Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[philosophical]

I'd be interested in this.

It says you have to do it and were randomly selected from info provided by your GP. You're not allowed to pass the test on to somebody.
If you go to the Imperial College site and look for antibody test I imagine there will be further information.

 

[Edie]

it's just dickheads.

It’s just kids. They’re all teenagers or very early 20s. Who cares? They’re outside, having a laugh, little risk. The hill was full of parents and kids sledging today. You cannot keep an entire nation in their homes indefinitely. We are social animals. The young especially will get bored and go out looking for some excitement eventually. It’s absolutely inevitable.

 

[killer b]

It’s just kids. They’re all teenagers or very early 20s. Who cares? They’re outside, having a laugh, little risk. The hill was full of parents and kids sledging today. You cannot keep an entire nation in their homes indefinitely. We are social animals. The young especially will get bored and go out looking for some excitement eventually. It’s absolutely inevitable.

I'd not watched the video tbf, didn't see the point.

 

[ddraig]

Had an actual letter through the door, from council and NHS Wales saying how serious it is, what we should be doing and a vaccination timetable

 

[Buddy Bradley]

And it is outside and not prolonged contact.

Until you slip over and end up in A&E alongside hundreds of coughing Covid patients. It's not just about what you're doing right now, it's everything that can happen before and after.

 

[muscovyduck]

Went into a town centre today (imagine a similar sort of place to the centre of Salisbury, Lowestoft or Walsall). Place was almost as quiet as lockdown one. Was a bit taken aback, I assumed it would be rammed based on what things have been like for months up to ten days or so ago and what I've been seeing online about the UK in general. Some places are open that weren't open in lockdown one but a lot of places that had been open then were closed now. Frustratingly the places open are skewed towards being more useless than last time, eg more takeaway coffee and less banking. Barely any shoppers/customers, mainly people trying to run errands like go the post office. People working non-essential retail/catering in some guise outnumbered everyone else. Supermarket was near empty too.

 

[Orang Utan]

Until you slip over and end up in A&E alongside hundreds of coughing Covid patients. It's not just about what you're doing right now, it's everything that can happen before and after.

Young people are invincible and don't think that way

 

[Steel Icarus]

I think I'm going to put this forum on ignore for a while. It's making me frustrated and sad. And a bit cross.

 

[TopCat]

I think I'm going to put this forum on ignore for a while. It's making me frustrated and sad. And a bit cross.

Chil mate. It's a stressy time. X

 

[William of Walworth]

Had an actual letter through the door, from council and NHS Wales saying how serious it is, what we should be doing and a vaccination timetable

If that's going to everyone in Wales, I expect we'll also get our copies any time now -- looking forward to seeing it.

 

[William of Walworth]

At one (large) sub-section of my Civil Service workplace, they're right now introducing lateral flow tests for all employees in that section -- twice a week for each person is the aim.
ETA : Just rechecked the message from our Chief Exec about this programme, and as I thought, the company that makes the tests isn't specified!

It would seem the plan is to expand the testing regime for everyone in all our sections over the next two or three weeks.

So reading some earlier posts about the unreliability of some lateral flow tests was concerning

But would multiple tests over several weeks for each person, offer better cover?

Besides that question, my natural suspicion of my employer's reluctance to send people home who can't work from home** does make me go at the above plan, to some extent at least!

**(see many earlier posts from me about this, many pages back )

 

[Supine]

At one (large) sub-section of my Civil Service workplace, they're right now introducing lateral flow tests for all employees in that section -- twice a week for each person is the aim.

It would seem the plan is to expand this for everyone in all our sections over the next two or three weeks.

So reading some earlier posts about the unreliability of some lateral flow tests was concerning

But would multiple tests over several weeks for each person, offer better cover?

Besides that question, my natural suspicion of my employer's reluctance to send people home who can't work from home** does make me go at the above plan, to some extent at least!

**(see many earlier posts from me about this, many pages back )

The inaccuracies reported aren't an issue as long as you know how they are being used.

They accurately tell you who is positive. They are not as good telling you who is negative.

Because of this they should be used to weed out positive people to make everyone else safe. They should not be used to make people believe they are negative. It's just a way of filtering out the infectious.

 

[William of Walworth]

The inaccuracies reported aren't an issue as long as you know how they are being used.

They accurately tell you who is positive. They are not as good telling you who is negative.

Because of this they should be used to weed out positive people to make everyone else safe. They should not be used to make people believe they are negative. It's just a way of filtering out the infectious.

Cheers

On reflection, and TBF, the announcement I referred to in my ETA above did actually state that identifying positive cases was the general aim .....

