowns ultimately just delay infections until later on, they are not a solution to the problem. So we need to deploy them only when there is a specific short term reason such as when vaccines were being rolled out. That’s not the case now.


you need an exit strategy, we can’t continue permanently restricting peoples’ everyday lives, willingness to accept restrictions is clearly waning especially among 20-somethings who have least to fear from Covid.

 

At the moment, the key number continues to be hospitalisations, which are currently at a sustainable level. Reimposing restrictions would only be justified if hospitalisations are getting out of control, and there is no sign of that as yet.

 

So although it’s an uncomfortable idea, it’s looking like we’re now at a point where Covid cases could be too low as well as too high, otherwise we might face high numbers  later at a time when the NHS has less capacity to cope.

 

I’m open to other ideas but I’ve not heard any, except China seems to be going for a permanent policy of harsh restrictions and lockdowns, which let’s face it probably suits the Chinese state. I think this is more than anything because it would be embarrassing for them to concede their zero-Covid approach is obviously impossible, which has been clear for quite some time.

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1 hour ago, Yellow Fever said:

Herd immunity for Covid is myth - was debunked last Spring and confirmed in the summer.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00728-2

Simply we would have to vaccinate everybody (including the refusniks) plus all the children

AND when vaccinated you would have to be incapable of further transmitting the disease - an assumption we now know to be false.

This has been the scientific consensus for many months now.

So the question becomes one of containment, vaccines, better treatments and managing hospitalizations within sensible numbers and resources.

Putting that all together  are you advocating never ending restrictions  or a complete absence of restrictions as there is no point in them as this will remain epidemic forever regardless of what we do? Either of those seem the logical end points of your arguments

I understand your interpretation of that article but I am not sure it was the intended one. Its an article really about vaccination as a route to elimination and discusses the prospects for herd immunity by this method alone. I have never thought that vaccines alone would bring this to a halt and I have long accepted that endemic disease is the end state ( or at least have since 18 may 2020 when @Van wink shared the story about the vaccine not giving sterilising immunity in monkeys). I hope I am wrong a zero covid becomes a thing, its possible even if unlikely

What i am sure of is that we will get herd immunity to this disease, it cannot remain epidemic (ie growing exponentially) forever.  Like the article says that immunity won't be just because of vaccines, some of it will need to be done the hard way.

Maybe I should state what the terms 'herd immunity' and 'endemic' mean to me as that might situate my response a bit better. In reality being at the herd immunity threshold means no more and no less than, on average,  R=1 when mixing is free. A disease that is endemic is one , as you put it, in a steady state, which is of course also R=1. If we combine these two then we can say with certainty that if we are in an endemic state then herd immunity is acheived and vice versa.

I have said 'on average' because endemic diseases will flare up and die down from time to time. That's what will probably happen with this as it does with all.  I guess what I think is beneficial is that these.flare ups happen when the pressure is not on the health service and, crucially, when immunity in individuals is high, like soon after a vaccine or three.... I am therefore not adverse to targeted measures but they must be carefully applied with a very specific goal. A circuit breaker just because the August figures are looking  dodgy just wouldn't cut it.

As a concluding thought the HIT for Delta is crazy high. I've seen estimates of an R0 of 7 or 8 so HIT would be between 86 and 88% ([1- 1/R0]*100%) so i wouldn't necessarily expect is to be at that level already, the key thing is will we be there because the flu patients really start checking in... 

 

Edited by Barbe bleu
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1 hour ago, Tetteys Jig said:

where did you study maths? 405 have taken at least their first dose so will presumably go back for dose 2.

Callus Robinson represents an interesting case really... surely he will have very high antibody levels now so what is the benefit to him rushing to get vaccinated other than to avoid travel disruption?

It would be interesting to hear the view of a subject matter expert for this instance since it was widely considered that 1 infection is similar to getting 1 dose of vaccine for immunity and some countries even accept that for their pass... how about 2 infections?

Is he and indeed everyone that comes into contact with him going to actually benefit or is he just taking an unnecessary (allbeit tiny) risk of bad side effects by taking the jab now? I believe Kyrie Irving is using a similar excuse with his explanation but maybe only had 1 infection?

Just seems that blanket rules aren't able to really cover such exceptions.

My maths is sound. At the time of posting. No explanation accompanied why these others have only had one jab. So as far as I am concerned as they were eligible in June for the jab, they haven't got a sprint on for the second and may not be bothering. Maybe they play for clubs not in Europe or don't play for their country.

