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Starmer leads Johnson by 13% as “most capable PM” – politicalbetting.com

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  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    It just doesn't past the sniff test. If it was the case, never mind the pub being shut for Christmas, we would be in a Chinese style lockdown.

    It also doesn't go with Tim Spector claim of 4k omicron cases a day in London and in London it is much more prevalent than else where, and total 86k cases a day via zoe app.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    There's a major difference between 200k cases per day and 200k active cases.

    Considering active cases are normally ~10x daily cases, 200k per day would be 20k daily cases which is quite plausible.
    They've been offered several chances to convert to a sensible interpretation and keep wanting to double down on the insane one.
  • boulay said:

    MattW said:

    MattW said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    Its pathetic middle-aged attention seeking....look at me I'm a rebel I am....
    Rather ageist.

    How is "middle aged attention seeking" different from the generation snowflake aka millenial or old codger variety?
    “Generation snowflake” is nearly middle-aged.
    So are Millenials. The cap fits :smile:

    Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years,

    Happy to add in Gen Z, if you wish.
    I’m very concerned that after Gen Z uses up all our alphabet we are going to have to refer to future generations by Greek letters which will traumatise certain cohorts by being linked to Covid strains. Roman numerals are out as it will associate them with the rapacious slave owning Romans, what are we going to do?! Perhaps our future Chinese overlords will give them a Chinese character?
    Ogham script. :)
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
  • See this Twitter thread.

    Well blow me down. I genuinely didn't think this could be right, given 1,500-odd confirmed cases today. But I'm assured repeatedly that it is.

    Omicron Covid variant is already infecting 200,000 people every *DAY* in the UK, as of today, UKHSA believes.


    https://twitter.com/danbloom1/status/1470485901520293894
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,572

    boulay said:

    MattW said:

    MattW said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    Its pathetic middle-aged attention seeking....look at me I'm a rebel I am....
    Rather ageist.

    How is "middle aged attention seeking" different from the generation snowflake aka millenial or old codger variety?
    “Generation snowflake” is nearly middle-aged.
    So are Millenials. The cap fits :smile:

    Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years,

    Happy to add in Gen Z, if you wish.
    I’m very concerned that after Gen Z uses up all our alphabet we are going to have to refer to future generations by Greek letters which will traumatise certain cohorts by being linked to Covid strains. Roman numerals are out as it will associate them with the rapacious slave owning Romans, what are we going to do?! Perhaps our future Chinese overlords will give them a Chinese character?
    Ogham script. :)
    Cup and ring marks :)
  • maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    I was also briefly given that clarification, but was later told that the clarification was incorrect, and that it was in fact 200k new infections per day not 200k people 'are currently infected'.

    https://twitter.com/danbloom1/status/1470485901520293894
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,148
    edited December 2021
    boulay said:

    MattW said:

    MattW said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    Its pathetic middle-aged attention seeking....look at me I'm a rebel I am....
    Rather ageist.

    How is "middle aged attention seeking" different from the generation snowflake aka millenial or old codger variety?
    “Generation snowflake” is nearly middle-aged.
    So are Millenials. The cap fits :smile:

    Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years,

    Happy to add in Gen Z, if you wish.
    I’m very concerned that after Gen Z uses up all our alphabet we are going to have to refer to future generations by Greek letters which will traumatise certain cohorts by being linked to Covid strains. Roman numerals are out as it will associate them with the rapacious slave owning Romans, what are we going to do?! Perhaps our future Chinese overlords will give them a Chinese character?
    You're all too late.

    We are already into Gen Alpha.



    Boris's next offshoot will be Gen Beta, perhaps.
  • MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,188
    boulay said:

    MattW said:

    MattW said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    Its pathetic middle-aged attention seeking....look at me I'm a rebel I am....
    Rather ageist.

    How is "middle aged attention seeking" different from the generation snowflake aka millenial or old codger variety?
    “Generation snowflake” is nearly middle-aged.
    So are Millenials. The cap fits :smile:

    Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years,

    Happy to add in Gen Z, if you wish.
    I’m very concerned that after Gen Z uses up all our alphabet we are going to have to refer to future generations by Greek letters which will traumatise certain cohorts by being linked to Covid strains. Roman numerals are out as it will associate them with the rapacious slave owning Romans, what are we going to do?! Perhaps our future Chinese overlords will give them a Chinese character?
    Gen α

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Alpha

    Which means we get to gen О (Generation omicron) at about AD 2,237
  • maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663

    See this Twitter thread.