... brief update on the lateral flow testing that we are piloting with Contact Centre staff. As you know, we have worked hard to be part of this testing pilot which is being run by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) in conjunction with Public Health England. The pilot is designed to detect the virus in asymptomatic people, i.e. those who do not experience or show any symptoms but who could still be infectious and pass the virus on to others.

The pilot launched on Friday when 228 staff were tested with every result returned as negative. Of course, a negative test result does not mean that you can ignore the lockdown restrictions in place both in the workplace and in the community and you must still be scrupulously careful and follow all restrictions.

It's just that before re-reading this workplace message just now, some of the earlier posts up above about false negatives with lateral flow tests was starting to concern me ...... thanks for applying better context though

 

[elbows]

Its a way to find some more positives, it wont find all of them, far from it. Better than nothing, if used appropriately. Worse than nothing if used as an excuse to reduce other measures, eg no wonder some care homes and local authorities got cold feet about relying too heavily on lateral flow tests in order to let people make care home visits. Can still be used carefully as one component of that system, but easy to go too far.

 

[elbows]

I cannot for example imagine a situation where I would approve of lateral flow tests as an alternative to working from home, for those who can actually work from home.

 

[clicker]

Cheers

On reflection, and TBF, the announcement I referred to in my ETA above did actually state that identifying positive cases was the general aim .....


It's just that before re-reading this workplace message just now, some of the earlier posts up above about false negatives with lateral flow tests was starting to concern me ...... thanks for applying better contest though

Yes, so still act as though you could have it...social distancing etc. But the tests will weed out some people who actually have it. So less people should get it. But a negative test isn't conclusive you haven't got it. It's better than nothing, should pick up some asymptomatics.

 

[William of Walworth]

Yes, so still act as though you could have it...social distancing etc. But the tests will weed out some people who actually have it. So less people should get it. But a negative test isn't conclusive you haven't got it. It's better than nothing, should pick up some asymptomatics.

Recent posts in this thread did get me thinking more, yes, and I'm a lot clearer about the lateral flow test thing now.

And you can bet your life that I'm being more careful than ever about distancing, at the moment

 

[William of Walworth]

I cannot for example imagine a situation where I would approve of lateral flow tests as an alternative to working from home, for those who can actually work from home.

Completely agree.
As I've posted before ( ), some of us at our place can't work from home because of the nature of much of the paper-based work, and the logistics of supplying/collecting work and data-secure laptops/printers to our houses.

But the chances of the rules either in Wales or England of sending (even) us Civil Servants home on the 'Special Leave' that we had March to early August, seem to me to be zero -- I've heard nothing along these lines, even as the Covid infection news was getting steadily more shocking

Hence my suspicion about them introducing this lateral flow test regime as a substitute -- not that I'll object to being tested, but!

 

[20Bees]

I had the first of my tests at work this evening, using the Innova lateral flow test as part of the employer’s rollout of a testing scheme for all staff. Easy enough, and they seem to have a good setup. All tests are voluntary and they suggest staff take one each week, more (or less) often if they prefer. Negative result, as expected, text arrived after 30 mins.

 

[Badgers]

1248 deaths yesterday then

Due to work and other shite I am just catching up with the news. New cases seem down but up in some places? Naturally I am interested in the areas family are and they are up/down/level.

 

[TopCat]

1248.

 

[TopCat]

Bit bleak out today.

 

[frogwoman]

 

[Pingety Pong]

Cases are rising quite sharply in Manchester

 

[Numbers]

Bit bleak out today.

Y/day felt bleaker to me, really miserable day.
At least it’s Friday and even tho we have fuck all planned it still gives that Friday feeling.

 

[ash]

Looking better here

 

[teuchter]

In a scenario where lots or most people are vaccinated - but it turns out that they can still carry and pass on the infection - will we need a new type of test for "carriers"? Or is that picked up in some way in the current tests?

 

[Pickman's model]

In a scenario where lots or most people are vaccinated - but it turns out that they can still carry and pass on the infection - will we need a new type of test for "carriers"? Or is that picked up in some way in the current tests?

So you're positing a situation in which the vaccinations are successful but some people have it but are still asymptomatic?

 

[wayward bob]

Had an actual letter through the door, from council and NHS Wales saying how serious it is, what we should be doing and a vaccination timetable

how are they doing on this? cos it looks like a fucking shambles from what little i've seen/read...

 

[gentlegreen]

In a scenario where lots or most people are vaccinated - but it turns out that they can still carry and pass on the infection - will we need a new type of test for "carriers"? Or is that picked up in some way in the current tests?

We're properly stuffed if that is a persistent issue because of all the immuno-compromised who can't be vaccinated ...