Coronavirus Pandemic

[Oaf]

What happened to limb clock?

[Harlequin]

What happened to limb clock?

He is creating commercial cartoons and is on IRC most mornings.

[Oaf]

Ah great! I had this mental image of him as a teenager, but he’s in his mid thirties now…. Glad he’s professionally doing what he always had a passion for.

[merman]

Officially 150,000 deaths from COVID in the UK.


As measured within 28 days of a positive test where COVID is mentioned on the death certificate or by the coroner.


So the true figure is much higher.


(And if you wonder why the difference between Wales and England matters, ask Chester football club. Registered with the English FA and part of English competitions and an English postal address for the stadium, because part of the pitch and stadium crosses the border the Welsh authorities are threatening them with legal action for playing games in front of spectators - as Wales brought back restrictions on live sporting events after Boxing Day. That’s just one example where having different rules in different regions is nonsense. A senior health official has also commented that the multiple changes of rules and regional differences has contributed to people's fatigue and lack of co-operation).

[Cloudane]

Bad, but just to look on the bright side the reasonable worst case scenario from March 2020 was 500,000 deaths so overall the balance of measures plus vaccines has done a decent job in keeping the death toll "down".

[merman]

Bad, but just to look on the bright side the reasonable worst case scenario from March 2020 was 500,000 deaths so overall the balance of measures plus vaccines has done a decent job in keeping the death toll "down".

There’s nothing to celebrate in the British Government’s handling of the pandemic.

Late to lock down first time
Too quick to open up
Eat Out To Help Out driving a surge in cases
Dithering about locking down at Christmas 2020
“Freedom Day” declared too early
More dithering about Plan B

And now proposing that people are charged to have a lateral flow test (despite the huge sums set aside for Test & Trace) and trying to claim it is now “endemic” and easier to live with when the Omicron variant is sending hundreds of people a day into hospital. And that’s without mentioning the flip-flopping over travel restrictions.

Look at Germany. Larger population, lower death rate. Or Japan, who have caught up and overtaken our “world-beating” vaccination programme.

[Cloudane]

I didn't say the government handled things well, the comment wasn't political.

The NHS have done great despite being starved of funds
The vaccine developers have saved hundreds of thousands of lives
The British people have been FAR more sensible about the jab than other countries such as the USA with all the "but muh freedom" bullshit
The lockdowns that we did have, whilst delayed and not as effective as they could have been, have still also helped avert that 500k estimate

[KlaxonCow]

Some nice contradictory policy from Boris.

He wants to further reduce self-isolation from 7 days to 5 days, to help staffing levels, as vast numbers of people are self-isolating.

But he also wants to scrap free lateral flow tests, even though it was the use of these - testing negative on days 6 and 7 of isolation - that was behind the earlier reduction of isolation from 10 days to 7 days. Basically, self-isolation was 10 days, but then they amended it, so that if you were testing negative on days 6 and 7, you could end it early.

The free lateral flow tests that he wants to scrap are how we could safely reduce isolation from 10 days to 7 days. Because the lateral flow tests are good at showing if someone is currently infectious - and, thus, whether they're contagious - so if you have two negative tests in a row, this permits early release, as we have proof that a person isn't going to spread it.

But if Boris wants a further reduction to 5 days, then he needs more lateral flow tests, not scrapping them. They are what allows the early release - because we can work to when someone is testing negative, rather than some generic "number of days" (which, by necessity, has to be conservative and over-estimate how long you need to isolate to make sure that it's appropriate for everyone). And, indeed, it could be rephrased as "if you test negative two days in a row, from days 4 and 5 onwards, then you can end your self-isolation".

And, as long as those tests are conducting correctly and come back negative, then this should be perfectly safe, as we have direct evidence that this person is no longer contagious.

Either we keep lateral flow testing, so we can reduce isolation based on negative testing... or we scrap them, but then have to make self-isolation longer (indeed, not just not reducing it to 5 days, but actually raising it from the current 7 back up to 10, to be sure that we're covering all cases).

