Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[weltweit]

We have to face it, testing is shambolic, they apparently now have a capacity of 40k per day but are only testing 20k, it looks like they will be miles away from their 100k per day target, of capacity or actual tests carried out. If they can't get to 100k by the end of the month should there be consequences?

 

[killer b]

Whitty also went on about how the peak we've just had was not a natural epidemic peak, because of the social distancing interventions, it was an artificial peak. So the peaks would be expected to happen around the country at about the same time, unlike what can happen with natural epidemics. Because the 'lockdown' happened at the same time all across the land. And of course that also means that places that had smaller/later epidemics brewing at the moment when lockdown came, fared much better in terms of deaths. Their emerging epidemics were 'nipped in the bud' in a way that couldnt be said of London or various other places. Anyway Whitty didnt quite say all of that, I added a bit to the subject he brought up.

I was wondering about this today - while many of my contacts elsewhere in the country report relatives, neighbours, workmates and friends struck down, I've seen almost no similar reports in my immediate area. The North West is supposed to be badly affected, but I think perhaps it's not been that bad outside of the Liverpool and Manchester metropolitan areas - my local NHS trust (Lancashire) is reporting 80-odd deaths so far - some of the Liverpool & Manchester trusts are reporting 2-3 times as many.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Does anyone know why they can't do the tests on staff in the actual hospitals they work in and instead force them to drive out to distant locations? a) doesn't seem an efficient use of their time and b) not everyone's got a car, particularly in london.

My Trust, which provides services to people across half-a-dozen counties and unitary authority areas, has apparently managed to provide five (5) tests to staff per day* since the testing regime was finally opened up at Easter - involving staff getting themselves (by driving, walking or cycling - but NOT public transport) to either Bristol or Swindon for a drive-thru swabbing

At that rate, we might all be tested by sometime around next Spring Bank Holiday.

* And that might actually be overestimating how many have been tested

 

[LDC]

My Trust, which provides services to people across half-a-dozen counties and unitary authority areas, has apparently managed to provide five (5) tests to staff per day* since the testing regime was finally opened up at Easter - involving staff getting themselves (by driving, walking or cycling - but NOT public transport) to either Bristol or Swindon for a drive-thru swabbing

At that rate, we might all be tested by sometime around next Spring Bank Holiday.

* And that might actually be overestimating how many have been tested

Yeah, I mentioned up-thread that my Trust (employs 8500 or so) was getting 8 a day until recently.

 

[phillm]

For the love of scrubs ! there is something very sad and very touching about this. Very sad that the NHS in a pandemic should have in some instances have come to this very touching at the hearts and hands outstretched to help.

For The Love Of Scrubs - Original Group | Facebook

The Original For The Love Of Scrubs Group that was set up by nurse Ashleigh Linsdell in March 2020 in response to the COVID - 19 pandemic. This group acts as a knowledge base, support hub and...

www.facebook.com

This board represents the current processing state of hospitals and whether they accept donations of scrubs from the public.

Trello

Organize anything, together. Trello is a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. In one glance, know what's being worked on, who's working on what, and where something is in a process.

trello.com

 

[bimble]

That's been clear in the plan from the outset if people read the research papers, but in the midst of the mess, shit press questions, and the understandable stress we've seen in the last few weeks it has been a bit sidelined, but yes it did come out tonight more clearly. It is grim and it's going to be harsh when this seeps into the public consciousness.

I fully expected life not to be ‘normal’ until sometime next year but him saying it out loud today has somehow still managed to make me feel shocked and sad.
Wonder if it was planned and intended to start saying this instead of Johnson’s ‘we’ll turn the tide in weeks’ refrain.

 

[two sheds]

We have to face it, testing is shambolic, they apparently now have a capacity of 40k per day but are only testing 20k, it looks like they will be miles away from their 100k per day target, of capacity or actual tests carried out. If they can't get to 100k by the end of the month should there be consequences?

Indeed there will be consequences. They'll announce a target of 200k by the end of next month and start talking about that instead.

 

[Azrael]

Track and trace isn't a solution is it though? It's a tactic that has to fit within a wider strategy.

And the only strategic solutions that I can make sense that there are is either total suppression or a managed population infection/immunity until a vaccine comes available (if possible).

Both require different things to be done, and maybe the first is only possible if grabbed and acted on swiftly early on in the outbreak (like NZ). I think the reality for the UK is we have to go with 'herd immunity', just in a managed way. But it is very grim, my understanding is that there will be a very high death toll, just spread out and managed so as not to overwhelm the NHS.

