Corona Virus main thread

[Indy 3,298]

14 minutes ago, Aggy said:

A few (lengthy) points on this.

1. On the article you’ve linked to:

“Basically it concludes roughly CV risk of dying is about the same per age as your annual 'normal ' no covid risk (So if you have a 1% chance of dying from something else you would also have an extra 1% chance of dying from Covid).”

The quote you’ve put in your post doesn’t say that.

It says “being infected with covid” raises the risk. If you’re not infected, your risk doesn’t increase by that amount.

The modelling further down your post is done on the basis the virus was left “completely unchallenged”, in which case it might (only might) infect 80 per cent of the population.

On the basis we aren’t leaving it “completely unchallenged” and haven’t done since March, you can instantly chop chunks off that 600,000.

The 200,000 deaths T referred to was based on the lockdowns we’ve had already. So further lockdowns = more deaths from collateral things as a result of lockdown.

And T’s 200,00 deaths didn’t even take long term deaths from increased poverty into account. So we can bump that 200,000 up even if there are no further lockdowns, and bump it up again if we have additional lockdowns.

The 600,000 vs 200,000 deaths argument suddenly not quite as convincing. Exactly why the other things need to start being taken more seriously.

 

Point 2.

When I referred to sleepwalking, this sort of response is basically what I meant. Not specifically aimed at you YF but generally the whole public.

T posted a post about 200,000 people potentially dying. It got around twelve responses and not one of them talked about ways we might avoid hundreds of thousands of deaths. 

Rather than discuss trying to avoid 200,000 deaths caused as a result of lockdown policies, or the dozens of thousands (perhaps more) of deaths in young people medium to long term which my links refer to, the response was to find some statistics to try and in effect downplay the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people or show that they were somehow less important/ less urgent than covid deaths.

T didn’t say we should let all old people die. He didn’t say we should scrap all restrictions. He said that people only seem focussed on covid deaths and not potentially hundreds of thousands of other deaths. And your responses rather support that opinion.

This isn’t specific to this messageboard. The whole nation has become so scared that anything discussing anything other than the number of covid deaths that occurred yesterday is simply dismissed.

How many times have we heard “follow the science”, but the people saying it don’t even bother to factor in “the science” relating to hundreds of thousands of deaths due to lockdown and the state of the economy for years to come? 

How many times did we hear the government failed to follow SAGE advice re lockdown? Then compare that to how many times people have mentioned other SAGE advisors warning about the long term health impacts that lockdown will have on the young.

Sonyc says it’s a discussion and people haven’t got their heads in the sand, but it’s not a discussion. Any discussion (not just on here but generally in the public sphere) about anything other than covid deaths gets ignored and downplayed because covid deaths are the only thing that matter too often.

As i said, extremely concerned that we are sleepwalking into a horrendous situation for millions of people, particularly young people, for years (possibly decades) to come.
 

Point 3. 

On the wider point of avoiding nhs being overwhelmed, Sir Richard Leese commented recently that he is pretty shocked we still haven’t got proper mandatory shielding in place. Before VW tells me my grandma’s about to die again, Leese didn’t say we should have no other restrictions.
 

He made the point that closing pubs and shops won’t alone stop the spread. Asking the most vulnerable to shield won’t alone stop the spread. They would however both help, but we’re currently only enforcing (or even asking people to follow) the one that will result in people losing jobs and health issues which arise from that. Yes, elderly and vulnerable will suffer from mental health issues as a result of shielding, but so will millions of others from losing jobs.

Leese also made the point that whilst other restrictions are still needed to help curb the spread, it is still the case that the extremely large majority of deaths are elderly people, and average age of icu patient is retirement age (hospitalisations lower at c.60). So yes we need other things to help stop the spread as well, but shielding would significantly help reduce the number of hospital admissions. I’m not sure why we haven’t reintroduced this. Even in tier three shielding isn’t mandatory.

Some will say it’s unfair to introduce shielding for, say, 85 year olds in areas with low rates of infection. But others will wonder which is more likely to lead to deaths - a 25 year old going to a covid secure place of work, or two 85 year olds meeting up indoors with their two school aged grandkids, son and daughter in law who have both been into work.

Doesn’t have to be one of shielding or jobs - why not both?

Nice structured read.

[Yellow Fever 3,782]

6 minutes ago, Aggy said:

A few (lengthy) points on this.

1. On the article you’ve linked to:

“Basically it concludes roughly CV risk of dying is about the same per age as your annual 'normal ' no covid risk (So if you have a 1% chance of dying from something else you would also have an extra 1% chance of dying from Covid).”

The quote you’ve put in your post doesn’t say that.

It says “being infected with covid” raises the risk. If you’re not infected, your risk doesn’t increase by that amount.

The modelling further down your post is done on the basis the virus was left “completely unchallenged”, in which case it might (only might) infect 80 per cent of the population.

On the basis we aren’t leaving it “completely unchallenged” and haven’t done since March, you can instantly chop chunks off that 600,000.

The 200,000 deaths T referred to was based on the lockdowns we’ve had already. So further lockdowns = more deaths from collateral things as a result of lockdown.

