COVID-19/Coronavirus Information and Support Thread (see OP for useful links)

[Dennisch]

Our numbers are starting to look great. Little over 600 people in hospital, little over 200 on the IC. Creeping towards a thousand confirmed cases a day. I won't say that the numbers are plummeting but especially the IC numbers are dropping fast. More than 12 million out of 17 have had at least one shot. And because of a surplus of vaccines, starting next week we can choose if we want the Johnson one shot, or Pfizer/Moderna double poke. There is a decent possibility that we have a fully vaccinated country before the end of August, apart from the Facebook professors of course.

 

[Outspacer]

Can this really be considered a successful vaccination program if it's neutering one variant but potentially making way for an even worse one?

I'd also say yes, for the same reasons as @Joey D but we just don't know what the likelihood is of a new variant (which is only a matter of time) being worse for hospitalisations.

Pagel's thread goes into a lot more detail than my brief summary, but I think she pretty much covers this i.e. it could take a few weeks longer to reach 1st/2nd wave levels of hospitalisations, but it's still not good.

I read it all, those numbers were from it. Her thinking is that hospitalisations are rising at a similar rate to cases (in one way by taking 187 and 96 and calling it a doubling in 9 days) but as I showed the numbers don't support that method. Also, the 7 day average of cases rose at very close to 7%/day for every day from 31st May to 4th June, yet, with a 10 day lag, admissions 'only' rose by 5.8%/day for the comparable period. I'm not trying to undermine any of her conclusions, which amply noted the uncertainties, but it would be very interesting if that difference continues rather than the two converging.

If it does continue, is the only reason at hand increased vaccination? It seems the most likely to me. I wondered if demographics of cases played a part and not sure about that - while we'd expect younger cases to have (far) fewer hospitalisations per case, I don't think that would affect the rate of increase. But with about 1 million a week getting their first shot, in the age ranges that have higher case numbers... maybe something like shots give protection against hosp quicker than protection against infection?

5.8% vs 7% is big enough to possibly be something... but it could just be a quirk of low numbers.

The take home message is that the UK Government's strategy of just vaccinating more people more quickly will not be enough to stave off a big 3rd wave (of hospitalisations) alone.

Agreed, that's what the data shows either way. Even one dose in all 18+ will probably only slow it a little from here. There's clearly some blind hope that summer will suppress cases, which *shrug* it might.

 

[Stotty]

Imagine how many more cancer deaths there would be without screening!.

You are aware that millions of cancer screenings simply haven’t happened because the NHS has been entirely focussed on only one illness for the past 18 months.... and that people still can’t get to see their GP for screening referrals because GP surgeries won’t take appointments?

Ah, hang on... everything else is irrelevant compared to saving a life that could be lost to covid

 

[Outspacer]

You are aware that millions of cancer screenings simply haven’t happened because the NHS has been entirely focussed on only one illness for the past 18 months.... and that people still can’t get to see their GP for screening referrals because GP surgeries won’t take appointments?

Ah, hang on... everything else is irrelevant compared to saving a life that could be lost to covid

Well there's another fine mess of false equivalences and falsehoods!

Not having lockdowns and restrictions would certainly not have made things any better for the NHS. Or maybe you think COVID cases shouldn't have been admitted. (Cancer services were mostly up and running when COVID cases were low, before you try that).

GP surgeries are taking appointments.

If you're going to repeat crap from whatever echo chamber you've chosen, at least check it's still valid

 

[Barra333]

You are aware that millions of cancer screenings simply haven’t happened because the NHS has been entirely focussed on only one illness for the past 18 months.... and that people still can’t get to see their GP for screening referrals because GP surgeries won’t take appointments?

