Generic Virus Thread

[Lichfield Dean]

36 minutes ago, VILLAMARV said:

I love how the beeb goes about asking questions in it's bold text and then doesn't bother to answer them in the article.

Anyone thinking there's an ounce of journalistic integrity left in that organisation is fooling themselves.

Misdirectional, sales driven con written all over this app.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/explainers-52442754

They really need to give a concrete example of how the centralised data is of more benefit than the decentralised token exchange method. If they don't, and they just keep trotting out the line about "extra insights" without any detail then how can we possibly trust it?

Also, what happens on the Irish border where there will be two incompatible tracking systems in play? In what way is it sensible not to use the worldwide standard when we have land borders with other countries?

It must be open source too, both for privacy reasons and so that it can be checked for bugs.

There are so many questions here, all of which would not have to be asked if they just used the Google/Apple APIs and open sourced the app code.

Edited May 5, 2020 by Lichfield Dean
Typo

[VILLAMARV]

Even if it worked it's crossing the Rubicon for me. 

I just don't want to submit willingly to a society where 

A) We usher in such things without laying the legal framework down first

And

B ) We enter a new age of outsourcing complex human decisions to alert tones on a mobile device.

One size doesn't fit all. Take nutrition for example. We can run campaigns and chuck out posters and such about eating fruit and veg being good for you, your kids, your health service in the long run, but those most at risk, say the mother's shoving McDonalds through the fence at schools, aren't going to benefit from it. They are the ones who need the most education we might argue. 

Or the sexual health issues that we all need to know about, getting through to sex workers for instance. 

One might argue they need the human touch.

A.I. is a tool. Technology has always had a transformative effect on healthcare when properly applied. But we don't walk around with a hammer hitting stuff if you need a torque wrench.

Some solutions are not homogenous.

 

Edited May 5, 2020 by VILLAMARV
Added bit

[Straggler]

25 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Nobody walks around with their phone unlocked. Even if you tried, most phones auto lock after a certain amount of time.

I'm sure you can turn this off, but will people do that? Or know how to do it?

Plus a big emphasis yesterday was on the app not draining your battery. Hancock made sure to mention it. But if you have to walk round with your screen on the whole time it definitely will drain your battery!

No freaking way.  That is a security nightmare.  Never mind running down your battery, every phone will be a thieves wet dream.

[wazzap24]

Weird new virus symptom in Russia.....it appears to be making doctors fall out of windows 

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/04/europe/russia-medical-workers-windows-intl/index.html
 

Quote

Three frontline health care workers have mysteriously fallen out of hospital windows in Russia over the past two weeks, heightening public attention to the working conditions for doctors and medical professionals amid the coronavirus pandemic.

 

[VILLAMARV]

14 minutes ago, Lichfield Dean said:

It must be open source.

Transparency could save us globally imho.

[wazzap24]

On 04/05/2020 at 10:17, HanoiVillan said:

The chances of that being cross-contamination or a testing error are extremely close to 100%.

The doctor who did the testing is pretty convinced. Used 2 separate testing techniques apparently to ensure there was ‘no error’ 

Approx 2 mins in: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w172x2w6blyc09n

Quote

We hear from the doctor who's managed to trace the first infection in France to a month earlier than was thought.....

This is on top of the US backdating their first ‘known death’ to Feb 6th (died at home, so who knows what kind of transmission could have been taking place by then?) and the first ‘known case’ in China being November 17th (and not even in Wuhan). They still think there could be earlier cases too. 

https://www.livescience.com/first-case-coronavirus-found.html

 

Quote

Even with this Nov. 17 case identified, doctors can't be certain the individual is "patient zero," or the very first individual to have been infected with SARS-CoV-2, and there's a chance even earlier cases will be found, the SCMP reported.

 

[HanoiVillan]

15 minutes ago, wazzap24 said:

The doctor who did the testing is pretty convinced. Used 2 separate testing techniques apparently to ensure there was ‘no error’ 

Approx 2 mins in: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w172x2w6blyc09n

This is on top of the US backdating their first ‘known death’ to Feb 6th (died at home, so who knows what kind of transmission could have been taking place by then?) and the first ‘known case’ in China being November 17th (and not even in Wuhan). They still think there could be earlier cases too. 

https://www.livescience.com/first-case-coronavirus-found.html

 

 

Thanks. Reading more about this French case, it sounds a lot more persuasive than I first thought, so I shouldn't have been so dismissive.

[terrytini]

4 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Thanks. Reading more about this French case, it sounds a lot more persuasive than I first thought, so I shouldn't have been so dismissive.

You’ll never have a career in politics with that attitude..

