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Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

teuchter said:
I think my behaviour will now only move back towards a "more cautious" approach if there's a really dramatic rise in cases and/or a significant rise in hospitalisations/deaths.
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Yeah thats where the action will be, that will be the key dynamic if circumstances demand it. That will be a journey you will not be alone on, you'll probably be part of the majority.

I dont spend much time shouting at people over such matters, especially not during summers. There is an inevitability to much of this that means I do not seek to place many millions of people into a villainous pandemic role. I reserve that for those whose impatience and rigidity leave them facing in entirely the wrong direction, calling for the wrong things, at really crucial moments in other seasons.

Plus the only reason I'm not fully on that journey myself, at least during summer, is down to my own circumstances and how limited my contact patterns were before this pandemic. WIth the fact I only got my 2nd jab 3 weeks ago on top. And the fact I dont have quite the same relationship with summer as many do, because from a young age hayfever put some barriers I cant be arsed with in my way during that season. I'm a bit of a miserable outsider during summers, apart from a period in my youth where I did do festivals, but that doesnt mean I lack empathy in regards what others expect of summers. I try to compensate for my own personal bias and circumstances and that means not judging others harshly during pandemic summers. Maybe some pent-up stuff from summers does make me harsher towards certain attitudes in autumn and winter thought.
 
And from a less personal angle, this is a pretty neat fit with ideas such as 'there is a world of difference between the government getting away with their agenda in summer compared to the other seasons'. The press and the public went along with things this summer to an extent that cannot be banked on once less favourable seasons start to weigh more on peoples minds. But how evident this actually becomes, and how quickly, really does come down to various key bits of data. If hospital numbers start to rise more quickly then a chunk of the media will start to cast doubt on the sustainability of the current approach, and this may become the dominant theme.
 
I just, again, don't see an end to this.

The government has clearly given up pretending to fight the pandemic in any way the scientific community would find sound. So I just don't see how things can ever get out of this twilight zone.

I feel increasingly stupid wearing a mask, like the only person invited to a fancy dress party as the only person who didn't realise it wasn't a fancy dress party. Or the time, at a friend's 30th years ago that was fancy dress. Everyone turned up in fairly benign family friendly costume except for 2 mutual friends and cosplayers who turned up rocking full on serious Hellraise cenobite costumes.

The shops are full of people not wearing masks. Buses are increasingly going the same way. I shall continue to wear mine as long as I can, it's not stupid to do so of course. But the peope are clearly being led to believe it's all over. Back to normal. Furlough ends in a short while, coinciding with the new school year and the footie season, and of course Autumn and Winter. I'm not really feeling positive. We're stuck at around a thousand deaths a week from this, how can that be anything other than a tragedy? But of course the goons will just say "people die every day" as they have for months. A thousand people a day, all year round, weren't dying of the same cause though were they. Fuck's sake. I don't even want to go out anymore, but I don't want to not be able to
 
I got forced into tesco as co-op don’t stock enough food these days. Think I was almost the only person wearing a mask.

I wasn’t bothered tbh - I was also least likely to catch covid :)
 
I had to get a bus this afternoon. Almost everyone wearing masks, except for a young family (parents and two young kids) who got on with no masks and sat two seats in front of me and then the parents bellowed at the top of their voices across the aisle to each other for the rest of the journey. Felt deeply uncomfortable and got off the bus earlier than I needed to :(
 
_Russ_ said:
Trouble is they will hold demos outside and bellow at you as you try get in, remember these people aren't reasonable adults they're fucking loons who think freedom means being free to intimidate people who don't believe their horse shit
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No problem with that as I'll be inside in the warm enjoying good company and beer while they shout to the sky in the rain.
 
Supine said:
Lots to process here

inews.co.uk

Boris Johnson 'privately accepts' up to 50,000 annual Covid deaths as acceptable, advisers say

i understands Downing Street will consider a cost-benefit analysis on both saving lives and effect of deaths on the UK economy before implementing contingency plans for further lockdowns
inews.co.uk inews.co.uk
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Is 50,000 deaths the new 20,000 "is a good outcome"?

On one level it's hard to put too much weight on this. Words coming out of Johnson's mouth might as well be meaningless noise. If he made a promise this morning I'd expect him to be doing the opposite by now, with all the acknowledgement he'd changed of a weather person who was predicting sun but is now predicting rain. 'A Downing Street spokesman' is as reliable a source of information as the woodlouse my daughter was playing with earlier.

But that said, this will reflect the current thinking amongst some of the government's advisors. So what the fuck does it mean?

The article says that the cost-benefit analysis suggests 50,000 dead in a year is the point it becomes economical to act. Because money is all that matters. Do they have models that suggest numbers dead will be below 50,000 in the next year? Is that just what they think they can get away with?

