CV19 - Cure worse than the disease? (Vol 10)

[moanthebairns]

TheJimi said:

Steve vRS said:

alangla said:

It'll be interesting to see what Sturgeon comes out with this afternoon. Several areas of mainland Scotland are now at infection levels that would be tier zero under the old bandings, tier 1 under the new - even urban plague pits like Glasgow would be in tier 2 under the old bandings. Looking at the detailed data that's been published, it looks like several authorities have got very concentrated outbreaks with very little across the rest of their areas. Surely the justification for national restrictions has long gone?

She will not move quicker than England. I’d put a large wager on it but would be happy to be proved wrong.

Me too.

Not a snowball's chance in hell she'll move quicker.

Although, she might - if she thinks it makes her look more reasonable than Boris, just in time for the elections around the corner.

She is proposing that 4 people from 2 households can now meet outside, as opposed to 2 people from 2 households.

I was out in a group of 4 on the mountain bike at the weekend from 4 different households. I wasn't the fking only one.

This is a token gesture, seen to be doing something. They must know people have been doing this for months, they bloody well will after Sundays shenanigans.

[TheJimi]

moanthebairns said:

TheJimi said:

Steve vRS said:

alangla said:

It'll be interesting to see what Sturgeon comes out with this afternoon. Several areas of mainland Scotland are now at infection levels that would be tier zero under the old bandings, tier 1 under the new - even urban plague pits like Glasgow would be in tier 2 under the old bandings. Looking at the detailed data that's been published, it looks like several authorities have got very concentrated outbreaks with very little across the rest of their areas. Surely the justification for national restrictions has long gone?

She will not move quicker than England. I’d put a large wager on it but would be happy to be proved wrong.

Me too.

Not a snowball's chance in hell she'll move quicker.

Although, she might - if she thinks it makes her look more reasonable than Boris, just in time for the elections around the corner.

She is proposing that 4 people from 2 households can now meet outside, as opposed to 2 people from 2 households.

I was out in a group of 4 on the mountain bike at the weekend from 4 different households. I wasn't the fking only one.

This is a token gesture, seen to be doing something. They must know people have been doing this for months, they bloody well will after Sundays shenanigans.

Utter s. Even Prof Woolhouse, a member of sage, said openly that outdoor transmission risk is very low.

[bodhi]

Garvin said:

When the hospitalisations and deaths hit rock bottom in the coming weeks surely business will put immense pressure on the government to open up quickly, media will be reporting it and the Tory ‘rebels’ will be on the backs of Boris and Sunak. The more so as the sterilising effect of the vaccines seems to be quite good as well. The spectre of mutations will continue but that risk will be with us forever and a day and we can’t continue to hide from that risk . . . . . . can we?

Really interesting view from an anonymous molecular biologist in the US, who it is strongly suggested works for Moderna.

https://twitter.com/sailorrooscout/status/13689217...

If my understanding is correct, she is suggesting that because E484K is so prevalent in all the mutations no matter where they appear, it may be that they are as bad as they are going to get. She doesn't eliminate the possibility that SARS-CoV2 has another couple of tricks up it's sleeve, but is feeling generally optimistic overall.

[SCEtoAUX]

Whitty and Vallance taking the piss now.

They know the game is up, just can't bring themselves to say "You not what, when we said 'follow the science' we meant 'follow the science if it tells us what we want it to' "

Positive tests dropping at over 30% each week
Daily deaths at seasonal flu levels
Spring coming
23 million vaccinated, 30 million by the end of March
Hospitalisations at 20% of peak and falling

Absolutely no reason why they can't bring things forward a bit, because you know what, I think people would be more likely to stick to the rules if they did.

[Not-The-Messiah]

Garvin said:

When the hospitalisations and deaths hit rock bottom in the coming weeks surely business will put immense pressure on the government to open up quickly, media will be reporting it and the Tory ‘rebels’ will be on the backs of Boris and Sunak. The more so as the sterilising effect of the vaccines seems to be quite good as well. The spectre of mutations will continue but that risk will be with us forever and a day and we can’t continue to hide from that risk . . . . . . can we?

The only group that can put pressure on the government are the media. And they love lockdown, the media control the millions of Sheep in society the government know this so intern being populist are also controlled by the media.

[Elysium]

rfsteel said:

EddieSteadyGo said:

rfsteel said:

This got me thinking, if case numbers are irrelevant due to the @1m tests a day being conducted, isn't cases positivity the way to go, number cases / number cases ?

Taking the data from https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ for Cases by date reported & Virus tests conducted and was able to plot the following;

It is a bit hard to read the scale on your graph, but I agree positivity rates is an important measure, but I would say we should look at PCR positivity rates (to minimise the distortion mass testing acheives).

