Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[wayward bob]

yeah i noted that too weltweit. good job my phone rarely leaves home even when i go out

 

[Azrael]

Just heard a snippet that the mobile companies may be asked to track whether people are complying with social distancing. I know in China there was a lot of surveillance, I suppose one could expect the UK Gov to enquire about it, how though, and but really?

South Korea's been doing since the start. Anonymized data's made public, and using GPS, citizens receive text alerts if they've come close to infection, and are told to report immediately for testing.

We've never been in a better position to impose effective quarantine, yet in the West, have squandered it.

 

[elbows]

Don't worry elbows I am not having a go at you. I just find it frustrating where we are now.

Don't worry, I didnt think you were, I was just reviewing some of the history. I was frustrated all the way along really, although I doubt I framed things properly at some stages and I was slow on the uptake as to some of the new approaches. Mostly frustrated because I knew some of the absurdities of the old orthodox approach (containment my arse), some of the assumptions it was based on, and the low chances that countries would deviate from that approach before disaster struck.

 

[Azrael]

The old orthodox way of thinking about things was about more than a 2nd wave, there were a lot of other assumptions wrapped up in the approach too.

The WHO's own orthodoxy meant they did not recommend widespread travel restrictions, border closures etc. I talked about this at the time and then they proceeded to reiterate it.

It was therefore not surprising that orthodox approaches to the 'containment' phase in other countries dominated thinking for quite a period.

That period really should have ended no later than when the WHO had press conferences about, and then published a report by, their team that went to China. This was the moment that the orthodox 'influenza-based pandemic planning' approach should have been ditched, and the alternative approach no longer considered some unthinkable thing that couldnt be done here. The WHO press conference was on February 24th. The report was published on February 28th.

Yes, WHO are far from blameless. The Asian countries with a folk memory of SARS and MERS didn't wait around, and rushed to impose effective quarantine.

Agree that the press conference was a crucial missed opportunity.

 

[Lord Camomile]

If only Cineworld and all those like them had waited until the end of the week.

But no, couldn't wait to get rid of people. Heartless, ruthless cunts.

Fuck off

If it is backdated to 28 Feb, and thus going back would have no impact on the (ex-)employees, would be interested to see how many do go back. Some will have enjoyed the job, or at least aspects of it, and made good friends there, but I bet a lot of 'em think Cineworld and Picturehouse can get fooked.

 

[wayward bob]

We've never been in a better position to impose effective quarantine, yet in the West, have squandered it.

but surely at the cost of level of state surveillance that's a massive imposition and hard to roll back?

 

[elbows]

Thinking back to the last third of January, and early February, it pains me to think that many of the clues were there.

I remember there was a lot of focus on blaming China, and people were understandably not impressed with the way information came out, how the outbreak was handled early on, and the timetable of the outbreak compared to the timetable of actually detecting it and then later actually responding properly. I remember using the word lag far too many times, to describe far too many things. And one of my main points when talking about that was was that many of the delays that happened in China would be expected to happen elsewhere too, even though, unlike China at the start, everywhere else did have advanced warning.

Well, I made those points with a certain set of assumptions in mind at the time (including 'the horse has already bolted'), and a big focus on the early phases and the orthodox approach. I was just trying to ready people for the fact that our own detection of cases would lag behind the reality, and that we would make many of the same mistakes China made. What I had no idea of at the time was that the orthodoxy about what comes next would be challenged. We had no idea Chinas suppression strategy would have big results, and then when it showed results I and many other people were skeptical of some of Chinas data.

Orthodox thinking still ended up being destroyed in record time by this pandemic, but sadly not fast enough to avoid a first horrible wave of epidemic in many places

 

[weltweit]

South Korea's been doing since the start. Anonymized data's made public, and using GPS, citizens receive text alerts if they've come close to infection, and are told to report immediately for testing.

How do they know people are close to infection? What/where/when is the known about infection?

We've never been in a better position to impose effective quarantine, yet in the West, have squandered it.

