How has the government so comprehensively fucked this up. They should have introduced vaxports ten weeks ago. And now we’d be free. Fucking cretins
No. No. No.
Whether you like it or not, I’m right. We need 85% of the country vaxxed. That hasn’t happened because we’ve let refuseniks like Dura Ace live normally.
Now we approach another lockdown, a much greater imposition on our liberty - and economy - and mental health - than a bloody online certificate of vaccination
We’re really not approaching another lockdown. Chill.
The news - everywhere - suggests otherwise. This looks very much like another belated panicky handbrake turn by Boris
I hope half term slows the growth and I’m proven wrong.
They should bring in vaxports anyway. Everywhere else is doing it, so it will be the only way of ever travelling
You're forgetting that @Cookie was on here yesterday 'proving' that we passed the peak earlier this week.
The goalposts have been shifted again and again by these people.
First it was that vaccines would be the way out, if we got the elderly done we'd be free and cases would fall through the floor and so would deaths. Didn't happen.
Then it was get most of us vaccinated. Deaths and cases would disappear and we could live with COVID forever. Didn't happen.
Every time we have not acted early, we have been worse off. So let's for once act early and do something.
Vaccines were the way out. Deaths did go through the floor. It did happen.
Most us did get vaccinated. Deaths disappeared even more and we can live with Covid forever. Did happen.
What exactly in that has not happened? We are living with Covid. Some people are just whiny bitches. Diseases, illnesses and death exist in the real world, this is what "learning to live with it" means. Stop whinging and get on with it.
FWIW my view is we are into the endemic phase or near enough. Some bumps coming as we adjust to seasonal upswing in a virus that will be with us for a very long time now.
It is going to take one hell of a lot of evidence to persuade me now that we need to lockdown and close schools yet again give the vax levels we have.
Frankly, I think it would border on criminal to do again for so little reason.
Firstly, always check how much of an announcement is new money. HMT worked out long ago to turn their own return on investment logic to public communications – why only get one good news story out of some money when you can re-announce it again and again? The problem is, of course, if it’s not new it won’t actually make anything better on the ground – which might be important to you if you live anywhere outside SW1.
"Only about £1.5bn of what the Treasury is styling a “local transport revolution” appears to be new money, with £4.2bn having been previously announced in 2019 for cities, and the bus funding coming from a £3bn fund promised by Boris Johnson last year."
A previous government already gave Fujitsu billions to digitise the NHS. IIRC the project ended up in court...
Such a typical negative comment
What's the betting it was the NHS and the civil servants who messed up the contract rather than the company?
Fujitsu and BT should share the blame - no one comes out of that scheme well.
It should be easier now though as technology has moved on and lessons should have been learnt
If the requirements hadn't been a moving target it might have gone better...
There were a few too many cooks on both the implementation and the NHS side.
One of the problems was that it was an attempt at a vast, waterfall project. Which could only work if the requirements were utterly frozen.
In the real world things change. This is why other project management methodologies embrace change, rather than treating it as evil.
Think small steps, lots of them. A eco system of small pieces, evolving forwards from basic functionality....
The original contractuality was certainly of a waterfall era. I think the ultimate tally was that NPfIT delivered around 25% of the functionality for around 50% of the cost - I think around 6-7 bn of the planned 12 bn was ultimately spent over the 10 years or so of its core life (though the final delivery, the hospital patient admin system for Hull iirc, actually was delivered as late as around 2018-9, over 5 years after Hunt declared it over). So, the cost was around 6-700m per year over the period.
And some things went better than others:
- The central Spine databases delivered a base functionality from very early, but didn't get as much richness as was planned. Still, it exists in successor contracts to this day and underpins a hell of a lot from the 'what the hell data are we looking at here and can we trust it?' that became mid-Staffs and many others (and under another politician might have remained suppressed for far longer, Burnham ultimately a good number of the right things) to e-prescribing and much more. - GP and ambulance systems never got off the ground and were mostly dumped early. - The specced out requirements for separate, very expensive, networking seemed over the top and clunky even for a health systems requirement, and a lot more use could have been made of off the shelf network provider interconnection for many of the needs.