The vaccine is free. And increases your antibodies. So I do not understand Robinson's reticence. Unless you have a medical reason not to be vaccinated, then not having one is reckless and unnecessary.

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I read a mention in an article that the Beta variant is on the way to becoming extinct because the Delta variant is so much more transmissible and it made me think, do we need to save Beta from extinction 😎?

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1 minute ago, It's Character Forming said:

I read a mention in an article that the Beta variant is on the way to becoming extinct because the Delta variant is so much more transmissible and it made me think, do we need to save Beta from extinction 😎?

Even Delta has now a rival as 6% of all new cases are a variant

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32 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

Putting that all together  are you advocating never ending restrictions  or a complete absence of restrictions as there is no point in them as this will remain epidemic forever regardless of what we do? Either of those seem the logical end points of your arguments

I understand your interpretation of that article but I am not sure it was the intended one. Its an article really about vaccination as a route to elimination and discusses the prospects for herd immunity by this method alone. I have never thought that vaccines alone would bring this to a halt and I have long accepted that endemic disease is the end state ( or at least have since 18 may 2020 when @Van wink shared the story about the vaccine not giving sterilising immunity in monkeys). I hope I am wrong a zero covid becomes a thing, its possible even if unlikely

What i am sure of is that we will get herd immunity to this disease, it cannot remain epidemic (ie growing exponentially) forever.  Like the article says that immunity won't be just because of vaccines, some of it will need to be done the hard way.

Maybe I should state what the terms 'herd immunity' and 'endemic' mean to me as that might situate my response a bit better. In reality being at the herd immunity threshold means no more and no less than, on average,  R=1 when mixing is free. A disease that is endemic is one , as you put it, in a steady state, which is of course also R=1. If we combine these two then we can say with certainty that if we are in an endemic state then herd immunity is acheived and vice versa.

I have said 'on average' because endemic diseases will flare up and die down from time to time. That's what will probably happen with this as it does with all.  I guess what I think is beneficial.is that these.flarw ups happen when the pressure is not on the health service and, crucially, when immunity in individuals is high, like soon after a vaccine or three....

The HIT for Delta is crazy high. I've seen estimates of an R0 of 7 or 8 so HIT would be between 86 and 88% (1- 1/R0 *100%) so i wouldn't necessarily expect is to be at that level already, the key thing is will we be there because the flu patients really start checking in... 

 

I didn't mean to be abrupt before - but herd immunity really means that any 'flare ups' naturally die down i.e. cant spread far with a minimum of interventions - natural isolating.

As to previous pandemics - yes of course they fade over several years as the weak, infirm or plain unlucky are culled out (and the virus hopefully evolves to become less severe). We have a lot of them - even on here! There is even some Darwinian evolution for us involved as well (c.f. Bubonic plague - Ok bacterial but the point stands)! Those that are strong survive and do indeed become resistant to it like most viruses after multiple exposures or ongoing vaccinations. However I don't think you really mean to let the virus do it's business untroubled by us and for nature, red in tooth and claw to take its course?

In the meantime yes we will need to be more careful - I guess those that don't may live fast and die young.

ICF asks is for an exit strategy. Sorry but we are dealing with nature that likes culling over rampant species (think rabbits and myxomatosis) and just perhaps it has other ideas!  We have to use our technology and intelligence to stay one step ahead. 

 

Edited by Yellow Fever
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Just now, keelansgrandad said:

My maths is sound. At the time of posting. No explanation accompanied why these others have only had one jab. So as far as I am concerned as they were eligible in June for the jab, they haven't got a sprint on for the second and may not be bothering. Maybe they play for clubs not in Europe or don't play for their country.

The vaccine is free. And increases your antibodies. So I do not understand Robinson's reticence. Unless you have a medical reason not to be vaccinated, then not having one is reckless and unnecessary.

but if his antibodies are already sky high, is there any need to rush to be vaccinated... I suspect unless we know the full ins and outs we don't know that one.

Also, I suspect many footballers in the prem were involved in the euros and other similar things so didn't want to take the jab when they had important games to play in hence the delay. Imagine Kane took the jab just before the Scotland game and then had to miss it with a bit of a reaction when he could have just got sorted before or after the tournament.

In my view, they should have been offered the jab long before the euros like Southgate said so they were all set for it. Its only a small group but a fairly important one for public messaging etc.