And T’s 200,00 deaths didn’t even take long term deaths from increased poverty into account. So we can bump that 200,000 up even if there are no further lockdowns, and bump it up again if we have additional lockdowns.

The 600,000 vs 200,000 deaths argument suddenly not quite as convincing. Exactly why the other things need to start being taken more seriously.

 

Point 2.

When I referred to sleepwalking, this sort of response is basically what I meant. Not specifically aimed at you YF but generally the whole public.

T posted a post about 200,000 people potentially dying. It got around twelve responses and not one of them talked about ways we might avoid hundreds of thousands of deaths. 

Rather than discuss trying to avoid 200,000 deaths caused as a result of lockdown policies, or the dozens of thousands (perhaps more) of deaths in young people medium to long term which my links refer to, the response was to find some statistics to try and in effect downplay the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people or show that they were somehow less important/ less urgent than covid deaths.

T didn’t say we should let all old people die. He didn’t say we should scrap all restrictions. He said that people only seem focussed on covid deaths and not potentially hundreds of thousands of other deaths. And your responses rather support that opinion.

This isn’t specific to this messageboard. The whole nation has become so scared that anything discussing anything other than the number of covid deaths that occurred yesterday is simply dismissed.

How many times have we heard “follow the science”, but the people saying it don’t even bother to factor in “the science” relating to hundreds of thousands of deaths due to lockdown and the state of the economy for years to come? 

How many times did we hear the government failed to follow SAGE advice re lockdown? Then compare that to how many times people have mentioned other SAGE advisors warning about the long term health impacts that lockdown will have on the young.

Sonyc says it’s a discussion and people haven’t got their heads in the sand, but it’s not a discussion. Any discussion (not just on here but generally in the public sphere) about anything other than covid deaths gets ignored and downplayed because covid deaths are the only thing that matter too often.

As i said, extremely concerned that we are sleepwalking into a horrendous situation for millions of people, particularly young people, for years (possibly decades) to come.
 

Point 3. 

On the wider point of avoiding nhs being overwhelmed, Sir Richard Leese commented recently that he is pretty shocked we still haven’t got proper mandatory shielding in place. Before VW tells me my grandma’s about to die again, Leese didn’t say we should have no other restrictions.
 

He made the point that closing pubs and shops won’t alone stop the spread. Asking the most vulnerable to shield won’t alone stop the spread. They would however both help, but we’re currently only enforcing (or even asking people to follow) the one that will result in people losing jobs and health issues which arise from that. Yes, elderly and vulnerable will suffer from mental health issues as a result of shielding, but so will millions of others from losing jobs.

Leese also made the point that whilst other restrictions are still needed to help curb the spread, it is still the case that the extremely large majority of deaths are elderly people, and average age of icu patient is retirement age (hospitalisations lower at c.60). So yes we need other things to help stop the spread as well, but shielding would significantly help reduce the number of hospital admissions. I’m not sure why we haven’t reintroduced this. Even in tier three shielding isn’t mandatory.

Some will say it’s unfair to introduce shielding for, say, 85 year olds in areas with low rates of infection. But others will wonder which is more likely to lead to deaths - a 25 year old going to a covid secure place of work, or two 85 year olds meeting up indoors with their two school aged grandkids, son and daughter in law who have both been into work.

Doesn’t have to be one of shielding or jobs - why not both?

Aggy - Its a BMJ paper trying to give some simple answers to Covid risk.

But - As to your point 1 yes of course you have to catch it  - but if you 'open up' I guess everybody will be pretty much a cert to 'catch-it ' at some point - even those shielding. All it did was crudely point out that Covid on the loose for most people simply doubles the daily risk of dying - and for the elderly even more.  That excludes the costs of care for sick, NHS beds etc.

Do you really think  you can enforce all those 'vulnerable' over 60 say people to mandatory 'shield - what 'holiday camps' or 'prisons do you have in mind. In a democracy its unworkable. There is already enough of an uproar about care homes stopping relatives visiting. 

By the way - many if not most of 200K would also be classed as vulnerable almost by definition. Are they clogging the system up too?  

From a medical perspective you are simply trying to treat palliatively the symptoms and not the cause. The cause is the virus.

[Well b back 3,203]

2 hours ago, sonyc said:

Well, you may not have to wait too long Wbb if the reports I read prove correct. Johnson is rumoured to be stepping down in the first part of 2021. I suppose he can then tick off the 'prime minister' position off his list to be world king. I am quite sure he will go on to earn more like Cameron and Blair before in after dinner / corporate speeches and media opportunities. Maybe Sunak will be more your kind of Tory leader? He looks the most likely. Cannot see Gove, Hancock, Raab, Patel being acceptable (then, are they to anyone?). I think the PM role has not proved such a wheeze that Johnson expected. If he does decide to go he leaves behind him quite some legacy!