I am not sure I am displeased about this

 

[Azrael]

but surely at the cost of level of state surveillance that's a massive imposition and hard to roll back?

We already have highly intrusive surveillance for a range of criminal and civil matters. Stopping an epidemic in its tracks is surely the definition of a reasonable search and seizure!

That doesn't mean states should get a blank cheque, of course. I certainly don't agree with the British law's two-year sunset clause. But provided there's safeguards, I would unhesitatingly support the South Korean approach.

 

[elbows]

The surveillance stuff is such a complex subject, I do think things will get messy on this front, and my 'never say never' mode is engaged on this one for all sorts of reasons, many high stakes in this area.

Because although its true that they squandered the chance to do this for this particular phase, there is always a chance, if levels of infection drop to a certain level and other capabilities come online such as massive amounts of testing, that a subsequent opportunity for full on virus suppression will be spotted.

One of the issues for making this stuff work is that another UK establishment orthodoxy will have to be dispensed with or heavily modified - its not so much a question of the surveillance itself, but whether its overt or covert. I do not have special secret knowledge about existing UK capabilities, but over the years it has been possible to at least ascertain that this country really hates revealing any of its methods, to the extent that such things sometimes seem to be the overriding priority above all others.

 

[Azrael]

How do they [S. Korea] know people are close to infection? What/where/when is the known about infection?

Believe a combo of test results, self-reporting and diagnosis from clinicians is fed into a programme, and geodata triggers an alert. Am very interested to learn more about it.

I am not sure I am displeased about this

Given the alternative, I certainly am!

 

[Azrael]

Thinking back to the last third of January, and early February, it pains me to think that many of the clues were there.

I remember there was a lot of focus on blaming China, and people were understandably not impressed with the way information came out, how the outbreak was handled early on, and the timetable of the outbreak compared to the timetable of actually detecting it and then later actually responding properly. I remember using the word lag far too many times, to describe far too many things. And one of my main points when talking about that was was that many of the delays that happened in China would be expected to happen elsewhere too, even though, unlike China at the start, everywhere else did have advanced warning.

Well, I made those points with a certain set of assumptions in mind at the time, and a big focus on the early phases and the orthodox approach. I was just trying to ready people for the fact that our own detection of cases would lag behind the reality, and that we would make many of the same mistakes China made. What I had no idea of at the time was that the orthodoxy about what comes next would be challenged. We had no idea Chinas suppression strategy would have big results, and then when it showed results I and many other people were skeptical of some of Chinas data.

Orthodox thinking still ended up being destroyed in record time by this pandemic, but sadly not fast enough to avoid a first horrible wave of epidemic in many places

I had grave misgivings about the lack of travel bans and border testing from the start, but British contact tracing did seem to be proving effective (I.e. in suppressing an outbreak in Brighton), so kept them off here out of a wish to avoid spreading panic.

Turns out they were cooking the books, knew there were likely tens of thousands of untested cases in circulation, and egregiously, had no intention of suppressing the disease. I took the next states as contingency plans for if containment failed, when it turned out they were the intended endzone. Disastrous.

 

[8ball]

I had grave misgivings about the lack of travel bans and border testing from the start, but British contact tracing did seem to be proving effective (I.e. in suppressing an outbreak in Brighton), so kept them off here out of a wish to avoid spreading panic.

Turns out they were cooking the books, knew there were likely tens of thousands of untested cases in circulation, and egregiously, had no intention of suppressing the disease. I took the next states as contingency plans for if containment failed, when it turned out they were the intended endzone. Disastrous.

I can actually feel my piss boiling. Have had a lot of anger these last few days.

 

[Azrael]

The surveillance stuff is such a complex subject, I do think things will get messy on this front, and my 'never say never' mode is engaged on this one for all sorts of reasons, many high stakes in this area.

