Coronavirus

[Spy Bee]

[Spy Bee]

Plan in the UK seems to be for 60% of people to get it ASAP. Which means herd immunity happens more quickly, but also means the death toll and suffering in the short term will be almost unimagineable!

[Butch]

[Spy Bee]

https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/science-shows-that-only-radical-action-can-avert-a-coronavirus-bloodbath-2e9955a724d2

 

A worst-case scenario could see up to 1.5 million deaths in the UK, and up to 7.6 million deaths in the United States, based on assuming the highest estimated fatality rate. This scenario is entirely avoidable. But current US and UK government strategies make higher fatality rates more likely by failing to slow the infection spread and thus rapidly overwhelming healthcare facilities early on.

[Mudface]

From the Guardian live blog-

 

The UK government’s chief scientific officer Sir Patrick Vallance has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s agenda setting news programme Today to defend the measures announced last night by the prime minister, Boris Johnson, to combat the spread of Covid-19 in the UK.

Many people had criticised the measures, which appeared comparatively relaxed compared to those taken by other countries, even in Europe, as too little, too late. But Vallance said that the government’s reasoning was “based on which interventions are going to have the biggest effect.”

He said the government’s plan was to reduce the peak of the epidemic, “pull it down and broaden it,” which he said everyone agreed was the best approach.

The government wanted to encourage “herd immunity” among the population, Vallance said, suggesting that it would be worse to suppress the disease completely then for it to return in the autumn

If you suppress something very hard, when you release those measures it bounces back at the wrong time so our aim is to try and reduce the peak, broaden the peak, not to suppress it completely. So because most people get a mild illness, to build up some degree of herd immunity as well, so that more people are immune to this disease and we reduce the transmission, at the same we protect those who are most vulnerable.

 

That's a bit more reassuring, as I can see what they're trying to do. Slow the infections down so that the systems can cope, then as herd immunity builds up, the rate will naturally die out. Whilst the draconian measures elsewhere are effective in the short term, they're not sustainable, so when they're relaxed and the disease inevitably comes back, it could make things worse in the long term. It's not great obviously, but either way looks to have its problems.

[Butch]

Funny how Last month or so nobody gave a fuck about it as it was happening on the other side of the world. Bring it home and everyone gives so much of a shit now they stock up on bog roll. 

[Spy Bee]

9 minutes ago, Butch said:

Funny how Last month or so nobody gave a fuck about it as it was happening on the other side of the world. Bring it home and everyone gives so much of a shit now they stock up on bog roll. 

Imagine caring more about your parents than some other people you'll never lay eyes on.

[Babb'sBurstNad]

14 minutes ago, Mudface said:

From the Guardian live blog-

 

 

 

 

That's a bit more reassuring, as I can see what they're trying to do. Slow the infections down so that the systems can cope, then as herd immunity builds up, the rate will naturally die out. Whilst the draconian measures elsewhere are effective in the short term, they're not sustainable, so when they're relaxed and the disease inevitably comes back, it could make things worse in the long term. It's not great obviously, but either way looks to have its problems.

Indeed, hindsight will be the only way to know what the best approach is/was.

[johnsusername]

17 minutes ago, Butch said:

Funny how Last month or so nobody gave a fuck about it as it was happening on the other side of the world. Bring it home and everyone gives so much of a shit now they stock up on bog roll. 

To be fair this threads been going since January. 

 

Personally I did worry originally when those first cases were being reported on. It's been ten years since swine flu so was only a matter of time until another mass flu would come along. 

 

I haven't decided whether the overwhelming media coverage is helping or making things worse. 

[Dr Nowt]

25 minutes ago, Butch said:

Funny how Last month or so nobody gave a fuck about it as it was happening on the other side of the world. Bring it home and everyone gives so much of a shit now they stock up on bog roll. 

Peak internet bellendry.

[Sugar Ape]

I bet people in London were more worried when the 7/7 suicide bombings happened than they were when they heard about suicide bombings in Baghdad. The weirdos. 

[Mudface]

38 minutes ago, Butch said:

Funny how Last month or so nobody gave a fuck about it as it was happening on the other side of the world. Bring it home and everyone gives so much of a shit now they stock up on bog roll. 

That's unfair, people will obviously always be more invested in something that could personally affect them. Even given that, the scenes and figures coming out of Wuhan back in January were still very shocking and I've felt a sense of dread ever since which has been steadily amplified as the virus has spread.

[Bjornebye]

On 23/01/2020 at 23:43, Bjornebye said:

Deserves its own thread and quite frankly I wish everyone the best. x 

I stand by this x 

[Sugar Ape]

Much of Italy is currently in lockdown as the country's tally of coronavirus deaths has topped 1,000.

 

The outbreak is putting the Italian healthcare service under immense strain.

 

But will the UK follow this path?