Glad to see the numbers have improved from where they were anyway... sure previously it was at 1/3 vaccinated so hopefully it's mainly hesitancy rather than actual antivaxx

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43 minutes ago, Tetteys Jig said:

but if his antibodies are already sky high, is there any need to rush to be vaccinated... I suspect unless we know the full ins and outs we don't know that one.

Also, I suspect many footballers in the prem were involved in the euros and other similar things so didn't want to take the jab when they had important games to play in hence the delay. Imagine Kane took the jab just before the Scotland game and then had to miss it with a bit of a reaction when he could have just got sorted before or after the tournament.

In my view, they should have been offered the jab long before the euros like Southgate said so they were all set for it. Its only a small group but a fairly important one for public messaging etc.

Glad to see the numbers have improved from where they were anyway... sure previously it was at 1/3 vaccinated so hopefully it's mainly hesitancy rather than actual antivaxx

Of course it doesn't specify nationality either.

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7 hours ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Of course Covid isn't going to go away unless we take the right steps to force it to do so, and for the record hospital admissions are already way too high and have been for many weeks now -

Purely out of interest, do you have the hospital admission figures this year compared to September/October in years pre-covid?

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2 hours ago, Yellow Fever said:

 

ICF asks is for an exit strategy. Sorry but we are dealing with nature that likes culling over rampant species (think rabbits and myxomatosis) and just perhaps it has other ideas!  We have to use our technology and intelligence to stay one step ahead. 

 

This is of course one of the biggest challenges to humanity, the fact we cannot accept death, we need to hold people on to life when quality has long gone! We are killing the planet and when nature fights back we try to stay ahead as you say. Reality is we are very fragile, we will die and ultimately nature will kill us off as a species eventually.

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27 minutes ago, Indy said:

This is of course one of the biggest challenges to humanity, the fact we cannot accept death, we need to hold people on to life when quality has long gone! We are killing the planet and when nature fights back we try to stay ahead as you say. Reality is we are very fragile, we will die and ultimately nature will kill us off as a species eventually.

I agree Indy - but perhaps in an odd manner I was trying to say that we don't have ALL the answers to a Covid 'exit' and it may well be that things take a long time to go back to normal with Covid around. Get used to it. As a species we are not designed to live in such high densities as we do but in more diffuse smaller groups where such diseases would by nature/isolation be more self-limiting. Our humongous populations and global travel means we can expect such pandemics and its totally naive to think that we won't need to change our ways to limit the risks. SARS, MERs were ample warning. Nature has ways to deal with such species - climate change is another way of applying some 'negative' feedback on us!  

All that said I have a high degree of confidence that we can engineer workable solutions given my background but not carefree miracles! Some of us will be able to tell tall stories to our grand-children of the hedonistic life before Covid (and global warming).

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2 hours ago, Aggy said:

Purely out of interest, do you have the hospital admission figures this year compared to September/October in years pre-covid?

Well I'd be prepared to take a wild guess and say that pre-Covid the hospital admissions for Covid were zero! Currently we have nearly 8k Covid patients in hospital which actually displace considerably more than 8k of 'normal' patients since Covid patients require more space and resources both physical and human than the ‘usuals’.

Our hospital capacity is also impacted by another key factor of which I am certain - pre-Covid we had more doctors and nurses than we do now, and we also had lower sickness absence levels amongst doctors and nurses than we do now.

The result of this Covid squeeze is that we have hospital waiting lists of around 5.5 million and rising rapidly (from 0.6m in 2019) and waiting list times are now measured in years rather than weeks.

The backlog is currently projected to almost triple 14 million by next spring - @It's Character Forming apparently believes that this is ‘sustainable’ and I’m guessing that you probably agree with him – so my question to you is how long do you think it is sustainable for??

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21 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Well I'd be prepared to take a wild guess and say that pre-Covid the hospital admissions for Covid were zero! Currently we have nearly 8k Covid patients in hospital which actually displace considerably more than 8k of 'normal' patients since Covid patients require more space and resources both physical and human than the ‘usuals’.

 

Our hospital capacity is also impacted by another key factor of which I am certain - pre-Covid we had more doctors and nurses than we do now, and we also had lower sickness absence levels amongst doctors and nurses than we do now.

 

The result of this Covid squeeze is that we have hospital waiting lists of around 5.5 million and rising rapidly (from 0.6m in 2019) and waiting list times are now measured in years rather than weeks.

 

The backlog is currently projected to almost triple 14 million by next spring - @It's Character Forming apparently believes that this is ‘sustainable’ and I’m guessing that you probably agree with him – so my question to you is how long do you think it is sustainable for??