I have to say you would have needed luck to have managed your way through this, those that did, New Zealand being a good example will be National heroes. I just feel Boris has just gone with those that shout loudest, and eventually he was not respected and consequently the wrong person leading the Country at this time. Instead of saving health or the economy or being in that lucky group both, his decisions have done neither so depending on which side of the fence you were he hasn’t been ideal for any of us. His constant changing of position at times has been disturbing when he constantly used hind sight, but we knew it wasn’t really as we had seen the advice 2 months before on the Jenner / Oxford website. His latest spat with Burnham I believe ( personal opinion ) has done his position no favours whatsoever. It was a bit like a football manager and player having a spat in front of the cameras rather than behind closed doors. Strangely Burnham  hasn’t helped Labour either. 
As I have said many times only history will be able to show the rights and wrongs, but even then there will be differing opinions. The first test for let the virus run and protect the economy or stop the virus best you can and let it hurt the economy will come in 2 weeks time when the US vote.

[Aggy 755]

8 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Aggy - Its a BMJ paper trying to give some simple answers to Covid risk.

But - As to your point 1 yes of course you have to catch it  - but if you 'open up' I guess everybody will be pretty much a cert to 'catch-it ' at some point - even those shielding. All it did was crudely point out that Covid on the loose for most people simply doubles the daily risk of dying - and for the elderly even more.  That excludes the costs of care for sick, NHS beds etc.

Do you really think  you can enforce all those 'vulnerable' over 60 say people to mandatory 'shield - what 'holiday camps' or 'prisons do you have in mind. In a democracy its unworkable. There is already enough of an uproar about care homes stopping relatives visiting. 

By the way - many if not most of 200K would also be classed as vulnerable almost by definition. Are they clogging the system up too?  

From a medical perspective you are simply trying to treat palliatively the symptoms and not the cause. The cause is the virus.

Not sure if relevance to BMJ - haven’t tried to discredit the figures, just how you’ve used them. 

The point is you’ve used an article to say 600,000 might die compared to the 200,000 T has mentioned in his articles. You’ve effectively said we shouldn’t consider the 200k in government policy because there might be 600k dying of covid.

But 600,000 isn’t reflective of real life. We aren’t opening up. We aren’t “letting it rip”. Nobody seriously (perhaps Jools but, well..) is saying that we should “let it rip”. So 600,000 isn’t a figure we should be using as a comparator.

With the current three tier system (which I think is fairly decent actually, although tier three could be stricter), that 600,000 drops significantly.

As mentioned above, T’s 200k is already higher as it doesn’t factor in deaths as a result of economic hardship. As under tier 3 we have businesses forcibly closed, that figure continues to go up already. If we have more lockdowns, it goes up even further. 

So ignoring more than 200,00 potential deaths because 600,000 might die in conditions that don’t currently exist (and haven’t done for seven months) is not a sensible way to approach things.

 

Are you suggesting if not everyone complied with a law we shouldn’t bother? How is it any different to a National lockdown or a circuit break involving everyone? And if making it mandatory makes even a small percentage of people take it more seriously then that’s a good thing isn’t it? 
 

If the only argument against mandatory shielding policy is that some might not follow it, then I can see a rather fundamental flaw in pretty much every other covid policy.

 

Who mentioned anyone clogging up the system? Again, this is exactly what I’m talking about. A sensible discussion about the possibility hundreds of thousands of people might die from something other than covid and you’re making up accusations that I’ve said covid patients are clogging up the system. Why?

[Yellow Fever 3,782]

42 minutes ago, Aggy said:

Not sure if relevance to BMJ - haven’t tried to discredit the figures, just how you’ve used them. 

The point is you’ve used an article to say 600,000 might die compared to the 200,000 T has mentioned in his articles. You’ve effectively said we shouldn’t consider the 200k in government policy because there might be 600k dying of covid.

But 600,000 isn’t reflective of real life. We aren’t opening up. We aren’t “letting it rip”. Nobody seriously (perhaps Jools but, well..) is saying that we should “let it rip”. So 600,000 isn’t a figure we should be using as a comparator.

With the current three tier system (which I think is fairly decent actually, although tier three could be stricter), that 600,000 drops significantly.

As mentioned above, T’s 200k is already higher as it doesn’t factor in deaths as a result of economic hardship. As under tier 3 we have businesses forcibly closed, that figure continues to go up already. If we have more lockdowns, it goes up even further. 

So ignoring more than 200,00 potential deaths because 600,000 might die in conditions that don’t currently exist (and haven’t done for seven months) is not a sensible way to approach things.

 

Are you suggesting if not everyone complied with a law we shouldn’t bother? How is it any different to a National lockdown or a circuit break involving everyone? And if making it mandatory makes even a small percentage of people take it more seriously then that’s a good thing isn’t it? 
 

If the only argument against mandatory shielding policy is that some might not follow it, then I can see a rather fundamental flaw in pretty much every other covid policy.

 

Who mentioned anyone clogging up the system? Again, this is exactly what I’m talking about. A sensible discussion about the possibility hundreds of thousands of people might die from something other than covid and you’re making up accusations that I’ve said covid patients are clogging up the system. Why?

I'm really not sure anymore what you're trying to argue.

The 600K figure was in the paper simply as a ground truth as the risks match - and was roughly also the annual mortality rate. The risks were taken from the hard data of the first wave - not hypothetical.

Of course Covid deaths will be a lot less due to the very things you appear to be arguing against - restrictions, lockdowns etc. - and of course better and earlier treatments and perhaps even an eventual vaccine.

