Generic Virus Thread

[LakotaDakota]

3 minutes ago, bickster said:

Its not the ONLY difference though is it

Just off the top of my head. Welsh Lockdown law is different to English. Scottish NHS is funded by Scottish Parliament... The are LOTS of differences

No you're right, Scotland & Wales are some of the worst countries in the world for ICU beds per capita...

[HanoiVillan]

2 hours ago, LondonLax said:

Some countries are using a lockdown to get the numbers back down to a level where ‘track and trace’ becomes a viable option again, rather than just slowing the curve on the way to a herd immunity. 

The UK could still have something like this in mind. 

 

2 hours ago, bickster said:

Nah, they never had this in mind, they allowed over 2000 people to enter the country unchecked from China at the same time as we were repariating from Wuham. They allowed 5,000Madrid fans into the country, Italy was in Lockdown but you could still get on a plane and walk into the UK

Never been part of any plan.

'Track and trace' testing was part of the plan, and was happening in February and very early March. The problem was that it was only done when people became symptomatic (which is seemingly after they become infectious) and that it wasn't accompanied by screening at ports of entry or quarantine measures, so it missed lots and lots of cases and quickly became too labour-intensive, so was abandoned a little more than a month ago. It was happening at one point, though.

[bickster]

1 minute ago, HanoiVillan said:

 

'Track and trace' testing was part of the plan, and was happening in February and very early March. The problem was that it was only done when people became symptomatic (which is seemingly after they become infectious) and that it wasn't accompanied by screening at ports of entry or quarantine measures, so it missed lots and lots of cases and quickly became too labour-intensive, so was abandoned a little more than a month ago. It was happening at one point, though.

I'd argue that it was paying lip serice to track and trace. Without screening at points of entry it was doomed to failure

[HanoiVillan]

6 minutes ago, snowychap said:

Grauniad:

When will they get it drummed in to their sodding heads that it is not about 'essential travel'.

The regulations state: no person may leave the place where they are living without reasonable excuse.

Even if they did think it was about 'essential travel' (which as you point out, it isn't), why on earth would they think that travelling to work with an NHS ID card didn't constitute 'essential travel'?

[HanoiVillan]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

I'd argue that it was paying lip serice to track and trace. Without screening at points of entry it was doomed to failure

Yeah, it seems to have been done in a haphazard way, of a piece with the other ways in which the government failed to take the virus seriously enough or pay enough attention to the data emerging from China early on.

[Stevo985]

We’ve got the worst daily death total in Europe and analysts are predicting we’ll be the worst affected country in Europe. 
 

If that’s the case, and you manage to convince yourself that we’ve done a good job, then there’s no helping you. 

[mjmooney]

Quote

When the lockdown is lifted, will the virus return? Of course it will. Matt Hancock has said we will do 100,000 tests each day by the end of April, but Britain still doesn’t have a way to control the virus that goes beyond lockdown. Without a proper programme of community surveillance and contact tracing, we won’t stop the spread of coronavirus. As patients pour into hospitals again, a series of national lockdowns will follow. It’s a pattern that could go on for years – until we have a vaccine.

The problem with Hancock’s plan is that testing alone won’t break the chain of community transmission. To stop the spread of a virus, tests must be linked to community surveillance and contact tracing. This ensures that people who have the virus, and people they have come into contact with, can be identified quickly and quarantined at home to prevent the virus spreading. The government’s tests will measure how many people have had the virus, and will show whether health workers are immune – but without community surveillance, tests alone won’t prevent its spread.

On 12 March, the chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance, and chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, announced that the UK had moved from containing the virus to delaying its spread. Their plan was to flatten the curve of the epidemic that would sweep through our population. They reassured us that herd immunity would kick in once 60% of the population had been infected. Social distancing and washing our hands would ease the pressure on health services, they said. Crucially, community testing and contract tracing would stop immediately. At that point, we were still four weeks behind Italy. The media felt safe, reassured by two eminent physicians.

The trouble is, those scientists were wrong. The maths wasn’t difficult: working off their figures, about 40 million people in the UK would be infected by coronavirus, and between 200,000 and 400,000 would eventually die. When the government’s mathematicians modelled figures from Italy and showed that 30% of people admitted to hospital ended up in intensive care, they warned the government that the NHS would be overwhelmed. The government backtracked within three days, and shifted to suppressing rather than mitigating the virus.

In reality, little changed. The government’s beliefs were founded on the assumption that coronavirus behaves like flu. It doesn’t. Its mortality rate is higher, there is little evidence that it is seasonal, and it poses a far greater threat to the NHS. Without a programme of community surveillance and contact tracing, the virus will continue to spread. Britain will be subject to routine flare-ups and repeated lockdowns.