 

I wasn’t really trying to make a point, more just asking if you had the figures. Do you not? What would be a level of admissions that’s not “too high” though if you don’t even know how many people we normally have in hospitals at this time of year?

Edited by Aggy

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21 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

I agree Indy - but perhaps in an odd manner I was trying to say that we don't have ALL the answers to a Covid 'exit' and it may well be that things take a long time to go back to normal with Covid around. Get used to it. As a species we are not designed to live in such high densities as we do but in more diffuse smaller groups where such diseases would by nature/isolation be more self-limiting. Our humongous populations and global travel means we can expect such pandemics and its totally naive to think that we won't need to change our ways to limit the risks. SARS, MERs were ample warning. Nature has ways to deal with such species - climate change is another way of applying some 'negative' feedback on us!  

All that said I have a high degree of confidence that we can engineer workable solutions given my background but not carefree miracles! Some of us will be able to tell tall stories to our grand-children of the hedonistic life before Covid (and global warming).

I think it depends what you mean by ‘normal’. Other than that I work at home two or three days a week and save on overpriced sandwiches for lunch, I can’t say that my life is now any different than it was pre-covid. And I’m not just saying that to be argumentative, it just isn’t. I go into the office. I go to the cinema. I meet friends for food and drink. I can go on holiday now in the same way I could before (to most places that I’d likely go anyway). If I was so inclined, I could go dancing on tables in clubs in groups of as many people as I want. I can go into shops. I can even see my family inside.

What do we need to get used to? 

I think we’re at risk of overblowing it. Yes lots of people died and the debate about whether it could have been handled differently will rumble on and on. But we’ve always had pandemics, and will continue to do so. We’ve had much worse than covid before - the Black Death wiped out half the population of Europe when it was far less densely populated than it is now, the population was significantly less humongous, and we didn’t have planes or trains or cars. We might have much worse in the future (or we might not, or not for many centuries).
 

No doubt people were saying much the same as you after the Spanish flu and for whatever reason we haven’t had anything as bad as that for a century since. Some here and there that were bad but your reference to SARS and MERS as ample warning seems to forget that there have been similar ample warnings for ever and not all of them continue to escalate into bigger disasters year after year ad infinitum. Likewise, we had far far worse than either of those (and than covid) well before any of the factors you mention were relevant. That’s just life.

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Just now, Aggy said:

I wasn’t really trying to make a point, more just asking if you had the figures. Do you not? What would be a level of admissions that’s not “too high” though if you don’t even know how many people we normally have in hospitals at this time of year?

I was trying to point out that the absolute level of admissions is, in isolation, fairly irrelevent - as in most areas of life when demand and supply get completely out of kilter problems tend to arise.

In the case of our health system demand and supply is wildly out of kilter and the major cause of that is Covid infection which is still rising. I don't think that is a sustainable position but maybe I am wrong - let's see what happens as many millions more are denied the treatment they need this winter.

 

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Just now, Creative Midfielder said:

I was trying to point out that the absolute level of admissions is, in isolation, fairly irrelevent - as in most areas of life when demand and supply get completely out of kilter problems tend to arise.

In the case of our health system demand and supply is wildly out of kilter and the major cause of that is Covid infection which is still rising. I don't think that is a sustainable position but maybe I am wrong - let's see what happens as many millions more are denied the treatment they need this winter.

 

How do you know it’s out of kilter though if you haven’t got the pre-covid figures? 

Ignoring that point though, waiting lists were increasing year on year before covid. Far more to do with an ever aging society and a lack of funding in healthcare. Covid has accelerated the increase, but I expect we’d have had the current waiting lengths in 2023 or so even if we hadn’t had covid. Many millions were denied treatment for many many months in 2019. We didn’t lock down then.

We have for many years, especially in the winter, pushed non urgent treatment back to be able to carry out urgent surgery and have beds for critical care free. We didn’t lock down then.

We’ve had nowhere near enough funding in healthcare and later life treatment/living/facilities for decades. More people seem to now be aware of it as a result of covid, but it was a mess in 2019 too and has been for years. Hospitals are close to being overwhelmed every year. People get turned away from one hospital and moved to another because there aren’t beds. This all happened in 2019. We didn’t lock down then.

So is it sustainable currently? Well, it wasn’t sustainable in 2019.

But unless we’re at a point where people can’t get emergency life saving treatment, then the answer isn’t lockdowns and restrictions. It’s investing properly in health and social care.