T's 200K is also a very nebulous and even a more hypothetical figure - you could and can make similar arguments about future 'deaths' caused by Brexit and climate change. pollution etc.  Many do.

Bottom line is we have to deal with the here and now and the current health emergency. These deaths are not hazy but real and countable this year. Once we have sorted the pandemic then we can attend to longer term issues. When you are up to your neck in alligators, it's easy to forget that the goal was to drain the swamp

Restrict and suppress the virus such that we can keep the NHS (and jobs/society) operating quasi-normally (and I was there today no problems) so that we don't get the 200K or more deaths due to lack of screening and any other 'add-on' effects (it hasn't happened yet as per NHS/ONS quote)). Let the NHS be overwhelmed by wishful thinking and you'll get the very worst of all worlds.

Lastly, no government anywhere in the world, even the most authoritarian have tried to just 'shield' the supposed vulnerable (even if they really know who they are) but otherwise left society open and business unaffected. That said some societies are naturally better at social distancing than others. Those that have tried to play down or ignore Covid have generally come a cropper.

Edited October 21, 2020 by Yellow Fever

[ricardo 7,385]

 

280k  tests

26688- 191           7days ago 19724        14 days ago  14152

record number of positives but deaths down by 50. I understand that there were processing delays over the weekend so may be some back dating going on.

 

Inpatients  6479   only up 48 from yesterday????

 

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

Yesterdays European. looks like some catching up from weekend under reporting here

Italy   10847 - 79

France 20468 - 262

Spain  13873 - 218

Germany  7167 - 56

[sonyc 5,517]

1 hour ago, Aggy said:

Sonyc says it’s a discussion and people haven’t got their heads in the sand, but it’s not a discussion. Any discussion (not just on here but generally in the public sphere) about anything other than covid deaths gets ignored and downplayed because covid deaths are the only thing that matter too often.

Happy to read what you have to say Aggy. Always have done. No problem by me. Sometimes though folk don't always need to reply to every point made. 

I suppose the fact I've spent my whole working life providing services to disadvantaged people  to flourish in the economy, to better themselves etc etc  means I don't feel the need to defend the point about the economy,  because in a way I've walked the walk. It's second nature to think like that for me. I don't mean to sound precious in saying this.  I don't think covid deaths are the only thing that matter and there's room on a football messageboard for all views. I used the word 'debate' and think that is what this thread provides. Many read without going to the extent of comment.

[Teemu’s right foot 53]

So to continue my theme, a new day and a new story of more death that lockdown has caused. Experts are saying 1 in 3 people died with lung cancer during lockdown and many of those deaths have been put down as death from covid as the symptoms were the same

Also 

22,896 people with severe mental illness did not get their annual health checks in Mar-Jun 2020.

NHS warwickshire the worst performing at just 8% of people seen. 

122 out of 1385 patients.

48,772 increase in waiting treatment for cancer NHS England April to August 2020.

▪︎ Breast 13,171
▪︎ Urology 13,118
▪︎ Skin 6,036
▪︎ Gastrointestinal 4,505
▪︎ Lung 3,093

 

 

Edited October 21, 2020 by Teemu’s right foot

[Rock The Boat 1,330]

4 hours ago, horsefly said:

I really do recommend that everyone watches the Sky News documentary: "Hotspots: Global Pandemic". It collates contemporary news reports charting the development of the pandemic around the world. The overwhelming view I personally took from it was just how utterly irresponsible Johnson and his government were in delaying the lock-down. And this isn't a view gained in hindsight. One Italian mayor interviewed at a time when his country was being overwhelmed, but when we had only a handful of cases, is seen pleading with the UK government to act now or else face a crisis worse than the Italians. Hopefully, a genuine independent judicial inquiry will call many to account for this egregious dereliction of duty.

Sadly, whatever course of action we take now will amount to a constant gruelling process of fire-fighting the multitude outbreaks of economic and healthcare catastrophes until a vaccine becomes available. If only we had a government like that in New Zealand which reacted to the outbreak with immediate virus supressing actions. If only!

 

All good but what's to say that as soon as New Zealand opens up its borders as it must eventually do, that the virus won't rip through the population in the way that it did elsewhere. As far as I can see, a lockdown only defers the inevitable and taking the long-term view it doesn't make a great deal of difference when you lockdown as the virus is waiting to strike at both ends of the lockdown.

[ricardo 7,385]

Just now, Rock The Boat said:

All good but what's to say that as soon as New Zealand opens up its borders as it must eventually do, that the virus won't rip through the population in the way that it did elsewhere. As far as I can see, a lockdown only defers the inevitable and taking the long-term view it doesn't make a great deal of difference when you lockdown as the virus is waiting to strike at both ends of the lockdown.

This is the problem for places like N. Zealand. Lots of vulnerable and few with any sort of immunity due to lack of exposure.

Hide until a vaccine arrives seems to be the answer.

[horsefly 4,300]

1 minute ago, Rock The Boat said:

All good but what's to say that as soon as New Zealand opens up its borders as it must eventually do, that the virus won't rip through the population in the way that it did elsewhere. As far as I can see, a lockdown only defers the inevitable and taking the long-term view it doesn't make a great deal of difference when you lockdown as the virus is waiting to strike at both ends of the lockdown.

