Generic Virus Thread

[snowychap]

14 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

 

So...what exactly is the app doing?

Looking at the test results bit on the Gov website, it says that results will either be given by email or through the app.

Quote

Getting your test result

You'll get a text or email with your result when it's ready. If you use the NHS COVID-19 app, you may also get your result in the app.

Does this mean that only those results that are being given through the app are then being used to give out alerts? And if there isn't any personal data held anywhere other than on the individual 'phone, how can the app deliver test results to individuals?

[Genie]

I just saw this on Facebook. For a country still in phase 1 it looks a bit crazy to relax things so much.

 

[snowychap]

18 minutes ago, snowychap said:

And if there isn't any personal data held anywhere other than on the individual 'phone, how can the app deliver test results to individuals?

Well, according to the BBC piece on it:

Quote

How will the app order a test?

Users can report symptoms - and when they started - at any time.

If they suggest infection, the user is told to book a test and that everyone in their household must self-isolate for eight days.

Booking a test involves using an external website, which asks for the user's name and address.

But these personal details are not shared back to the app.

And a unique code lets users receive their test result via the app as soon as it is ready.

...more

Surely this means the app is also having to, in this circumstance, connect to and communicate data with outside sources - so there would be a record at least centrally of the user with that unique code requesting the test result being sent to a particular device?

Perhaps the standard workings of the app are decentralised and anonymous (alerts being sent out/details of where and when people have signed in via QR code) but the add-ons aren't?

Edit:

The BBC piece also says:

Quote

The notification will tell the recipient to go into self-isolation for a fortnight - and trigger the start of the app's countdown clock.

But the recipient is not told who triggered the alert.

And the authorities cannot identify either party, although they can track how many people have been told to self-isolate.

Even if the recipient has no symptoms or a subsequent negative test result, they must stay at home for the duration.

That last line is very worrying and doesn't fit in with other media reports on how people are to take this instructions. It would be nice if these things were clear.

Quote

From 28 September, people in England can be fined £1,000 or more for breaching self-isolation rules. The Department of Health has confirmed in theory this applies to app-delivered orders stay at home.

But because the app lets users remain anonymous and health chiefs want it to be popular, fines for users should not be an issue.

Firstly, that contradicts what Matt Hancock has stated publicly and secondly, 'fines for users should not be an issue' is hardly the most reassuring thing when the fine is a grand.

Still, I guess we await the detail of what the law will be. It's not been published yet, has it?

Edited September 26, 2020 by snowychap

[Lichfield Dean]

37 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

 

So...what exactly is the app doing?

Well, the serco app will work fine with serco approved tests. Just not, you know, NHS tests.

Edited September 26, 2020 by Lichfield Dean
Spelling

[HanoiVillan]

Opening universities isn't going very well is it.

 

[OutByEaster?]

It's almost as if they're trying to direct testing through to a limited number of privatised sources and away from those provided by the NHS. In doing so they are both reducing the amount of testing that can be properly recorded and only benefitting those companies providing testing for profit.

Protecting the NHS by paying other people to do the stuff it does elsewhere.

 

[chrisp65]

Interesting choice of language.

 

 

[darrenm]

The wife reads test results off the machine at her Hospital. I was taken aback when she says there's an interface so it can all be done automatically (which presumably would link up with the codes) but NHS England/gov/hospital wouldn't pay for it. So instead the test results just show as positive or negative on the screen of the PCR machine where someone has to go and read them off and manually input them onto the system.

[Wainy316]

Worst freshers week ever!

Cambridge Halls in Manchester is where I was back in 03/04.

[bickster]

4 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

Opening universities isn't going very well is it.

 

Just seen that on the tellybox and the line from one of the students... "It's a good job we all get along with each other."

It's Freshers Week, you'll f***ing hate at least two of your four new friends by the end of next week, usually when they've stolen your cheese or shagged that person you fancy

[HanoiVillan]

2 hours ago, Wainy316 said:

Worst freshers week ever!

Cambridge Halls in Manchester is where I was back in 03/04.