- Hospital systems got bogged down in a lot of customisation requirements, often of dubious necessity, plus data ingestion variability. The dual approach that eventually came about was fascinating (a) adapt existing commercial US system predicated on charging the asses off of people to the NHS (South) vs (b) Develop a new NHS friendly PAS from scratch (North)
It was hare and tortoise stuff. (a) rolled out faster and went fairly well in a decent number of hospitals but was badly, badly fraught in others. The underpinning product was clunky, with dated menu based systems, and I understand a carer trying to maintain good connection with a patient whilst navigate the menus was hard work (one should note in the post 2010 political world the software vendor was able to supply hospital systems independently and had a similar record of triumph and disaster) (b) ran in pilot on one maternity ward for bloody years. When a maternity scandal broke in that trust, it probably wasn't a surprise, that must've been the most analysed NHS data in the history by a nation by a light year. But eventually progress was made and a whole wodge of the systems were ordered by hospitals in the dying days of the program, to be delivered years later in some cases.
The use of waterfall was laughable - even from the start.
A very eminent Canadian project management expert asked me at a conference to explain why it was being run like that - as the Brit in the room. Since, as he said, no project of even vaguely like that size had ever succeeded.
My answer was to relate the conversation I'd had with a high-flying Civil Servant. Who had explained to me that Waterfall was the Approved Method, and anything else was Heresy. His reaction when I explained other concepts was almost comical.....
Yes, blind rigidity of approach and lack of understanding is the true enemy. On the NHS, I think what I am driving at is that there were wins and you throw good people at something you will get a degree of output despite everything.
I've held the baby in more recent years on an Agile project where the understand of Agile was 'don't plan or document anything to any degree'. That sort of willful misunderstanding is a massive pain in the arse too. It really isn't a binary choice this stuff.
A previous government already gave Fujitsu billions to digitise the NHS. IIRC the project ended up in court...
Such a typical negative comment
What's the betting it was the NHS and the civil servants who messed up the contract rather than the company?
Fujitsu and BT should share the blame - no one comes out of that scheme well.
It should be easier now though as technology has moved on and lessons should have been learnt
If the requirements hadn't been a moving target it might have gone better...
There were a few too many cooks on both the implementation and the NHS side.
One of the problems was that it was an attempt at a vast, waterfall project. Which could only work if the requirements were utterly frozen.
In the real world things change. This is why other project management methodologies embrace change, rather than treating it as evil.
Think small steps, lots of them. A eco system of small pieces, evolving forwards from basic functionality....
The original contractuality was certainly of a waterfall era. I think the ultimate tally was that NPfIT delivered around 25% of the functionality for around 50% of the cost - I think around 6-7 bn of the planned 12 bn was ultimately spent over the 10 years or so of its core life (though the final delivery, the hospital patient admin system for Hull iirc, actually was delivered as late as around 2018-9, over 5 years after Hunt declared it over). So, the cost was around 6-700m per year over the period.
And some things went better than others:
- The central Spine databases delivered a base functionality from very early, but didn't get as much richness as was planned. Still, it exists in successor contracts to this day and underpins a hell of a lot from the 'what the hell data are we looking at here and can we trust it?' that became mid-Staffs and many others (and under another politician might have remained suppressed for far longer, Burnham ultimately a good number of the right things) to e-prescribing and much more. - GP and ambulance systems never got off the ground and were mostly dumped early. - The specced out requirements for separate, very expensive, networking seemed over the top and clunky even for a health systems requirement, and a lot more use could have been made of off the shelf network provider interconnection for many of the needs.
- Hospital systems got bogged down in a lot of customisation requirements, often of dubious necessity, plus data ingestion variability. The dual approach that eventually came about was fascinating (a) adapt existing commercial US system predicated on charging the asses off of people to the NHS (South) vs (b) Develop a new NHS friendly PAS from scratch (North)
It was hare and tortoise stuff. (a) rolled out faster and went fairly well in a decent number of hospitals but was badly, badly fraught in others. The underpinning product was clunky, with dated menu based systems, and I understand a carer trying to maintain good connection with a patient whilst navigate the menus was hard work (one should note in the post 2010 political world the software vendor was able to supply hospital systems independently and had a similar record of triumph and disaster) (b) ran in pilot on one maternity ward for bloody years. When a maternity scandal broke in that trust, it probably wasn't a surprise, that must've been the most analysed NHS data in the history by a nation by a light year. But eventually progress was made and a whole wodge of the systems were ordered by hospitals in the dying days of the program, to be delivered years later in some cases.