They have opened their borders in very limited ways, but done so according to protocols that prevent the spread of the virus. And they have had cases but reacted instantly to them with selective lockdowns etc. 

https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/covid-19-causes-mortality-rates-spike-around-globe-nz-sees-dramatic-drop-in-deaths

You are right that the only point of lock-downs is to stop the spread of disease for that period. But that does mean you can drastically reduce the number of people who require hospitalisation. According to Sage scientisits we were facing half-a-million deaths without the lock-down. Our only hope now is to find a balance between economic imperatives and minimizing covid cases until we have a vaccine available next year.

[Essjayess 307]

17 minutes ago, ricardo said:

 

280k  tests

26688- 191           7days ago 19724        14 days ago  14152

record number of positives but deaths down by 50. I understand that there were processing delays over the weekend so may be some back dating going on.

 

Inpatients  6479   only up 48 from yesterday????

 

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

Yesterdays European. looks like some catching up from weekend under reporting here

Italy   10847 - 79

France 20468 - 262

Spain  13873 - 218

Germany  7167 - 56

26688...ya..pretty much what i was expecting, said on Monday i  imagined by Wednesday  new infections  wouls  likely be 25k+. While west European nations close to us are of most interest of course Ricardo, this current wave is hitting parts of East Europe much more  harder than the initial 1st wave  back in March / April. Here are 3 nations  in particular who, back in March / April, never suffered more than a few hundred  new cases  a day at worst...but of course one major factor for all is the  big increase in testing during the last 6 months. These are from either yesterday or today..

Poland 10,040 - 150

Czechia 11,984 - 106

Ukraine 6719 - 141.

[Teemu’s right foot 53]

8 minutes ago, Essjayess said:

26688...ya..pretty much what i was expecting, said on Monday i  imagined by Wednesday  new infections  wouls  likely be 25k+. While west European nations close to us are of most interest of course Ricardo, this current wave is hitting parts of East Europe much more  harder than the initial 1st wave  back in March / April. Here are 3 nations  in particular who, back in March / April, never suffered more than a few hundred  new cases  a day at worst...but of course one major factor for all is the  big increase in testing during the last 6 months. These are from either yesterday or today..

Poland 10,040 - 150

Czechia 11,984 - 106

Ukraine 6719 - 141.

The number of 25k is not new infections. It’s positive tests. Positive tests are not necessarily positive cases as there is a high percentage of false positives within those figures

[Mark .Y. 352]

Can anybody clear one thing up for me.

Pretty much at the beginning of all this, there was quite a scandal about Dominic Cummings being at SAGE meetings.

I seem to remember something coming out that he had wanted an earlier lockdown put in place (obviously for the general population - not him personally 😉 ) but the Scientists had said it wasn't required.

Is that correct or not ?  It seems to be a very important point to me and rarely gets mentioned when the Government is criticised for not locking down early enough. Of course, that may be because the story was simply untrue - but I would like to know.

[Well b back 3,203]

17 minutes ago, Teemu’s right foot said:

The number of 25k is not new infections. It’s positive tests. Positive tests are not necessarily positive cases as there is a high percentage of false positives within those figures

It is estimated by the ONS and ZOE ( which is the figure that the Goverment use ) that only 1/3 of positives actually have a test. It is now estimated ( the figures to 15/10 will be out Thursday ) is now 60 - 70,000 a day. Has anyone got the latest ZOE figures ?.

 

[Well b back 3,203]

16 minutes ago, Mark .Y. said:

Can anybody clear one thing up for me.

Pretty much at the beginning of all this, there was quite a scandal about Dominic Cummings being at SAGE meetings.

I seem to remember something coming out that he had wanted an earlier lockdown put in place (obviously for the general population - not him personally 😉 ) but the Scientists had said it wasn't required.

Is that correct or not ?  It seems to be a very important point to me and rarely gets mentioned when the Government is criticised for not locking down early enough. Of course, that may be because the story was simply untrue - but I would like to know.

Can’t 100% remember but I thought it was SAGE that recommended lock down 3 - 4 weeks before and the Goverment said no. They were definitely told to circuit break 4 weeks ago, but didn’t. Now the scientists say it’s to late hence same mistakes.

[Teemu’s right foot 53]

2 hours ago, Aggy said:

A few (lengthy) points on this.

1. On the article you’ve linked to:

“Basically it concludes roughly CV risk of dying is about the same per age as your annual 'normal ' no covid risk (So if you have a 1% chance of dying from something else you would also have an extra 1% chance of dying from Covid).”

The quote you’ve put in your post doesn’t say that.

It says “being infected with covid” raises the risk. If you’re not infected, your risk doesn’t increase by that amount.

The modelling further down your post is done on the basis the virus was left “completely unchallenged”, in which case it might (only might) infect 80 per cent of the population.

On the basis we aren’t leaving it “completely unchallenged” and haven’t done since March, you can instantly chop chunks off that 600,000.

The 200,000 deaths T referred to was based on the lockdowns we’ve had already. So further lockdowns = more deaths from collateral things as a result of lockdown.