Not sure if it's this block or another one, but students trapped in their rooms have received a nice message from the owners:

Apparently, they had signs in the windows saying things like 'Let Us Out' and 'Thanks Boris'. Source: https://twitter.com/Gabriel_Pogrund/status/1309907164560060416

 

[bickster]

15 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Not sure if it's this block or another one, but students trapped in their rooms have received a nice message from the owners:

Apparently, they had signs in the windows saying things like 'Let Us Out' and 'Thanks Boris'. Source: https://twitter.com/Gabriel_Pogrund/status/1309907164560060416

 

Hilarious, what are they going to do? Break the law to forcibly take the posters down?

[bickster]

Going back to Vit D

Quote

Coronavirus: Vitamin D reduces infection and impact of COVID-19, studies find

People are being urged to take a vitamin D supplement to reduce their risk of becoming infected with COVID-19.

Patients with sufficient levels of vitamin D are less likely to experience complications and die from COVID-19, according to a new study in the US, while another has found it also reduces infection rates.

Vitamin D sufficiency was linked with a significantly decreased level of inflammatory markets, and higher blood levels of immune cells, in new research from Boston University's school of medicine.

Sky

[bickster]

Following the Science...

Quote

Coronavirus: Scientists advising Boris Johnson ‘never discussed’ 10pm pubs curfew plan, reveals Sage member

Professor Graham Medley fuels growing belief that government adopted the measure alone

Indy

[Mandy Lifeboats]

Is COVID19 just this year's Dr Who Christmas Special?  

October -  Bernard Cribbins dies.

November - K9 replaces the Downing Street cat. 

December - Cummings is unmasked as an alien and Christmas is saved. 

[bannedfromHandV]

Just come to pick a breakfast up from our local cafe. 
 

It’s packed, 25+ people not wearing masks but because I’m picking up food I’m not allowed in without a mask so i have to stand outside like a leper.

Because you know, the virus doesn’t target people while they’re eating.

I think if all this shit was based on some form of clear logic I could get on board with it but you have morons following rules written by idiots, it’s a recipe for disaster from the outset.

Edited September 27, 2020 by bannedfromHandV

[Genie]

20 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Because you know, the virus doesn’t target people while they’re eating.

I don’t think anyone has said that, or that virus visits pubs at 10:01 at night which is another common complaint.

 

[Genie]

I’ve noticed that the Russian GP has lots of spectators, many standing huddled up at the fences.

[HanoiVillan]

A pretty good bit on why a vaccine isn't going to be a 'Hollywood ending' to the crisis, from (surprisingly) the Mail on Sunday today:

Will a vaccine really be the silver bullet we're all praying for? Asks our GP columnist DR ELLIE CANNON who's a guinea pig in the global trial

'...

Of course, I understand why people cling to this dream – the Hollywood ending to the pandemic. I say this both as a GP and as an ordinary person whose life, like everyone else's, has been turned upside down this year. I'm deeply invested – a fully signed-up guinea pig on the vaccine trial myself. I dearly wish it were true. But I feel, as a doctor, it's my duty to be honest: the jab, when it finally arrives, won't be the miracle cure or silver bullet these Ministers are making it out to be.

To claim otherwise is at best misguided, which, given the retinue of science advisers at their disposal, seems unlikely. At worst, it is deeply disingenuous. Mr Hancock and Mr Johnson could have done well to tune in to an interview with Oxford's star vaccine scientist Professor Sarah Gilbert earlier this month, in which she urged people to 'temper their expectations' about immunisation. She added: 'It's not going to be as it is in the movies, where there is some breakthrough and suddenly the world is protected.'

And I couldn't agree more. Vaccines are not a panacea. For a start, some people just won't opt to have the jab. At the moment, large numbers of people seem nervous.

A recent survey suggested 15 per cent of Britons would say no to the jab, up from five per cent in March. In America, as many as 40 per cent claim they'd turn it down.

Others simply won't get round to it. Most vaccines have to be given in two doses, which makes it even more likely people will forget, not get round to it, or put it off.

Others may not be suitable – for instance, people with immune system conditions, and those with certain types of cancer.