Ah, hang on... everything else is irrelevant compared to saving a life that could be lost to covid

It is insanely hard to quantify the deaths caused by missing screenings etc that you are talking about, but I expect that for every life lost due to this there would be multiple COVID deaths saved. Not to mention that the person with undiagnosed cancer is not passing it to anyone else - extra covid cases, diagnosed or not will, propagate the disease and a percentage of them will die. We are going through all of this crap not because COVID is a particularly nasty disease (compared to a bunch of others out there), but because it is transmitted so easily and asymptomatically. If ebola had the same transmission profile, humanity would be done for.

 

[Touring Mars]

You are aware that millions of cancer screenings simply haven’t happened because the NHS has been entirely focussed on only one illness for the past 18 months.... and that people still can’t get to see their GP for screening referrals because GP surgeries won’t take appointments?

Ah, hang on... everything else is irrelevant compared to saving a life that could be lost to covid

I understand your frustration, but you really need to stop with comments like the one I've bolded... it's provably untrue, and it doesn't help your case.

-

That said, I agree with what I believe your sentiment is, which is that there has to be a balance - my point, however, is that there already is... it's just that this balance is getting pushed hard in the favour of coping with COVID, at the expense of all other healthcare needs.

This is all the more reason to make it our absolute top priority to keep hospitalisations from COVID as low as possible. The knock-on effect of COVID and lockdown restrictions on all aspects of healthcare is horrendous, but left unchecked, COVID alone would cause even more carnage.

Let's just say, we're damned if we do and we're damned if we don't (when it comes to lockdown/restrictions etc.), but whatever we do we absolutely must be doing what the NHS needs us to do.

 

[CodeRedR51]

My work is finally going to do optional masks in the next week or so.

 

[Jezza819]

And then there's Alabama.....

Overall, 1,501,171 people or 30% of Alabama's population has been fully vaccinated.
https://usafacts.org/visualizations/covid-vaccine-tracker-states/state/alabama

I swear, these ****ing hillbillys

 

[McLaren]

It's not a difficult question to answer for me... People die. Every day. Of many different causes. Why is COVID any different to any other cause of death?

I don't have the moral dilemma to deal with that the zero COVID crowd seem to have.

So you'll stop visiting the doctor and/or refrain from visiting one if you are injured or ill?

You're going to die anyway, why bother doing anything about it....

 

[Stotty]

I understand your frustration, but you really need to stop with comments like the one I've bolded... it's provably untrue, and it doesn't help your case.

-

That said, I agree with what I believe your sentiment is, which is that there has to be a balance - my point, however, is that there already is... it's just that this balance is getting pushed hard in the favour of coping with COVID, at the expense of all other healthcare needs.

This is all the more reason to make it our absolute top priority to keep hospitalisations from COVID as low as possible. The knock-on effect of COVID and lockdown restrictions on all aspects of healthcare is horrendous, but left unchecked, COVID alone would cause even more carnage.

Let's just say, we're damned if we do and we're damned if we don't (when it comes to lockdown/restrictions etc.), but whatever we do we absolutely must be doing what the NHS needs us to do.

My apologies for exaggerating the situation... just trying to make a point.

Yes, that is my sentiment, and it has been all along - I'm not a Covid denier or an Anti vaxer (I have my 2nd Pfizer shot tomorrow, although I do wonder what the vaccine may lead to in the future, from both side effects and restrictions on freedoms).

Personally, I don't see a balanced approach, not from the Government, the NHS, the media or the public. COVID is driving every decision that's taken... even ignoring the destruction of democracy & civil liberties, it's been to the detriment of pretty much everything else.

This thread is a classic example of how Covid has, for want of a better word, consumed people... It's the only sticky in O&CE, and over the time it's been open it's probably had more posts than the other threads in this section of the forum combined.

Of course O&CE being consumed by Covid isn't a big deal, but things like government finances and other health provisions are - the long term impacts of which will cause significantly more harm to the population than Covid has or will ever do.

Take cancer (@Outpacer... I assume Cancer Research UK is not a source you could accuse of being an 'echo chamber'? )

Feb 2021

'COVID-19 has had a significant impact on primary care – patient presentation levels decreased, and CRUK estimates Around 430,000 fewer people than normal in the UK were on an urgent suspected cancer referral during March 2020-February 2021 compared with the same time the previous year.'