Corrections please?

Herd immunity has been tragically misapplied here. It's achieved via vaccination, and is about protecting the tiny number who can't get jabs by starving a disease of hosts. A benign term for protecting the vulnerable has been twisted into its opposite, killing them in droves to allow the most healthy to avoid restrictions. It's morally and linguistically atrocious. I remain appalled that any doctor advocated it.

If nothing else, what evidence is there that it's even possible? Is there a single example, ever, of an uncontrolled epidemic conferring "herd immunity"? That doesn't mean that a majority build up a degree of natural immunity, it means a disease vanishes.

This isn't just a depraved choice, it's a false choice. Lockdown has turned back the clock by driving down community transmission. We can, and must, exit only via an aggressive suppression. Until this is in place, we can't exit. We shouldn't even consider any other option.

 

[Dogsauce]

Thing is, testing in massive numbers isn’t as helpful now that the numbers infected has likely dropped, it won’t confirm that people who think they had it did have it, only had they been tested when they thought they did would it have given some clarity. I know (via gf’s family) that in Portugal anyone can get a test if they think they have it, and it’s been this way for a while, giving peace of mind and some idea about the spread of the infection.

There will be a lot of people out there certain that they’ve had it (see the numerous people on here and elsewhere swearing blind they or someone they know had it last September/November or whatever - people with the same symptoms more recently will be even more sure even though there’s plenty of other nasties about giving a similar effect). These people will perhaps be out there being a bit less careful than they should, falsely confident, maybe a danger to themselves or others. Given the reported sketchiness of antibody testing not sure how this will be resolved.

 

[Azrael]

As for Whitty, he appears dogmatically opposed to suppressing the virus, and was, according to the Times, talking about the unscientific nonsense of "herd immunity" back in January (on the basis of the old flu pandemic plan). It boggles the mind how one of our leading epidemiologists has come to believe this lethal nonsense.

Whitty isn't, much as he may think he is, running the government. Hancock is now talking about contact tracing and testing and isolating Covid patients, and Johnston's reported to be impressed by Australia's successes. As is Sturgeon in Scotland, who's now under overwhelming political pressure to atone for allowing the Scottish government to be led astray by a dentist and a gynaecologist (seriously).

Either Whitty gets behind suppressing the virus, or there's going to be moves to replace him with someone who is.

 

[Azrael]

Anthony Costello explains the situation well here. Far from being pliant spokespeople shilling unscientific policy invented by "run it hot" gamblers, the medical establishment are the ones in the driving seat, dragging their feet and undermining Hancock's efforts to implement a suppression regime. They invented fake "herd immunity" and they sold it to SPADs and ministers.

There's been far too much focus on ministers, based on the assumption that they've overruled advisors, and not nearly enough on the power and influence of those advisors. Look how Scotland shifted after her CMO was forced to resign over her roadtrips. The advisors aren't the solution, they're the problem, and they need to go.

 

[The39thStep]

Dunno, but if she'd been PM we'd have johnson and fellow headbangers trying to fuck the whole thing from the sidelines blaming Brussels the WHO, whilst trying to finely calibrate the moment when he used the crisis to get the job himself.

Depends I suppose on how sidelined they would have been.No doubt the same public health advice would have been given.

 

[Azrael]

Meanwhile north of the border, Scotland's exit plan is out tomorrow, based on "suppression" and "test, trace, isolate".



Devi Sridhar and other leading epidemiologists and public health experts from Edinburgh have now replaced the dentist and gynecologist in shaping Bute House's policy. Advisors matter, with ministers heavily dependent on their thinking. We must focus on who they are and what they're saying.

 

[zahir]

John Ashton sums up the UK response.

 

[Azrael]

Hancock in the House today, committing to intensive contact tracing linked to testing and isolating cases. He clearly understands the theory and explains it well. I loathe him as an oleaginous Toryboy of the kind we're all too familiar with, but on this, he's right, and has been pushing back against the advisors ever since he first rejected "herd immunity" after the weekend of terror.

 

[quimcunx]

Well that's very interesting. Perhaps the tube is safer after all.

I just imagine this miasma of disease swirling around down there and it puts me off.

South london makerspace are making those plastic face shields. you could apply to get one.

