Main Coronavirus / Covid-19 Discussion Thread

[e77]

My argument, to keep it simple, was meant to imply that the cost in lives and livelihoods if the economy remains shut down would be greater than the cost in lives and livelihoods if we open up and a number (many less than 2,000) of under-50s die.

There is no reasonable way you could take that argument to any conclusion that it isn't worth getting the vaccine. Do you genuinely think that arguing for an opening up of the economy is on the same track as arguing for stopping vaccination?

If the criteria is likelihood of someone dying of it as you alluded to then yes. Don't get me wrong, I am not going full Crodo and suggesting everyone stays at home until it is eliminated globally and if they stick to the target of everyone by the end of July then fine but equally wouldn't be happy if the rest of us are expected to pack onto trains and go back into offices while the vaccine is delayed to some time in the future.

 

[Billy the Fish]

Almost all of the UK press has been consumed in tribalism and has failed to report the story properly. Anyway I thought it was a good thread albeit long thread.

The EU were naive and relied too much on the goodwill of others. Like the UK they should have gone with a local pharma partner, ie UK gov dismissed Merck (USA) and Oxford ended up partnering with AZ. Instead Biotech went with Pfzier

The USA is looking after itself and not assisting its neighbours, instead its the EU has been supplying Canada with Pfzier when they should be getting it from a factory just over the border. They exported 31m doses, maybe too generous at this stage in the game

The phrase "relied on the goodwill of others" bothers me a bit. That is trying to paint the EU as a victim when it's far more complex than that. The author of that thread is ridiculously biased so you have to read between the lines with what he says. He's trying very hard to gloss over the fact that contracts were signed months after everyone else and supply chains weren't invested in quickly enough.

I'll say it again, the EU doesn't export anything and they haven't been supplying Canada, Pfizer has.
Where I do agree with the OP is that USA are causing big problems by banning exports, but it's interesting that none of the rhetoric from VDL or clement beaune has been aimed at them. Pfizer has also had production issues and under delivered on doses but I haven't noticed EU ministers trashing their vaccine in the press.

You need to take your EU tinted specs off.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

These negative undertones are really starting to wind me up. This was one from earlier today, Masks and social distancing could last years, according to an apparently leading epidemiologist.

This was one particular quote: “people have got used to those lower-level restrictions now, and people can live with them, and the economy can still go on with those less severe restrictions in place”.

I think that massively misses the mark of where the public mindset is at. People have largely followed the rules, as painful as they have been, because doing otherwise meant catastrophe. We are fast approaching having 50% of the population vaccinated with at least one dose and are now moving well into the lower risk groups. Already we are at fewer than 50 deaths per day in a country of 65 million people and that figure is falling. I appreciate that's a number that can move up as well as down, but the data now seems to suggest that it is immunisation, not lockdown, which is having the most profound effect and whilst we might go onto see an increase in cases in the coming weeks, that shouldn't correlate with deaths as it has in the past. Once the death number starts to reach relatively inconsequential levels and settles there, no way will people support any unnecessary restriction of their freedoms.

Here's what life looks like in Israel right now. Yes, a couple of masks present amongst staff, but everything else about this footage is reflective of happy, normal living:

[tweet]1371814003715014656[/tweet]
Don't get me wrong, I am not an anti-lockdown nutjob - far from it. I have supported each lockdown every time a fresh one has had to be implemented, and I even felt that we should have acted earlier at the back end of last year. However, there needs to be an end in sight to all this - this is not a healthy way for people to live, physically or mentally. To casually suggest that we're going to be living like this for years to come, and that people will just be fine with it as we're all used to it now, is a dangerous miscalculation. If it's true, fine, then let's be transparent with the public and present the data and modelling that supports the argument - but don't just throw out dystopian soundbites to secure your five minutes of fame in the national media, which is precisely what I think is happening here.

Regardless of what happens from here on in, the public in general will remain scarred by the experience of the pandemic. I consider myself to be pretty mentally and emotionally robust, but I'd be lying if I said the last twelve months haven't left me feeling a little bumped and bruised. The more anxious people of society, or which there are probably a lot more now than there were 18 months ago, are naturally going to ruminate on negative headlines such as these. The media, and the talking heads feeding it, need to be more responsible in what they publish.

Rant over.

Spot on.

I hope you are ok


I’ll add -

This was one particular quote: “people have got used to those lower-level restrictions now, and people can live with them, and the economy can still go on with those less severe restrictions in place”.


This is also helping the conspiracy theory pushes - as it’s pretty much what they said would happen.

The Gov would do well to ban sage/PHE from the media.

We are addicted to bad news in the media here - I’ve got a couple of friends in South Africa and they said the panic over new mutations is a British thing and being reported completely different there - Granted this is the view of two people, but it is fully believable.

 

[Solid at the back]

He's a a disgrace, and proven to just come on here to scare people. He should be permanently banned from here. He will make people sick with worry. Absolutely disgusting.