'This is mirrored by a decrease in diagnostic testing – in England, over March 2020-February 2021 there was a 24% reduction in the number of key radiology and endoscopy tests undertaken (around 4.6 million fewer of these were undertaken compared to the same time in the previous year).'

We have had it drilled in to us for years how important it is to catch cancer early to give patients the best chance of survival... yet 430,000 people have not had their referral. It got about half a day of sporadic coverage when Cancer Research UK tried to publicise it, then the media immediately switched back to their 99.9% Covid focus.

Add to this the NHS now has a waiting list of 5.1 million 'non urgent procedures'... Ah, no worries. they aren't urgent, so people won't mind waiting... but within that will be 10's of thousands of hip replacements for example... people who's quality of life could be transformed by what is a relatively simple operation... similarly for cataract operations, knee replacements, etc etc etc.

How is this balanced?

There's more coverage in the press of 'long covid' than there is of the cancer 'time bomb' and the scale of the NHS waiting lists.

The NHS aren't to blame for what happened in March & April 2020. But they are, along with the Government, to blame for not seeing what was going to come in the Autumn/Winter and not having any sort of plan to manage it in addition to normal healthcare demand.

And here we are, 12 months on, still having to restrict healthy peoples lives to 'protect the NHS'. And there's nothing I've seen that would indicate this winter will be any different. Where's the plan to build more general capacity to help reduce the waiting lists? What's been done to build more ICU capacity that will be needed if we're going to be able to reduce the cancer waiting lists as well as deal with another Covid **** storm.

The British people believe they have the best Health Care system in the World. The reality is that their beloved NHS is, to put it bluntly, a ****ing shambles. It's not the nurses fault, or the doctors, it's decades of under investment by Tory and Labour governments and mismanagement. It would have gone bust decades ago if it was a private company.

We'd be better off selling it to the Chinese and taking the billions they would pay for it to help reduce the debt we've had to take on this year. I'm sure they couldn't be any worse at running it than our governments and the management.

As for what we do now, given the situation we're in... for me, we have to just let it go. Let people make their own decisions... if you want to wear a mask, fine wear one. If you want to only have x number of people from other households round your house for dinner, fine. If you don't feel safe going on holiday, no problem. But don't restrict those that do - the country and the economy needs to get back to normal - or as normal as is possible after the last 18 months.

The alternative seems to be an endless spiral of restrictions being reduced and increased, with no clear plan to get out. That's not sustainable for society, either financially or emotionally.

 

[Joey D]

Where's the plan to build more general capacity to help reduce the waiting lists? What's been done to build more ICU capacity that will be needed if we're going to be able to reduce the cancer waiting lists as well as deal with another Covid **** storm.

It doesn't work like that. Building infrastructure is easy, getting people to work in it is not. The UK already had a shortage of 50,000 nurses pre-pandemic and it's likely that it's larger of a gap now. So you can certainly build more capacity but unless you have the staff to actually run it, it's going to be for naught.

I also can't remember what the training program is like for the UK, but I seem to recall that to become a critical care nurse is something like 18 months worth of training after you get your nursing license. So even if you start converting some nurses now, it wouldn't really pay off until this time next year assume they did a shortened course.

 

[Touring Mars]

@Stotty The problem is that COVID cannot be decoupled from anything... and while it isn't and shouldn't be 'all consuming', it is by far and away the biggest problem we have collectively faced this side of WW2, by a long way.

I agree that there needs to be a clear plan out, and unfortunately right now it remains uncertain. But the fact is that although there is a difference of opinion on various fronts, I strongly believe that we all basically want the same thing and that is for COVID to be as diminished as possible.