Because although its true that they squandered the chance to do this for this particular phase, there is always a chance, if levels of infection drop to a certain level and other capabilities come online such as massive amounts of testing, that a subsequent opportunity for full on virus suppression will be spotted.

One of the issues for making this stuff work is that another UK establishment orthodoxy will have to be dispensed with or heavily modified - its not so much a question of the surveillance itself, but whether its overt or covert. I do not have special secret knowledge about existing UK capabilities, but over the years it has been possible to at least ascertain that this country really hates revealing any of its methods, to the extent that such things sometimes seem to be the overriding priority above all others.

Can't see any other way to return to a semblance of normality before a vaccine's available. Even if some of the promising antivirals are proven and fast-tracked, A&Es and ICUs would still be swamped by uncontrolled spread, and there'd still be a serious death toll among vulnerable groups.

If people see South Korea and other countries succeed in containing Covid-19 without draconian lockdowns for an extended period, the political and economic pessure to use surveillance and quarantine as a route back to normality will be overwhelming.

 

[Azrael]

I can actually feel my piss boiling. Have had a lot of anger these last few days.

Was consumed by rage like I've never felt all weekend. The British government planned to allow hundreds of thousands to die in a grotesque medical experiment, and senior doctors signed off on it. Has upended everything I thought I knew about the state and the professions, and I won't be forgetting it.

 

[8ball]

Was consumed by rage like I've never felt all weekend. The British government planned to allow hundreds of thousands to die in a grotesque medical experiment, and senior doctors signed off on it. Has upended everything I thought I knew about the state and the professions, and I won't be forgetting it.

That’s not really how I formulated it personally, but there’s something in that and I think it will be remembered.

Those doctors were most likely hammered with factoids about likely consequences of over-aggressive measures imo. And there’s the also the Chomskyite view that only those either on side or amenable to such manipulations would find themselves in such a position in the first place..

 

[elbows]

I had grave misgivings about the lack of travel bans and border testing from the start, but British contact tracing did seem to be proving effective (I.e. in suppressing an outbreak in Brighton), so kept them off here out of a wish to avoid spreading panic.

Turns out they were cooking the books, knew there were likely tens of thousands of untested cases in circulation, and egregiously, had no intention of suppressing the disease. I took the next states as contingency plans for if containment failed, when it turned out they were the intended endzone. Disastrous.

For me and probably some other people who have been on these threads for a long time, one of the most disconcerting aspects is that there wasnt actually an obvious moment where this revelation took place, not in that form at least.

By that I mean:

We were talking about all sorts of models from quite early on here. We saw the projections about what sort of numbers of infected people might have left Wuhan before the lockdown, what travel patterns were like, how effective airport screening is, and how many undetected cases we might reasonably assume are out there for every case that was actually detected. With that sort of stuff in mind, there never was a stage where we were confident that contact tracing and other measures in the UK were picking up all the cases.

The number of unconfirmed cases out there has clearly increased over time, I forgot what sorts of numbers were being modelled for that sort of thing at the time, but I dont think it would have been tens of thousands of UK cases back then. Given doubling every x days, the numbers would have been pretty small back then to get to tens of thousands recently. Anyway thats not to distract from all your points.

If I wanted to be really kind to the orthodox thinking on the pandemic, I suppose I could say that rather than calling them intended endzones, they were considered to be inevitabilities. Like what happened with the swine flu pandemic of 2009 - once it was properly spotted it was already active in communities in several countries, all the assumptions and traditional thinking about flu pandemics kicked in, and it was considered inevitable that everywhere would get it. Initial containment phases were more about getting clinical data from early cases in the country, and some data useful for epidemic modelling, than anything else. Of course such thinking is more forgivable in a flu pandemic because there tend to be pharmaceutical interventions available and the more solid prospect of a vaccine within a known timeframe. But it could still have been a disaster if that had been a very bad flu pandemic.

 

[Azrael]

That’s not really how I formulated it personally, but there’s something in that and I think it will be remembered.

