Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

[Wilf]

I suppose I dont really see it that way because the chances of u-turns in this pandemic have been much greater than u-turns in other policy areas.

In terms of the number of different people posting on this thread and the volume of posts, it has clearly dropped over time. eg no subsequent lockdown generated quite as much traffic as the original one. Partly because these things were no longer a shocking new event that was unlike anything we had previously seen in out lifetimes.

If the peak comes relatively early then the government may avoid repeating the same set of u-turns this time. Or if the pace of increasing infections slows then the timing will be changed and the government will be hoping to cling on to their current approach. So it is not possible to claim that this period will be sure to be a sort of re-run on the first half of March 2020. It might, it might not.

I don't doubt this government are capable of u-turns and it may well be the pressure on acute beds, cancer operations and the rest that does it. Trouble is I think they've pinned their colours so much to this de facto mass infection policy that any potential u-turns will be further down the line that might have been the case in previous waves. The other thing is, if it's the NHS becoming overwhelmed that restores a degree of sanity, well, that's the NHS being overwhelmed.

 

[elbows]

Yes.

Although they will also be able to use the likes of Scotland to provide clues about peak size and timing and whether levels of immunity there result in what they have banked on actually happening.

Having said that, in terms of official announcements about next step timing I think the UK government are due to reveal theirs a day earlier than Scotland, next week.

 

[LDC]

Just got to that 55 minute point in the Indy SAGE briefing now...

"A drive by the libertarian right to get us to live with death and long term disability for ideological reasons." Or something very similar said.

 

[elbows]

Pinning all that shit down to being a libertarian right thing ignores the very many decades where it was part of the establishment standard thinking in this country. The UK has an incredibly long history of that sort of thing.

 

[Artaxerxes]

Pinning all that shit down to being a libertarian right thing ignores the very many decades where it was part of the establishment standard thinking in this country. The UK has an incredibly long history of that sort of thing.

The libertarian ideology is a continuation of pre-Victorian attitudes towards “well the poor deserve it, rules are for those who can’t pay to disobey”

They’ve just been continually in charge since the oil shock of the 70s whether they call themselves neoliberals, Thatcherite or libertarians

 

[elbows]

Yeah although if anything I think it goes even deeper than that.

Plenty of other nation states have their own version of that, and yet ours is so bad that it really gets exposed in this pandemic when certain international comparisons are made.

I'll never forget the stupid looks on their faces as they realised in press conferences of March 9th and March 12th 2020 that they were going to struggle to sell the classic UK plan to the public and press this time.

 

[platinumsage]

Just got to that 55 minute point in the Indy SAGE briefing now...

"A drive by the libertarian right to get us to live with death and long term disability for ideological reasons." Or something very similar said.

"Independent" SAGE, although ostensibly apolitical, has clearly been filled up with people who ideologically oppose the Conservative government, so it would be a surprise if they didn't shoehorn this sort of stuff into their output. I tend to ignore them because they're never going to provide anything more useful than a robot parrot set to shake it's head continuously. This might be nice if you think the government get every single thing completely wrong, but it's not useful.

 

[Wilf]

Just got to that 55 minute point in the Indy SAGE briefing now...

"A drive by the libertarian right to get us to live with death and long term disability for ideological reasons." Or something very similar said.

I watched about an hour and found it to be perfectly modulated, articulate and relevant. A politically engaged public understanding of science event. The depressing thing is all that science and rationality has no political agency and remains detached from class forces. Feels to me that gig economy workers will be currently anxious as hell about having to work in areas without masks and distancing, whilst being relieved about not having to isolate. None of this has taken us to a point where there are mass campaigns against precarity. My point isn't, obviously I hope, that workers and particularly gig economy workers don't know the science/risks, it's the absence of any kind of poles of opposition, any kind of sense of how things might be different. It's how wrong all those opinion pieces were a year ago saying how something better 'must' emerge from the pandemic.

Sorry, I'm essentially just venting my own depression about the situation.