The irony is that when folks (including me) say that we just want things to 'return to normal', it's easy to forget just how grim 'normal' is for a huge number of people. I guess what I really hope for is for things to stop getting even worse, and that means getting this pandemic (and, dare I say it, future pandemics that might be just around the corner) under control - or, at the very least, a joined up, effective way of dealing with viral pandemics that doesn't mean causing massive societal damage. The trouble is that it is far easier said than done.

Anyway, best of luck for your 2nd shot tomorrow - I get mine on July 1st.

 

[Danoff]

This thread is a classic example of how Covid has, for want of a better word, consumed people... It's the only sticky in O&CE, and over the time it's been open it's probably had more posts than the other threads in this section of the forum combined.

I wonder why.

(For full disclosure, I searched to see if this image was accurate for the US, and found some discussion of how to calculate covid-19 deaths given that it only accounted for a portion of 2020. The "leading cause of death" claims for the US usually start at the beginning of the pandemic and go into a corresponding portion of 2021 to create this statistic. It was apparently the 3rd leading cause for calendar year 2020, and I'd guess it won't even be that high for 2021. So you have to choose the dates to correspond to the period of the pandemic to create this result)


Edit:

Keep in mind, this occurred in some of these nations despite wrecking their economies, shutting everything down, and rampant mask-wearing. Similar efforts decimated the flu, but didn't prevent COVID-19. It's world-wide historical, astonishing, and we're living through it. Of course it has consumed people.

 

[Stotty]

It doesn't work like that. Building infrastructure is easy, getting people to work in it is not. The UK already had a shortage of 50,000 nurses pre-pandemic and it's likely that it's larger of a gap now. So you can certainly build more capacity but unless you have the staff to actually run it, it's going to be for naught.

I also can't remember what the training program is like for the UK, but I seem to recall that to become a critical care nurse is something like 18 months worth of training after you get your nursing license. So even if you start converting some nurses now, it wouldn't really pay off until this time next year assume they did a shortened course.

I know ICU nurses take a long time to train... but they are being trained to cover multiple illnesses. Covid is one illness. Take the best non ICU nurses and train them how to manage covid patients in ICU. Leave the existing ICU nurses to cover 'normal' ICU patients..

If we're short of general nursing staff, bring in the forces, accelerate nurse already in training, or bring in nurses from other countries and pay them very well - would still be cheaper than paying millions of healthy people to sit at home and do nothing.

The NHS has already had at least a year to start preparing... where's the forward planning?

Anyway, best of luck for your 2nd shot tomorrow - I get mine on July 1st.

👍

I'm sure it will be fine.

I wonder why.

(For full disclosure, I searched to see if this image was accurate for the US, and found some discussion of how to calculate covid-19 deaths given that it only accounted for a portion of 2020. The "leading cause of death" claims for the US usually start at the beginning of the pandemic and go into a corresponding portion of 2021 to create this statistic)

It may be the leading cause of death, but it's not the ONLY cause of death... yet it's the only cause of death that is important. It would be easy to assume a case of Covid is more important than a death from cancer the majority of the time.

Dementia, alzheimers, heart disease, cancer... all should be bigger priorities as these have been killing 10's of thousands in the UK every year, for decades, and will continue to do so for decades to come. We've not spent £300bn in one year trying to prevent these killing people.[/user]

 

[Danoff]

It may be the leading cause of death, but it's not the ONLY cause of death... yet it's the only cause of death that is important. It would be easy to assume a case of Covid is more important than a death from cancer the majority of the time.

Dementia, alzheimers, heart disease, cancer... all should be bigger priorities as these have been killing 10's of thousands in the UK every year, for decades, and will continue to do so for decades to come. We've not spent £300bn in one year trying to prevent these killing people

Take a step back. A pandemic entered the world stage and within a calendar year of showing up rocketed to be the leading cause of death in many countries around the world. Societies turned themselves upside down and to stop it, and it still ended up being severe. We're used to cancer, we're used to heart disease... this is the new hotness when it comes to health care. It's pretty easy to see why it gets the focus, and why it's hard to let go of restrictions when such a dramatic force is still present and circulating.