And T’s 200,00 deaths didn’t even take long term deaths from increased poverty into account. So we can bump that 200,000 up even if there are no further lockdowns, and bump it up again if we have additional lockdowns.

The 600,000 vs 200,000 deaths argument suddenly not quite as convincing. Exactly why the other things need to start being taken more seriously.

 

Point 2.

When I referred to sleepwalking, this sort of response is basically what I meant. Not specifically aimed at you YF but generally the whole public.

T posted a post about 200,000 people potentially dying. It got around twelve responses and not one of them talked about ways we might avoid hundreds of thousands of deaths. 

Rather than discuss trying to avoid 200,000 deaths caused as a result of lockdown policies, or the dozens of thousands (perhaps more) of deaths in young people medium to long term which my links refer to, the response was to find some statistics to try and in effect downplay the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people or show that they were somehow less important/ less urgent than covid deaths.

T didn’t say we should let all old people die. He didn’t say we should scrap all restrictions. He said that people only seem focussed on covid deaths and not potentially hundreds of thousands of other deaths. And your responses rather support that opinion.

This isn’t specific to this messageboard. The whole nation has become so scared that anything discussing anything other than the number of covid deaths that occurred yesterday is simply dismissed.

How many times have we heard “follow the science”, but the people saying it don’t even bother to factor in “the science” relating to hundreds of thousands of deaths due to lockdown and the state of the economy for years to come? 

How many times did we hear the government failed to follow SAGE advice re lockdown? Then compare that to how many times people have mentioned other SAGE advisors warning about the long term health impacts that lockdown will have on the young.

Sonyc says it’s a discussion and people haven’t got their heads in the sand, but it’s not a discussion. Any discussion (not just on here but generally in the public sphere) about anything other than covid deaths gets ignored and downplayed because covid deaths are the only thing that matter too often.

As i said, extremely concerned that we are sleepwalking into a horrendous situation for millions of people, particularly young people, for years (possibly decades) to come.
 

Point 3. 

On the wider point of avoiding nhs being overwhelmed, Sir Richard Leese commented recently that he is pretty shocked we still haven’t got proper mandatory shielding in place. Before VW tells me my grandma’s about to die again, Leese didn’t say we should have no other restrictions.
 

He made the point that closing pubs and shops won’t alone stop the spread. Asking the most vulnerable to shield won’t alone stop the spread. They would however both help, but we’re currently only enforcing (or even asking people to follow) the one that will result in people losing jobs and health issues which arise from that. Yes, elderly and vulnerable will suffer from mental health issues as a result of shielding, but so will millions of others from losing jobs.

Leese also made the point that whilst other restrictions are still needed to help curb the spread, it is still the case that the extremely large majority of deaths are elderly people, and average age of icu patient is retirement age (hospitalisations lower at c.60). So yes we need other things to help stop the spread as well, but shielding would significantly help reduce the number of hospital admissions. I’m not sure why we haven’t reintroduced this. Even in tier three shielding isn’t mandatory.

Some will say it’s unfair to introduce shielding for, say, 85 year olds in areas with low rates of infection. But others will wonder which is more likely to lead to deaths - a 25 year old going to a covid secure place of work, or two 85 year olds meeting up indoors with their two school aged grandkids, son and daughter in law who have both been into work.

Doesn’t have to be one of shielding or jobs - why not both?

Explained far better than I could ever hope to. Thanks for posting this as this is what I’ve been trying to highlight 

[Well b back 3,203]

54 minutes ago, ricardo said:

This is the problem for places like N. Zealand. Lots of vulnerable and few with any sort of immunity due to lack of exposure.

Hide until a vaccine arrives seems to be the answer.

Hi Ricardo

Yes surely the answer is not long to a vaccine so take absoloutely no risks. But NZ will be a template for areas like this and China. How will they play it going forward, will it be you show us your vaccination proof or you quarantine for 2 weeks.

[Well b back 3,203]

1 hour ago, Teemu’s right foot said:

So to continue my theme, a new day and a new story of more death that lockdown has caused. Experts are saying 1 in 3 people died with lung cancer during lockdown and many of those deaths have been put down as death from covid as the symptoms were the same

Also 

22,896 people with severe mental illness did not get their annual health checks in Mar-Jun 2020.

NHS warwickshire the worst performing at just 8% of people seen. 

122 out of 1385 patients.

48,772 increase in waiting treatment for cancer NHS England April to August 2020.

▪︎ Breast 13,171
▪︎ Urology 13,118
▪︎ Skin 6,036
▪︎ Gastrointestinal 4,505
▪︎ Lung 3,093

 

 

So what’s your answer ? As I don’t know what it is. These wards and doctors are still open for business but people are refusing to go. It’s not the hospitals closed ( at least at the current time ). I am trying to understand why letting Covid run through the population would make these figures any better. 
Some countries like New Zealand and China are reporting their flu seasons are virtually zero. Consequently as they no longer have Covid or flu, both their economies and their deaths have dramatic improvements this year.

[ricardo 7,385]

40 minutes ago, Mark .Y. said:

Can anybody clear one thing up for me.