One or the other, but not both.

Because if Boris is worried about staffing levels, then to reduce self-isolation too far, without backing that up with negative testing, you could be sending "virus bombs" back into the workplace. Folks who're still contagious, seeding "super spreader events" at their office... and then EVERYONE ends up in self-isolation. Making staffing levels not just low, but actually non-existent.

You can't do the reduction safely without the lateral flow testing to back it up as valid, or you risk simply making a bad situation even worse.


But, that said, I'm not sure that this hasn't been Boris's "plan A" all along. Though they deny that "wild herd immunity" was their original plan, it absolutely obviously was, as we all saw the footage of them advocating for it. As I've said before: ignore words, as people lie. Look at their actions, as actions can't lie. And, throughout this, Boris's actions and policies have all been very clearly chasing after "wild herd immunity". That's "plan A" and it always has been.

There's only been deviation from this plan when the numbers threatened the NHS - as if the NHS loses its ability to cope, then he fears the image of people being left to die, untreated, on camper bed in sports halls because the numbers are so high, they simply can't do anything else. But the second it looks like the NHS will struggle through, Boris reverts to the "wild herd immunity" plan. With "Freedom Day", with no restrictions, with enough dithering to make sure the virus is "seeded" before implementing restrictions (as he doesn't actually want to accidentally stop it, but rather just slow it down) and now with reducing self-isolation. But he doesn't want to make that reduction dependent on lateral flow testing, or we'd actually stop the spread of the virus - so he wants to reduce the time AND remove the lateral flow testing, so that some still infectious people keep the spread going.

After all, we've been here before. The government shifted Covid patients from hospitals to care homes without testing them first. They seeded those care homes and a significant chunk of the deaths - particularly in the first wave - come from that. They took people confirmed to have Covid and then dumped them - without testing them - into the most vulnerable population, seeding the vast numbers of deaths that occurred in care homes (which is a significant fraction of the whole death toll, as older people are, of course, more vulnerable to hospitalisation and death).

You'd think "once bitten, twice shy". But now they want to take those who have been confirmed to have Covid and then dump them - without testing - in the midst of hospitals and businesses.

If you ignore words - because words lie - and look at actions instead, then the conclusion is pretty obvious. There was no "accident" in seeding care homes with Covid. It was a policy decision. And there's no "accident" that Boris wants to reduce isolation at the same time that he wants to remove free lateral flow testing. He wants it to spread far and wide, to get "herd immunity", by hook or by crook.

This is - and has always been - "plan A". That everyone gets it, we "accept" the deaths and then move on. The only deviations from this plan have come when surges have - or, with Omicron, have threatened to - overwhelm the NHS. Because, yes, if the NHS flood gates are breached, then we'll have to start rationing treatment - choosing who lives and who dies - and just stacking up camper beds in sports halls, as large "waiting to die" rooms.

Indeed, "flattening the curve" has always been presented as a means to avoid overwhelming the NHS. Never as a means of buying time for vaccines and treatments, to reduce the numbers of cases and deaths overall.

Consider that DoD "generic coronavirus" vaccine. We do all this, we "accept" the deaths... and then, shortly afterwards, we might have a jab that could end not just the current variant, not just all Covid variants, but actually takes out all coronaviruses and so also stops you getting the common cold too.

We have treatments now that, if taken early, are reducing the occurrences of hospitalisations and deaths by ~89%. They work by blocking the virus from replicating (which is why you need to take the treatment early, as what it does is stop the viral load any getting worse - but if it's already bad, then it's less helpful).

Just because a virus is endemic, doesn't mean we just "accept" it as is and do nothing.

As I've noted before, we have annual 'flu jabs. The whole world has now seen the effort that goes into developing these vaccines, as we watched and waited for the Covid vaccines. But, like, this process goes on every single year - year after year - for influenza. They're always working on next year's jab right now, to get it done - approved, manufactured - on time. Such an effort and enterprise has been going on every year for decades and decades.

