terrytini

So, that Dean Smith fella eh ?

“Red States” experiencing a significant upturn in cases.

Already.

Salutary lesson to all rational people.

24 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Re the discussion about Sunak and Hancock:

It's very interesting to see how people's perceptions are guided by the public-facing roles ministers play. Inevitable, I suppose, but rather misleading at times. About two weeks ago, when the papers were reporting on the government debating about easing the lockdown, they noted that the cabinet were largely split into 'hawks' who wanted to end the lockdown early, accompanied by faster reductions in financial support, and 'doves' who wanted to move more slowly on both fronts. The most prominent hawk was Rishi Sunak (along with Dominic Raab); the most firmly dove-ish was Matt Hancock (with Johnson said to be leaning that way).

I say this not to excuse Hancock for his manifold failures, but to point out that government is a collective endeavour, and just because Sunak has the nice-seeming job of handing out money, doesn't mean that he's inherently 'nicer' or 'better' than anyone else.

Hear hear.

2 minutes ago, sne said:

Things are bleak, people still doesn't seem to grasp how serious it is.

It really is down to how many lives are people willing to risk or sacrifice so that for example Burton Albion or Grimsby Town can survive.

Yup.

In all respects, Premier League or anything else, it all boils down to the severity of the disease.

None of us know for certain how bad it will be,  but it is how bad it will be that will define everything else. 

Or to put it another way, at one end of the scale we have events that barely affect life. Far across at the other extreme we have existential threats.

It would be just as daft to suggest football ( or anything else) would carry on under the latter as it would to suggest it should stop for the former. So the reality is just a question of where we are on that scale, and the debate is a function of where we as individuals think we are or might be on that scale. 
 

So, yes, if things are bad enough ( whatever that looks like) it will impact accordingly.

It doesn’t make a scrap of difference whether Clubs will go bankrupt. Just like it doesn’t make a scrap of difference if the Pub, or the Cinema, or the Builders Merchant go bankrupt. 
 

If the illness is severe enough, that’s what will happen. If it isn’t severe enough, it won’t.

3 hours ago, villalad21 said:

But there isn't any evidence to suggest this Virus will get any better anytime soon. In fact the virus may turn more aggressive and become more deadly, no one knows.

The Spanish flu actually turned more deadly during the second wave.

So would you recommend to void the whole of next season too?

As things stand, yes.

57 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

I don't know, I read somewhere yesterday, (and i know that's hardly the strongest source ever) that 49% of people in employment are now having (at least some of) their wages paid directly by the government at this point.

What wriggle room is there under the current economic paradigm to do anything other than raise taxes and cut costs to get out of that?

Genuine question that to our resident economists. 

 

 

There are alternatives.

And if those alternatives aren’t welcome, ( politically or ideologically )increased taxation done properly shouldn’t require the destruction of our infrastructure or of people’s livelihoods.

54 minutes ago, welnik said:

Please, elaborate, I'm very interested? 

I think the debate on how it is all paid for will be as fundamental as any other part of this crisis, so I’d expect it’s inevitable this thread will include arguments about it. When that happens I will join in !
 

But for the present I think it’s safe to say there’s plenty of money, and plenty of alternative credible economic theory, around. Not the least of which is known ( somewhat oddly, as it’s not new) ‘modern monetary theory’.

Whether we see the political or ideological will is another question. It’s usually easier to convince ordinary people to stump up.

7 hours ago, welnik said:

By which time I will have had back all the tax I paid last year and more! 

How the actual, are we supposed to pay for it all? 

It’s very affordable. 
I could say more. Indeed, I thought I did. 

3 hours ago, welnik said:

By which time I will have had back all the tax I paid last year and more! 

How the actual, are we supposed to pay for it all? 

Because money is all pretend !

I pay you, you pay me, we pay him. Round and round it goes.

Largely a convenient illusion.

But notwithstanding that it can be afforded with relatively modest taxation ( especially if we finally embrace the idea that there’s a lot of money in the hands of relatively few) over a long period. Then the only issue is whether the Markets will be happy with it and, by and large, they will be.