Interesting post. Many thanks. You sound like you know a great deal about this?
I have some direct experience, but at a coal face level. Tbh, a lot of the wider context comes from following industry websites like EHealth Insider, latterly Digital Health for years.
A previous government already gave Fujitsu billions to digitise the NHS. IIRC the project ended up in court...
Such a typical negative comment
What's the betting it was the NHS and the civil servants who messed up the contract rather than the company?
Fujitsu and BT should share the blame - no one comes out of that scheme well.
It should be easier now though as technology has moved on and lessons should have been learnt
If the requirements hadn't been a moving target it might have gone better...
There were a few too many cooks on both the implementation and the NHS side.
One of the problems was that it was an attempt at a vast, waterfall project. Which could only work if the requirements were utterly frozen.
In the real world things change. This is why other project management methodologies embrace change, rather than treating it as evil.
Think small steps, lots of them. A eco system of small pieces, evolving forwards from basic functionality....
The original contractuality was certainly of a waterfall era. I think the ultimate tally was that NPfIT delivered around 25% of the functionality for around 50% of the cost - I think around 6-7 bn of the planned 12 bn was ultimately spent over the 10 years or so of its core life (though the final delivery, the hospital patient admin system for Hull iirc, actually was delivered as late as around 2018-9, over 5 years after Hunt declared it over). So, the cost was around 6-700m per year over the period.
And some things went better than others:
- The central Spine databases delivered a base functionality from very early, but didn't get as much richness as was planned. Still, it exists in successor contracts to this day and underpins a hell of a lot from the 'what the hell data are we looking at here and can we trust it?' that became mid-Staffs and many others (and under another politician might have remained suppressed for far longer, Burnham ultimately a good number of the right things) to e-prescribing and much more. - GP and ambulance systems never got off the ground and were mostly dumped early. - The specced out requirements for separate, very expensive, networking seemed over the top and clunky even for a health systems requirement, and a lot more use could have been made of off the shelf network provider interconnection for many of the needs.
- Hospital systems got bogged down in a lot of customisation requirements, often of dubious necessity, plus data ingestion variability. The dual approach that eventually came about was fascinating (a) adapt existing commercial US system predicated on charging the asses off of people to the NHS (South) vs (b) Develop a new NHS friendly PAS from scratch (North)
It was hare and tortoise stuff. (a) rolled out faster and went fairly well in a decent number of hospitals but was badly, badly fraught in others. The underpinning product was clunky, with dated menu based systems, and I understand a carer trying to maintain good connection with a patient whilst navigate the menus was hard work (one should note in the post 2010 political world the software vendor was able to supply hospital systems independently and had a similar record of triumph and disaster) (b) ran in pilot on one maternity ward for bloody years. When a maternity scandal broke in that trust, it probably wasn't a surprise, that must've been the most analysed NHS data in the history by a nation by a light year. But eventually progress was made and a whole wodge of the systems were ordered by hospitals in the dying days of the program, to be delivered years later in some cases.
The use of waterfall was laughable - even from the start.
A very eminent Canadian project management expert asked me at a conference to explain why it was being run like that - as the Brit in the room. Since, as he said, no project of even vaguely like that size had ever succeeded.
My answer was to relate the conversation I'd had with a high-flying Civil Servant. Who had explained to me that Waterfall was the Approved Method, and anything else was Heresy. His reaction when I explained other concepts was almost comical.....
Yes, blind rigidity of approach and lack of understanding is the true enemy. On the NHS, I think what I am driving at is that there were wins and you throw good people at something you will get a degree of output despite everything.