    Well blow me down. I genuinely didn't think this could be right, given 1,500-odd confirmed cases today. But I'm assured repeatedly that it is.

    Omicron Covid variant is already infecting 200,000 people every *DAY* in the UK, as of today, UKHSA believes.


    https://twitter.com/danbloom1/status/1470485901520293894

    Someone needs to clarify the clarification clarification.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    It really feels like a bunch of press secretaries with questionable numeracy are following the general order to make everything as scary as possible without realising they're just being ridiculous.
  • MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    This has a feeling of being an Iraqi WMD is 45 minutes away from being used moment.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021
    What a clusterfuck of an omni-shambles.....
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 42,957
    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    TOPPING said:

    Polruan said:



    Boosters per capita

    UK 32.53%
    France 18.04%

    That doesn't look squandered to me.

    Do you think France will finish theirs this month? Do you think France are going to catch up with us any time soon?

    We squandered the advantage in that we should have been doing that kind of rate for the last month at least. If we had done so, and in particular if we'd lowered the interval to 5 or less months as I and many others suggested, we'd be in a far better position now - and that was obvious even without Omicron.
    But to be fair we are going to ay a price for the surge. Our surgery today has announced it is cancelling all but urgent appointments for the foreseeable future so that it can concentrate on boosters. Chances are people will die as a result of this or at least have serious, life threatening conditions delayed in being identified. To say that we should have done this sooner when even now it is not obvious that this is a life threatening strain is simply wrong.
    No, it's exactly the other way round. If we'd done it in a planned way, starting before the winter which is always worse for the NHS, making full use of pharmacies, and taking full advantage of the opportunity of doing boosters at the same time as boosters, we wouldn't be having to do things in a panic now, with the negative consequences which you highlight.
    It was being done in a planned way, it was already available to 30-somethings.
    Err, yes. A badly planned way.
    How was it badly planned? The vulnerable were already done. No other comparable nation even comes close. All despite the JCVIs prevarication.

    You're being petulant.
    Couple of examples - hope they're petulant enough:

    - Despite the JVCI taking a contrarian view against international best practice causing months of delay to the decision to vaccinate 12-15 year-olds, the rollout still wasn't ready to go when finally approved, meaning that only a minority had been vaccinated by October half-term. I'm not sure that "no other comparable" nation has done this as badly, but a lot have done it better. And there's still no plan for the second vaccination in the course for this group, or for vaccination certification for them. Large numbers of infections during the past term could have been reduced, which would have helped to control case numbers in the wider community as well as protecting teenagers from the medical risks of covid and from missing out on education. As the parent of a teenager, this doesn't feel like great planning.

    - From Johnson's last "I need to move the news agenda on" announcement of expanding the availability of boosters to actual implementation was around three weeks even to amend booking criteria to take account of reducing the intra-dose time from 6 months to 5 months then to 3 months. During this period the vaccination booking website said essentially "plans to do the stuff the PM announced are coming soon, check back later". Announcing something which there seems to be no plan to implement and then scrambling to do it doesn't feel like great planning.
    On the first point prevarication over the young lies squarely with the JCVI.
    Did someone elect the JCVI to government. It's the govt's responsibility. They can do what they want. They are advised by scientists and the JCVI but they make the decisions.

    Unless you are saying they are pathetic indecisive idiots.
    It is the government's responsibility ultimately, but its also the government's responsibility to maintain faith in the vaccine system for the long-term. So the JCVIs independence is important to maintain.

    Advisors advise but the JCVI were engaged in almost malfeasance by simply refusing to advise. They were refusing to give the government their advice.

    I believe that ultimately Javid had to hurry them along threatening to change the setup if they refused to put their report in by a deadline. It shouldn't have taken Javid to do that to get them to do their job.
    It's what happens when the government hands over policy decisions to unaccountable "experts". We have no way to vote them out and more often than not it turns out these experts are anything but public policy experts.
    No, it's what happens when the government doesn't ask the experts the right questions, and doesn't scrutinise, understand, and challenge the answers.
    Ever the defender of the "expert" class. I'm sure you would have been part of the 360 economists condemning Mrs Thatcher at the time as well. I don't disagree that the government has been poor at properly questioning them but the advice has been poor all throughout. The star performing expert was a private sector venture capitalist who the public sector briefed against and tried to get pushed out of the role. The academics have been pretty poor overall. There's been a real lack of transparency as well from the academics, I'm still waiting for the underlying code to be uploaded to GitHub for the 25k-75k deaths model that is supposedly driving decision making.

