LDC
On est tous des pangolins
I get what you mean, but don't agree 100%, I think there's an element of fuckwittery about it for sure, but some of it is ideological and a very clear choice rather than incompetence. But I know you know that!
Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion
- Thread starter Sasaferrato
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I get what you mean, but don't agree 100%, I think there's an element of fuckwittery about it for sure, but some of it is ideological and a very clear choice rather than incompetence. But I know you know that!
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
This is a response to the 'herd immunity' proposal
Artaxerxes
Look out, he's got a gnu!
We did, it got ignored in the rush to open back up because the government wanted to keep pace with the rest of Europe rather than have the population locked down for two more weeks
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
and 
cupid_stunt
Chief seagull hater & farmerbarleymow's nemesis.
Covid: pubs in north of England face new restrictions within days
Alarming rise in cases puts pressure on ministers to act as Nicola Sturgeon imposes Scotland crackdown
chilango
Hypothetical Wanker
I get what you mean, but don't agree 100%, I think there's an element of fuckwittery about it for sure, but some of it is ideological and a very clear choice rather than incompetence. But I know you know that!
The privatisation of the pandemic has required us to become epidemiologists of the self.
elbows
Well-Known Member
I dont know about anyone else tend to feel a bit better when health officials etc start acknowledging the role of things that were previously deliberately played down, like the role of hospitality settings in increasing transmission.
All the ways people pissed on the angles taken by the Barrington clowns were good stuff too, good for my state of mind.
All the ways people pissed on the angles taken by the Barrington clowns were good stuff too, good for my state of mind.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Non-severe hospital outbreaks are a bit of an oxymoron in my book. In that its often hard to escape the serious consequences, either to hospital patients, staff or those discharged to care homes and everyone in those homes.
A near constant theme of mine has been the underreporting and lack of analysis of this subject, and a huge unwillingness for national journalists to tell evolving, joined up stories about this aspect of the pandemic. Its been a while since I looked at various stats about what proportion of hospital Covid-19 illness was from cases acquired in hospital in the first wave but it was quite a fair proportion and I will go back over this ground again one day.
Several serious, deadly, outbreaks have been reported in the news since the end of the intense part of the first wave, unlike during the peak of the wave when there was pretty much no news about this side of things at all. Partly because these outbreaks stood out a mile when they happened against a backdrop of low levels of community infection and serious illness. Perhaps this stuff will disappear back into the pandemic fog as general transmission increases again. But there are some per hospital-trust stats that come out monthly which may allow us to spot notable outbreaks in hindsight.
LDC
On est tous des pangolins
It's clear we just need to shut pubs, restaurants, bars, etc. to slow this, and it needs to come with support so it can happen, as I think if not it'll be resisted by some (Starmer and Burnham are already making noises to that end) and won't work well.
Some local bars and breweries to me are already circulating petitions and calls to write to MPs to end the 10pm curfew as they say they're being fucked by it. (I also think there's plenty of small businesses that are just pissed off and no amount of clear messaging and scientific evidence will convince them closing is the right thing to do.)
Some local bars and breweries to me are already circulating petitions and calls to write to MPs to end the 10pm curfew as they say they're being fucked by it. (I also think there's plenty of small businesses that are just pissed off and no amount of clear messaging and scientific evidence will convince them closing is the right thing to do.)
elbows
Well-Known Member
No problem, I dont expect any detail, am not fishing for that.
My own attitude about whether people should avoid hospitals is that every situation should be judged on its own merit, very much including where the hospital is, its reputation for the infection control side of things, and what the patient needs the hospital for.
Like other settings, how busy the hospital is also makes a difference to risk and the magnitude of potential consequences. Its a numbers game in a number of ways, and I really hope that things like influenza are suppressed by peoples behavioural changes this winter so that some of the usual seasonal NHS pressures are reduced.
elbows
Well-Known Member
Its also impossible for me to claim to know whether the current NHS plans to keep other stuff going is a doomed, reckless idea that will cause much death, or whether it represents a decent attempt at balancing the different merits and risks of such options. Because it will come down to what levels of infection we end up with in the coming months. In theory they should try, so long as they have a good plan for how to change approach in a timely way if thats what circumstances end up demanding.