50,000 dead in a year. That's 137 deaths per day. Today the 7 day rolling average is around 110 deaths per day. Case numbers are rising and it's widely predicted that the bank holiday weekend followed by schools going back will see a further rise in numbers. It won't take much to surpass 137 deaths per day. Is the government expecting the current wave to burn itself out over autumn and winter before we hit that number? Is it the first step towards softening us up for the reintroduction of restrictions? Does it mean nothing at all? I might as well read the tea leaves as read the news.
 
Its bollocks in the sense that if they judge things based on cost-benefit analysis then they will have to do the same for hospital pressures, indirect deaths due to NHS being overwhelmed, the effects that has on wider societies economic activity etc.

Its never been a simple numbers game based only on deaths, there are political etc considerations involving the death rate but the hospital numbers game trumps that, especially when it comes to timing of measures.

So personally I dont find the detail in those articles interesting, the noteworthy thing is more that we are in a period where such articles are being written again - this does not suggest establishment and media confidence that the current approach will be plain sailing from here on.
 
Johnny Vodka said:
I kind of think that anti-maskers/anti-vaxxers aren't going to change their behaviour (or adhere to the rules) just because cases rise. They seem to have a certain thick stubbornness about them IME.
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no changes from them
editor said:
No problem with that as I'll be inside in the warm enjoying good company and beer while they shout to the sky in the rain.
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thy will be in there too ;-)
e2a;; TYPOS
 
I went to the office for the first time in 10 months on Thursday and I encountered something that seemed new. Several people I spoke to said that they thought it was better to get infected now whilst their vaccine was still fully effective. That way, they will almost certainly be fine and they can gain additional, or “top-up” immunity. So long as they keep getting reinfected whilst their immunity is strong, they’ll continue to be almost certainly okay.

I think there is an understandable logic to this — maybe they’re even right from a self-protection perspective given the circumstances we now find ourselves in — but it really is the defeatism of those who have come to believe that the government won’t or can’t do anything and they have to find the least worst option for themselves.
 
kabbes said:
I went to the office for the first time in 10 months on Thursday and I encountered something that seemed new. Several people I spoke to said that they thought it was better to get infected now whilst their vaccine was still fully effective. That way, they will almost certainly be fine and they can gain additional, or “top-up” immunity. So long as they keep getting reinfected whilst their immunity is strong, they’ll continue to be almost certainly okay.

I think there is an understandable logic to this — maybe they’re even right from a self-protection perspective given the circumstances we now find ourselves in — but it really is the defeatism of those who have come to believe that the government won’t or can’t do anything and they have to find the least worst option for themselves.
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I've heard this line several times this week too, that it might be better to get infected now. Unconvinced.
 
I'm going to continue to try not to get it. Obviously this is going to prove increasingly difficult but as I've said in response to everyone who's said it's not that bad it's the random nature of effects that scares me. I might be anything from vaguely under the weather to dead, and same for anyone I might pass it on to. I don't think this is good for mentally because it means worry and hyper-vigilance but I'm not ready to simply let the chips fall where they may.
 
kabbes said:
I went to the office for the first time in 10 months on Thursday and I encountered something that seemed new. Several people I spoke to said that they thought it was better to get infected now whilst their vaccine was still fully effective. That way, they will almost certainly be fine and they can gain additional, or “top-up” immunity. So long as they keep getting reinfected whilst their immunity is strong, they’ll continue to be almost certainly okay.

I think there is an understandable logic to this — maybe they’re even right from a self-protection perspective given the circumstances we now find ourselves in — but it really is the defeatism of those who have come to believe that the government won’t or can’t do anything and they have to find the least worst option for themselves.
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This says a lot about how long covid has been downplayed all along. Mild covid (such as you might get when vaccinated) gives you a percentage chance of medium to long term disability that is much, much higher than most people would be willing to accept in any other situation. Knowing the cost of mild covid not just to myself but to multiple other people I know, it's like most of the population has decided to get into wingsuit flying from mountains without understanding the risks.
 
I read somewhere the other day the vaccines do decrease the chance of getting long Covid. I can’t remember where. And it obviously just getting Covid does mean a chance of getting long Covid. I think that is what BAis getting at. this is a non-0 risk which otherwise wouldn’t be there.
 
xenon said:
I read somewhere the other day the vaccines do decrease the chance of getting long Covid. I can’t remember where. And it obviously just getting Covid does mean a chance of getting long Covid. I think that is what BAis getting at. this is a non-0 risk which otherwise wouldn’t be there.
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There's a certain pool of 'long covid' sufferers who are in fact suffering the consequences of very severe covid and hospitalisation etc - a lot of the damage is sheer physical damage to lungs and so on. Obviously vaccination reduces this group of people dramatically. Most of the people who I know with long covid were younger and covid just felt like a cold or something to them - in fact one of them thought it was a cold until suddenly she was getting spells of dizziness and exhaustion that left her in bed for days at a time.
 
