CV19 - Cure worse than the disease? (Vol 5)

[johnboy1975]

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

[smashing]

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

[johnboy1975]

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

[MDMetal]

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

I can imagine the arguments as people bring their kettles in as proof and have to have them tested, it boils water but much slower than normal, is it broken?
But seriously anytime the state tries to intervene with knee jerk badly thought out rules/legislation it's a disaster. It's almost like there's a reason laws take days of debate and oversight and are drawn up over many months by people that know what they're doing...

[markyb_lcy]

Apologies if we’ve had this already, but this is now getting interesting. I always hoped something like this would happen...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/25/to...

Torygraph said:

Tory MPs want a pandemic equivalent of the European Research Group
Former ERG head Steve Baker is being urged by almost a hundred lawmakers to put the case for an alternative to perpetual Covid lockdowns

[Newc]

djohnson said:

We surely wouldn’t be in a position whereby the developers and / or manufacturers of a vaccine had no accountability for its effects? If those who develop and make it won’t stand behind it then you’d be nuts to take it unless it was an absolute last chance, which for 99.9% of people it won’t be.

It's going well in Korea:

https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavir...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore has temporarily halted the use of two influenza vaccines as a precaution after some people who received them in South Korea died, becoming among the first countries to publicly announce a halt of the vaccines’ usage.

[smashing]

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

Tesco losing out on sales because of government intervention creates SM st storm to force government to undo said intervention.

[CrutyRammers]

Warby80 said:

CrutyRammers said:

Elysium said:

Daily cases by specimen date are varying significantly, between 14k and 25K in the last week.

Daily PCR swabs processed is also varying considerably between 260k and 340k over a similar period.

I wanted to understand how these variances might interact, so I put together this graph, which compares test numbers with cases by specimen date 2 days prior:



In september, day to day changes in the number of tests did not make a big difference to the number of cases. However, this has changed during October and there is now a close correlation.

My first thought was that the availability of tests is a limiting factor. So the more we test the more cases we find. If this is true the %'age of positive tests should be similar day to day. However it isn't:



The %'age of positive test results is increasing as numbers of tests increase and falling as they reduce. This should not be happening. It should either fall or remain constant.

I think this is evidence of a significant problem with the testing process as Mike Yeadon has suggested.

More tests leading to a greater percentage of positive results could indicate an increase in the error rate in the laboratories.

You're right in that you wouldn't expect that to happen. But I'd want to see a couple of week's more correlation before I was convinced there's anything there; at the moment I'd file that under "something to keep an eye on" rather than definitive proof. It is certainly worth watching as it does seem rather odd.

The %positive rate has been steadily climbing since the end of Sept, presumably for 2 reasons:

A: more people actually have the virus.

B: testing has been targeted to find these people (on campus testing for students etc)

Yeah, I'm talking about the apparent correlation between the peaks and troughs imposed on the overall trend. Not enough to convince me of a relationship yet, but certainly interesting. One has to be careful not to jump to conclusions, sometimes things are just random and only look like a pattern.

[johnboy1975]

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

Tesco losing out on sales because of government intervention creates SM st storm to force government to undo said intervention.

Its a fairly bonkers interpretation of the rule though. And the fault for that lies squarely with Tesco.

Edit: Apparently after receiving advice from Welsh government

I think it will be u turned. Whether this has helped or not, I'm not so sure.

Respect to the guy doing his weekly shop in his boxers to show the stupidity of clothes being non essential

Edited by johnboy1975 on Monday 26th October 16:14

[Earthdweller]

the-photographer said:

Actual named people or social media comments?

I can name two .. my wife ( an ICU nurse ) and cousin ( a physiotherapist) if that helps

[Alucidnation]

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

Tesco losing out on sales because of government intervention creates SM st storm to force government to undo said intervention.

Its a fairly bonkers interpretation of the rule though. And the fault for that lies squarely with Tesco.

Edit: Apparently after receiving advice from Welsh government

I think it will be u turned. Whether this has helped or not, I'm not so sure.

Respect to the guy doing his weekly shop in his boxers to show the stupidity of clothes being non essential

Edited by johnboy1975 on Monday 26th October 16:14

I thought the idea was to stop supermarkets selling non essential stuff, as non essential shops were forced to close and this would be seen as unfair?

[JagLover]

markyb_lcy said:

Apologies if we’ve had this already, but this is now getting interesting. I always hoped something like this would happen...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/25/to...

Torygraph said:

Tory MPs want a pandemic equivalent of the European Research Group
Former ERG head Steve Baker is being urged by almost a hundred lawmakers to put the case for an alternative to perpetual Covid lockdowns

There has already been suggestions that Boris has been held back from further restrictions by fear of a backbench revolt.