 

[elbows]

"Independent" SAGE, although ostensibly apolitical, has clearly been filled up with people who ideologically oppose the Conservative government, so it would be a surprise if they didn't shoehorn this sort of stuff into their output. I tend to ignore them because they're never going to provide anything more useful than a robot parrot set to shake it's head continuously. This might be nice if you think the government get every single thing completely wrong, but it's not useful.

Sometimes I idly wonder what brought you here in this pandemic.

 

[elbows]

I watched about an hour and found it to be perfectly modulated, articulate and relevant. A politically engaged public understanding of science event. The depressing thing is all that science and rationality has no political agency and remains detached from class forces. Feels to me that gig economy workers will be currently anxious as hell about having to work in areas without masks and distancing, whilst being relieved about not having to isolate. None of this has taken us to a point where there are mass campaigns against precarity. My point isn't, obviously I hope, that workers and particularly gig economy workers don't know the science/risks, it's the absence of any kind of poles of opposition, any kind of sense of how things might be different. It's how wrong all those opinion pieces were a year ago saying how something better 'must' emerge from the pandemic.

Sorry, I'm essentially just venting my own depression about the situation.

I do keep an eye on the likes of the FT fretting that surveys implied 41% of people want to find a different job once the acute phase of the pandemic had worn off.

Pandemic-inspired change may well not be as direct, swift and obvious as many hoped. But I think its contributed to something that was probably already happening due to the somewhat precarious state of various things today, and the large amount of changes required in the coming decades in order to cope with climate change & energy issues.

 

[elbows]

But actually he is wrong about that. As I mentioned yesterday, journalists have been briefed that 'hybrid immunity' is part of the plan. And that just means a mix of immunity through vaccination and immunity through infection, so it is just a modified version of the old herd immunity plan, reenabled by vaccine programme successes.

And I probably should point out that this plan has much in common with with very many other countries will attempt.

But the detail matters and will be the difference between whether this plan is in tune with the inevitable end game of pandemic epidemiology, or something that blows up in the UKs face this time around. And if it does blow up in their face again then we'll just have to see whether that only leads to a delay before attempting the same thing again, or whether there is a political earthquake.

It boils down to timing (eg fucking up timing by assuming the overall protective effects of population immunity levels are close if they are actually further away). And quite how far a return to the old normal is pushed.

Countries will not ignore the levels of immunity in their populations and will base much of their plans and timetables on this. The careful ones will take it slowly and will keep certain baseline measures in place well beyond the moments of maximum danger.

The UK takes the approach of Johnson seeking to dust off the superman cape he wanted to wear at the start of the pandemic. They want to demonstrate to other countries that they too can follow this path with accelerated timing. They want to be the first to claim victory and to use that as a foundation for all manner of hideous ideology and policy.

 

[Doctor Carrot]

"Independent" SAGE, although ostensibly apolitical, has clearly been filled up with people who ideologically oppose the Conservative government, so it would be a surprise if they didn't shoehorn this sort of stuff into their output. I tend to ignore them because they're never going to provide anything more useful than a robot parrot set to shake it's head continuously. This might be nice if you think the government get every single thing completely wrong, but it's not useful.

Do you even listen to their output? As far as I know they haven't got much, if anything, wrong throughout. They're not even saying don't open up they're saying not yet and not without things like keeping masks mandatory, better ventilation in schools and more vaccination.
My guess is they said the things about the libertarian right because if it looks and quacks like a duck it's a duck. The libertarian right are doing this and they are demanding you accept a certain level of death and disability, all of which is predicted in various modelling.

 

[teuchter]

This mornings Indie Sage. Very strong, very clear and direct account of why the government's approach is appalling. I've been critical of Whitty on various threads and the guy from the Lancet mentions him and Vallance from 55:35 onwards. The whole thing is worth a (depressing) watch though.

This is not Indie SAGE is it?
As far as I can see this is the group of people who wrote the letter in the Lancet.