Pretty much at the beginning of all this, there was quite a scandal about Dominic Cummings being at SAGE meetings.

I seem to remember something coming out that he had wanted an earlier lockdown put in place (obviously for the general population - not him personally 😉 ) but the Scientists had said it wasn't required.

Is that correct or not ?  It seems to be a very important point to me and rarely gets mentioned when the Government is criticised for not locking down early enough. Of course, that may be because the story was simply untrue - but I would like to know.

Yes, the Guardian ran a story claiming Cummings spoke at a SAGE meeting when they were discussing lockdowns. The inference was that he spoke against it but tellingly the Guardian dropped the story when it came out that he had spoken in favour.

[ricardo 7,385]

15 minutes ago, Well b back said:

Hi Ricardo

Yes surely the answer is not long to a vaccine so take absoloutely no risks. But NZ will be a template for areas like this and China. How will they play it going forward, will it be you show us your vaccination proof or you quarantine for 2 weeks.

It will be interesting to see how it plays out but a hide strategy can't  work forever. Failing a certain amonut of  immunity due to exposure, a successful vaccine is the only long term answer.

[sonyc 5,517]

7 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Yes, the Guardian ran a story claiming Cummings spoke at a SAGE meeting when they were discussing lockdowns. The inference was that he spoke against it but tellingly the Guardian dropped the story when it came out that he had spoken in favour.

And I was thinking he wanted a lockdown sooner....that was my recollection. I found some sources supporting this.

https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/brexit-news/dominic-cummings-swayed-sage-coronavirus-debate-in-his-favour-report-76580

Of course he then did his own thing.

[horsefly 4,300]

35 minutes ago, Mark .Y. said:

Can anybody clear one thing up for me.

Pretty much at the beginning of all this, there was quite a scandal about Dominic Cummings being at SAGE meetings.

I seem to remember something coming out that he had wanted an earlier lockdown put in place (obviously for the general population - not him personally 😉 ) but the Scientists had said it wasn't required.

Is that correct or not ?  It seems to be a very important point to me and rarely gets mentioned when the Government is criticised for not locking down early enough. Of course, that may be because the story was simply untrue - but I would like to know.

I don't think we will ever know for certain unless there is a genuinely independent judicial inquiry. The outrage of Cummings being present was that it interfered with a process of a truly independent meeting motivated  purely by scientific knowledge and expertise. 

Connected to this, we also really need to know what questions the government put forward for the scientists to answer. I am deeply suspicious that a lot of the early recommendations of Sage were premissed on a large number of caveats introduced by the government as a result of its lack of preparedness for a pandemic. I don't think it is wildly speculative to imagine the questions were something like, "Given we don't have access to anywhere near enough PPE for the next month what does the committee recommend regarding ..."

Let's hope this all comes out in the future.

[ricardo 7,385]

Oh dear, 75 cases at Bernard Matthews factory.

[Aggy 755]

1 hour ago, Yellow Fever said:

I'm really not sure anymore what you're trying to argue.

The 600K figure was in the paper simply as a ground truth as the risks match - and was roughly also the annual mortality rate. The risks were taken from the hard data of the first wave - not hypothetical.

Of course Covid deaths will be a lot less due to the very things you appear to be arguing against - restrictions, lockdowns etc. - and of course better and earlier treatments and perhaps even an eventual vaccine.

T's 200K is also a very nebulous and even a more hypothetical figure - you could and can make similar arguments about future 'deaths' caused by Brexit and climate change. pollution etc.  Many do.

Bottom line is we have to deal with the here and now and the current health emergency. These deaths are not hazy but real and countable this year. Once we have sorted the pandemic then we can attend to longer term issues. When you are up to your neck in alligators, it's easy to forget that the goal was to drain the swamp

Restrict and suppress the virus such that we can keep the NHS (and jobs/society) operating quasi-normally (and I was there today no problems) so that we don't get the 200K or more deaths due to lack of screening and any other 'add-on' effects (it hasn't happened yet as per BHS/ONS quote)). Let the NHS be overwhelmed by wishful thinking and you'll get the very worst of all worlds.

Lastly, no government anywhere in the world, even the most authoritarian have tried to just 'shield' the supposed vulnerable (even if they really know who they are) but otherwise left society open and business unaffected. That said some societies are naturally better at social distancing than others. Those that have tried to play down or ignore Covid have generally have come a cropper.

200k = modelling system based on what actually happened and predicted outcomes. 600k = modelling system based on hypothetical conditions which don’t exist and haven’t for seven months (no restrictions at all). Literally no point using the 600k figure unless people are suggesting we scrap all restrictions - which nobody is. 

Nobody has said we should have shielding and nothing else. Literally said three times in last post we need other restrictions as well. The question asked was whether there was any argument for not having shielding in conjunction with other restrictions other than “some people might not comply”? As Sonyc says, no need to answer but twisting the question to try and belittle the point being made = not cool.

The point being made is:

your worst case scenario with no restrictions = 600k deaths.

We have got various restrictions in place, so 600k deaths isn’t going to happen, using the modelling you’ve linked.

Other modelling suggests previous lockdowns could have already caused potentially more than 200k deaths either having already occurred or will occur in the future. Ignoring that figure is outrageous.

