Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[little_legs]

I reckon those sleeves will last 2 weeks

 

[two sheds]

This whole thing has made me realise that I kind of live in a socialist/anarchist bubble where we discuss data that is dredged up for us all to argue about here for the most part or with similarly minded IRL friends/comrades and that if the govt say "it's ok to go back to work now" or "it's ok to meet up with 6 other people" it isn't actually everyone who is thinking "not fucking likely mate" like I do.

Yeh and then you see stuff in the US about southern republicans coughing in the face of people wearing masks to ridicule them.

 

[David Clapson]

I've done another IFR/mortality sum, for England this time: it's 1.3%. Infection rate in England is estimated at about 7%, according to new numbers from the ONS About 7% have had coronavirus, says ONS survey. The full ONS report is here Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection Survey pilot - Office for National Statistics According to the FT the excess deaths number for England is 52,400. Scroll down here: UK suffers second-highest death rate from coronavirus | Free to read The population of England is 56m, so IFR/mortality is 1.3%. Various caveats about the data if you look at how the 7% number was arrived at. But 1.3% is pretty bad. Maybe the most cheery way to look at it, from the point of view of the living, is that the virus has already been allowed to rip through care homes, killing its easiest targets. So from here on the IFR should get much, much better. I'd better stop now, cos this is starting to look like an argument to end mitigation.

 

[muscovyduck]

I reckon those sleeves will last 2 weeks

Surely making everyone who uses the train over the course of the day sit in the same few seats when there are plenty of sterile seats available is unwise?

 

[Pickman's model]

I'm going with yes. Italy hospital footage didnt make for good optics.

Optics are for spirits

 

[two sheds]

Have you ever tried drinking spirits out of footage?

 

[Numbers]

Have you ever tried drinking spirits out of footage?

Not the type of footage I imagine you mean but yes I have, i.e. we have a glass slipper (originally came filled with liquor) in our Rum cupboard which we once or twice a year use for Rum drinking.

 

[brogdale]

Interesting that there's different "science" in all 4 components of the UK leading to differing 'lockdown' relaxation.

 

[Mation]

Maybe the most cheery way to look at it, from the point of view of the living, is that the virus has already been allowed to rip through care homes, killing its easiest targets.

Whoop whoop.

 

[Pickman's model]

Not the type of footage I imagine you mean but yes I have, i.e. we have a glass slipper (originally came filled with liquor) in our Rum cupboard which we once or twice a year use for Rum drinking.

Do you have brandy, whisky, tequila and vodka cupboards?

 

[Pickman's model]

Interesting that there's different "science" in all 4 components of the UK leading to differing 'lockdown' relaxation.

Johnson has a sweepstake with the heads of the devolved assemblies on who will kill fewest proportionally

 

[Lorca]

My partner, a Nurse has just finished her night shift and was telling me that because the perception seems to be that the lockdown has lifted, many people are visiting their elderly relatives for the first time in a couple of months and are finding that in many cases they have been quite ill, but have kept it to themselves and tried to manage as best as they can in order to not be a burden as it were. Consequently there has been a large spike in elderly patient hospital admissions in the last day as family members call ambulances for things like uti's, chest infections, sepsis, falls, broken bones etc. Some have likely got Covid, some have dementia and many are falls risks, which is labour intensive. This is placing a lot of extra pressure and stress on already understaffed and stressed out services and she thinks (and she knows what she's talking about) there will be a spike in elderly death rates over the next few weeks. She also said that senior managers have been forcing primary care wards to accept very mentally ill patients, even though staff lack the training and the resources to provide proper care.

She also reckons there has been a recent uptick, locally at least in NHS staff contracting Covid, which she attributes to poor quality PPE - they haven't got the correct equipment - no proper face shields and they are often wearing masks donated by local schoolkids, which makes for a good photo-op in the local paper but isn't good enough for medical use. Also! maybe an obvious point but she reckons there is a hidden crisis of alcoholism (heavy drinkers drinking at home) and mental health issues which will at some point inevitably put even more pressure on creaking Health and Social Care services. Psychologically, it seems many people are already thinking this crisis is over but sadly I suspect it really isn't.

 

[brogdale]

My partner, a Nurse has just finished her night shift and was telling me that because the perception seems to be that the lockdown has lifted, many people are visiting their elderly relatives for the first time in a couple of months and are finding that in many cases they have been quite ill, but have kept it to themselves and tried to manage as best as they can in order to not be a burden as it were. Consequently there has been a large spike in elderly patient hospital admissions in the last day as family members call ambulances for things like uti's, chest infections, sepsis, falls, broken bones etc. Some have likely got Covid, some have dementia and many are falls risks, which is labour intensive. This is placing a lot of extra pressure and stress on already understaffed and stressed out services and she thinks (and she knows what she's talking about) there will be a spike in elderly death rates over the next few weeks. She also said that senior managers have been forcing primary care wards to accept very mentally ill patients, even though staff lack the training and the resources to provide proper care.