In these patients, vaccinations aren't recommended because they can interfere with treatments.

And there has to be the capacity and infrastructure to quickly vaccinate a lot of people – and as we've seen, those put in charge of these kinds of things can often be 'surprised' by surges in demand.

Professor Stephen Evans, 77, who is an expert in pharmaceuticals at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and a participant, like me, in the Oxford vaccine trial, added: 'There must be good systems able to track who has been vaccinated and who hasn't and the data on this must be able to get back to GP records.

'It is not clear that the planning for this massive data-processing task has been done, but it's crucial to ensure that the vaccine is really effective in actual use, rather than just in the trials.''

more on link: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-8775855/Will-vaccine-really-silver-bullet-praying-Asks-DR-ELLIE-CANNON.html

Edited September 27, 2020 by HanoiVillan

[darrenm]

51 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

A pretty good bit on why a vaccine isn't going to be a 'Hollywood ending' to the crisis, from (surprisingly) the Mail on Sunday today:

Will a vaccine really be the silver bullet we're all praying for? Asks our GP columnist DR ELLIE CANNON who's a guinea pig in the global trial

'...

Of course, I understand why people cling to this dream – the Hollywood ending to the pandemic. I say this both as a GP and as an ordinary person whose life, like everyone else's, has been turned upside down this year. I'm deeply invested – a fully signed-up guinea pig on the vaccine trial myself. I dearly wish it were true. But I feel, as a doctor, it's my duty to be honest: the jab, when it finally arrives, won't be the miracle cure or silver bullet these Ministers are making it out to be.

To claim otherwise is at best misguided, which, given the retinue of science advisers at their disposal, seems unlikely. At worst, it is deeply disingenuous. Mr Hancock and Mr Johnson could have done well to tune in to an interview with Oxford's star vaccine scientist Professor Sarah Gilbert earlier this month, in which she urged people to 'temper their expectations' about immunisation. She added: 'It's not going to be as it is in the movies, where there is some breakthrough and suddenly the world is protected.'

And I couldn't agree more. Vaccines are not a panacea. For a start, some people just won't opt to have the jab. At the moment, large numbers of people seem nervous.

A recent survey suggested 15 per cent of Britons would say no to the jab, up from five per cent in March. In America, as many as 40 per cent claim they'd turn it down.

Others simply won't get round to it. Most vaccines have to be given in two doses, which makes it even more likely people will forget, not get round to it, or put it off.

Others may not be suitable – for instance, people with immune system conditions, and those with certain types of cancer.

In these patients, vaccinations aren't recommended because they can interfere with treatments.

And there has to be the capacity and infrastructure to quickly vaccinate a lot of people – and as we've seen, those put in charge of these kinds of things can often be 'surprised' by surges in demand.

Professor Stephen Evans, 77, who is an expert in pharmaceuticals at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and a participant, like me, in the Oxford vaccine trial, added: 'There must be good systems able to track who has been vaccinated and who hasn't and the data on this must be able to get back to GP records.

'It is not clear that the planning for this massive data-processing task has been done, but it's crucial to ensure that the vaccine is really effective in actual use, rather than just in the trials.''

more on link: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-8775855/Will-vaccine-really-silver-bullet-praying-Asks-DR-ELLIE-CANNON.html

I was reading that really hoping to have my views challenged and I'm a bit disappointed.

Her argument is basically 'people won't have it'. Well yeah, the anti vaxxers won't. And yes some people won't get around to it. So you need to make it worth their while by there being a lockdown until enough people have had it. If the carrot is that 'life can go back to normal if you all just go and have the jab' then I doubt the people resisting will number too many. As for people forgetting, legislate to make companies give people half a day off work for it? There are loads of ways to make sure enough people have the vaccine, even without getting towards creepy 'you must have this injection'.

Like I said before though, you only need to vaccinate the same groups you'd do every winter for the flu jab anyway. Just make sure they actually turn up for it.

I'd love my views challenged on this but if anything, that article makes me more confident that the vaccine will be a 'big end' because if the only obstacles are logistics, then they aren't really obstacles to a government sufficiently motivated (say, by a collapsing economy)