[markyb_lcy]

JagLover said:

markyb_lcy said:

Apologies if we’ve had this already, but this is now getting interesting. I always hoped something like this would happen...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/25/to...

Torygraph said:

Tory MPs want a pandemic equivalent of the European Research Group
Former ERG head Steve Baker is being urged by almost a hundred lawmakers to put the case for an alternative to perpetual Covid lockdowns

There has already been suggestions that Boris has been held back from further restrictions by fear of a backbench revolt.

Is that the addition of a “Tier 4” I saw reported?

Proper scope creep that isn’t it?

I wasn’t a fan of the ERG but if these same libertarian bods organise in support of a return to normal life for the vast majority, then they have my full support.

[EddieSteadyGo]

JagLover said:

There has already been suggestions that Boris has been held back from further restrictions by fear of a backbench revolt.

I'm certain this is the case. We would already be in lockdown if we didn't have some sceptical MPs willing to put their head over the parapet.

However, my concern is that they are going into battle using the wrong arguments e.g. "false positives", "casedemic", "lockdowns don't work" etc.

These are the wrong arguments, and they will be proven to be wrong. "False positives" as the primary cause of the recent rise in cases has largely been debunked by the ONS survey. I believe the "casedemic" arguments will fall when excess deaths start to rise in the next 2-3 weeks. Arguing "lockdowns don't work" is another fallacy - of course if you lock everyone down and reduce interactions between people you will reduce the spread of a respiratory infection - and we will see this from the reduction in infection rates in Wales from their lockdown which will be hard to argue against.

The effective arguments are i) how the harms caused by lockdown are more damaging to overall public health than the lives it saves ii) how shielding can actually work in practise to achieve a lower mortality figures than would be achieved with rolling lockdowns and iii) how we should be focused on isolating those with symptoms rather than the healthy.

IMO Boris is going to continue with the tier system until the credibility of those who have picked the wrong arguments are proven clearly to be wrong. After which he will switch to a lockdown policy towards the end of Nov.

[JagLover]

markyb_lcy said:

JagLover said:

markyb_lcy said:

Apologies if we’ve had this already, but this is now getting interesting. I always hoped something like this would happen...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/25/to...

Torygraph said:

Tory MPs want a pandemic equivalent of the European Research Group
Former ERG head Steve Baker is being urged by almost a hundred lawmakers to put the case for an alternative to perpetual Covid lockdowns

There has already been suggestions that Boris has been held back from further restrictions by fear of a backbench revolt.

Is that the addition of a “Tier 4” I saw reported?

Proper scope creep that isn’t it?

I wasn’t a fan of the ERG but if these same libertarian bods organise in support of a return to normal life for the vast majority, then they have my full support.

I think they were referring in the article I read about why we didn't go into another lockdown when Sage suggested it and they went for the rather half hearted Tier restrictions instead.

[anonymous-user]

EddieSteadyGo said:

I'm certain this is the case. We would already be in lockdown if we didn't have some sceptical MPs willing to put their head over the parapet.

However, my concern is that they are going into battle using the wrong arguments e.g. "false positives", "casedemic", "lockdowns don't work" etc.

These are the wrong arguments, and they will be proven to be wrong. "False positives" as the primary cause of the recent rise in cases has largely been debunked by the ONS survey. I believe the "casedemic" arguments will fall when excess deaths start to rise in the next 2-3 weeks. Arguing "lockdowns don't work" is another fallacy - of course if you lock everyone down and reduce interactions between people you will reduce the spread of a respiratory infection - and we will see this from the reduction in infection rates in Wales from their lockdown which will be hard to argue against.

The effective arguments are i) how the harms caused by lockdown are more damaging to overall public health than the lives it saves ii) how shielding can actually work in practise to achieve a lower mortality figures than would be achieved with rolling lockdowns and iii) how we should be focused on isolating those with symptoms rather than the healthy.

IMO Boris is going to continue with the tier system until the credibility of those who have picked the wrong arguments are proven clearly to be wrong. After which he will switch to a lockdown policy towards the end of Nov.

The most effective argument against the tiered local lockdowns, is that they're ineffective.

[EddieSteadyGo]

RonaldMcDonaldAteMyCat said:

EddieSteadyGo said:

I'm certain this is the case. We would already be in lockdown if we didn't have some sceptical MPs willing to put their head over the parapet.

However, my concern is that they are going into battle using the wrong arguments e.g. "false positives", "casedemic", "lockdowns don't work" etc.

These are the wrong arguments, and they will be proven to be wrong. "False positives" as the primary cause of the recent rise in cases has largely been debunked by the ONS survey. I believe the "casedemic" arguments will fall when excess deaths start to rise in the next 2-3 weeks. Arguing "lockdowns don't work" is another fallacy - of course if you lock everyone down and reduce interactions between people you will reduce the spread of a respiratory infection - and we will see this from the reduction in infection rates in Wales from their lockdown which will be hard to argue against.