I'm not sure, but I'd guess that where you live if you have a heart attack you can still get medical attention, and medication if you have high blood pressure/etc. Part of that is because your hospitals are (I'm guessing) not completely overrun with covid patients.

 

[Outspacer]

My apologies for exaggerating the situation... just trying to make a point.

Yes, that is my sentiment, and it has been all along - I'm not a Covid denier or an Anti vaxer (I have my 2nd Pfizer shot tomorrow, although I do wonder what the vaccine may lead to in the future, from both side effects and restrictions on freedoms).

Personally, I don't see a balanced approach, not from the Government, the NHS, the media or the public. COVID is driving every decision that's taken... even ignoring the destruction of democracy & civil liberties, it's been to the detriment of pretty much everything else.

This thread is a classic example of how Covid has, for want of a better word, consumed people... It's the only sticky in O&CE, and over the time it's been open it's probably had more posts than the other threads in this section of the forum combined.

Of course O&CE being consumed by Covid isn't a big deal, but things like government finances and other health provisions are - the long term impacts of which will cause significantly more harm to the population than Covid has or will ever do.

Take cancer (@Outpacer... I assume Cancer Research UK is not a source you could accuse of being an 'echo chamber'? )

Feb 2021

'COVID-19 has had a significant impact on primary care – patient presentation levels decreased, and CRUK estimates Around 430,000 fewer people than normal in the UK were on an urgent suspected cancer referral during March 2020-February 2021 compared with the same time the previous year.'

'This is mirrored by a decrease in diagnostic testing – in England, over March 2020-February 2021 there was a 24% reduction in the number of key radiology and endoscopy tests undertaken (around 4.6 million fewer of these were undertaken compared to the same time in the previous year).'

We have had it drilled in to us for years how important it is to catch cancer early to give patients the best chance of survival... yet 430,000 people have not had their referral. It got about half a day of sporadic coverage when Cancer Research UK tried to publicise it, then the media immediately switched back to their 99.9% Covid focus.

Add to this the NHS now has a waiting list of 5.1 million 'non urgent procedures'... Ah, no worries. they aren't urgent, so people won't mind waiting... but within that will be 10's of thousands of hip replacements for example... people who's quality of life could be transformed by what is a relatively simple operation... similarly for cataract operations, knee replacements, etc etc etc.

How is this balanced?

There's more coverage in the press of 'long covid' than there is of the cancer 'time bomb' and the scale of the NHS waiting lists.

The NHS aren't to blame for what happened in March & April 2020. But they are, along with the Government, to blame for not seeing what was going to come in the Autumn/Winter and not having any sort of plan to manage it in addition to normal healthcare demand.

And here we are, 12 months on, still having to restrict healthy peoples lives to 'protect the NHS'. And there's nothing I've seen that would indicate this winter will be any different. Where's the plan to build more general capacity to help reduce the waiting lists? What's been done to build more ICU capacity that will be needed if we're going to be able to reduce the cancer waiting lists as well as deal with another Covid **** storm.

The British people believe they have the best Health Care system in the World. The reality is that their beloved NHS is, to put it bluntly, a ****ing shambles. It's not the nurses fault, or the doctors, it's decades of under investment by Tory and Labour governments and mismanagement. It would have gone bust decades ago if it was a private company.

We'd be better off selling it to the Chinese and taking the billions they would pay for it to help reduce the debt we've had to take on this year. I'm sure they couldn't be any worse at running it than our governments and the management.

As for what we do now, given the situation we're in... for me, we have to just let it go. Let people make their own decisions... if you want to wear a mask, fine wear one. If you want to only have x number of people from other households round your house for dinner, fine. If you don't feel safe going on holiday, no problem. But don't restrict those that do - the country and the economy needs to get back to normal - or as normal as is possible after the last 18 months.