It might be the case that more than 200k deaths in the medium to long term is the “better” figure but it needs to be considered and monitored. WHO director thinks so. Sage scientists think so. Boris clearly thinks so as we aren’t in full lockdown yet. You don’t. Fair enough.

Eg; (completely made up figures): if current restrictions will lead to 10,000 deaths from covid in a month and a lockdown for the same period would cause 10,000 “collateral” early deaths (20,000 total) then how does that change in various situations?

If full lockdown for a month reduces covid deaths to 2,000 but causes 75,000 “collateral” deaths in the next few years then full lockdown isn’t worth it. 
Equally if the initial figures were 100,000 deaths from covid in a month and lockdown helps reduce it to 10,000 in total including collateral then clearly lockdown is sensible.

Hospitals becoming overwhelmed needs  to be factored in. If they’re overwhelmed, more people will die than if they’re not overwhelmed. That’s obvious. But if the measures put in place to stop hospitals being overwhelmed will kill more than they will save, then are they worth it? 

I don’t know the figures. I expect the government does (or at least has pretty good modelling from various different disciplines) and the figures suggest that anything more than a one-off two week circuit break (and even that only if things get very bad) will cause more death than it will save. Which is why nowhere in the world is suggesting another full lockdown for sustained periods. 

[sonyc 5,517]

15 minutes ago, Well b back said:

So what’s your answer ? As I don’t know what it is. These wards and doctors are still open for business but people are refusing to go. It’s not the hospitals closed ( at least at the current time ). I am trying to understand why letting Covid run through the population would make these figures any better. 
Some countries like New Zealand and China are reporting their flu seasons are virtually zero. Consequently as they no longer have Covid or flu, both their economies and their deaths have dramatic improvements this year.

One of my biggest beefs as you'll know from previous posts is that government health messaging could be much stronger, more robust. In this crisis especially but beyond too. It would help for more adverts on TV, in papers that encourage people to visit GPs, to get screenings etc. It might work because people could be much more receptive about health warnings.....many people have changed diets to give one example. That is a positive. The public is scared though isn't it? Our main media outlets do love putting the frighteners on. They are effective in this respect. 

[Teemu’s right foot 53]

Just now, sonyc said:

One of my biggest beefs as you'll know from previous posts is that government health messaging could be much stronger, more robust. In this crisis especially but beyond too. It would help for more adverts on TV, in papers that encourage people to visit GPs, to get screenings etc. It might work because people could be much more receptive about health warnings.....many people have changed diets to give one example. That is a positive. The public is scared though isn't it? Our main media outlets do love putting the frighteners on. They are effective in this respect. 

It’s no coincidence that the Nhs is advertising it’s open on practically every commercial break now. The government know what they have done regarding this and the figures for deaths involving these illnesses I’ve highlighted over the next year or two won’t be pretty. In hindsight it wasn’t the brightest idea to go with the slogan “protect the nhs, stay at home and save lives” as many people have taken that advice literally, detrimental to their own health 

[Well b back 3,203]

2 minutes ago, sonyc said:

One of my biggest beefs as you'll know from previous posts is that government health messaging could be much stronger, more robust. In this crisis especially but beyond too. It would help for more adverts on TV, in papers that encourage people to visit GPs, to get screenings etc. It might work because people could be much more receptive about health warnings.....many people have changed diets to give one example. That is a positive. The public is scared though isn't it? Our main media outlets do love putting the frighteners on. They are effective in this respect. 

Yep

Apparently the Goverment are about to release a film about long Covid which will outline ( apparently ) the old die, we don’t know what’s going to happen to others we are only just beginning to find out. Again 3 months to late, no good scaring the youngsters now it’s to late. 
On the positive side once this is under control, have you seen New Zealand and China’s death figures ( all causes ) they have plummeted. That just goes to show when the Goverment was being listened to ie wash hands and generally be hygienic it seems to have almost wiped out flu.

[ricardo 7,385]

4 minutes ago, Teemu’s right foot said:

It’s no coincidence that the Nhs is advertising it’s open on practically every commercial break now. The government know what they have done regarding this and the figures for deaths involving these illnesses I’ve highlighted over the next year or two won’t be pretty. In hindsight it wasn’t the brightest idea to go with the slogan “protect the nhs, stay at home and save lives” as many people have taken that advice literally, detrimental to their own health 

There can be little doubt that people feared attending appointments. The big drop in people going to A&E show this clearly.

[sonyc 5,517]

7 minutes ago, Teemu’s right foot said:

It’s no coincidence that the Nhs is advertising it’s open on practically every commercial break now. The government know what they have done regarding this and the figures for deaths involving these illnesses I’ve highlighted over the next year or two won’t be pretty. In hindsight it wasn’t the brightest idea to go with the slogan “protect the nhs, stay at home and save lives” as many people have taken that advice literally, detrimental to their own health 

Yep. That particular message worked well for compliance. Weirdly, the Clap for the NHS worked even better. That was a social media campaign of course but it struck a chord. I believe the public is responsive to messaging (I'm old enough to still remember the hooded devil warning of children swimming in lakes!). I guess the government is learning all the time.