Sorry chart was quickly thrown together. the X axis goes to 0.25 (25%) but never passes 0.1929 (19.29%), infact these are the 4 highest values and dates on the graph;

22/04/2020 4451 23073 0.192909461
24/04/2020 5386 28225 0.190823738
21/04/2020 4301 22763 0.188946975
25/04/2020 4913 29058 0.169075642

We as the latest values are;

06/03/2021 6040 452750 0.013340696
05/03/2021 5947 953671 0.006235903
04/03/2021 6573 992812 0.006620589
03/03/2021 6385 863658 0.007392973
02/03/2021 6391 675543 0.009460538
01/03/2021 5455 727972 0.00749342
28/02/2021 6035 526679 0.011458592

edit - cleaned up the axis

Test positivity is a key metric. I have been tracking it alongside deaths and admissions where the relationship has been clear and consistent:



The massive increase in LFD tests actually makes a surprisingly minor difference to the data. Despite all the LFD noise, cases per 100k tests and cases overall are declining at a predictable rate. Halving every 18 days since the New Year

[paulw123]

SCEtoAUX said:

Whitty and Vallance taking the piss now.

They know the game is up, just can't bring themselves to say "You not what, when we said 'follow the science' we meant 'follow the science if it tells us what we want it to' "

Positive tests dropping at over 30% each week
Daily deaths at seasonal flu levels
Spring coming
23 million vaccinated, 30 million by the end of March
Hospitalisations at 20% of peak and falling

Absolutely no reason why they can't bring things forward a bit, because you know what, I think people would be more likely to stick to the rules if they did.

It’s getting harder and harder to justify the restrictions now. Even my clients who have barely left the house in a year are 3 weeks past their jab and cracking on as normal as the restrictions allow. Hoping for a sunny Easter weekend now and let the carnage commence. Gov are so desperate to control the narrative now I have no idea what they will find next. 5.4 million tests last week to ‘find’ 40k cases. Spending money like it’s going out of fashion.

[isaldiri]

Garvin said:

The more so as the sterilising effect of the vaccines seems to be quite good as well.

What sterilising effect? It's being theorised that it reduces transmission - there is nothing as far as I have seen that says anything about sterilising immunity (especially long term sterilising immunity).

[a311]

danllama said:

LBC can't help themselves but I did enjoy this first comment

I don't know the guy, he doesn't seem to me like he'd care but you wonder how much could be down to some of this mob enjoying the spot light this had brought and not wanting to step out of it into obscurity.

All that aside it would seem that the vaccine is doing its job, keeping people out of hospital and from dying (with COVID).

I've been anti lockdown from pretty much the moment it seemed fairly obvious most of the population weren't at much of a risk of being seriously ill and dying from it.

The thing I can't reconcile myself with, was the situation in the hospitals. It won't be the same across the board but our local hospital was full to the point they had to re-commission an old maternity ward that was due for demolition to stick COVID patients in. Deaths have been low but it seems to choke up hospitals with people who need admitted and need medical attention (I don't know what the average admission time with COVID is) but for a week or two.

I don't know what the answer to this is, like the majority I hope we learn to live with it and never have to lockdown again.

[Elysium]

Update on Excess Deaths following todays ONS report:

1. Deaths by age band. I have shared this spreadsheet previoiusly, but now include an estimate of deaths per million population for the entire pandemic to date. A grand total of 809 people under 40 have died. 0.6% of deaths from almost 50% of the population.

27 people per million.



This graph attempts to show the number of people in each age group who have died with COVID (red) or survived the pandemic (blue) by age band. For most ages the deaths are barely visible. For the 90+ group, which is the most significantly impacted, deaths are still just over 5%



3. This graph looks at weekly deaths 'due to' COVID (orange) and non COVID related (blue) and compares them to the 5 year max, min and average. I have also show a green line for the point of statistically significant excess (2 standard deviations) and an 'upper bound' as used by PHE of 3 standard deviations from the mean:



It is now increasingly clear that the first wave consists of a highly unusual spike following a mild winter period. However, the second wave appears to follow a normal seasonal pattern, but at significantly elevated mortality. To be honest, I am surprised at how closely it is tracking past years

[Saweep]

The UAE has now vaccinated 64% of its population.

Why is it on the no fly list?

It's really fking my life up not being able to even transit through the Middle East.

[Driller]

Alucidnation said:

Seems Whitty isn't convinced and has basically said there will be another surge, which makes sense i guess.


"Prof Chris Whitty, England's chief medical officer, tells the Commons Science and Technology Select Committee that all the modelling shows there will be another surge of the virus despite the vaccination programme."

A study has been done of the Hong King sars virus showing that it could be contagious ip to a distance of 200m. This could explain why despite all the lockdown bullst, seasonal colds, flu snd gastro have all but disappeared but covid is here to stay. Confine the sick and old, let the rest of us live with it and use our immune systems

[Otispunkmeyer]

isaldiri said:

Garvin said:

The more so as the sterilising effect of the vaccines seems to be quite good as well.

What sterilising effect? It's being theorised that it reduces transmission - there is nothing as far as I have seen that says anything about sterilising immunity (especially long term sterilising immunity).

Yes the theory is that reduced symptoms = reduced transmission (in a round about way, someone did correct me that it was to do with binding and neutralising titers, i guess they reduce shedding?)