 

[Hilltop]

He's a a disgrace, and proven to just come on here to scare people. He should be permanently banned from here. He will make people sick with worry. Absolutely disgusting.

My money is on him not ever getting out of the front door even without a lockdown.

 

[Poojah]

Spot on.

I hope you are ok


I’ll add -

This was one particular quote: “people have got used to those lower-level restrictions now, and people can live with them, and the economy can still go on with those less severe restrictions in place”.


This is also helping the conspiracy theory pushes - as it’s pretty much what they said would happen.

The Gov would do well to ban sage/PHE from the media.

We are addicted to bad news in the media here - I’ve got a couple of friends in South Africa and they said the panic over new mutations is a British thing and being reported completely different there - Granted this is the view of two people, but it is fully believable.

I’m absolutely fine, thank you, but then I know I’m in a far more fortunate position than many have been over the past 12 months. I’ve been able to work entirely from home for over a year now, have not suffered any adverse financial effects and, touch wood, have not lost anyone close to Covid-19 (although my sister-in-law’s husband was seriously ill in hospital for some time).

As I say, I’d also consider myself to be emotionally resilient, but despite all of that I still feel a bit fried. Working from home can be suffocating, especially when the kids haven’t been at school, and I’ve lost access to most of my stress outlets - the football, the Friday evening pint after work, the odd night out just me and the missus. I know I’ve had it comparatively easy, but it’s still been tough.

What I and others don’t need is a barrage of unfounded claims that suggest some never ending cycle of restrictions. It’s just adding unnecessary weight to people’s shoulders. At a time when mental health issues are talked about more than ever before, I find it hard to believe that the mainstream media can get away with their intentionally depressing, clickbaity headlines. I am certain it is doing real damage out there in the world.

Social distancing is a necessary evil, but an evil all the same. It’s stopped me seeing my mum and dad, my extended family, my mates, going to the football, going to the office, and for the most part going to the pub. It’s sucked a whole lot of joy out of people’s lives and I want it gone as a concept as soon as it is safe and sensible to do so.

Sometimes you have to face up to uncomfortable truths - that’s what the last year as been pretty much all about. But there are so many untruths and wildly speculative theories out there right now that it really should be criminal. If I present a suggestion that person X is a paedophile as fact, but I cannot prove it, then I leave myself open to massive legal ramifications. Why then can a so-called ‘expert’ say seemingly whatever the hell they like about this pandemic, which is affecting us all, without so much of a bean of valid evidence, and get away with it? I don’t understand I it, but the sad thing is that the residual effect of all of this negative bilge is probably costing the lives of people, young people who cannot see past the end of this crisis.

It needs to stop.

 

[Sussexscots]

Spot on.

I hope you are ok


I’ll add -

This was one particular quote: “people have got used to those lower-level restrictions now, and people can live with them, and the economy can still go on with those less severe restrictions in place”.


This is also helping the conspiracy theory pushes - as it’s pretty much what they said would happen.

The Gov would do well to ban sage/PHE from the media.

We are addicted to bad news in the media here - I’ve got a couple of friends in South Africa and they said the panic over new mutations is a British thing and being reported completely different there - Granted this is the view of two people, but it is fully believable.

Thing is, mask wearing and so called 'social' distancing are NOT low level restrictions. They impact on almost every aspect of our daily lives.

A face covered, distanced foreseeable future holds no appeal. But so successfully have SAGE, Ministers and the hysterical MSM inculcated the 'sense of personal threat', I fear many will live in terror of Covid for years.

 

[Weststander]

Sky News love their hyperbole and shit stirring - their news angle 100% about the EU about to block vaccine exports. With no evidence or serious quotes.

Whilst the good old BBC on R4, R5 and TV news calmly explaining that “there’s no appetite by national leaders and diplomats for an export ban to the UK. Instead they’re working diplomatically to increase supply from within and outside”.

Well worth the licence fee to get facts. Thank you Katya Adler et al.

 

[Weststander]

Following the pandemic in the US and Europe over the last year, the situation in some nations with their third/fourth waves just now is horrendous. So many soles losing their lives.

7 day moving average deaths, per day:
Hungary - 211 (scaled up to our pop'n, the equivalent of 1,449). A friend's wife is Hungarian, she said last April/May they handled it well with the police and army enforcing strict laws, overseas arrivials at that time had to stay indoors in one home for 2 weeks, with the police visiting daily to check).

Czech Republic - 183 (1,166).

Slovakia - 74 (923).

 

[dazzer6666]

Following the pandemic in the US and Europe over the last year, the situation in some nations with their third/fourth just now is horrendous. So many soles losing their lives.

7 day moving average deaths, per day:

Hungary - 211 (scaled up to our pop'n, the equivalent of 1,449). A friend's wife is Hungarian, she said last April/May they handled it well with the police and army enforcing strict laws, overseas arrivials at that time had to stay indoors in one home for 2 weeks, with the police visiting daily to check).

