The banker loving, baby-eating Tory party thread (regenerated)

[bickster]

26 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

more on the links

Like I've got nothing better to do than click on invisible links to medical experts talking about economics, xenophobia and behavioural "science." 

[tonyh29]

29 minutes ago, bickster said:

Like I've got nothing better to do than click on invisible links to medical experts talking about economics, xenophobia and behavioural "science." 

your posting history suggests that you do indeed have nothing better to do

 

[bickster]

9 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

your posting history suggests that you do indeed have nothing better to do

 

Currently trying to avoid a meeting about setting up Home Working (as implementation will have feck all to do with me)

[Sam-AVFC]

@tonyh29 I don't have anything better to do.

Also from the same article:

Prof Deenan Pillay, professor of virology, University College London

Quote

Many organisations and businesses are already implementing working from home and reducing meetings. I’m surprised there’s not an emphasis on that, it would be good for government policy to reflect it.

Dr Jennifer Rohn, cell biologist, University College London

Quote

I was surprised and disappointed to see nothing on testing. The people with suggestive symptoms should be tested during their self-isolation, so that we can maintain more reliable data about the actual real-time reach and spread of this epidemic, and so that crucially their immediate contacts can be traced. What is government doing on increasing our supply of testing kits and the workforce to go out and test people at their homes? I was disappointed to hear no update on that.

...

Not banning major events now is the biggest disappointment and surprise for me. I think buy-in would be high anyway – many will already choose not to attend. The virus is clearly circulating in communities, and large gatherings in confined spaces could accelerate onward transmission.

Prof Paul Hunter, professor in medicine, Norwich Medical School, University of East Anglia

Quote

I was expecting there to be something a bit more rigorous. I can’t see that any of these measures are going to have a big impact on the current situation.

...

I would like to see a bit more about why they’re not closing schools and banning large events. We do know, in general, that school holidays lead to a marked reduction of transmission in infections and at the end of school holidays, infection rates take off.

Prof John Ashton, former regional director of public health for north-west England

Quote

This is a kind of ragbag with no particular logic to it. The fact that they are now declaring we’re moving into this second phase, as if it’s some kind of planned event, is really meaningless. We need to mobilise the whole community response to this and they are behaving in a top-down way, in a half-hearted way, so it’s neither one thing nor the other.

They are issuing some semi-directive things but they are not really doing what we need to do, which is to mobilise and encourage communities, neighbourhoods, families to form their own plans for the next period in which the local situation will influence what happens – whether it’s not going out to eat, or stopping sporting events. It will be determined by the data, which they should be sharing promptly and fully with everybody so that people can decide for their town, village, neighbourhood what they need to do.

If everybody reduced the amount of mixing time that they’ve got, that would help to slow things down. We should take this as an opportunity to develop home working. Universities don’t need so much bricks and mortar because there’s so much learning online.

What we’ve got is this cack-handed centralised country trying to run everything from London. In a period of three months we’ve gone from “we don’t need experts” to “we are the experts, we will tell you what to do” and neither position is right. You do need expertise but you also need to trust the population.

So, while 3 out of 4 might agree with some measures taken (or not), they all have concerns about how it has been handled.

[tonyh29]

8 minutes ago, Sam-AVFC said:

@tonyh29 I don't have anything better to do.

[Snip]

So, while 3 out of 4 might agree with some measures taken (or not), they all have concerns about how it has been handled

Agreed and i said as much in my post ..the point was they aren't Behavioural scientists , they are medical doctors and they are giving  "some"  (italics in original post) support to the government position

Edited March 13, 2020 by tonyh29

[bickster]

Is there a reason why people with a degree in Behavioural Psychology get a BA not a BSc?

[bannedfromHandV]

13 minutes ago, bickster said:

Is there a reason why people with a degree in Behavioural Psychology get a BA not a BSc?

Hmm, good question, I don’t know the answer but I’d guess it’s because behavioural psychology is quite far from an exact science, of sorts.

[blandy]

33 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

.the point was they aren't Behavioural scientists , they are medical doctors and they are giving  "some"  (italics in original post) support to the government position

We have been told the "plan" is to slow down the rate of spread of the lurgie, so that hospitals and medics don't get overloaded. Given that we know the virus spreads exponentially, or thereabouts - there is absolutely no compatibility between the "plan" (slow it down) and the lax approach (being kind) to mass gatherings etc. Schools is different, but sporting and cultural events, large workplaces etc - these should absolutely have been handled as other nations have done, given the "slow it down" plan.

That this hasn't been done suggests either the plan isn't the stated one, or that the Gov't is incompetent (or both).