[MiniMan64]

If there’s not a major spike in the next 2 weeks with schools back then it will be increasingly impossible to maintain the schedule. I know some of the more fringe posters in the thread were hoping for a bit of wide spread disobedience but I think you’ll just see a slow and steady increase in people choosing the rules as the “fear” ebbs away. Especially if we get another hit of good weather towards Easter.

What I can’t understand is why Boris wouldn’t advance it, massive political gain to be made there surely...?

[Saweep]

Otispunkmeyer said:

isaldiri said:

Garvin said:

The more so as the sterilising effect of the vaccines seems to be quite good as well.

What sterilising effect? It's being theorised that it reduces transmission - there is nothing as far as I have seen that says anything about sterilising immunity (especially long term sterilising immunity).

Yes the theory is that reduced symptoms = reduced transmission (in a round about way, someone did correct me that it was to do with binding and neutralising titers, i guess they reduce shedding?)

This is one of those knots that the govt have tied themselves in. Tough one to get out of.

How can reduced symptoms reduce transmission when we are told, at least 1000 times per day, everywhere, that the driver of all this madness is people without symptoms?

[deebs]

TheJimi said:

moanthebairns said:

TheJimi said:

Steve vRS said:

alangla said:

It'll be interesting to see what Sturgeon comes out with this afternoon. Several areas of mainland Scotland are now at infection levels that would be tier zero under the old bandings, tier 1 under the new - even urban plague pits like Glasgow would be in tier 2 under the old bandings. Looking at the detailed data that's been published, it looks like several authorities have got very concentrated outbreaks with very little across the rest of their areas. Surely the justification for national restrictions has long gone?

She will not move quicker than England. I’d put a large wager on it but would be happy to be proved wrong.

Me too.

Not a snowball's chance in hell she'll move quicker.

Although, she might - if she thinks it makes her look more reasonable than Boris, just in time for the elections around the corner.

She is proposing that 4 people from 2 households can now meet outside, as opposed to 2 people from 2 households.

I was out in a group of 4 on the mountain bike at the weekend from 4 different households. I wasn't the fking only one.

This is a token gesture, seen to be doing something. They must know people have been doing this for months, they bloody well will after Sundays shenanigans.

Utter s. Even Prof Woolhouse, a member of sage, said openly that outdoor transmission risk is very low.

I agree that all that she is likely to announce is socialising rules eased allowing outodoor meeting of four people from two households, and maybe some concessions on kids sport. Which in reality, is "phase 2" of the non-roadmap, which was "unlikely before 15th March". She will probably say these changes are from later in this week, which will mean in reality all she is doing is bringing forward what was Phase 2 by a few days. There's nothing in phase 2 that most reasonable people arent already doing, and blowing a trumpet saying we are doing it early when its really only a few days is just more games.

[Not-The-Messiah]

The world's most deadly pandemic in a generation. A year where the global population growth was still around 80 million. The UK population as gone up 320000 in the same year.
God forbid we actually do come across a truly deadly disease one day.

[Otispunkmeyer]

MiniMan64 said:

If there’s not a major spike in the next 2 weeks with schools back then it will be increasingly impossible to maintain the schedule. I know some of the more fringe posters in the thread were hoping for a bit of wide spread disobedience but I think you’ll just see a slow and steady increase in people choosing the rules as the “fear” ebbs away. Especially if we get another hit of good weather towards Easter.

What I can’t understand is why Boris wouldn’t advance it, massive political gain to be made there surely...?

I thought work had been done now to suggest spreading at primary school at least was a nothing. Secondary might be a different story though.

And yes, I never understood why he said the decisions would be data driven, then proceeded to lay out a timeline with immovable milestone dates. Which is it Boris?

[Boringvolvodriver]

Elysium- thank you for the graphs and spreadsheets.

It would be interesting to see the number of total deaths in each age range band to see how many people have died of other things. And what percentage of the population that equates to as well.

I have tried to look at it before but struggle to collate in an iPad as the ONS spread sheets are hard to read and pull together.

Thanks .

[Ntv]

SCEtoAUX said:

Whitty and Vallance taking the piss now.

They know the game is up, just can't bring themselves to say "You not what, when we said 'follow the science' we meant 'follow the science if it tells us what we want it to' "

Positive tests dropping at over 30% each week
Daily deaths at seasonal flu levels
Spring coming
23 million vaccinated, 30 million by the end of March
Hospitalisations at 20% of peak and falling

Absolutely no reason why they can't bring things forward a bit, because you know what, I think people would be more likely to stick to the rules if they did.

Imagine Chris Whitty singing "I've had the time of my life". Why might he want this to continue??

Sometimes hearing these dudes (and to be fair they are FAR from the most extreme) it's almost as if there isn't a vaccine roll-out.

The "risk of mutation" was their last desperate card (Boris bought it I note - he does come across as incredibly one-dimensional much of the time). It's now not clear why we're keeping restrictions in place for so long.

It can't really be that a few more old dears might die with COVID as they are all acknowledging flu / learn to live with it etc.

I suspect part of the reason is they want Brits to holiday in the UK for economic reasons.