    The government is poor and their advisors have been poor as well. It's the main reason we've had an uneven pandemic strategy over the last two years.
    The government is all over the place with experts.

    Throws off their shackles on the one hand and slavishly follows them on the other.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,802

    See this Twitter thread.

    Well blow me down. I genuinely didn't think this could be right, given 1,500-odd confirmed cases today. But I'm assured repeatedly that it is.

    Omicron Covid variant is already infecting 200,000 people every *DAY* in the UK, as of today, UKHSA believes.


    https://twitter.com/danbloom1/status/1470485901520293894

    Nah, looks like it's 200k currently infected with Omicron, at least that's what the Guardian have from a non-political source which is probably more trustworthy. It also aligns with the ONS estimate and the testing scheme. That's 1m active cases, or about 90k per day, up from about 80k per day last week.
  • MaxPB said:



    An unfavourable comparison to France doesn't make sense though, they're behind us and they've already opened up to all 18+ to drum up demand. One of the reasons we're only going to have the 1m+ days now is that demand has been unrestricted. As the pharmacist said today while she waited for us to leave so she could close up, it's the first time she's ever finished her daily allocation of doses. The surge is about to happen in the UK and I think by the end of the week people will be shocked at the final number of vaccines done. Walk in centres with no restrictions are a game changer for the short term, we've never done it before on this scale either. Usually it's just a few sites or a one major site with publicity. This is basically every vaccination centre running at 100% capacity utilisation.

    I'm sure we're going to get a big increase in numbers now. Let's hope so!
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 4,664
    edited December 2021

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    It still seems too many.

    We aren't running at steady state, so 200,000 cases with a doubling time of two days would imply about 60,000 Omicron cases today (roughly)
  • MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    This has a feeling of being an Iraqi WMD is 45 minutes away from being used moment.
    Its even less believable....
  • What a clusterfuck of an omni-shambles.....

    Omicron-shambles.
  • For how long does the average person have COVID for the purpose of these stats?
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    Agreed.

    But according to TSE source the clarification I posted has been re-clarified back to 200k per day. Makes no sense to me. Must be an error.

    Could it be Javid fucked up and everyone's too scared to tell him?
  • If I was a new entrant to the next Con Leader/Next PM markets I'd be laying Sajid Javid like Boris Johnson lays his mistresses.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 18,355

    boulay said:

    MattW said:

    MattW said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    Its pathetic middle-aged attention seeking....look at me I'm a rebel I am....
    Rather ageist.

    How is "middle aged attention seeking" different from the generation snowflake aka millenial or old codger variety?
    “Generation snowflake” is nearly middle-aged.
    So are Millenials. The cap fits :smile:

    Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ending birth years,

    Happy to add in Gen Z, if you wish.
    I’m very concerned that after Gen Z uses up all our alphabet we are going to have to refer to future generations by Greek letters which will traumatise certain cohorts by being linked to Covid strains. Roman numerals are out as it will associate them with the rapacious slave owning Romans, what are we going to do?! Perhaps our future Chinese overlords will give them a Chinese character?
    Ogham script. :)
    My wedding ring has my wife's name engraved on it in Ogham script.
  • maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    It really feels like a bunch of press secretaries with questionable numeracy are following the general order to make everything as scary as possible without realising they're just being ridiculous.
    Yes innumeracy seems to be the order of the day.

    Journalists have had two years of innumeracy, so we shouldn't be shocked at press secretary's being the same by this point too.

    200k total is the thing that makes sense, the other doesn't pass the sniff test.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670

    ATM I’m scared about what the Scottish Government will announce tomorrow. Particularly as they are a bunch of puritans who think that pubs, and those that use them, are sinful. I hope they don’t copy Norway,

    At the moment pub owners are getting zero support even as their bookings melt away.

    If the government mandates something then their will have to be financial relief.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590

    If I was a new entrant to the next Con Leader/Next PM markets I'd be laying Sajid Javid like Boris Johnson lays his mistresses.

    Total limp non entity of a chancellor. Came in as the new skeptical health secretary and already gone native. What a shame.
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 4,839

    What a clusterfuck of an omni-shambles.....

    Omicron-shambles.
    Well, at least at this rate we'll all have had it before Christmas, so there's no conceivable point in restrictions at Christmas. Nor any time after it.