Even when we're literally talking about "a little 'flu", we have never just accepted it. We've always fought back. The only thing we're accepting there is that we can't win them all - our best efforts won't save everyone. But, at no point, is any doctor "accepting" those deaths. They're only accepting their failure to be able to save everyone. Subtle difference, but it's crucial.

"Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

[Dio]

The problem is all about the unvaccinated filling up the hospitals. After that's no longer a problem (preferably because everyone is vaxxed, but in actuality because all the unvaxed have had it and either recovered or died) then there's no need for isolation or testing.

We get there sometime between end Jan and the summer - probably earlier rather than later, since the current likely actual (not just those tested positive) case rate of 500k-1m cases a day burns through the whole population in literally weeks.

[snaff]

The problem is all about the unvaccinated filling up the hospitals.

Unvaccinated people were only the majority of hospital admissions a long time ago when the majority of people were unvaccinated.

More recent figures put the unvaccinated at 34% of hospital admissions.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... df#page=14

[PFVA]

Around here politicians seem to be very worried about how many people will be on isolation on the day of the elections (the 30th) and how that can affect the anticipated elections.

The number of people in the hospitals is not as high as last year but it's increasing and they are starting to send people to hospitals in areas of the country less affected. The number of deaths is nothing compared to last year and to that they are crediting the vaccine.

Schools re-open today.

We'll see.

[Dio]

The problem is all about the unvaccinated filling up the hospitals.

Unvaccinated people were only the majority of hospital admissions a long time ago when the majority of people were unvaccinated.

More recent figures put the unvaccinated at 34% of hospital admissions.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... df#page=14

Yes, that would be expected from the statistics, the number rocking up at hospital with covid who have had a vaccination is high because most people have had a vax and shitloads of people are getting covid.

But the key thing is ICU and oh golly, look at this one: https://twitter.com/sbattrawden/status/ ... 2010883080 . Way over 90% of critical care admissions are unvaccinated between May and December last year.

Vaccination largely prevents critical disease, has a significant effect on serious disease, and not very much effect on catching the thing.

[KlaxonCow]

After that's no longer a problem (preferably because everyone is vaxxed, but in actuality because all the unvaxed have had it and either recovered or died) then there's no need for isolation or testing. [...] We get there sometime between end Jan and the summer

Right, and that helps staffing levels in the here and now - which was given as the reason for the reduction in the isolation period - how exactly?

I mean, re-read what you've said there and, sure, "when it's no longer a problem"... then it's no longer a problem. But that's just a tautology, isn't it? "Long cat is long", and all that jazz.

And, like, we've been here before. Because Christmas was supposed to be normal and the end was in sight... then Omicron showed up.

We will have further variants (indeed, for the rest of all time, as this is endemic... unless science works out a way to wipe it out, it's not going anywhere) and whilst Omicron has gone in a good-ish (but hardly perfect) direction with this variant, there's no guarantees that it keeps doing that necessarily. We can hope that now it's had a taster of "milder" - and it thrived because of it - then it stays on that path and all is well. But there's nothing in the laws of the universe that commands that to be so.

The two policy announcements there remain contradictory.

We want to reduce isolation because it's affecting staffing levels. We have reduced it from 10 days to 7 days by using lateral flow testing - as, by doing this, we can end it early based on evidence that a person is no longer contagious from the tests, so we no longer have to apply a blanket length of time (which, by being generic, must be conservative and err on the side of the longest period needed, not the shortest, to ensure it covers everyone).

We can safely reduce the period there because we're using the tests to directly determine if it is safe for someone to leave isolation, not just using some blanket period of time for everyone (note that if you do not test negative on days 6 and 7 of isolation right now, then your isolation must go on past 7 days).