If hard choices are not made in regard to other transmission settings like hospitality, to keep infection levels in the community down below a certain level, then its much easier to predict that the current NHS plan is doomed.
If hard choices are not made in regard to other transmission settings like hospitality, to keep infection levels in the community down below a certain level, then its much easier to predict that the current NHS plan is doomed.
StoneRoad
heckling from the back!
my bold :
comment ...
I've already had a 'flu jab (too young for the pneumonia one) in preparation for this winter, but I do hope that all the anti-covid stuff also acts as anti-flu precautions ...
elbows
Well-Known Member
There are signs in some places that had their winter already that flu was at levels far below normal. But I cannot have too much confidence about whether that will end up applying here too given that we currently have a situation where covid-19 transmission is not under control, rhinovirus had no problem doing its normal 'back to school explosion of cases' thing etc. Other interplay factors may exist too that are not too well understood yet, such as whether our immune responses against covid make it less likely we will catch flu for a while, something I would expect to have an effect on the potential for any flu epidemics if these sorts of immunity factors turn out to be a strong phenomenon. Competition between viruses usually has losers I guess.
It's clear in public health terms, but without financial support it's the end for countless pubs, restaurants and the rest of it. They'll be boarded up and all their staff on the dole. Unless the government is prepared to underwrite the cost of temporarily shutting them down again - or at least restricting their activities to the point it could well bankrupt them - I can't blame them for pressing for restrictions to be lifted.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
You reckon? I think it might be the other way round
elbows
Well-Known Member
You reckon? I think it might be the other way round
Depends on the context. My statement was a little too broad.
But I'm saying it in the current context, which is that further restrictions on hospitality are highly likely to be imposed, at least regionally, so much more likely than the idea they will be lifted.
They might dick around with the 10pm thing under pressure but overall one of the few options they've left themselves to manage the levels of infection, given the reluctance to close schools etc, is to target hospitality. And I'm sure they will target hospitality, because no matter the other factors or levels of government incompetence, we've already seen that they are going to act on data that tells them the NHS would otherwise reach a point of collapse at some stage if the current trends were maintained. And since they are keen to avoid the most draconian levels of lockdown as much as possible, they simply have to be prepared to do other things instead to alter the timing of increases and waves.
In England they tried all the other sorts of local lockdown stuff that didnt achieve enough, so I dont think they have any choice.
Some of the detail may end up different to how Scotland has gone about this today, but the overall theme will be much the same I'm sure.
mauvais
on reddit or something
I went to the park for a walk today and it was distinctly busy with the Orthodox Jewish community - I think because it's a religious holiday at the moment. Hard to tell who is distancing because there's some big families but noone seemed bothered. Two caveats: It is Manchester so arguably the baseline is pretty poor to begin with, and also if I hung out around universities I would be writing something else, it's not exactly unique.
Anyway my wife sees patients from this community in a work capacity and some of them reported (albeit early this year) to her that government and media advice doesn't necessarily make it to constituents. Shortly after that, the Graun ran a piece on the same.
I wonder: is this manifesting in cases or casualty figures? Is there any data other than guessing at MSOAs?
Anyway my wife sees patients from this community in a work capacity and some of them reported (albeit early this year) to her that government and media advice doesn't necessarily make it to constituents. Shortly after that, the Graun ran a piece on the same.
I wonder: is this manifesting in cases or casualty figures? Is there any data other than guessing at MSOAs?
Cloo
Banana for scale
I was wondering why those local lockdowns weren't lowering cases, but I looked up the rules and saw that's because they're hardly lockdowns at all and basically everything's open but maybe for not quite as long and it's like 'No, really, do wear a mask please'. Doesn't seem much point to that!