The effective arguments are i) how the harms caused by lockdown are more damaging to overall public health than the lives it saves ii) how shielding can actually work in practise to achieve a lower mortality figures than would be achieved with rolling lockdowns and iii) how we should be focused on isolating those with symptoms rather than the healthy.

IMO Boris is going to continue with the tier system until the credibility of those who have picked the wrong arguments are proven clearly to be wrong. After which he will switch to a lockdown policy towards the end of Nov.

The most effective argument against the tiered local lockdowns, is that they're ineffective.

The tiered 1, 2 and 3 level restrictions though aren't really lockdowns. And some SAGE members are already publishing their evidence today that they don't reduce interactions between people and so are ineffective.

Which will be like a pincer movement, bearing in mind as I mentioned earlier, the incorrect arguments being made by the sceptics, which will result in a justification for a full lockdown.

[ChocolateFrog]

Alucidnation said:

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

smashing said:

johnboy1975 said:

http://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-welsh-govern...

Sanitary products "not essential "?

This is the rabbit hole that banning non essential products leads you down. Especially if the list is drawn up by a man.

The cynic in me says that was well played by Tesco's

How so?

More interesting, Drakeford said this

He said:

that supermarkets in the country can sell non-essential items during the firebreak lockdown in "exceptional circumstances".

So presumably if your kettle breaks, you can buy a new one. If you are just buying one for sts and giggles though, you can't

Tesco losing out on sales because of government intervention creates SM st storm to force government to undo said intervention.

Its a fairly bonkers interpretation of the rule though. And the fault for that lies squarely with Tesco.

Edit: Apparently after receiving advice from Welsh government

I think it will be u turned. Whether this has helped or not, I'm not so sure.

Respect to the guy doing his weekly shop in his boxers to show the stupidity of clothes being non essential

Edited by johnboy1975 on Monday 26th October 16:14

I thought the idea was to stop supermarkets selling non essential stuff, as non essential shops were forced to close and this would be seen as unfair?

They don't have the internet in Wales?

I'd not considered the possibility Tesco was doing a bit of political manoeuvring. Makes perfect sense as I can't imagine anyone, even a bloke, could class tampons as non-essential.

[ChocolateFrog]

RonaldMcDonaldAteMyCat said:

EddieSteadyGo said:

I'm certain this is the case. We would already be in lockdown if we didn't have some sceptical MPs willing to put their head over the parapet.

However, my concern is that they are going into battle using the wrong arguments e.g. "false positives", "casedemic", "lockdowns don't work" etc.

These are the wrong arguments, and they will be proven to be wrong. "False positives" as the primary cause of the recent rise in cases has largely been debunked by the ONS survey. I believe the "casedemic" arguments will fall when excess deaths start to rise in the next 2-3 weeks. Arguing "lockdowns don't work" is another fallacy - of course if you lock everyone down and reduce interactions between people you will reduce the spread of a respiratory infection - and we will see this from the reduction in infection rates in Wales from their lockdown which will be hard to argue against.

The effective arguments are i) how the harms caused by lockdown are more damaging to overall public health than the lives it saves ii) how shielding can actually work in practise to achieve a lower mortality figures than would be achieved with rolling lockdowns and iii) how we should be focused on isolating those with symptoms rather than the healthy.

IMO Boris is going to continue with the tier system until the credibility of those who have picked the wrong arguments are proven clearly to be wrong. After which he will switch to a lockdown policy towards the end of Nov.

The most effective argument against the tiered local lockdowns, is that they're ineffective.

It helps when you're on the edge of a Tier 3 zone. Means we can jump in the car and 5 mins later and magically be subject to fewer restrictions.

[Evolved]

Disastrous said:

stitched said:

In my experience it is not a lack of competence with some parents, just laziness.
A couple I knew who owned the fattest kid in my sons school year were a prime example, the child was invited to a party at my house, 5 kids and I had decided to let them, with supervision, cook cottage pie.
He had never seen potatoes or carrots peeled before. Never seen mince cooked.
12 years of age and never seen a meal cooked. Unable to comprehend that the house contained no crisps, sweets or fizzy drinks.
He actually got embarrassed as he thought I was too poor to supply such things, when I realised what he was thinking I pointed out that the house belonged to me outright, the 2 decent cars were mine and so were the 2 motorcycles in the garage.
That the lack of ste in the cupboards was a lifestyle choice was completely alien to his thinking

I know it's not what you mean but I love the mental picture of an adult angrily setting a child straight on the material value of his assets at a kids party. "No mate, it's an S1000rr and it is NOT on a PCP. This watch? Omega. Your dad got one of them? Didn't think so."

Haha, I read it that way too. Kid was thinking, wish I’d not asked now, getting a right lecture