 

[Maltin]

Just a quick follow-up to that. The data for earlier does exist, I can see it expressed by all the blue dots on this graph from the FT article:

View attachment 208196
Obviously in this format I dont know which year each dot is for, so for example I dont know which year the very highest dot for week 1 is, way off at the top, well beyond 20,000. But I know January 1976 had a rather large amount of flu death, and I do have quarterly figures for 1966-1999 which show the first quarter of 1976 as being by far the highest quarterly figure for this range of time, so I'm going to guess that the highest dot is for week 1 January 1976. I was 9 months old at that time.

The source of that FT chart refers to Harry Kennard who I googled.

From a section of his blog (statistics – Harry Kennard), there is a link to an ONS page with daily deaths in England and Wales from 1970 to 2014. That peak in January is January 1970.

Daily death occurrences, England, regions of England and Wales: 1970 to 2014 - Office for National Statistics

www.ons.gov.uk

The peak weeks (using Saturday to Friday as a week as they did for the recent reporting) were the week 1 January 1970 (20,444), week 51 December 1989 (18,791), week 1 January 2000 (18,731). Week 50 December 1989 also had over 18,000 deaths reported with 18,258. Highest death total for a day in that period is 2 January 1970 with 3,255 deaths reported.

The blog also refers to another ONS page with an article on excess winter deaths since 1950/51 where you can download the data (not weekly figures) from 1950/51 to 2015/16.

Excess winter mortality in England and Wales - Office for National Statistics

Excess winter mortality in England and Wales, by region, sex, age group and local authority.

www.ons.gov.uk

 

[Petcha]

Why has the BBC cut away from the live bonkers Trump conference to get an opinion from their commentator on how its going so far. Fucking terrible.

 

[Azrael]

See that Whitty's counsel of despair today has got the laissez-faire brigade screaming to end lockdown to let virus move through population to generate "herd immunity". Andrew Lilico probably most egregious example, but plenty others. Misusing this scientific term has been unfathomably dangerous.

Best case scenario is that Whitty's so tone deaf he doesn't realize the unintended consequences of his words. Regardless, he's a menace, and needs to go.

 

[elbows]

The source of that FT chart refers to Harry Kennard who I googled.

From a section of his blog (statistics – Harry Kennard), there is a link to an ONS page with daily deaths in England and Wales from 1970 to 2014. That peak in January is January 1970.

Daily death occurrences, England, regions of England and Wales: 1970 to 2014 - Office for National Statistics

www.ons.gov.uk

The peak weeks (using Saturday to Friday as a week as they did for the recent reporting) were the week 1 January 1970 (20,444), week 51 December 1989 (18,791), week 1 January 2000 (18,731). Week 50 December 1989 also had over 18,000 deaths reported with 18,258. Highest death total for a day in that period is 2 January 1970 with 3,255 deaths reported.

The blog also refers to another ONS page with an article on excess winter deaths since 1950/51 where you can download the data (not weekly figures) from 1950/51 to 2015/16.

Excess winter mortality in England and Wales - Office for National Statistics

Excess winter mortality in England and Wales, by region, sex, age group and local authority.

www.ons.gov.uk

Thank! I've been absent for much of the afternoon and evening because I managed to get that daily data by speaking to him on twitter (since I hadnt seen the blog), and was doing the same sort of thing as you with it. Its a shame the numbers only start at such a key moment at the start of 1970, when the country was experiencing its largest wave of H3N2 flu that became pandemic in 1968 but was rather late here. In some ways I do think of the H3N2 flu that began back then as our worst pandemic, if I stop looking at such a pandemic as a singular event, and instead consider all the deaths there have been from that type of flu ever since. Most of the bad days in that daily data throughout the decades since is a story of H3N2.

 

[Lurdan]

Don't know if it's of interest elbows but Ed Conway (Sky News Economics Editor) has also been producing his own charts, including this interactive graphic of weekly deaths since 1970 :

Nugget

nuggetcharts.com

(cursor over each grey dot to see the date). No idea if the data is sound but I think the chart itself is an interesting form of presentation.

Details of his workings on his twitter feed

 

[teuchter]

See that Whitty's counsel of despair today has got the laissez-faire brigade screaming to end lockdown to let virus move through population to generate "herd immunity". Andrew Lilico probably most egregious example, but plenty others. Misusing this scientific term has been unfathomably dangerous.

How exactly do you think the term has been misused? Herd immunity can be achieved via a vaccine or via widespread exposure to the virus itself.

 

[Maltin]

Don't know if it's of interest elbows but Ed Conway (Sky News Economics Editor) has also been producing his own charts, including this interactive graphic of weekly deaths since 1970 :

Nugget

nuggetcharts.com

(cursor over each grey dot to see the date). No idea if the data is sound but I think the chart itself is an interesting form of presentation.