Remember it’s only a couple of years back we were told there was no money for the very modest proposals in the Labour Manifesto versus Theresa May. 
 

Yet there was. And there is.

1 hour ago, Straggler said:

Seriously, what the hell happened to test, track, trace and isolate? It is impossible to contain a virus if you don't know where it is. How are we going to evaluate if there is a spike? The plan seems to be wait until people start turning up in hospital sick, which is way too late. Going back to work is fine we all need to pay our bills, but this a Hunger games lottery.

This, this, and more this.

Without it, everything else is irrelevant.

35 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Further information on carehomes and carers:

'The report' mentioned in the first tweet is 'Care and support workers’ perceptions of health and safetyissues in socialcareduring the COVID-19 pandemic': https://media.www.kent.ac.uk/se/11148/CareworkersHealthandSafetyreport15042.pdf

Reminder: most care workers barely make minimum wage.

Interesting in many ways, and unsurprisingly disturbing. Good to see an effort has been made to shine a spotlight on the Area.

Oddly the Report is written as if all Care is in Private Ownership, whereas many Care Homes are Council run, and aren’t mentioned. In those cases of course, staff absent through illness would be on full pay.

Its also interesting how mild many of the criticisms and observations from staff members are. I have heard much worse. Now, is that because staff are reluctant to speak out formally, or some other reason. In any event i5 makes the issue seem less serious than it is ( whilst it does indeed show it is serious).

There is little by way of direct criticism of Senior Management ( which in the case of Local Authorities has been astonishingly negligent) and CQC get off lightly in respect of their decision to cease Inspections. Not the smallest consequence of this is that Homes are now not meeting the Minimum Staff Numbers requirements, particularly overnight. Should an accident or other tragedy occur there are Homes with nowhere near enough staff to help the Residents..regardless of Co-vid there is enormous suffering due to lack of numbers.

In short, I said weeks ago that my advice to anyone with a person they care about in a Home, would be if at all possible get them out. Whilst I am aware of a couple of Homes where there seem to have been no cases, for the most part I would still say the same.

On 28/03/2020 at 16:19, terrytini said:

I’ve never been more certain of anything than I am that this Season is over 

So, 45 days and 152 pages later, anything changed yet ?

2 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

I don’t think there will be another spike in cases. The worst is behind us in my opinion. Which is why stock market is holding up. 

I think you are in for the shock of your life. We’ve have barely got started, in my view.

Though I do agree it is opinions only at this stage, anyone who says they know is fooling themselves.

I would add that I saw somewhere reference to a study of mice which showed repeated low doses could be just as infectious as a single high dose. 
This would obviously call into question some of the assumptions in the article over page.

@HanoiVillan - have you found anything that factually describes the ‘viral load’ parameters ?

For people to advise on the distance/time equation they must have more detailed knowledge of this than Ive seen anywhere.

The implication is you can get a certain amount of virus and it not make you sick. Perhaps that accounts for the asymptomatic people ? 
This in turn raises the possibility that a limited amount of exposure could - could - if it still initiated the creation of antibodies, create a possibility that such cases might get immunity ( with all the caveats about that).

A related issue would be the question of getting repeated amounts of virus at different times. In each case too little to cause illness. How many times, and/or over what time period could this be repeated ? 
Many other questions are raised by this, but I’ve found little research.

@HanoiVillan another great informative Post. Good stuff.

3 minutes ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

This sounds about right.  Especially when I hear things like people will be allowed to exercise twice a day instead of once.

We are still allowed to do none yes ? 

Just checking.....everyone staying alert ? Everyone controlling the virus ? Jolly good show, keep it up.

No chance Stephen Miller will get it, no virus would touch him.

I wonder if Humpty Trumpty will now think testing and tracing has some merit after all.

I doubt it.

And the Head of the FDA yesterday - carnage.

..although some of them may not have it, may be precautionary...but what a damning indictment of the way they’ve handled it.

Well they need to quarantine the entire Presidential staff.

But they won’t, because they are led by a fool.