10pm Curfew

And the elephant in the room

 

Exactly why isn't anybody raising this on the news or in parliament?

 

Simple number progression ?

 

I thought You Gov was pro Tory? Not with this they aren't......

 

Difficult not to like this enough.

I've never previously seen anything that distorted reality as much as that 'scenario', while using their position to suppress questioning by the media and thus influencing public opinion. I personally believe that it was criminal, and they could be prosecuted for endangering lives (Actually it's not a personal opinion, it's already in law). It's so far removed from science, and yet presented by people who purport to be scientists. Goebbels would have been in awe. They're every bit as dangerous, every bit as callous, every bit as removed from humanity.

The opinion of a scientist is not science. And a scientist who offers his opinion as science is no longer a scientist, no matter his credentials.

 

Similarly, editorialised news isn't news it's someone's opinion.

Another thing, yesterday Johnson said that hospital cases were currently above the level at the time of the lockdown. My ears pricked up and I thought that sounds bad as beds were full at lockdown.. hmmm. Checked the figures and they were correct at around the three to four thousand mark now and on March 23rd.

The misleading element to me was what happened straight after 23rd March. One week later it was at 10K, on 12th April it peaked at 19K.

The point I'm trying to make is that the image I had in my mind of the the NHS being overrun related to the peak of the crisis and I think again it was was put out there to invoke the same thoughts I had.

 

Wasn’t the whole point of the March lockdown to prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed?

 

Absolutely, but isn't the key point that - for whatever reason - the proportion of those infected being hospitalised back then was far, far higher? If hospitalisation and death rates are far lower then is the response proportionate?

 

Went to a local Indian restaurant the other night - three in our household group. At a table, a bit too close for comfort, and a fairly small table were six blokes - possibly a works or other social do - all talking (very) loudly and sitting next to each other and having a few drinks and a curry. They were following guidelines, but I asked the waiter to move us to a table further away from them - they never noticed. Now if one of them were a COVID carrier - it would be perfect conditions to pass it on to their five mates, and also spread it round the restaurant a bit too.

 

I think because we didn't know the real level of infections as only hospital patients and care home were being tested ? It had been suggested that the level of infections could have been over 100,000 per day.

I'm not suggesting that cases won't rise they probably will but I also suggest it is unlikely that the rise will be anything like the level seen in April. If it is after all the restrictions placed on the country for months then we might as well say bugger this it isn't working.

 

If you go to the pub, certainly all of the ones I've been to which are incredibly well managed, I think it's highly unlikely you would catch Covid off of another customer. But whether you go with one, two or six mates and spend all night together and one of you gets it there's certainly a good chance you' re all going to get it. But that's the risk you take by socialising and, IMO, one worth taking given I work from home and don't interact with anyone vulnerable.

We make decisions based on risk every single day.

 

Is the % of those infected being hospitalised reducing? Not doubting you but not seen that myself and would like to read up on that. Would be interesting to know why that’s the case.

 

The key thing for me is we knew nothing - or very little - about the virus back then. It's why predictions were so wild, treatment was so ineffective, and care home discharges so poorly managed.

The common phrase back then was that Covid "does not discriminate". Now it is absolutely clear it does. The data clearly shows it does. There are outliers, where a usually healthy person is badly affected, but they stand out because of how unusual they are.

We now know far better how to treat it. Previous interventions often exacerbated rather than alleviated symptoms. We know better how to treat outbreaks in care homes.

We also know that some affected are suffering some long term health challenges.

The R rate is a different beast now. We are asymptomatic testing which means the number of infections presents a very different picture to what was previously known.

All in all the facts are constantly changing. Anyone talking in absolute certainties about what is happening and how we should proceed are the only ones who are definitely wrong.

I sit on a bi-weekly outbreak management group with regional colleagues including public health. The key question they always refer back to is are the measures proportionate. There's often no consensus to be fair. But whenever someone posts about an affect of covid I think its reasonable to ask back to them, but does that warrant the level of reaction you're advocating? Is it proportionate?

 

Me too! But the government gave mishandled so much of this, that there is so little trust, that its difficult to have an informed or nuanced debate.

As Dave says it may well be that we're testing more, but then it follows that it must have a lower death rate than thought at that time, and far more of us must have already had it. Added in things like improved treatment and protecting care homes etc

 

I found this interesting

 

There were some landlords being interviewed before the curfew was announced that said they'd sooner have a full lockdown for 3 weeks, if it gave more chance of being open for lead up to Christmas, obviously with 80% furlough in place. Instead, they've waited 3 weeks with some **** and bull curfew, which SAGE have dismissed as marginal and reduced a large chunk of the country to single household only pub visits. It's not too dissimilar to the week before lockdown when BJ asked people to not go to the pub but didn't close them.

The Govt are killing jobs for a package of measures that aren't expected to do much to slow the spread. Can't imagine there'll be too many countries where both the economy and public health takes such a battering

 

https://www.heraldscotland.com/news...less-total-could-hit-three-million-next-year/

Hospitality will be by far the biggest casualty if three million end up jobless.