Those doctors were most likely hammered with factoids about likely consequences of over-aggressive measures imo. And there’s the also the Chomskyite view that only those either on side or amenable to such manipulations would find themselves in such a position in the first place..

True, but they still took an oath to do no harm, and I thought that counted for something. Turns out it's so much confetti, and scores of our most senior physicians will junk all ethics if politically expedient. When this is over, there's gonna be some extremely tough questions about how the medical profession's regulated, and how it ever allowed such people to go undetected.

 

[elbows]

Was consumed by rage like I've never felt all weekend. The British government planned to allow hundreds of thousands to die in a grotesque medical experiment, and senior doctors signed off on it. Has upended everything I thought I knew about the state and the professions, and I won't be forgetting it.

If you are in that sort of state then perhaps the following article will be of interest:

When it comes to national emergencies, Britain has a tradition of cold calculation | David Edgerton

The government’s reluctance to put the health of citizens first has echoes in the 1940s and 50s, says author David Edgerton

www.theguardian.com

Its not as good as I would have liked, but since I read it recently its the one that leapt readily to mind.

 

[Azrael]

For me and probably some other people who have been on these threads for a long time, one of the most disconcerting aspects is that there wasnt actually an obvious moment where this revelation took place, not in that form at least.

By that I mean:

We were talking about all sorts of models from quite early on here. We saw the projections about what sort of numbers of infected people might have left Wuhan before the lockdown, what travel patterns were like, how effective airport screening is, and how many undetected cases we might reasonably assume are out there for every case that was actually detected. With that sort of stuff in mind, there never was a stage where we were confident that contact tracing and other measures in the UK were picking up all the cases.

The number of unconfirmed cases out there has clearly increased over time, I forgot what sorts of numbers were being modelled for that sort of thing at the time, but I dont think it would have been tens of thousands of UK cases back then. Given doubling every x days, the numbers would have been pretty small back then to get to tens of thousands recently. Anyway thats not to distract from all your points.

If I wanted to be really kind to the orthodox thinking on the pandemic, I suppose I could say that rather than calling them intended endzones, they were considered to be inevitabilities. Like what happened with the swine flu pandemic of 2009 - once it was properly spotted it was already active in communities in several countries, all the assumptions and traditional thinking about flu pandemics kicked in, and it was considered inevitable that everywhere would get it. Initial containment phases were more about getting clinical data from early cases in the country, and some data useful for epidemic modelling, than anything else. Of course such thinking is more forgivable in a flu pandemic because there tend to be pharmaceutical interventions available and the more solid prospect of a vaccine within a known timeframe. But it could still have been a disaster if that had been a very bad flu pandemic.

I expect we'll reconsider our laissez faire attitude to influenza as a result of this, indeed, our tolerance of infections of all kinds. Who knows what broad spectrum antivirals and vaccines we could've developed if money had been pumped into R&D years ago.

The situation was, undoubtedly, confused at the start, but Asian countries show that it was possible to act without hindsight. We should've been learning everything we could from them from the off.

Those smelly little orthodoxies are still lingering: Sky News have just trotted out the second wave, and are talking about a year-long lockdown. More readers that hammer and dance article gets, the better.

 

[elbows]

Its still entirely valid to talk about subsequent waves, if the detail and context is right. At the moment as far as the public communication goes, its still a bit messy as the old orthodoxy fades into the new.

Its not just Britain either by the way. I made too many posts about European Centre for Disease Control reports on this pandemic last weekend and at the start of this week to go through all that again, but if there is ever an inquiry into this then there will be plenty of evidence that the UK was largely sticking to plans from the EU era. Still I would need an inquiry to understand the full story of events between Thursday 12th March and Monday 16th March. Oh that reminds me, there is one more ECDC thing for me to check on, to do with when their orthodox approach formally started to shift, will post again if it yields an interesting conclusion.