Went to the cinema tonight for first time since all this and was a bit shocked that they didn't even close alternate rows, and although there were only 10 of us there (we were 3 - and then there were 3 other groups that amounted to 7 people) our assigned seats put me sitting directly behind someone and then the other group was on the row behind and only and 3 or 4 seats to the left of us. But we were told not to move from our assigned seats so I didn't want to until the film started and we knew who was there - I moved to other side of my husband so I wasn't right behind someone but we still had three groups who were less than 2m apart when they could easily have closed off every other row. Given there were just 10 of us I suspect the risk is pretty low, but all the same...
mauvais - This week is the festival of Succot. There will absolutely be high deaths in the Orthodox community within a few weeks, there's no way they will observe social distancing or lower numbers in shul during the chaggim There were high death rates in Jewish community anyway - I can tell you that at peak in April death announcement emails from my synagogue were coming in 2-3 a day for about a fortnight then when it's normally about 1 or 2 a week, it was pretty awful.
Went to the cinema tonight for first time since all this and was a bit shocked that they didn't even close alternate rows, and although there were only 10 of us there (we were 3 - and then there were 3 other groups that amounted to 7 people) our assigned seats put me sitting directly behind someone and then the other group was on the row behind and only and 3 or 4 seats to the left of us. But we were told not to move from our assigned seats so I didn't want to until the film started and we knew who was there - I moved to other side of my husband so I wasn't right behind someone but we still had three groups who were less than 2m apart when they could easily have closed off every other row. Given there were just 10 of us I suspect the risk is pretty low, but all the same...
mauvais - This week is the festival of Succot. There will absolutely be high deaths in the Orthodox community within a few weeks, there's no way they will observe social distancing or lower numbers in shul during the chaggim There were high death rates in Jewish community anyway - I can tell you that at peak in April death announcement emails from my synagogue were coming in 2-3 a day for about a fortnight then when it's normally about 1 or 2 a week, it was pretty awful.
elbows
Well-Known Member
I may have expressed more confidence in that previous final sentence than I intended. When it comes to the detail of any particular measure, I dont have faith in this government. But they have proven to me since about March 16th that those who would promote a do nothing approach do not genuinely have the ear of this regime. Those options arent considered viable in exactly the same way the Barrington clowns are not credible. Its easy for individuals, publications etc that arent responsible for actually get the NHS through winter to take all manner of stances, but even if the government was fine with seeing many tens of thousands more deaths they do not have the same luxury as the clowns because of responsibility for hospitals etc.
elbows
Well-Known Member
In theory the stuff done in local lockdowns, for example limiting contact between housholds, should still have some effect. Clearly not enough on its own, and usually not possible to judge each measure individually because of other stuff happening at the same time and the fact we dont know how much worse the rise in cases would have been without those measures.
The reluctance to close all manner of things in those local lockdowns does stand in stark contrast to the principals of the proposed 'short, sharp shock' circuit-breaker things that have been floated for a while now. It has subjected people to extended periods of restrictions and this is one of the trade-offs the powers that be have made - by keeping so many things open they have prolonged the length of restrictions in those areas, and key objectives have not been achieved.
I cannot currently predict whether even a full hospitality shutdown will be enough, it depends on many things including enforcement of other measures. If they have to go even further than hospitality then they will have to reduce their ambitions regarding how many people are going to work, or reduce their education ambitions, and or do more NHS reconfiguration and cancellation of routine stuff than they would like.
elbows
Well-Known Member
I dont care if they met the pope and then flew around on a magic cloud. As far as I'm concerned that was just the government paying lip-service to the concerns of their swivel-eyed backbenchers. At most they were searching for viable alternatives but Gupta & co wont have given them anything that was any use in practice so its a dead end.
So this is not the danger that I'm focussed on. The danger for me is the same as always, that the government will act but not necessarily at the right time with the right strength or the right messages. But all that means is that eventually they have to slam on the brakes much harder again, it does not mean they will say fuck it, cut the brake cables and then go for a smoke in the boot as the car careens down a cliff.
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elbows
Well-Known Member
And the main danger of the pandemic clowns is that they sew confusion and reduce public compliance with measures that require people to take responsibility for their own behaviour. Its not that they will manage to convince the government to ignore all the NHS data and go off on a weird path. In just the same way that despite the initial instincts of the Johnson regime in this pandemic, even his sorry bunch had to throw their original plan in the bin and get in touch with pandemic reality when the time came (mid March).
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