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As for me, Apart fro some mask wearing, I’m pretty much just going about things as normal. But with that nagging doubt in the back of my mind. I haven’t gone anywhere crowded thus far yet though. I would actually like to go to a gig soon. And I have been putting off visiting my unvaccinated sister...
 
teuchter said:
Do we actually know this, though?
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We may not actually know the percentage risk of coming down with long term post Covid conditions, or have full knowledge of the chances of specific conditions or disabilities within that, but I think it's fair to say that for many people the perceived risk of Covid is all about the chance of dying and very little about the chances of long term post Covid conditions, unless perhaps they happen to know someone who is already experiencing such things.

Part of that is because of the impossibility of having statistical info about long term conditions ATM, although I'm sure decent approximations and estimates are available.

But part of it is also because of what appears to have been a deliberate downplaying of these risks, led by the government but taken up by others eg many parts of the media.

So I think it's a valid point being made that if people are saying they'd rather get Covid now because the consequences won't be as bad as if the caught it later, that's based in part on an incomplete picture of the risks involved.
 
teuchter said:
Do we actually know this, though?
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Hard to say what we know or don't know about the long-term effects of a disease that was unknown 20 months ago - there have definitely been enough reports of complex long-term effects, especially neurological issues, from infections that initially seemed mild, to suggest that deliberately getting infected is insanely reckless.

In the case of Covid, Dr. Bell said, experts believe that the symptoms are caused by “an inflammatory reaction to the virus” that can affect the brain as well as the rest of the body. And it makes sense that some people experience multiple neurological symptoms simultaneously or in clusters, Dr. Bell said, because “there’s only so much real estate in the brain, and there’s a lot of overlap” in regions responsible for different brain functions.

www.nytimes.com

They Had Mild Covid. Then Their Serious Symptoms Kicked In. (Published 2021)

A new study illuminates the complex array of neurological issues experienced by people months after their coronavirus infections.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
On the question of whether people have enough information to decide about the risks of long covid, I would say that not only has it not been reported enough, but it has also frequently been reported in a way that doesn't help people understand the impact. So here's a post from a long covid fb group that just came up in my feed. I didn't have to go looking for this - it's a very common type of post in those groups - this is from a quite young-looking woman (in a public group and I don't think she'd mind it being reposted):

"I’m having a little pity party today. I am so sick of this **** of a virus and how it’s destroyed my life.
Went to the football on Tuesday night, was probably a bad idea and didn’t think through how far I would have to walk (cos of the crowds) and stand. Been basically bed/ sofa / house ridden since. Was supposed to be going to Leeds Fest today. At 6am the crashing realisation that I can’t physically manage going hit me, and that it was a stupid idea in the first place as even on a good day I wouldn’t be able to walk that distance, manage the porta loos or the late night.
I just want to be able to do the things I used to do. Covid has taken everything from me, my job, my career, my social life and my health.
Feel like I have let my husband down as I can’t go with him (other people are going so he’ll still go) and that everyone is going to have an amazing day whilst I spend yet another day trapped in the house"

So you could just hope that vaccination reduces the chances of this happening to you. Fingers crossed, right?

Anyway, the point has been made. I'll leave it there.
 
Brainaddict said:
We don't have a large pool of people who have been vaccinated, got covid, then got long covid yet, but early evidence shows it probably can happen: Can the Vaccinated Develop Long Covid After a Breakthrough Infection?

You can wait for more evidence to come in before you stop wingsuit flying, or you could not go wingsuit flying until the evidence is in on disability rates. It's up to you.
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Wingsuit flying isn't a very good analogy because it's not something you do in the hope of decreasing your risk.

As I understand it, there's sketchy evidence that an infection plus vaccination gives you better long term protection than vaccination alone. And there's also sketchy evidence that the risk of getting long covid is not insignificant, if you get infected after being vaccinated.

What I was asking if we actually knew, was the "percentage chance of medium to long term disability that is much, much higher than most people would be willing to accept in any other situation". It suggests that out there, there's a reasonably reliable percentage chance. I don't think there is - it's not really known, other than that it's a risk.

Also, taking the attitude that getting infected post vaccination could even be beneficial, isn't just about an attempt to decrease your covid risk, it's part of a bigger decision making picture that includes how much you want to do activities that, unfortunately, carry a risk of infection.

So if, say, someone really wants to go to a festival, it wouldn't be unreasonable to look at the sketchy information out there, and decide that overall, there may be a small chance of you ending up with long covid, and also a small chance that if you do get infected, it'll actually benefit you in the long term. It all goes into the imprecise weighing-up that people do. If there's some evidence that a post vaccination infection might be beneficial then it seems fair enough to throw that into that mix of considerations.
 
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