Czech Republic - 183 (1,166).

Slovakia - 74 (923).

3,251 deaths and over 80,000 new cases in Brazil yesterday

 

[Weststander]

3,251 deaths and over 80,000 new cases in Brazil yesterday

The FT's total excess deaths data, shows almost 400,000 Russian's have died from CV19, 4 x the propaganda numbers total released by Putin.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

Who had India down in the mutation sweepstake?

 

[beorhthelm]

Unfortunately, most of those that were in ICUs, have died rather than recovered and also a large proportion of those that have died, did so outside the 28 days so don't appear on the official figures. There will be statistics but the Gov wouldn't release them but looking at when they introduced the 28 day limit, I seem to recall the numbers when form about 42k to 36k so applying the same ratios, the total deaths could be in the region of 140k!!

Of course the plus side is that far fewer are actually now going into ICUs so things are moving in the right direction.

here's the place for it...
i had a brief search for any evidence of this, then realised your own comment admits there isnt data. so what is the source for these assertions or just personal view?

 

[nicko31]

About 30k cases per day in France, said to be thousands of cases there of Brazil / SA cases here

No quarantine required or even an LF test for two third of daily entries into the UK.

Said weeks ago on here hauliers checked into France (since Dec 20') but nothing in the other direction

Are we going to wait again till after the horse has bolted?

 

[Billy the Fish]

About 30k cases per day in France, said to be thousands of cases there of Brazil / SA cases here

No quarantine required or even an LF test for two third of daily entries into the UK.

Said weeks ago on here hauliers checked into France (since Dec 20') but nothing in the other direction

Are we going to wait again till after the horse has bolted?

Still mostly UK variant according to the Guardian.

I agree though, new variants are a worry.

The so-called British variant now accounts for 76.3% of new daily cases nationwide, with the original strain representing 10.3% and the mutations first described in South Africa and Brazil 4.7% combined. The incidence rate of those two variants is higher – though falling – in a handful of départements.

 

[nicko31]

Still mostly UK variant according to the Guardian.

I agree though, new variants are a worry.

Hopefully the Guardian are correct. Anyway good news this morning, they are introducing tests on the UK side for hauliers, there were 45k cases in France yesterday, a worrying situation. Interestingly the French have dropped the need for tests entering France from UK

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56531330

 

[crodonilson]

The situation in Europe is extremely concerning, the adage is very true that we're not safe here until the whole world is safe (and even truer that our near neighbours are safe). Take the Polish data and with a country that has just over half of the population of ours their equivalent positive tests are now nearly 70,000 per day and still rising. They are also only testing approximately 70,000 per day so nearly half of all tests are coming back as positive. The numbers in the UK creeping up will almost inevitably increase much quicker as lockdown eases and we inherit the third wave from Europe, the only positive on this is our vaccination programme means this should have less affect on our healthcare system and deaths but the impact could still be substantial.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

The situation in Europe is extremely concerning, the adage is very true that we're not safe here until the whole world is safe (and even truer that our near neighbours are safe). Take the Polish data and with a country that has just over half of the population of ours their equivalent positive tests are now nearly 70,000 per day and still rising. They are also only testing approximately 70,000 per day so nearly half of all tests are coming back as positive. The numbers in the UK creeping up will almost inevitably increase much quicker as lockdown eases and we inherit the third wave from Europe, the only positive on this is our vaccination programme means this should have less affect on our healthcare system and deaths but the impact could still be substantial.

Can a mod ban the troll form the thread please?

 

[LamieRobertson]

The situation in Europe is extremely concerning, the adage is very true that we're not safe here until the whole world is safe (and even truer that our near neighbours are safe). Take the Polish data and with a country that has just over half of the population of ours their equivalent positive tests are now nearly 70,000 per day and still rising. They are also only testing approximately 70,000 per day so nearly half of all tests are coming back as positive. The numbers in the UK creeping up will almost inevitably increase much quicker as lockdown eases and we inherit the third wave from Europe, the only positive on this is our vaccination programme means this should have less affect on our healthcare system and deaths but the impact could still be substantial.

To take your post re Poland which is testing 70k per day and you say positive tests are 70k per day and then you say half are coming back positive ...hmm I’m make that 35k ..being half of 70k...are you perhaps confused in your rush to get your message out?
“Inherit third wave from Europe”...pure speculation.....”the only positive is our vaccination program” ..BLOODY BIG POSITIVE ..I’d say...it’s like having a goal the size of a football pitch! ...perhaps turn off MSM and go for a walk in that lovely place you reside in...I’ve booked my weekend in September not far from Lyme Regis..looking forward to it immensely

 

[crodonilson]

Can a mod ban the troll form the thread please?

What's trolling about my post?? It's what is happening on our doorstep, it is alarming, no

If you don't want bad news then there is the good news thread on the main board, but unfortunately almost all of the data from the continent currently is very bad news.