I've held the baby in more recent years on an Agile project where the understand of Agile was 'don't plan or document anything to any degree'. That sort of willful misunderstanding is a massive pain in the arse too. It really isn't a binary choice this stuff.
That isn't Agile. Any more than burning the warehouse down is implementing JIT....
The wins started when the project was broken in smaller pieces and flexibility in what was delivered and the requirements was bought in. Almost like.....
Real Agile is about some simple truths
1) At the start of the project, the end is a distant blur. 2) Get something working. Then make it better. 3) Things change. *Enjoy* this.
Absurd. It is very clearly political comment targeted at an unpleasant regime.
Welcome to a fun feature of "offended" culture. Using it to suppress protests against unpleasant regimes.
The Chinese do a lot of this, in some countries.
I’ve always been deeply uncomfortable with the idea of criminalising offending people. That the police would even consider such a complaint as this makes me more than uncomfortable. It is extremely clear that this is straightforward political speech.
Watched Dune tonight in the cinema. Don't think I've enjoyed a film as much in the cinema since the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The cinematography, score and Villeneuve's understanding of the source material just make it a mesmerising experience. If we don't get a sequel because streaming undercuts the Box Office, WB really are morons.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has ordered that the ambassadors from 10 countries be declared persona non grata after they called for the release of a jailed philanthropist https://twitter.com/nytimesworld/status/1451983634773184520
How has the government so comprehensively fucked this up. They should have introduced vaxports ten weeks ago. And now we’d be free. Fucking cretins
No. No. No.
Whether you like it or not, I’m right. We need 85% of the country vaxxed. That hasn’t happened because we’ve let refuseniks like Dura Ace live normally.
Now we approach another lockdown, a much greater imposition on our liberty - and economy - and mental health - than a bloody online certificate of vaccination
We’re really not approaching another lockdown. Chill.
The news - everywhere - suggests otherwise. This looks very much like another belated panicky handbrake turn by Boris
I hope half term slows the growth and I’m proven wrong.
They should bring in vaxports anyway. Everywhere else is doing it, so it will be the only way of ever travelling
You're forgetting that @Cookie was on here yesterday 'proving' that we passed the peak earlier this week.
The goalposts have been shifted again and again by these people.
First it was that vaccines would be the way out, if we got the elderly done we'd be free and cases would fall through the floor and so would deaths. Didn't happen.
Then it was get most of us vaccinated. Deaths and cases would disappear and we could live with COVID forever. Didn't happen.
Every time we have not acted early, we have been worse off. So let's for once act early and do something.
But it did happen, and we are free.
We're also making good progress on boosters, and with every day that passes, more young people are getting antibodies the natural way.
We may be making good progress on boosters now, but it's been a bit of a shambles hasn't it?
The authorities have had plenty of time to construct a plan to make sure that everybody gets a booster spot on six months after dose two. But they failed; I think I read that so far 4 million out of 7 million eligible had had their boosters. If they'd got this right, we may not be seeing the number of hospitalisations / deaths that we have recently. It's been pretty slack, though I accept that it looks like they're picking up the pace now.
How do you know that the other 3 million want a booster vaccination ?
And if they don't how are you going to make them accept one ?
Because I know numerous people who have had their booster but I nobody who is eligible to have it but is unable.
So why wouldn't they want a booster ?
Perhaps because they've had covid since being vaccinated or perhaps because they don't feel at risk - its the under 50s who are most lagging on the boosters.
How has the government so comprehensively fucked this up. They should have introduced vaxports ten weeks ago. And now we’d be free. Fucking cretins
No. No. No.
Whether you like it or not, I’m right. We need 85% of the country vaxxed. That hasn’t happened because we’ve let refuseniks like Dura Ace live normally.
Now we approach another lockdown, a much greater imposition on our liberty - and economy - and mental health - than a bloody online certificate of vaccination
We’re really not approaching another lockdown. Chill.
The news - everywhere - suggests otherwise. This looks very much like another belated panicky handbrake turn by Boris
I hope half term slows the growth and I’m proven wrong.
They should bring in vaxports anyway. Everywhere else is doing it, so it will be the only way of ever travelling
You're forgetting that @Cookie was on here yesterday 'proving' that we passed the peak earlier this week.