 

On Thursday, Boris Johnson's chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, said the UK was four weeks behind Italy "in terms of the scale of the outbreak" if not "in terms of the response".

 

Does that mean we're four weeks away from a similar fate?

 

Not necessarily. Here are three reasons why experts believe the UK's epidemic could be different from Italy's, and why the number of cases here means something different.

 

1. Different early transmission

 

The number of confirmed cases is not the same as the number of actual cases. It depends on how many infected people are detected.

 

The epidemics in both countries may be growing at a similar rate now, but early on the UK had more diagnosed cases than Italy. Italian numbers shot up on 23 February, leading scientists to think there was a period when the virus was spreading without being detected.

 

That gave less room for measures like tracing contacts of those who had fallen ill and isolating cases to slow the spread.

 

Professor of international public health Jimmy Whitworth says that put the health system "behind the curve" in controlling the epidemic.

 

Researchers also warn that the Italy virus testing system has become overwhelmed and is not keeping up with new cases. This means Italy's figures could be falling further behind the total number of actual cases.

 

And as the UK adds more testing capacity, Prof Whitworth adds, we might see a "jump in numbers" - not just a result of greater transmission, but better detection. 

 

2. Italy's epidemic is more concentrated

 

The pressure on health services also depends on where, and how severe, each case is.

 

There are good reasons to believe that these factors are different for the two countries. Since the initial spread, most of Italy's epidemic has been concentrated in the northern region of Lombardy, home to just over 15% of Italians.

 

Lombardy has accounted for almost 60 in every 100 cases in Italy. By contrast, the epidemic, so far, is more spread out in the UK. Like Lombardy, London has about 15% of citizens. But it has a smaller proportion of cases: just under 25 in 100.

 

So 15,000 cases spread out across the UK might not put the same pressure on hospitals as they would if they were mainly in one city or region.

 

The UK government is still planning for a time when the NHS will face significant challenges. But that may not be when we catch up with Italy's current number of confirmed cases.

 

 

3. More of Italy's confirmed cases are fatal

 

The death rate among confirmed cases in Italy is higher than in the UK. As of 12 March, the mortality rates among detected cases were 1.4% for the UK and 6.7% for Italy.

 

Prof Whitworth believes a higher death rate in Italy could mean that the observed cases contain a larger number of sicker patients. Italy has an older population than the UK, and the effects of Covid-19 infection have been more serious in older people.

 

That puts more pressure on services.

The alternative explanation for the higher death rate is that Italy's is an overwhelmed health service.

 

Don't relax quite yet

Even though our epidemic may not follow Italy's exactly, that doesn't mean the UK will escape serious changes to its way of life. 

 

Epidemiologist Adam Kucharski warns against simple comparisons of case numbers and that "without efforts to control the virus we could still see a situation evolve like that in Italy", even if not necessarily in the next four weeks.

[Sugar Ape]

2 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

I stand by this x 

You even wish Turdseye the best?

[Bjornebye]

8 minutes ago, Sugar Ape said:

You even wish Turdseye the best?

Yeah course. 

[3 Stacks]

Hudson-Odoi has said on Instagram that he's recovered. The positive test result was just last night. Imagine how many people he could have infected...

[Anubis]

Currently an epic cunt-off happening on Twitter between Piers Morgan and Alan Sugar. 

[Davelfc]

6 minutes ago, Anubis said:

Currently an epic cunt-off happening on Twitter between Piers Morgan and Alan Sugar. 

[Stickman]

1 hour ago, Spy Bee said:

 

 

[Red Phoenix]

*puts tinfoil hat on*

 

Lijian Zhao from the Chinese Foreign Ministry has linked an article on twitter that includes this :

 

Quote

It would seem the only possibility for origination is the US because only that country has the “tree trunk” of all the varieties. And it may therefore be true that the original source of the COVID-19 virus was the US military bio-warfare lab at Fort Detrick.

 

I'm sure this will go down well.

 

 

[1892-LFCWasBorn]

Dr John Ashton on Sky News fucking nailing it.

 

Haven't watched QT yet, which he was on last night.

[M_B]

I don't see how doing nothing at all will slow down the virus and protect the NHS from being overwhelmed. Just doesn't make sense to me.

[Spy Bee]

1 minute ago, M_B said:

I don't see how doing nothing at all will slow down the virus and protect the NHS from being overwhelmed. Just doesn't make sense to me.

I can only think that they want to run at capacity (of healthcare systems) for as short a term as possible. While we are operating under capacity, we are inefficient. So if that theory is correct, they want to hit capacity as soon as possible then control it at as close to capacity as possible.

[Red Phoenix]

It's good that we have Ashton having a go at the government response to this, we even have Jeremy Cunt having a go too. But where the fuck is everyone else?

 

Boris Johnson's herd immunity genocide run needs more opposition and quickly.