Herd Immunity

Rashford is an absolutely decent human being who has used his superstar status as a platform to champion causes that are immensely important.

People will listen to him because he isn't a middle aged person like Starmer who to be quite honest unless you have an interest in politics most folk might say 'Sir Who?'

 

Couldn't agree more.

 

Taiwan that has had a grand total of 46 Covid deaths? You will note that is not 46,000, 4,600 or even 460, but 46. That is less than Barnsley (820 deaths). From a densely populated island with over 23 million inhabitants - and with the current spike in cases they are on roughly pro-rata 1/2 of the cases in the UK? They do have a low vaccine take-up though which is one of the problems behind this spike (the other was complacency) - although the government has just announced that 20m are ordered and should be in place by August.

Interestingly, the current outbreak in Taiwan has been traced to unvaccinated airline pilots from China that were infected with the Kent variant.

Their economy also grew by 2.98% last year - when was the last time the UK economy grew by that much in a year? (The answer is 2005 BTW and before that 2003, and 1997-2000).

 

Reduce all contact between people and a virus can't spread. Lockdowns work.

So the question should never have been 'do lockdowns work?'

Their wide-ranging negative impact should have been properly assessed
Then, the question should always be 'are lockdowns necessary?' Do we *need* to criminalise everyday life? Or can we ask people to make some changes?

Several research articles highlight that cases were plateauing, if not declining before each of the 3 UK lockdowns
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi...g6pX725YneLmWSoviXMNrXhUWm1aWgwvx82vf7ncSU0N8
https://thecritic.co.uk/seven-indictors-that-show-infections-were-falling-before-lockdown-3-0/

If the purpose of lockdowns were to reduce deaths, this has even less evidence, and some evidence even indicates higher all-cause mortality in some countries with the harshest and/or longest lockdowns.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30208-X/fulltext

I don't think any if this is as simple as this country did it right and this one did it wrong ect.

 

Another question, is when are lockdowns necessary? Given that each in the UK was delayed until it was too late - and it can be argued that at least two were forced on us by the French government threatening to shut the border (or actually shutting it in December) - there is a strong argument that these delays made them longer - and possibly harsher than they needed to be. If we had locked down in early March 2020, would it have lasted until mid-June? or would it have been until mid-April? If we had mandatory quarantine for international travelers would that have made things better?

There are many other questions as well. A lockdown should only be a last resort, but having to resort to the last resort 3 times in one year (and we've been in some form of local restrictions since October really) suggests that none of the other measures were effective - why is that? Why didn't Track and Trace work properly? Why didn't we limit international travel? Was the messaging wrong? Did the high-profile breaches of the rules lead to more low-scale breaches?

Its a complex argument and there are many aspects too consider, but following the evidence given yesterday (under oath I believe) it suggests that the government didn't have a plan and winged it - with multiple public lies to save face.

We might not like to admit it, but this was the 3rd Coronavirus outbreak in the last 20 years. It is only a matter of time (and we might only have 5-10 years) before the next one (or flu, etc), and our preparation and leadership needs to be much, much better.

 

Don't disagree with any of that.

 

Just to add to the debate, just seen this linked from Nature - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03553-9

If you catch Covid and survive, your chances of dying of another cause in the next 6 months are 50% higher than if you don't catch it (compared to the normal population). And your risk of serious complications is 50% higher, and much higher than that if you go into hospital or ICU. These complications include anything from cardiovascular disease, through hair loss, fatigue, diarrhea, to mental health issues including substance abuse.

These might only affect small percentages of the population, but a small percentage of a large number is still a large number.

 

An interesting aside from earlier today and crossing over into yesterdays political drama.

Yesterday Hancock was accused of lieing about statistics and what was happening. Late yesterday and earlier today, he denied being a liar and that the accusations were false.

Earlier today Matt Hancock said in the commons that "tens of thousands" of people in Bolton were getting jabs every single day.

Official records show that vaccines in Bolton have never exceeded 5,500 (circa) and of late, they are nearer 2,000 a day, with less than 1,000 on Sunday last.

 

They can't help it can they. It's like they have a form of bull**** tourrettes

 

I'm quite prepared to go with Cummings and his confession as to how useless our politicians in power are. And how the choice at the last election was woeful. It was.

I'm not so sure about those ministers who he lets off the hook.

Everybody's to blame for this debacle. Me and everyone else. In mitigation, I wish we'd had sensible reputable honest competents to vote for.

I hope we're getting to a post-politics landscape where we all know what's best and it's just a matter of putting the persons most able, in the hot seat, to do what's needed.

But from what I read on here I doubt this.

 

It’s just been on LBC that 5 flights have landed at Heathrow today from India. The passengers sharing arrival queues and luggage reclaim with every one else! Pathetic

 

YeahBut!! Priti Patel has been out with her frontline staff in a customised jacket to prove to the DM brigade that we’re tough on border control.

It’s like watching some tinpot banana republic, openly showing you the stories (and lies) they want you to take notice of, whilst barely hiding* the inconvenient truths.
*like a toddler stood behind the curtain with their feet poking out.

 

Yet unbelievably, there are literally millions thinking they are doing a good job!