The alternative seems to be an endless spiral of restrictions being reduced and increased, with no clear plan to get out. That's not sustainable for society, either financially or emotionally.

You see, now you actually go looking for the facts to support your exaggerated absolutist argument, they don't say anything like what you were claiming. 430,000 is indeed a big number, but if it's a similar reduction to the 24% mentioned then really it's quite impressive that it isn't even more.

How would not having lockdowns and restrictions have made any of the issues you point at any better?

Same for the economy - how would not having lockdowns and restrictions, and all the money spent on supporting businesses, have made it any better?

Yes you'd have had your freedom, but what would the country have been like to inhabit? Where would we be at now in terms of not just COVID deaths but expected future deaths from lack of care, and in terms of economic cost, compared to where we are?

You're the one making the argument, it's up to you to back it up with proper facts and figures that aren't simply cherry picked.

In these recent posts you're essentially just repeating much of what you said at the end of September, as if there hadn't been 85,000 more COVID deaths since then. And as if hospital occupancy rates from COVID hadn't been double what virtually collapsed the NHS last spring (I still don't understand how they managed that, but I'm hugely impressed and grateful).

Filing this under 'posts that aged well' to remind you that the people you deride as "zero covid crowd", and models you deride as "junk", were, to put it bluntly, far more correct than you...

The continued use of dramatic and misleading language used by the UK government and the media is becoming ingrained in peoples minds... a 'surge' would indicate we're seeing the situation returning to March/April levels, but this is far from the case.. it's not a surge, it's not even a wave, though it might just be a ripple...

This relatively tiny increase in cases is easily explained by the natural increase in prevalence of flu like illnesses seen every year as we go in to autumn and winter.

Deaths 'with covid19' are practically irrelevant - 11 in the UK yesterday and mentioned in 1% of all deaths in the UK for w/e Sept 11.

Even in Spain and France, which are quoted as being 3 weeks ahead of the UK in this 'terrifying 2nd wave', deaths are nowhere near March/April levels... and despite the terrifying messages in the media, only 9% of Spanish hospital beds are occupied by Covid19 patients, with only 1,400 in ICU.

(Deaths in France are significantly lower than than Spain)

Despite quoting what's happening in Spain and France as one of their reference points, the charts presented yesterday by the UK governments medial advisors painted a significantly more dramatic potential outcome for the UK.... creating more fear in the population.

The data does not support their actions - Boris, Whitty and Handcock can't (or won't) even answer basic questions on false positive tests... they are either too stupid to do the basic maths, or they are choosing to avoid an answer as they know it doesn't support their position.

They are already responsible for thousands of deaths back in March and April, following their decision to empty hospitals of old people and send them to nursing homes, taking Coivd19 with them to slaughter other old and vulnerable people. They are responsible for the current ineptitude of the NHS, which has become totally focused on Covid19 and is not carrying out critical work as a result. Their decisions are politically based. They have no strategy for dealing with this - there's no end point, just hanging on to the vain hope a vaccine comes quickly... and that any side effects from a vaccine that clearly won't have been properly tested will land after their period in government is over.

The impact of the restrictions on the operation of the NHS, businesses and the economy will be far more destructive to society over the medium/long term than Covid19... unsustainable National debt (£2tn and counting), massive unemployment, bankruptcies, massive back log of critical testing (cancer screening, for example) and treatment in the NHS which will lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths... all this without considering the longer term change to they way we live, and the destruction of our civil liberties and proper democratic process.

Protect the vulnerable (the old and those with existing serious contributing conditions) but let the rest of the population get back to life as normal... the current approach is like using a hammer to try and kill a fly.

 

[MatskiMonk]

Filing this under 'posts that aged well'

The timing of that post couldn't really have been worse!

 

[Touring Mars]

A huge problem with COVID as opposed to other major health crises in the country is that it can affect anyone in a plethora of different ways.