I spoke to a senior international epidemic expert, who wished to remain anonymous. They described the UK’s response as too weak. “Finding these viruses is like guerrilla warfare. If you don’t know where the virus is hiding you cannot control it. We must use a bundle of measures to chase it. We must organise teams of friendly community workers to find people with symptoms, test for the virus, isolate and treat them, and trace their contacts. Workers must check on them in their homes every one or two days,” they said.

I asked them whether social distancing alone could beat the virus. “It won’t work,” they told me. “You can stop contact tracing in the hotspots, but when you lift the lockdown, everywhere at the same time, you’ll face a problem: the virus will come back. New hotspots will form.

“Without a community programme for case detection and contact tracing, you won’t find the virus until it’s too late.”

In China, Xi Jinping initially prevaricated, suppressing the findings of a fact-finding mission on 4 January that investigated the outbreak in Wuhan. But by 26 January, China had placed more than 50 million people under quarantine; 40 provinces reported a total of 2,744 cases and 80 deaths. The Chinese communist party mobilised thousands of community workers to scale up a national testing effort, while mapping infections using case definitions based on symptoms.

Almost 40,000 health workers were flown in from across China to help with this huge community surveillance effort. The government enforced regional lockdowns, closed down shops, bars, universities and schools, and policed the supermarkets and pharmacies. They developed apps to monitor peoples’ symptoms and their compliance with quarantine, and set up 24-hour TV channels in every province to update people on data, progress and prevention. With this comprehensive response, China managed to suppress the transmission of the virus in less than two months.

By contrast, the UK was slow to act, and timid when it did. The government mistakenly based its coronavirus response on social distancing alone. The UK’s Scientific Advisory Group of Experts (Sage) didn’t even ask their mathematical advisers to model a community testing programme. Neil Ferguson reportedly said community testing and contact tracing wasn’t included as a possible strategy in the original modelling because not enough tests were available. But we had eight weeks’ notice.

We still don’t have a coordinated mobilisation of general practices and public health outbreak management teams. None are linked with digital apps or laboratory testing. In one of the best research cultures in the world, we failed to create the community surveillance and testing effort needed to stop the spread of the virus.

The government and its advisers are now committed to their strategy of delaying the spread of coronavirus, which they hope will eventually lead to herd immunity. Our present predicament is a symptom of past decisions: the decision not to roll out testing sooner put the government on the back foot, scrambling to catch up with the virus.

But it isn’t too late. To prevent the spread of coronavirus, we need a change of direction. Local authorities must take control of their public-health outbreak management teams. We need a centralised app and database to allow citizens to report their symptoms, such as the NHSX app that researchers have been working on since January.

GP networks, working with teams of trained volunteers and retired health workers equipped with personal protective equipment, could visit everyone reporting suspicious symptoms at home every one to two days. If there is testing, all the better. But symptom-based reporting will do. With a proper community protection scheme in place, local authorities could shield their population from the threat of the virus, which has taken hold in hotspots like London and the cities of the Midlands and north west.

The lockdown will flatten the curve, but we have a month or more before it lifts. This gives us time. To prevent the virus spreading to less affected areas, we have a choice: a dramatic change of direction, or praying that vaccinologists can work miracles.

• Anthony Costello is professor of global health at UCL, and former director of maternal and child health at the World Health Organization

Grauniad

[snowychap]

2 hours ago, StefanAVFC said:

I hate these horrible bunch of bastards.

 

[bickster]

On the surface this seems like a great responsible tweet

Until you know that the enforcement is concentrated around the beaches (as evidenced by the photo too). This "inconsiderate parking" that they are enforcing has jack shit to do with Key Workers and NHS Staff. I don't have a problem with them enforcing in these areas either, I just hate the false justification. Tell people straight, you shouldn't be here

And then moments later, they retweet this...

Talk about completely mixed messages! Is it any wonder that people haven't a clue what they are doing?

[Awol]

 

11 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Yeah, it seems to have been done in a haphazard way, of a piece with the other ways in which the government failed to take the virus seriously enough or pay enough attention to the data emerging from China early on.

Agree with the first part, but the bit in bold has been a major part of the problem. China behaved appalling, literally lying to the WHO in late Jan about human to human transmission, and clearly lying about their death rates giving public health professionals a false picture of what they were dealing with. 

[Delphinho123]

28 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

The thing that's soul destroying is its so apparent and yet so many of the public think they've done a good job

The conservatives ratings have gone up. Highest it’s been in a while. 

[HanoiVillan]

3 minutes ago, Awol said:

 

Agree with the first part, but the bit in bold has been a major part of the problem. China behaved appalling, literally lying to the WHO in late Jan about human to human transmission, and clearly lying about their death rates giving public health professionals a false picture of what they were dealing with. 

For sure, but there was enough reliable data by early-mid February that you and I (to name just two) were taking it seriously.