The goalposts have been shifted again and again by these people.
First it was that vaccines would be the way out, if we got the elderly done we'd be free and cases would fall through the floor and so would deaths. Didn't happen.
Then it was get most of us vaccinated. Deaths and cases would disappear and we could live with COVID forever. Didn't happen.
Every time we have not acted early, we have been worse off. So let's for once act early and do something.
But it did happen, and we are free.
We're also making good progress on boosters, and with every day that passes, more young people are getting antibodies the natural way.
Exactly right. People want to lockdown to protect freedom. It's weird. Let's not throw away our progress against COVID by throwing it all away.
Normally smart people are panicking for nothing. Everyone can get a vaccine. 90% of adults have done so, 1 in 9 adults have now had third doses and we're definitely ramping that up. I saw a lot of advertising for it out in London last night that wasn't there last week.
Final point around half of all cases are in under 18s which I'd why the hospitalisation rate to case rate has been steadily dropping. I think we've got a severe case of fear of large numbers wrt cases. That's where this all stems from.
Many people like the idea of restrictions on others.
Some people like the whole concept of lockdown with people only being allowed to leave their home with the government's permission.
Watched Dune tonight in the cinema. Don't think I've enjoyed a film as much in the cinema since the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The cinematography, score and Villeneuve's understanding of the source material just make it a mesmerising experience. If we don't get a sequel because streaming undercuts the Box Office, WB really are morons.
Thanks for the recommendation. I've been meaning to watch the David Lynch version for ages, never got round to it.
Watched Dune tonight in the cinema. Don't think I've enjoyed a film as much in the cinema since the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The cinematography, score and Villeneuve's understanding of the source material just make it a mesmerising experience. If we don't get a sequel because streaming undercuts the Box Office, WB really are morons.
Thanks for the recommendation. I've been meaning to watch the David Lynch version for ages, never got round to it.
I second Randall. Great movie. And well worth heading to the cinema for.
Comments
It is going to take one hell of a lot of evidence to persuade me now that we need to lockdown and close schools yet again give the vax levels we have.
Frankly, I think it would border on criminal to do again for so little reason.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/oct/23/english-cities-transport-budget-greater-manchester-west-midlands
I've held the baby in more recent years on an Agile project where the understand of Agile was 'don't plan or document anything to any degree'. That sort of willful misunderstanding is a massive pain in the arse too. It really isn't a binary choice this stuff.
The wins started when the project was broken in smaller pieces and flexibility in what was delivered and the requirements was bought in. Almost like.....
Real Agile is about some simple truths
1) At the start of the project, the end is a distant blur.
2) Get something working. Then make it better.
3) Things change. *Enjoy* this.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/oct/23/callum-wilson-is-the-best-natural-finisher-ive-worked-with
Absurd. It is very clearly political comment targeted at an unpleasant regime.
Con 335
Lab 230
LD 7
Green 1
SNP 55
PC 4
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/prediction_main.html
The Chinese do a lot of this, in some countries.
It is extremely clear that this is straightforward political speech.
We are a democracy, not a totalitarian state.
If we don't get a sequel because streaming undercuts the Box Office, WB really are morons.
Missouri governor vows criminal prosecution of reporter who found flaw in state website
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch notified a state agency and held its story while a problem that risked exposing the social security numbers of Missouri teachers was fixed
https://missouriindependent.com/2021/10/14/missouri-governor-vows-criminal-prosecution-of-reporter-who-found-flaw-in-state-website/
https://twitter.com/nytimesworld/status/1451983634773184520
And if they don't how are you going to make them accept one ?
Because I know numerous people who have had their booster but I nobody who is eligible to have it but is unable.
So why wouldn't they want a booster ?
Perhaps because they've had covid since being vaccinated or perhaps because they don't feel at risk - its the under 50s who are most lagging on the boosters.
Some people like the whole concept of lockdown with people only being allowed to leave their home with the government's permission.
So far biggest news out of Climate Pledge Stadium is that our WNBA mega-star Sue Bird is at the game modeling a Kraken jersey.