This is the latest Indie SAGE:



I don't think it's helpful for Indie SAGE to air political opinions, like the one about the Libertarian right that's been discussed in the past page or so - but I don't think they have. That comment was made in a different context.

 

[Supine]

It was Indy Sage but today they were alongside The Citizens and the Lancet.

It isn’t really possible to disconnect the science from politics at the moment is it. Indy Sage have made scientific proposals throughout. The latest government decisions are directly not related to the data. As was pointed out in today’s briefing.

Science needs to get more political if it wants to get the gov to u-turn on current July 19th plans.

 

[2hats]

The latest Imperial REACT-1 (interim) report (round 13, 24 June-5 July) is out. 47k people across England RT-PCR swabbing.

This indicated exponential growth throughout this period where R=1.87 [95CI:1.40-2.45], doubling rate 6.1 days [95CI:4.0-12].

590/100k infection rate seen, with infection rising substantially in all age cohorts under 75, but particularly 13-17 years (around 1430/100k). Growth in infection in all regions but notably much higher incidence in London, followed by Yorks/Humber; lowest in the SW and the SE. Infection higher in males.

Amongst under 65s infection rates were three times higher in unvaccinated versus vaccinated, though rises in both cohorts were proportionately similar (note: vaccination status self-reported).

The estimate of unadjusted(*) effectiveness for two doses of vaccine against PCR-confirmed infection was 72.6% [95CI:62.8-79.6%] for this round (compared to 72.4% [95CI:56.7-82.4%] for the previous round).
* ie does not account for variation in individual behaviour (eg adoption of NPIs).

Our results indicate that England is now experiencing a substantial third wave of infections, reinforcing other data streams which have been showing a similar signal.

Our results add important context since, being based on a random community sample of named individuals, they should be less affected by changes in testing behaviour than the routine testing. Also, our results show a similar trajectory to those reported by the Office for National Statistics Coronavirus Infection Survey which again uses a community sample.

In summary we have documented the continued and accelerating increase of exponential growth of SARS-CoV-2 infections in England from May to early July 2021, as the third wave of infections in England takes hold. We are entering a critical period with a number of important competing processes: continued vaccination rollout to the whole adult population in England, increased natural immunity through infection, reduced social mixing of children during school holidays, increased proportion of mixing occurring outdoors during summer, the intended full opening of hospitality and entertainment and cessation of mandated social distancing and mask wearing.

 

[Wilf]

This is not Indie SAGE is it?
As far as I can see this is the group of people who wrote the letter in the Lancet.

This is the latest Indie SAGE:



I don't think it's helpful for Indie SAGE to air political opinions, like the one about the Libertarian right that's been discussed in the past page or so - but I don't think they have. That comment was made in a different context.

Yep. My mistake. Not sure I agree with you on the political opinions though. A pandemic isn't just science/virus, it has a social response. And in this country it's the government's response rather than the virus that has killed tens of thousands who didn't need to die.

 

[Wilf]

In fact that's worth saying directly, it isn't the virus that's killing people in this country, it's the government. An obvious point in some ways, but my brain hadn't ever put it together as a sentence.

 

[elbows]

Its a coalition, the covid coalition.

 

[elbows]

Just a random example of the recent hospital situation from my town in the middle of the midlands.

10 patients. 4 unvaccinated. One single dosed. Five double dosed. Slanted headline is a bit silly as a result.

Almost half of Nuneaton hospital's Covid-19 patients have not had vaccination

It has led to a plea to people to make sure that they get their jab

www.coventrytelegraph.net

 

[elbows]

I say silly because its a bit awkward having to frame it that way. But there are entirely understandable public health reasons why reporting of all things relating to vaccines are done in a manner designed to encourage people to get vaccinated.

 

[teuchter]

Yep. My mistake. Not sure I agree with you on the political opinions though. A pandemic isn't just science/virus, it has a social response. And in this country it's the government's response rather than the virus that has killed tens of thousands who didn't need to die.

I think that by including political opinions in information that is presented as scientific advice you are liable to put certain people off, and open yourself to being accused of presenting the scientific facts in a way that is biased by your political opinions.

