Coronavirus

[birch-chorley]

20 minutes ago, Nowack said:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/deathsduetocovid19comparedwithdeathsfrominfluenzaandpneumonia

Below is an extract from table 5 showing annual deaths, on the left, and the ones on the right are flue season deaths. This also includes pneumonia by the way. 

2006	28,721	20,242
2007	28,317	19,195
2008	29,114	18,678
2009	26,683	18,290
2010	25,839	16,582
2011	25,868	17,581
2012	26,365	17,770
2013	26,625	18,984
2014	25,909	16,465
2015	29,451	21,157
2016	27,927	19,046
2017	27,858	18,725
2018	29,103	21,314
2019	25,406	17,432
2020	-	14,013

 

Fair enough, if that table is correct (which I’m sure it is) then it would appear that the widely reported figures of ‘50k excess deaths due to ineffective winter flu vaccine’ are massively overstated 

on another note, this paragraph from your link strikes me as really odd, If 17k usually die each year from flu then how on earth have we only had 394 so far this year? 

• Of all death occurrences between January and August 2020, there were 48,168 deaths due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) compared with 13,619 deaths due to pneumonia and 394 deaths due to influenza.

[Nowack]

4 minutes ago, birch-chorley said:

 how on earth have we only had 394 so far this year?

No idea. Maybe everyone is wearing masks and washing hands while self isolating. 

 

[Tombwfc]

1 hour ago, birch-chorley said:

The economic impact of 15m isolating for 6 months would be bad 

But nowhere near as bad as it was shutting large parts of the economy down for 4 months for all 66m of us. Clearly if 50m could have operated as normal and businesses remained open then the economic picture would have been a lot better 

We could have paid the 15m vulnerable people £1k a month through lockdown and it would still have been cheaper than the furlough scheme, that’s without even considering all the other government spending incurred (on top of the huge hit in tax revenue) 

With regards other countries, of course it gives pause for thought. To be fair I was supportive of lockdown / saving the NHS myself in March. With hindsight I believe it was the wrong way to go at it, now we can start to see the economic damage caused I think the cure is worse than the virus  

With that in mind, If it’s another 12 months for a vaccine I’d say we need to change our approach. If a vaccine is a matter of weeks away as has been suggested then of course we should carry on with plan A at this stage 

 

There are 11m over 65s in this country, 5.4m receiving treatment for asthma, 14m who are obese, plus cancer patients and others who immunocompromised. There will be overlapping, but all those people plus those who live with them = way more than 15m.

It seems to me that it's pretty obvious why no-one has tried what you're suggesting, it's practically and morally impossible. 

I'd also suggest that it's actually much, much easier to get 60m to stay indoors, than it is to get 20m to do it while everyone else cracks on.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-herd-immunity-sweden-covid-cases-anders-tegnell-b1421541.html

 

[Nowack]

6 minutes ago, birch-chorley said:

50k excess deaths due to ineffective winter flu vaccine’ are massively overstated

Look at the exact wording, it's like saying "up to 100% effective." it could be 5% effective and the statement is still valid. 

[birch-chorley]

3 minutes ago, Nowack said:

No idea. Maybe everyone is wearing masks and washing hands while self isolating. 

 

Come on, that stands out like a saw thumb, a 98% reduction in flu deaths? Masks and hand washing only really became a thing in March 

Seems ridiculous 

[Nowack]

Just now, birch-chorley said:

Come on, that stands out like a saw thumb, a 98% reduction in flu deaths? Masks and hand washing only really became a thing in March 

Seems ridiculous 

Like I said I've no idea. Maybe the actual statistics take time to correlate, maybe everyone is furloughed or working from home. Time will tell. 

[Escobarp]

1 minute ago, birch-chorley said:

Come on, that stands out like a saw thumb, a 98% reduction in flu deaths? Masks and hand washing only really became a thing in March 

Seems ridiculous 

Of course it’s ridiculous and it’s why I always take out death numbers with a pinch of salt when folk start throwing comparables about like confetti 

[Sweep]

Just now, Tombwfc said:

 

There are 11m over 65s in this country, 5.4m receiving treatment for asthma, 14m who are obese, plus cancer patients and others who immunocompromised. There will be overlapping, but all those people plus those who live with them = way more than 15m.

It seems to me that it's pretty obvious why no-one has tried what you're suggesting, it's practically and morally impossible. 

I'd also suggest that it's actually much, much easier to get 60m to stay indoors, than it is to get 20m to do it while everyone else cracks on.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/coronavirus-herd-immunity-sweden-covid-cases-anders-tegnell-b1421541.html

 

Somebody on LBC suggested that over 1/3 of the working population can be classed as "vulnerable" and there are 35M working people, so that's circa 12M. There are 12M pensioners  in the UK, so add them in, and we're already up to 24M, so that's a huge chunk the UK population we want to isolate for up to 6 months.

I guess a lot comes down to who decides what is actually classed as vulnerable, and how they get categorised. Some vulnerable people might not want to isolate, what do we do? - intern them?