She also reckons there has been a recent uptick, locally at least in NHS staff contracting Covid, which she attributes to poor quality PPE - they haven't got the correct equipment - no proper face shields and they are often wearing masks donated by local schoolkids, which makes for a good photo-op in the local paper but isn't good enough for medical use. Also! maybe an obvious point but she reckons there is a hidden crisis of alcoholism (heavy drinkers drinking at home) and mental health issues which will at some point inevitably put even more pressure on creaking Health and Social Care services. Psychologically, it seems many people are already thinking this crisis is over but sadly I suspect it really isn't.

Really good post; thanks for the info.

 

[Artaxerxes]

My partner, a Nurse has just finished her night shift and was telling me that because the perception seems to be that the lockdown has lifted, many people are visiting their elderly relatives for the first time in a couple of months and are finding that in many cases they have been quite ill, but have kept it to themselves and tried to manage as best as they can in order to not be a burden as it were. Consequently there has been a large spike in elderly patient hospital admissions in the last day as family members call ambulances for things like uti's, chest infections, sepsis, falls, broken bones etc. Some have likely got Covid, some have dementia and many are falls risks, which is labour intensive. This is placing a lot of extra pressure and stress on already understaffed and stressed out services and she thinks (and she knows what she's talking about) there will be a spike in elderly death rates over the next few weeks. She also said that senior managers have been forcing primary care wards to accept very mentally ill patients, even though staff lack the training and the resources to provide proper care.

She also reckons there has been a recent uptick, locally at least in NHS staff contracting Covid, which she attributes to poor quality PPE - they haven't got the correct equipment - no proper face shields and they are often wearing masks donated by local schoolkids, which makes for a good photo-op in the local paper but isn't good enough for medical use. Also! maybe an obvious point but she reckons there is a hidden crisis of alcoholism (heavy drinkers drinking at home) and mental health issues which will at some point inevitably put even more pressure on creaking Health and Social Care services. Psychologically, it seems many people are already thinking this crisis is over but sadly I suspect it really isn't.

Depressing but lines up with a lot of predictions from the start

We're going to see the legacy of this for quite a while to come.

 

[brogdale]

Some tentative evidence of this in the latest PHE data for London region:

 

[quimcunx]

Still no proper PPE.

 

[Teaboy]

Some tentative evidence of this in the latest PHE data for London region:

View attachment 215200

Well, yes. If you've been suppressing a virus that hasn't gone away the numbers are going to rise when you start lifting that suppression. I guess the important thing is what sort of level is tolerable?

Anyone know what's happened to the 'R' value by the way? For all of March and most of April none of the press conferences mentioned it. It then suddenly became the single most important number. And now? Not being talked about again?

 

[brogdale]

Well, yes. If you've been suppressing a virus that hasn't gone away the numbers are going to rise when you start lifting that suppression. I guess the important thing is what sort of level is tolerable?

Anyone know what's happened to the 'R' value by the way? For all of March and most of April none of the press conferences mentioned it. It then suddenly became the single most important number. And now? Not being talked about again?

What's worrying about that uptick (if subsequently verified) is that it will represent the hospitalisation of those infected before any formal lifting of the lockdown. With a typical 2 to 3 week lag between infection & hospitalisation, many of the folk shown in that mini-spike were likely infected about 3/4 weeks ago...VEday75, maybe?

 

[20Bees]

Local ‘cottage’ initiatives sewing scrubs are winding down, after a massive drive supplying several hospitals.

My son has been teaching in China for several years and some of his youngeat students have drawn posters portraying the fight against the virus, intending to send posters and donate a few thousand disposable masks here and hoping for emails back with photos and a thank you to the children. I contacted some local settings and there was no interest at all.

 

[teuchter]

I've done another IFR/mortality sum, for England this time: it's 1.3%. Infection rate in England is estimated at about 7%, according to new numbers from the ONS About 7% have had coronavirus, says ONS survey.

If those are from tests around the end of April... and there is a 2-3 week lag in antibodies becoming apparent, does that actually mean the number of people who had already been infected around the beginning of April?

 

[xes]

Did any else get a strange text to their land line this morning telling them to run their taps for 10 minutes?

 

[elbows]

The questio

If those are from tests around the end of April... and there is a 2-3 week lag in antibodies becoming apparent, does that actually mean the number of people who had already been infected around the beginning of April?

Its an ongoing pilot survey. April 26th is the date that bit of the survey began but it is ongoing stuff, some (or most, dunno yet) of the blood tests will have been a lot more recent than that, and these figures will continue to evolve.

This is based on blood test results from 885 individuals since the start of the study on 26 April 2020.

Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection Survey pilot - Office for National Statistics

This release contains initial data on the percentage of the population in England testing positive for COVID-19 taken from the pilot phase of the COVID-19 Incidence Survey.

www.ons.gov.uk

 

[Steel Icarus]

Lockdown absent
Non-resident visiting next door, ice cream van attracting a queue, group of six non-distancing youth on the corner...Mrs SI reports Jack's had nobody on the door counting shoppers in so it was packed, very difficult for her to maintain safe distancing

 

[elbows]

Some tentative evidence of this in the latest PHE data for London region:

Need to keep an eye on that for sure. Its a shame I cannot have as much confidence in the very latest weeks data as I can earlier data. They have a disclaimer about that under those graphs but I havent completely got my head around it yet.

* For the most recent week, more samples are expected therefore the increase seen in the above graphs should be interpreted with caution.

I thought the antibody results in the document were quite interesting.



These weekly reports are available from:

National COVID-19 surveillance reports

National COVID-19 surveillance reports, including weekly summary of findings monitored through various COVID-19 surveillance systems.

www.gov.uk

Edited to add that I suppose I should quote a few things from that section too:

After making adjustments based on the latest information on the accuracy of the assay*, the overall ad- justed prevalence in London increased from 1.3% in week 13 to 10.6% in weeks 15-16 and 14.8% in week 18. It is important to note that the adjusted figures presented this week have changed slightly from those reported last week based on updated evidence about assay sensitivity, which appears to be better after more convalescent samples from confirmed cases have been tested.

The estimates among adults show a continued increase in prevalence within London, however the in- crease seen between weeks 16 and 18 is relatively smaller than the increase observed between weeks 13 and 16. Given that the antibody response takes at least two weeks to become detectable, those displaying a positive result in week 18 are likely to have become infected before mid-April. As the incidence in this period may only have just begun to slow following the impact of lockdown measures, this may explain the slight increase over that period.

The lower prevalence in the samples from other regions including the Midlands, North East, South East and South West regions is consistent with data from other surveillance systems. The adjusted prevalence in the Midlands in week 14 was similar to that in London in weeks 13-14 but lower in week 17 compared with later sampling in London. The adjusted prevalence in North East and North West regions in weeks 16 is well above baseline (3.5% and 5.3% respectively), higher than in London and the Midlands in week 14, but not as high as seen in London in week 16, which is consistent with the surveillance trends reported for England.

The highest adjusted prevalence in all regions is typically found among adolescents and young adults in the 17-29 year old age group (from week 16 onwards, varying from 4.4% in the South East [week 18] to 16.9% in the North West regions [weeks 16-17]). However, in the most recent data from London, the in- crease is more marked in older age groups suggesting that this population have been affected later. These patterns may reflect differences in behaviour and mixing patterns in the different age groups.

 

[weltweit]

I see Siemens today announcing a new antibody test that is supposed to be accurate.

 

[teuchter]

Need to keep an eye on that for sure. Its a shame I cannot have as much confidence in the very latest weeks data as I can earlier data. They have a disclaimer about that under those graphs but I havent completely got my head around it yet.




I thought the antibody results in the document were quite interesting.

View attachment 215225

These weekly reports are available from:

National COVID-19 surveillance reports

National COVID-19 surveillance reports, including weekly summary of findings monitored through various COVID-19 surveillance systems.

www.gov.uk

Edited to add that I suppose I should quote a few things from that section too:

I'm quite surprised that the 'south east' numbers are so low because I'd have thought there would be a significant portion of that population commuting into london on crowded trains, working in office buildings etc. But maybe that is actually a small portion of the overall population.

 

[two sheds]

I'm quite surprised that the 'south east' numbers are so low because I'd have thought there would be a significant portion of that population commuting into london on crowded trains, working in office buildings etc. But maybe that is actually a small portion of the overall population.

And some of it is rich area of the country, commuter belt has a lot of houses with big gardens.

 

[teuchter]

And some of it is rich area of the country, commuter belt has a lot of houses with big gardens.

The big garden is nice for lockdown but doesn't help you in the infection period if you are spending 2+ hours per day on crowded trains and tubes, and working in a building with hundreds of others pressing lift buttons and so on. (And have been jetting around skiing and going to meetings)

 

[two sheds]

true enough. I'd imagine a lot can work from home though. And not crowded together in high-rise flats (some are of course).

 

[SpookyFrank]

Interesting that there's different "science" in all 4 components of the UK leading to differing 'lockdown' relaxation.

Without in any way defending government bullshit, the UK constituent nations do have different demographics, population densities, healthcare capacities and distribution of covid cases. Allowing different regional responses makes a lot of sense; provided you've got the public on board via consistent, open communication and competent, effective and humane actions to contain the virus.