 

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Further to my post yesterday dealing with why UK's daily Covid cases are much higher than all our neighbouring  countries and indeed much of Europe, i read a Bloomberg article that further shows more reasons why this is the case. I mentioned the almost total lack of wearing face coverings by the general population here, which is certainly one factor, but its really a selection of reasons why we are where we are.

We vaxxed a good deal earlier than rest of Europe, so the vax protection has waned earlier over time than on the continent.

Government policy in July, just basically saying to the populace "ok go back to normality, vax is enough  and need nothing more".

Our population density is 2nd highest in Europe of main nations, only Netherlands is higher.

We have tested a hugely higher amount than any other nation in Europe, maybe Denmark excepted.

These higher amounts of testings include schools and hospitals, no other nation comes close to the UK testings.

"That" Labs 43k negative send outs mistake...it speaks for itself.

Once again, its the UK starting to see the growth of yet another variant, the Delta Plus, of course the perfect breeding ground considering all of the above.

There could be other less obvious reasons but the ones above  by themselves do help to show that its a fair number of things put together and here we are...i dunno, this island race of ours always seemingly does things differently to rest of Europe...nothing ever changes does it...we are in Europe but not part of it...or should that be part of Europe but not in it..whatever. Maybe Covid  even itself has become somewhat different to the rest of Europe to..certainly the stats relating to Covid usually has us bucking the trend in Europe.

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6 hours ago, Essjayess said:

Further to my post yesterday dealing with why UK's daily Covid cases are much higher than all our neighbouring  countries and indeed much of Europe, i read a Bloomberg article that further shows more reasons why this is the case. I mentioned the almost total lack of wearing face coverings by the general population here, which is certainly one factor, but its really a selection of reasons why we are where we are.

We vaxxed a good deal earlier than rest of Europe, so the vax protection has waned earlier over time than on the continent.

Government policy in July, just basically saying to the populace "ok go back to normality, vax is enough  and need nothing more".

Our population density is 2nd highest in Europe of main nations, only Netherlands is higher.

We have tested a hugely higher amount than any other nation in Europe, maybe Denmark excepted.

These higher amounts of testings include schools and hospitals, no other nation comes close to the UK testings.

"That" Labs 43k negative send outs mistake...it speaks for itself.

Once again, its the UK starting to see the growth of yet another variant, the Delta Plus, of course the perfect breeding ground considering all of the above.

There could be other less obvious reasons but the ones above  by themselves do help to show that its a fair number of things put together and here we are...i dunno, this island race of ours always seemingly does things differently to rest of Europe...nothing ever changes does it...we are in Europe but not part of it...or should that be part of Europe but not in it..whatever. Maybe Covid  even itself has become somewhat different to the rest of Europe to..certainly the stats relating to Covid usually has us bucking the trend in Europe.

Agree with most of that - the missing  43K likely 'positives'.....

However - Watching the news this morning its deja vu from last year. NHS, Scientists, Sage and Indy Sage members all calling for plan B (Basically masks) to save or delay even harsher restrictions.

Government sticks its head in the sand and says no.

So apart from all the valid points made above the overriding one is as usual this government's incompetence.

Edited by Yellow Fever

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14 hours ago, keelansgrandad said:

Of course it doesn't specify nationality either.

speaking of which, I'm sure there was one country at the euros who vaccinated all their players pre tournament? can't remember who it was though.

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1 hour ago, A Load of Squit said:

Carry on Covid.

 

For Carry On you could also substitute Blackadder 4:

 

 

IMG_20211020_111516.jpg

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8 hours ago, Essjayess said:

These higher amounts of testings include schools and hospitals

We are testing a lot but the increase in rates is not always correlating. 

Something else is happening with the current rate of increase. 

Whatever peoples' thoughts are on Covid (and they have all been laid out in these pages on the thread) I think we all ought to be worried about the pressure on the NHS and everyone working in hospitals as well as everyone waiting to have medical procedures, treatments or long awaited operations.

This is an incredibly serious situation (it appears to me anyway). We've heard this morning though that government policy is "working". Wonder what 'not working' might look like? 

Worrying times. Let's all hope those increased rates do not lead to hospitalisation rates again rising. They appear flat at present at least.

In my area the number of infections is also dropping sharply for the last week (Zoe) but I'm unsure if Zoe leads the way as a trend indicator anymore. If it does then at least a positive sign (living in a denser metropolitan area you'd possibly expect higher rates).

IMG_20211020_111533.jpg

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