Cancer doesn't kill nurses treating cancer patients. Alzheimer's doesn't spread from patient to patient, or patient to carer. COVID does. Dental practices don't need to shut down if a few patients don't turn up, but they do need to shut down if their dentists, hygienists or administrators become infectious.

Meanwhile, the WHO estimate that a staggering 115,000 healthcare workers have died from COVID in a little over one year.

https://www.euronews.com/2021/05/24...ealth-workers-have-died-from-disease-says-who

That's an incredible and shocking number.

At the peak of the second wave in the UK in Jan 2021, an estimated 50,000 NHS staff were off sick with COVID.

https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/01/2...al-betrayal-of-the-worlds-healthcare-workers/

The bottom line is this: COVID is different. It is taking a horrendous toll on society, the economy and everything else besides, and yes, it does need to be prioritized - it absolutely must be prioritized, otherwise everything else could grind to a halt - even more so than it already has.

The NHS and healthcare workers across the globe have done an astounding job thus far, but it has come at an enormous cost.

It isn't just deaths or people getting ill themselves, but deep psychological trauma, fear, anger etc. that is driving more and more healthcare workers to quit their jobs in despair. This is damage that will take years to repair, even if the damage were to stop tomorrow - which, sadly, it won't.

 

[Outspacer]

The timing of that post couldn't really have been worse!

Indeed! Point isn't to bash that error again, but that it's being repeated - certainty to that degree is clearly misguided.

Of course it's different now we have vaccinated so many, and confidence in any modeling predictions is much lower than it was then because of that. Vaccination has reduced the number of people who can become cases, the proportion of cases that will end up in hospital, and (on very limited data) also appears to be reducing the proportion of those in hospital who die. We can't now use the same stats as we did in September to predict hopitalisations and deaths from case numbers. Let's say we'd like to keep admissions below 1,000/day, back then we could reliably translate that to wanting cases below about 15,000/day. Now it's a number we don't know - 60k? 120k? - but unfortunately there's a reasonable chance that cases will go as high as it. Maybe to avoid impact on other NHS services we need admissions lower than that.

What people like @Touring Mars and me post are reasonable possibilties, knowing that we could be shown wrong (heck, it's in his sig ). We don't always agree, and that's fine. Dig back through my posts and you'll find optimism just before the Kent variant appeared, or before Christmas thinking that people meeting at Christmas wouldn't have much effect on cases. Actually, still not clear if it was Christmas day activities or those in the week before... but anyway, very, very wrong! That said, I think most of the posts based on data have held up just fine.

 

[Outspacer]

AstraZeneca welcomes Court ruling on supply of its COVID-19 vaccine to Europe

"AstraZeneca today welcomed the ruling by the Court of First Instance in Brussels. The European Commission had requested 120 million vaccine doses cumulatively by the end of June 2021, and a total of 300 million doses by the end of September 2021. The judge ordered delivery of 80.2 million doses by 27 September 2021. To date, the Company has supplied more than 70 million doses to the European Union and will substantially exceed 80.2 million doses by the end of June 2021. All other measures sought by the European Commission have been dismissed, and in particular the Court found that the European Commission has no exclusivity or right of priority over all other contracting parties.

The judgement also acknowledged that the difficulties experienced by AstraZeneca in this unprecedented situation had a substantial impact on the delay. AstraZeneca now looks forward to renewed collaboration with the European Commission to help combat the pandemic in Europe. The Company remains committed to broad and equitable distribution of the vaccine as laid out in the Advanced Purchase Agreement of August 2020."

 

[CodeRedR51]

My work is finally going to do optional masks in the next week or so.

Update: we have to provide proof of vaccination and get approval before we can go without. Effective Monday the 21st.

 

[TB]

@R1600Turbo walking into work on Monday:

 

[CodeRedR51]

@R1600Turbo walking into work on Monday:

Maybe end of next week. We have to submit photos of the card starting Monday, then wait for approval.

 

[NotThePrez]

Got my 2nd Vaccine about 15 minutes ago. So far my arm hurts like a bastard...again. We'll see how miserable tomorrow is.