And, in case you missed it, when we're talking about "safe" here, what we mean is that they won't spread it. Because, remember, we're reducing this to deal with staffing level problems. So if you're releasing people who're still contagious and they infect other staff, then that's NOT going to help staffing levels. It's going to make them worse, as now everyone in the office has it and has to self-isolate.

We're not talking hospitalisations and deaths here - although, let's remember, those do still occur, albeit at much reduced levels now - but simply about mitigating the staffing level issues. But you don't fix that problem by sending a still-contagious "virus bomb" into the middle of the office.

You yourself noted it. The vaccines are great at breaking the link to hospitalisations and deaths - though, again, not perfectly so, and we shouldn't entirely forget that they never were, and never could be, 100% effective - but they don't really do much to stop folks contracting Covid. And if people have it, they'll self-isolate - exactly so that they don't go infecting the entire office and sending everyone to their sick beds for a week.

And this also seems a tad pernickety. In that, you know, we've suffered nearly 2 years of this shit. Why the hell are we getting so anal about two or three days?

I remember watching BBC News when there were heavy snows one year and an "expert" came on the TV to declare that the UK would be bankrupt if folks had one more day off because of the snows preventing them getting to work.

At the time, I though this was ridiculous. Basically, if you're running your business so close to the wire that you're going to collapse if one person takes one more day off, then you're running your business very badly and you need to fix that. Because, like, even if it wasn't snowing then they might need to take a sick day because, you know, people get ill sometimes. This is utterly stupid business planning: "If you're even 3 seconds too late in reaching the office, we go bankrupt and the office explodes!!". Really? That's what's going to happen? Umm, then why the hell did management ever allow that to happen?

(This is like that time when folks were campaigning for the UK to move to Central European Time - oh, that one now seems hilarious in hindsight, eh? - and they were making arguments that "if the UK was on CET, then our tourism, museums and visitor attractions could make an extra billion pounds a year". Now, they might have though that a compelling argument. But it just made me think "then why the fuck are you not doing this already?". Like, all you're doing with a clock change is fooling yourself to get up an hour earlier, go to work an hour earlier, open and close an hour earlier. You could, instead of changing the clocks, just decide to get up and live your life an hour earlier instead. Exactly the same thing. That is basically what happens when we change the clocks - we're just changing the clocks to make them lie to us that it's an hour later than it really is. That's all we're ever doing. If you can make an extra billions pounds from doing that, then why are you not already just doing it anyway?)

But this shit really doesn't wash anymore. We've spent nearly two years in lockdown, restrictions, work from home, on furlough, etc. and now a single day off matters?

We've gone through all of this... and we're straight back to the bullshit that if you're 3 minutes late to reach the office then the sky is going to fall?

Sorry, no-one's going to buy it anymore. Because the sky did, in fact, fall for two years and we struggled through it. I'm not going to buy some bullshit that one day here or 5 minutes there is genuinely the make-or-break straw that breaks the camel's back. Bollocks.

If we are moving into a post-Covid world, then be aware that that world ain't ever going back to how it was. Not entirely. Some things permanently changed.

(Though if we're really moving on past this now - one hopes, with fingers crossed - then we're in for a ride. There's a reason why "the Roaring '20s" were so roaring. Folks had just come out of the 1918 pandemic... and now that people could meet other people socially again, the 1920s went wild. Indeed, the pandemic effectively killed the Victorian mindset and ushered in our "modern" attitudes of today.)

[Dio]

If we are moving into a post-Covid world, then be aware that that world ain't ever going back to how it was. Not entirely. Some things permanently changed.

Not in any ways that matter. We might have a plan for the next one, we might get jabs a bit more often, we might be a little more keen to stay off work when ill, we are all going to work from home a bit more. Nowt much else is going to change. And that's probably a good thing.

[KlaxonCow]

Email has emerged of No.10 holding a "bring your own booze" party in the Downing Street garden, sent to about 100 people:



This was in May 2020. In the midst of the first lockdown, where restrictions were tightest and we were not supposed to meet anyone (but for one other person who could be admitted into your "bubble").