There are people who will agree with the scientific facts, but disagree with what the response should be. And there will be people who reject the science. Indie SAGE is wasting its time with the latter, but for the former group, I think its best not to alienate them, because you have some chance of influencing their response, and making sure their response is not based on wrong or partial facts.

 

[glitch hiker]

All of this:

 

[NoXion]

"Independent" SAGE, although ostensibly apolitical, has clearly been filled up with people who ideologically oppose the Conservative government, so it would be a surprise if they didn't shoehorn this sort of stuff into their output. I tend to ignore them because they're never going to provide anything more useful than a robot parrot set to shake it's head continuously. This might be nice if you think the government get every single thing completely wrong, but it's not useful.

The government is embarking on a plan that will purposefully see more people infected, with the attendant possibility of death or long-term/permanent illness. You don't have to be anti-Conservative to have a problem with that, you just have to be a decent fucking human being.

 

[platinumsage]

The government is embarking on a plan that will purposefully see more people infected, with the attendant possibility of death or long-term/permanent illness. You don't have to be anti-Conservative to have a problem with that, you just have to be a decent fucking human being.

Any plan other than an immediate full-on lockdown is a plan that will purposefully see more people infected.

 

[NoXion]

Any plan other than an immediate full-on lockdown is a plan that will purposefully see more people infected.

Wrong. Allowing more time for people to get their vaccinations and for allowing them to build up immunity once jabbed will provide better outcomes.

 

[platinumsage]

Wrong. Allowing more time for people to get their vaccinations and for allowing them to build up immunity once jabbed will provide better outcomes.

Maybe, maybe not if infections are just delayed until winter. However what is clear is that infections are already increasing exponentially right now. Therefore maintaining the status quo of restrictions is also an action that will purposefully see more people infected. Don't pretend that there's some philosophical difference between the positions because there isn't.

 

[cupid_stunt]

New cases 32,551, a drop in the 7-day average increase to +34.9%

Hospital admissions (4/7) - 456, 7-day average increase +51.5%

Deaths 35, 7-day average increase +52.6%



Here in Worthing, 7-day average increase in cases +146.5%, hospital admissions +166.7%.

 

[NoXion]

Maybe, maybe not if infections are just delayed until winter. However what is clear is that infections are already increasing exponentially right now. Therefore maintaining the status quo of restrictions is also an action that will purposefully see more people infected. Don't pretend that there's some philosophical difference between the positions because there isn't.

Yes there is, are you fucking trolling right now? If restrictions are lifted further, then that provides more opportunity for the virus to spread. That means more infections and more chances that people will die or get seriously ill. By winter there will be more people vaccinated than there are now. I'm due my second jab in August. So it's not just a question of delay, it's also a question of allowing more people to gain immunity via vaccination, instead of by risking death and illness through infection.

Good grief.

 

[platinumsage]

Yes there is, are you fucking trolling right now? If restrictions are lifted further, then that provides more opportunity for the virus to spread. That means more infections and more chances that people will die or get seriously ill. By winter there will be more people vaccinated than there are now. I'm due my second jab in August. So it's not just a question of delay, it's also a question of allowing more people to gain immunity via vaccination, instead of risking death and illness.

Good grief.

Right, even if you are convinced of what you say, I'm not sure why you think the status quo isn't purposefully allowing more people to be infected. Following your logic, a lockdown stringent enough to get R below 1 immediately should be imposed. Otherwise it's just a matter of degrees of infection rather than a philosophical difference in approach.

 

[NoXion]

Right, even if you are convinced of what you say, I'm not sure why you think the status quo isn't purposefully allowing more people to be infected. Following your logic, a lockdown stringent enough to get R below 1 immediately should be imposed. Otherwise it's just a matter of degrees of infection rather than a philosophical difference in approach.

They're literally throwing the doors open you stupid fucking twat. How the fuck does NOT result in more people getting infected than a more gradual re-opening that allows more vaccine immunity to build up first?