Details of his workings on his twitter feed

That chart also credits Harry Kennard so it is the same data. I guess he submitted a request previously for this data which is on the ONS site.

 

[Azrael]

How exactly do you think the term has been misused? Herd immunity can be achieved via a vaccine or via widespread exposure to the virus itself.

Do you have any examples of an epidemic generating "herd immunity" and eliminating a virus from the general population? Even if you do, what evidence did the government have that it was even possible with SARS-CoV-2?

They could've said "natural immunity", which is, I assume, what they meant. It's anyone's guess what the virus would do at this point. Would it merge with other coronaviruses, become milder, cycle through the population alongside the common cold? Would it do so while retaining its lethal symptoms? Perhaps people can become reinfected: prior exposure could even make their condition worse.

We just don't know, and it was grossly negligent to try.

 

[Azrael]

Adding to the above, there is an older, pre-WW2 use of the term, which applied to a disease decreasing when people built up natural immunity. Post-WW2, it's usually applied to unvaccinated people being protected by vaccination programmes. Anyone who's argued back and forth with anti-vaxers will be familiar with this.

If Whitty and Vallance were using "herd immunity" in its old sense, it was a comms disaster. Given the nihilistic presser of doom the CMO treated us to yesterday, I'm willing to believe that, but if they didn't even believe that the "free riders" would be protected, it'd make the policy even more monstrous.

 

[teuchter]

Do you have any examples of an epidemic generating "herd immunity" and eliminating a virus from the general population? Even if you do, what evidence did the government have that it was even possible with SARS-CoV-2?

They could've said "natural immunity", which is, I assume, what they meant. It's anyone's guess what the virus would do at this point. Would it merge with other coronaviruses, become milder, cycle through the population alongside the common cold? Would it do so while retaining its lethal symptoms? Perhaps people can become reinfected: prior exposure could even make their condition worse.

We just don't know, and it was grossly negligent to try.

Herd immunity is simply a term used to talk about the effects of a significant proportion of the population becoming immune to an infection. There's nothing to say that it can only be used when talking about total eradication, or only when it offers a certain level of protection, nor that it can't be used when discussing potential strategies before you know whether or not it will be effective.

 

[Azrael]

Herd immunity is simply a term used to talk about the effects of a significant proportion of the population becoming immune to an infection. There's nothing to say that it can only be used when talking about total eradication, or only when it offers a certain level of protection, nor that it can't be used when discussing potential strategies before you know whether or not it will be effective.

Yes, I noted the old use already. That's not how it's commonly used today, and if they did intend the old use, it makes the strategy even more incomprehensible.

It's also tied to the characteristics of a specific disease. SARS-CoV-2 is simply too new -- for all its impact, discovered just a few months ago -- to even contemplate such an approach. We were calling it the novel coronavirus for good reason.

 

[teuchter]

there is an older, pre-WW2 use of the term, which applied to a disease decreasing when people built up natural immunity. Post-WW2, it's usually applied to unvaccinated people being protected by vaccination programmes.

Who says there's been a change in usage? Natural immunity is one form of herd immunity. Checking in a current medical dictionary, there's no mention of herd immunity only referring to vaccine-related immunity.

Definition of HERD IMMUNITY

a reduction in the risk of infection with a specific communicable disease (such as measles or influenza) that occurs when a significant proportion of the population has become immune to infection (as because of previous exposure or vaccination) so that susceptible… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

 

[teuchter]

Yes, I noted the old use already. That's not how it's commonly used today, and if they did intend the old use, it makes the strategy even more incomprehensible.

It's also tied to the characteristics of a specific disease. SARS-CoV-2 is simply too new -- for all its impact, discovered just a few months ago -- to even contemplate such an approach. We were calling it the novel coronavirus for good reason.

You might disagree with its appropriateness as a strategy, but that isn't the same as the term being misused.

My understanding was that they were indeed originally talking about a strategy that involved building up natural immunity. Natural immunity is one way of creating herd immunity, so it was not a misuse of the term. How could it have been anything else, unless they believed that a vaccine would be available in a matter of days or weeks?

 

[philosophical]

I love my neighbour's cat calling round on his daily scrounge patrol.
He does a lot of winning wriggling on his back, purring, and rubbing against me.
I keep a bag of Dreamies to treat him.
Anyway does anybody know if the Rona can be caught by stroking and head scratching a passing cat?