[birch-chorley]

1 minute ago, Nowack said:

Look at the exact wording, it's like saying "up to 100% effective." it could be 5% effective and the statement is still valid. 

50k more people died than normal that Winter, the numbers you shared show it didn't come from flu, must have been something else 

 

[birch-chorley]

6 minutes ago, Sweep said:

Somebody on LBC suggested that over 1/3 of the working population can be classed as "vulnerable" and there are 35M working people, so that's circa 12M. There are 12M pensioners  in the UK, so add them in, and we're already up to 24M, so that's a huge chunk the UK population we want to isolate for up to 6 months.

I guess a lot comes down to who decides what is actually classed as vulnerable, and how they get categorised. Some vulnerable people might not want to isolate, what do we do? - intern them?

Like any if it, your hoping the relevant people do as they are asked. Just like when you move one city into tier 3, your asking part of the U.K. population to adhere to different rules from another part of the population 

I’m not sure i quite agree that it’s easier to lockdown 66m (as we did in spring) as it is to lockdown 15m 

Its certainly not easier on the economy 

[mickbrown]

52 minutes ago, Mounts Kipper said:

 You can’t live your life isolating repeatedly for 2 weeks whenever you get the message. 

 I read somewhere that in most cases the incubation time was 5 days, now if the government tested you on the 5th day they’d have a much better chance of folk isolating, as it stands you are not supposed to get tested unless you have symptoms, therefore it has to be 14 days.  Most folk want to do the right thing but currently it’s not encouraging folk to do that.

Absolutely. To ask folk to isolate without testing is bollox.

My nipper is currently on her second isolation since starting back at school. It's bullshit without a test

[mickbrown]

1 hour ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

They are only 'useless' if you dont come down with it. But thats the whole point of it, you're potentially infectious before you become ill, so isolating protects others.

By that same token a test undertaken too early may give false assurance.

Until these new machines are rolled out (with supposed higher accuracy) then were stuck with current methods.

These machines ain't coming. It's part of Boris's Blustering Bullshit Bingo.

[Tombwfc]

These new quick turnaround tests have a whiff of the 'game changing' antibody tests from when we first went into lockdown.

But, time will tell.

[athywhite1958]

I have been working from home since the end of March, I have made the odd trip to the supermarket, I go to the garage every day for a paper and i have been to football 3 times, oh and I went on Colls Saturday for a couple of hours, other than that I have been stuck at home, each time I left the house I made sure I had a face covering handy and stayed away from people as much as I could, so if anybody thinks I am going to isolate for (another) 6 months and not venture out at all they can fuck off, 

[DaisyHWanderer]

It’s going to be a tough old month. Lockdowns bad enough without the dark nights and shitty weather. 
 

Check up on your mates and family folks. It’s never been more important to.

[birch-chorley]

25 minutes ago, athywhite1958 said:

I have been working from home since the end of March, I have made the odd trip to the supermarket, I go to the garage every day for a paper and i have been to football 3 times, oh and I went on Colls Saturday for a couple of hours, other than that I have been stuck at home, each time I left the house I made sure I had a face covering handy and stayed away from people as much as I could, so if anybody thinks I am going to isolate for (another) 6 months and not venture out at all they can fuck off, 

I think most people are feeling the fatigue of the restrictions I think most of the population will adhere to the next 4 weeks lockdown much more beyond that and I think many more millions will be telling the government to ‘fuck off’ as you say 

Better hope that the vaccine comes soon or  it may well be taken out of the governments hands 

[Guest]

Liverpool cases down by half from the peak

[Spider]

Just now, boltondiver said:

Liverpool cases down by half from the peak

Tier 3 👍👍👍👍👍

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Spider said:

Tier 3 👍👍👍👍👍

Too soon to have taken effect, I expect

[Casino]

I've just realised what's going on

End of lockdown, South is fine and dandy, north goes in tier 3

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Casino said:

I've just realised what's going on

End of lockdown, South is fine and dandy, north goes in tier 3

No need

https://mobile.twitter.com/ChrisLo43505224/status/1323320417956880390/photo/1

 

[Tonge moor green jacket]

2 hours ago, birch-chorley said:

If the predominant reason given for excess deaths was ‘an ineffective flu vaccine’ then I’d assume they died of flu. Might have been pneumonia as a result of flu perhaps 

Thats certainly what happened to my wife’s nan that Winter 

Predominant yes, but surely not all.

Asthma sufferers often suffer more in winter for example. 

[Boby Brno]

Wales lockdown has seen a steady rise in cases, Liverpool in tier 3 and Scotland with their lesser restrictions have also seen a steady decrease.

Uk cases today are less than last Monday.

There really isn’t a simple answer.

[Mounts Kipper]

35 minutes ago, boltondiver said:

No need

https://mobile.twitter.com/ChrisLo43505224/status/1323320417956880390/photo/1

 

10-19 year olds biggest infection rates but numbers now dropping faster than any other age group, very strange the rapid rate of decrease given they were all in school. 

[Spider]