 

[Azrael]

If you are in that sort of state then perhaps the following article will be of interest:

When it comes to national emergencies, Britain has a tradition of cold calculation | David Edgerton

The government’s reluctance to put the health of citizens first has echoes in the 1940s and 50s, says author David Edgerton

www.theguardian.com

Its not as good as I would have liked, but since I read it recently its the one that leapt readily to mind.

Read it few days back, good piece.

Crucial difference for me (and one mentioned in the article) is that while planners didn't make life-saving contingencies in the Blitz or the Cold War, in both cases, the state put every effort into averting calamity, whether via appeasement and belated rearmament, or in developing a serious nuclear deterrent. The first of course failed disastrously and the second is debatable, but the intent to head off disaster was at least there.

This time, they nodded it through until they decided hundreds of thousands of deaths were politically unviable.

 

[two sheds]

there were huge clues though - not testing people coming in from italy, not testing people generally, not tracing people was fucking insane.

 

[8ball]

When this is over, there's gonna be some extremely tough questions about how the medical profession's regulated, and how it ever allowed such people to go undetected.

This may be my current mood talking, but that strikes me as optimistic.

 

[8ball]

there were huge clues though - not testing people coming in from italy, not testing people generally, not tracing people was fucking insane.

The lack of rigorous contract tracing is the thing that makes me most angry.

 

[elbows]

I'm kind of scared to go and see what I wrote at the time but I feel like I might get some temporary closure on some aspects if I have a quick hunt and post one or two bits and bobs.

 

[Azrael]

Its still entirely valid to talk about subsequent waves, if the detail and context is right. At the moment as far as the public communication goes, its still a bit messy as the old orthodoxy fades into the new.

Its not just Britain either by the way. I made too many posts about European Centre for Disease Control reports on this pandemic last weekend and at the start of this week to go through all that again, but if there is ever an inquiry into this then there will be plenty of evidence that the UK was largely sticking to plans from the EU era. Still I would need an inquiry to understand the full story of events between Thursday 12th March and Monday 16th March. Oh that reminds me, there is one more ECDC thing for me to check on, to do with when their orthodox approach formally started to shift, will post again if it yields an interesting conclusion.

Think the problem is with the phrasing "second wave", which suggests that suppression's impossible and Covid-19's become hopelessly endemic. It's a fatalistic approach, and the orthodox defeatism's gonna wear people down, fast. If they talked instead about eliminating the virus and suppressing new outbreaks, whole different ballgame.

Interesting point about E.U. plans. "Herd immunity" was being pushed by the Netherlands the other day, and was implicit in plans of other European countries, so this goes past Whitehall. Their plan was particularly disastrous thanks to the malignant influence of the weirdos, but the underlying failing spreads far beyond our borders.

 

[Azrael]

there were huge clues though - not testing people coming in from italy, not testing people generally, not tracing people was fucking insane.

Indeed. I was never convinced by the arguments that airport screening would do more harm than good -- of course it would miss many, perhaps most, but it'd raise awareness and offer the first link in a contact tracing chain -- but the success of British contact tracing dampened my unease.

Heard several worrying reports of people being denied testing if they didn't meet the travel or contacts criteria, but that could be reasonable if the capacity just wasn't there yet, and other tracing could've filled the gap.

With hindsight, the whole strategy comes together. The editor of the The Lancet suspects that the entire approach was geared towards facilitating a "controlled"epidemic, and I see no reason to doubt his suspicions.

 

[weltweit]

..
With hindsight, the whole strategy comes together. The editor of the The Lancet suspects that the entire approach was geared towards facilitating a "controlled"epidemic, and I see no reason to doubt his suspicions.

Are we too late to avoid that fate though?

 

[8ball]

"Herd immunity" was being pushed by the Netherlands the other day, and was implicit in plans of other European countries, so this goes past Whitehall. Their plan was particularly disastrous thanks to the malignant influence of the weirdos, but the underlying failing spreads far beyond our borders.

Fuck's sake. "Herd immunity". Cunts. Nigh on every epidemiologist in the country must have choked on their cornflakes at that.