[snowychap]

 

[DCJonah]

7 minutes ago, snowychap said:

 

And people will still push the 'they'd have died soon anyway' nonsense. 

[chrisp65]

Hmmm, just been to Lidl and there was no queue control, no barriers, nobody counting on the door. Just walk in like the good ol’ days. 

Queues for the tills.

Anybody else seen anything like that beginning to happen?

[HanoiVillan]

26 minutes ago, snowychap said:

 

Would be interesting to see the northern Italy number divided up as well . . . shudder to think what it must be for Lombardy.

[snowychap]

2 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Would be interesting to see the northern Italy number divided up as well . . . shudder to think what it must be for Lombardy.

It's in the other tweets in that thread - sorry, I should have said that there were subsequent tweets:

Bergamo, according to the next, was +567.6%.

[HanoiVillan]

Just now, snowychap said:

Bergamo, according to the next, was +567.6%.

Jesus.

[HanoiVillan]

Talking about death tolls:

Neither the BBC News Twitter account nor Laura Kuenssberg have managed to mention it yet, though doubtless they'll get round to it after more important matters are attended to, like Boris looking silly:

. . . or some sheep on a rugby pitch in Wales:

 

[chrisp65]

Kuenssberg must have the most embarrassing crush on a politician ever.

She’s just shameless about it. Just **** tweeting staged pap shots of him in the park now.

That woman has a creepy stalker shrine to him somewhere at home, you just know it.

 

[VILLAMARV]

19 minutes ago, snowychap said:

sorry, I should have said that there were subsequent tweets:

Yeah, but it goes Twitter weird kinda quickly so you did the right thing

[Chindie]

22 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Talking about death tolls:

Neither the BBC News Twitter account nor Laura Kuenssberg have managed to mention it yet, though doubtless they'll get round to it after more important matters are attended to, like Boris looking silly:

. . . or some sheep on a rugby pitch in Wales:

 

Yeah but Britain just so happens to have had the highest number of people likely to die soon anyway in Europe. So there.

[blandy]

28 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

And people will still push the 'they'd have died soon anyway' nonsense. 

This is something to be very careful with. Clearly loads of people have died who wouldn't have died "anyway". Clearly some people have died who would have "died anyway". Because of a lack of diagnosis and testing etc. it is not possible to very accurately determine the numbers. We do know that way more people than is normal have died in the time period. We also. know that something like 50% of those who have died have been over 80. Now many of that 50% may well have otherwise gone on to live for another good few years. It is reasonable to wonder how many were perhaps in their last year of life. Not in order to make an argument, but in order to understand the figures and consequences with a view to getting a better understanding of vulnerability, of risks, of protective measures that are going to be needed in the future and so on. of the 32,000 that are recorded as having died with Covi, if around 50% were in there 80s - around 16000 people, and 10% of them (say) were close to the end of their lives anyway, then that would be (say) 5% of the total deaths could have been from just the 80+ age group who would have died anyway. Then if you add in those from other age groups and those with underlying conditions and so on, it's not inconceivable that (so far) a couple of thousand people may have died with Covi who would have "died anyway". Then if you add in (like from personal knowledge) people who died with it, but were not recorded that way, or those who died from it, but were never tested or diagnosed, it's feasible that well over 2,000 people, perhaps many more are in that category.

Absolutely none of which is proposing or supporting a course of action about lifting lockdown, or lockdown being too harsh, or whatever else. It's just trying to understand what the data, when analysed closely (much more than my version done for the sake of discussion without name calling, or motive questioning, does) might reveal. Nor is it trying to say those deaths don't matter. They do, to the people and families and friends affected, to nursing home staff, to medics...etc. They're all individual tragedies. Some (a very small number) may have brought a little relief to some relatives - people with existing, horrible, terminal illnesses, severe dementia etc. being taken by the virus. But that's a side issue.

And also none of this is an "excuse" for policy to somehow ignore protecting the vulnerable, whether with limited future lifespan or not.

Time will tell, but saying some people were at risk of dying anyway and were killed by Covi ought not on its own to be anything other than something that appears to be supported by the data. The question is can we see, or will we, what sort of percentage that turns out to be? If we know that, we'll also know what percentage would not have died anyway, and be able to understand more accurately what sort of percentage lethality the virus has on different age groups of healthy people, and on all kinds of other factors - background, ethnicity, blood group, BMI etc etc. Understanding data is good. The sooner a test can be rolled out to determine who has had it and recovered, the better the picture will become.

[VILLAMARV]

23 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

or some sheep on a rugby pitch in Wales:

Typical double standards here, no one complained when Joe wicks' model wife went to work for him but when Brecon's groundsman does the same...