Edit: Well, it seems like a good portion of the pain in my arm has subsided and migrated to me head. All things considered, nothing too crazy, just highly annoying more than anything else.

 

[Outspacer]

In this week's indie_SAGE presentation, Kit Yates had a look at the current situation regarding how cases are translating into hospitalisations currently:



Funny thing is, earlier on Friday, I'd had a look at making the graph of ratio of admissions to prior cases myself. However I couldn't draw any conclusion from it apart from that there are clearly too many factors involved to even try to explain it!

This is a version of it for whole UK data, and using today's data, so looks a little different to Kit's but broadly the same shape:

Hmm, it's a mess! I can see why Kit started his graph 1st Jan

On this scale, I'd say that the number of days that cases are delayed by doesn't really make a large difference to the overall shape of the trace. All traces are currently declining.

I could have a go at an incomplete list of factors I guess:

• Firstly, as I posited before, I think the peak in Dec may well be due to the number of PCR tests being insufficient, and cases therefore being under-reported. (This peak was actually about 14% on the England data). The same may also be true for the swings in August/September (even though cases were low, it looks likely that we weren't catching a representative portion of them).
• Demographics of cases - if a greater proportion of cases are in the younger age groups, there will be fewer hospitalisations as a result.
• Demographics of testing - any increase of testing in schools would have skewed the ratio downwards (and vice versa).
• Behavioural changes - whether enforced by restrictions or not, people will go through phases of avoiding contact and then catching up on those missed contacts (whether social, business, whatever).
• Low numbers - when cases numbers are low, cases can be either under or over reported relative to times when we have moderate incidence.

Particularly considering testing, we could say that we didn't have enough of it until relatively recently (2021). So I think that's a good enough reason on its own to ignore this chart for 2020. Interesting looking as it might be, that part certainly can't inform us much. Then considering the other factors, I'd say this chart still can't inform very well for anything short term (by which I mean the entire time of this Delta driven wave), and we'd need to break it down to age groups to really see what's happening.

So for now I think - when looking for good news - it's better to calculate the doubling time of cases and that of admissions, which do still appear to be different in a good way (10d vs 13d... better to check that mid-week).

 

[TexRex]

Comparing cancer to COVID-19 and stating that the deaths are comparable when there are now at least 5 possible vaccines to prevent severe illness from COVID-19 whereas there is no known cure for cancer.... seems like a strawman.

In much the same way that you can't be intolerant of abuses by and lack of accountability for abuses by law enforcement in your own country while Muslims are persecuted in China.

It's perversely amusing to see these people employ the same reasoning (well, the marked lack thereof) across subject matter. One wonders if they have meetings.

 

[Dennisch]

Today's the day for me and the missus, and I can't deny that I woke up with a healthy dose of heebie-jeebies. Stockpiled a bunch of hydrating sport drinks, just in case, didn't touch the beer last night and most importantly, I slept like a rock last night.

I'm good to go.

 

[JKgo]

Today's the day for me and the missus, and I can't deny that I woke up with a healthy dose of heebie-jeebies. Stockpiled a bunch of hydrating sport drinks, just in case, didn't touch the beer last night and most importantly, I slept like a rock last night.

I'm good to go.

We shall await with bated breaths whether or not you (or your significant other) become new Magneto. 🤣

 

[35mm]

Today's the day for me and the missus, and I can't deny that I woke up with a healthy dose of heebie-jeebies. Stockpiled a bunch of hydrating sport drinks, just in case, didn't touch the beer last night and most importantly, I slept like a rock last night.

I'm good to go.

Happy wedding!





Oh, wait...

 

[Dennisch]

Beep boop beep. I mean 01000001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01110111 01100101 01101110 01110100 00100000 01110111 01100101 01101100 01101100 00101100 00100000 01110011 01101111 00100000 01100110 01100001 01110010 00101110