I'll go with "both"

[hippo]

27 minutes ago, blandy said:

We have been told the "plan" is to slow down the rate of spread of the lurgie, so that hospitals and medics don't get overloaded. Given that we know the virus spreads exponentially, or thereabouts - there is absolutely no compatibility between the "plan" (slow it down) and the lax approach (being kind) to mass gatherings etc. Schools is different, but sporting and cultural events, large workplaces etc - these should absolutely have been handled as other nations have done, given the "slow it down" plan.

That this hasn't been done suggests either the plan isn't the stated one, or that the Gov't is incompetent (or both).

I'll go with "both"

The economy or people's lives ?

[bickster]

6 hours ago, blandy said:

We have been told the "plan" is to slow down the rate of spread of the lurgie, so that hospitals and medics don't get overloaded. Given that we know the virus spreads exponentially, or thereabouts - there is absolutely no compatibility between the "plan" (slow it down) and the lax approach (being kind) to mass gatherings etc. Schools is different, but sporting and cultural events, large workplaces etc - these should absolutely have been handled as other nations have done, given the "slow it down" plan.

That this hasn't been done suggests either the plan isn't the stated one, or that the Gov't is incompetent (or both).

I'll go with "both"

I'll go with you are being far too generous

Bunch of callous bastards know exactly what they are doing. My only hope is that Cummings swings from a lampost before the end of this

[blandy]

19 hours ago, hippo said:

The economy or people's lives ?

That’s not it. I think, from reading and listening etc. to scientists and advisors that the govt plan, as given to them by the experts is along these lines

The signs are though that they will be overtaken by events.

[Chindie]

The government is being quite careful about not making it obvious that their plan is to let as many as needs be die.

Can't think why.

[LondonLax]

2 minutes ago, Chindie said:

The government is being quite careful about not making it obvious that their plan is to let as many as needs be die.

Can't think why.

There is not a deliberate plan to let people die, it is a plan to save lives but it is very much in dispute as to whether the UK approach is the best way to do that. 

[DeepDish]

Norway and Denmark is shutting down everything now. Airports, ports and borders are closing Monday. And Norway has had quite good control over the people who has the virus, as they have traced 80-90% from being abroad, mainly on winter holidays in the alps in Italy, Austria and Switzerland.

I am afraid that what you are doing in Britain is a reckless experiment.

Edited March 14, 2020 by DeepDish

[Chindie]

2 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

There is not a deliberate plan to let people die, it is a plan to save lives but it is very much in dispute as to whether the UK approach is the best way to do that. 

If your plan with an infectious disease epidemic with a significant severity and lethality is to attempt to get it to infect as many as possible in the hope you can force herd immunity through natural means, you are planning to allow people to die. It's inescapable.

[bickster]

1 minute ago, LondonLax said:

There is not a deliberate plan to let people die

There most definitely is, that is exactly their approach

The whole point of flattening the curve is to reduce strain on medical services and help keep more people alive. They aren't remotely attempting to flatten the curve despite what they say. Their current actions are the exact opposite of flattening the curve

[LondonLax]

8 minutes ago, bickster said:

There most definitely is, that is exactly their approach

The whole point of flattening the curve is to reduce strain on medical services and help keep more people alive. They aren't remotely attempting to flatten the curve despite what they say. Their current actions are the exact opposite of flattening the curve

 

18 minutes ago, Chindie said:

If your plan with an infectious disease epidemic with a significant severity and lethality is to attempt to get it to infect as many as possible in the hope you can force herd immunity through natural means, you are planning to allow people to die. It's inescapable.

 

I understand that but I believe the government would be acting on advice that indicates the standard ‘flatten the curve’ model (that most countries are adopting) may actually result in additional deaths for reasons we are not privy to (perhaps deaths from a resulting economic collapse or from a second wave etc etc, I’m not going to claim to know).

Common sense and most medical advice I’ve seen would indicate their approach is not conventional but I also do not believe the UK’s chief medical officer is trying to kill people, they will be trying to save people by unconventional methods.

Time will show which countries approach was the most successful. My money is on the Chinese and Koreans

[bickster]

1 minute ago, LondonLax said:

but I also do not believe the UK’s chief medical officer is trying to kill people

Has explained why he has done a complete U-Turn on his opinion of about ten days ago?

What information has he been privvy to in that time frame that has changed his mind being as all of the modelling is based on past events not the current one?

 

[LondonLax]

6 minutes ago, bickster said:

Has explained why he has done a complete U-Turn on his opinion of about ten days ago?

What information has he been privvy to in that time frame that has changed his mind being as all of the modelling is based on past events not the current one?

 

You would have to ask him but as I say, I don’t believe the plan by the medical staff advising the government is to let people die, which was in the post I challenged. The plan will be to save as many lives as possible, the question then is whether this is the right plan.

I’m not defending the plan, just the motivation.

Edited March 14, 2020 by LondonLax

[bickster]

13 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

just the motivation.

The motivation is to avoid the economic harm of flattening the curve. Get it over with and get back on track