[StefanAVFC]

Buzzfeed turning out some top content lately, fair play.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/albertonardelli/coronavirus-timeline-uk-germany-comparison-johnson-merkel

Quote

The Coronavirus Hit Germany And The UK Just Days Apart But The Countries Have Responded Differently. Here’s How.

From a first case to thousands of deaths: A timeline of how Boris Johnson and Angela Merkel’s governments handled COVID-19.

When the novel coronavirus reached the UK and Germany, both governments assessed the risk as low and said they were well prepared. But a detailed analysis by BuzzFeed News of the two countries’ responses since the first cases were reported at the end of January shows how the two countries adopted different approaches in those crucial early weeks.

While Angela Merkel’s government moved quickly to scale up testing and contact tracing of those infected, Boris Johnson’s initial strategy, on the basis of the recommendations of his top scientific advisers, continued to focus primarily on hygiene recommendations while schools, mass gatherings, work and leisure activities continued.

Nearly three months since their first positive cases, Germany has conducted more than 1.3 million tests and contact tracing remains central to its strategy. The UK has carried out fewer than 335,000 tests and all but dropped attempts to aggressively trace contacts. About 3,000 people have died so far in Germany. More than 10,000 have died in the UK.

This timeline reveals how British and German leaders communicated about this crisis at every step, and shows that they prepared differently and rolled out key measures to fight the virus at different times. Decisions delayed by just a few days may have had a significant impact.

 

[Awol]

6 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

For sure, but there was enough reliable data by early-mid February that you and I (to name just two) were taking it seriously.

For sure. I’m not absolving our lot for a minute, but we need to remember how, why and where this started, including the responsibility of the Chinese Communist Party in making it exponentially worse. 

Edited April 12, 2020 by Awol
For sure, for sure, for sure... *facepalm*

[mikeyp102]

1 hour ago, foreveryoung said:

Still convinced me and the Mrs (and come to think of it my 5 year old had a 2 week cough) had it in december. We have never had flu like it, temp shortness of breath included. Mine lasted bout 2-3 weeks. Also a few had it at work too. A colleague I work with who does iron man stuff was off a week with it too and complained of dizzy spells inc breathing problems.  

Some specialists saying this started sept October I have read too.

Yep loads of people were having really bad flu in December, I agree that it seems it was the start of it 

[terrytini]

14 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

For sure, but there was enough reliable data by early-mid February that you and I (to name just two) were taking it seriously.

Well said. I’m sick and tired of hearing Trump and other apologists suggesting this came as a surprise. We were debating it in detail on here in Jan/Feb, I and others had already “ locked down “ in early March.

 

[mjmooney]

4 minutes ago, mikeyp102 said:

Yep loads of people were having really bad flu in December, I agree that it seems it was the start of it 

We did. Felt utterly crap, pretty much through the whole of December and January (Xmas Day was particularly awful). Still not convinced it was COVID-19, though. 

[foreveryoung]

31 minutes ago, Awol said:

 

Agree with the first part, but the bit in bold has been a major part of the problem. China behaved appalling, literally lying to the WHO in late Jan about human to human transmission, and clearly lying about their death rates giving public health professionals a false picture of what they were dealing with. 

China are still acting appallingly, with holding information even now. They are a communist state remember holding most information from there people, I doubt they are going to tell us the facts. 

This is why you cannot rule out a virus escaped from that Wuhan lab or even bio warfare.

What are your thoughts on this Awol??

[Xann]

54 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

We’ve got the worst daily death total in Europe and analysts are predicting we’ll be the worst affected country in Europe. 
 

If that’s the case, and you manage to convince yourself that we’ve done a good job, then there’s no helping you. 

Squirming denial and f***wittery of the lowest standard.

Trying to push the blame up and down the timeline. Yet it keeps landing in the laps of the same collective. Go figure.

[markavfc40]

48 minutes ago, Delphinho123 said:

The conservatives ratings have gone up. Highest it’s been in a while. 

I wouldn't be surprised if they do come out of this and have managed to dupe enough people, propped up by much of the British media, into believing they have done a good job. 

The ability to fool enough people has kept them in power for 10 years and had led to us, despite being one of the wealthiest counties in the world, going into the crisis as one of the worst prepared in Europe with a health service running at max capacity, with a lack of ICU beds, with a social care system that had been decimated over 10 years leading to bed blocking in our hospitals, with us scrambling to get thousands of homeless people off our streets, with a welfare system not fit for purpose and offering nothing even approaching a decent safety net, with a leader who 5 weeks ago bragging about how he shook hands with coronavirus patients, with us leaving those we are asking to care for us without basic PPE and some dying due to it and with us staring down the barrel of being the worst hit country in Europe despite us having the advantage of being able to see what was coming down the track that other countries didn't.

Despite all of the above I am in no doubt there are enough people stupid enough to give them another free pass. As the saying goes you can indeed fool some of the people all of the time.