    The pandemic will be well and truly over in time for Big Ben's bongs. Happy Covid-Free 2022 everyone! :smiley:
  • If I was a new entrant to the next Con Leader/Next PM markets I'd be laying Sajid Javid like Boris Johnson lays his mistresses.

    19/1 - 24/1 the spread at the moment for next CON leader.

    I do think that's a bit short. His campaign last time showed he lacks the support within the party regardless of any present shenanigans.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,213

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    SwatIsaid. So about 1 million in UK have Covid currently if Omi is 20% of the total.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663

    For how long does the average person have COVID for the purpose of these stats?

    300 years according to Javid.
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    Good evening.

    I have been away from PB for a few days while packing.

    Are you going somewhere nice?

    New York, Covid willing.

    Arrive New Year’s Eve. I gloomily half-expect to land on the threshold of another lockdown. The censoriousness of New York seems to be quite different from licentious London.
    They’ve just introduced no entry to office buildings unless double vaxxed
  • PolruanPolruan Posts: 2,083
    Only slightly off-topic, but has anyone else had problems with the NHS Covid pass app today? Mine currently says that it's expired (for the domestic version) and that no records are found (for the travel version). I'm <10 days from a positive PCR test, which I guess could explain it, but expected that to generate a message explicitly stating that I'd recently tested positive or similar, not just to break it. Any other similar experiences?
  • williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 51,625

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    This has a feeling of being an Iraqi WMD is 45 minutes away from being used moment.
    The model shows that we’re 45 minutes away from herd immunity.
  • Sean_FSean_F Posts: 37,348
    edited December 2021
    I think Javid just loves being the Grim Reaper, uttering his message of despair unto our nation.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,213

    See this Twitter thread.

    Well blow me down. I genuinely didn't think this could be right, given 1,500-odd confirmed cases today. But I'm assured repeatedly that it is.

    Omicron Covid variant is already infecting 200,000 people every *DAY* in the UK, as of today, UKHSA believes.


    https://twitter.com/danbloom1/status/1470485901520293894

    Someone needs to clarify the clarification clarification.
    Oh FFS
  • Good job Boris hasn't hired that Crosby hard man, otherwise this would be the scene at the DoH....

    https://twitter.com/Robritchie409/status/1072805738962137089?t=v1AN6HkcxE-7QHERiTgHKw&s=19
  • Stocky said:

    Stocky said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model.

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000.

    If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    If there are that many with Omicron it must be mild if the vast majority of that isn't translating into positive tests.
    Mild....it must be so mild millions of people aren't going to even have a clue they have it over the next week and it will be through the whole population in a couple of weeks.
    Fingers crossed
    If we've got 200,000 new cases a day already, then it has to be mild. We would already have had substantial numbers and it should have started generating hospitalisations. In fact, you'd expect to be seeing at least 2000 a day by next Saturday.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    edited December 2021

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?

    20k Omi and Omi = 20% of total implies 100k per day total which cf 50k +ve tests might represent reality.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,213

    Stocky said:

    Stocky said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model.

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000.

    If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    If there are that many with Omicron it must be mild if the vast majority of that isn't translating into positive tests.
    Mild....it must be so mild millions of people aren't going to even have a clue they have it over the next week and it will be through the whole population in a couple of weeks.
    Fingers crossed
    If we've got 200,000 new cases a day already, then it has to be mild. We would already have had substantial numbers and it should have started generating hospitalisations. In fact, you'd expect to be seeing at least 2000 a day by next Saturday.
    Yes - feeling a bit more positive this evening. Makes a change.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,802

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 4,664

    What a clusterfuck of an omni-shambles.....

    Omicron-shambles.
    Just Omishambles, surely.
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 4,839
    Alistair said:

    ATM I’m scared about what the Scottish Government will announce tomorrow. Particularly as they are a bunch of puritans who think that pubs, and those that use them, are sinful. I hope they don’t copy Norway,

    At the moment pub owners are getting zero support even as their bookings melt away.

    If the government mandates something then their will have to be financial relief.
    The beauty of that, assuming that I've understood the division of devolved and reserved competencies correctly, is that the Scottish Government doesn't need to bother offering support. That's down to Sunak. And if he doesn't ride to the rescue quickly enough then the blame for the consequences can be placed upon the UK Government accordingly.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
    His SPADS though?
  • MaxPB said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
    He did,

    But much worse, he's worked at Deutsche Bank.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,213
    edited December 2021

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    1m new cases a day is obviously absurd,. How thick are they? They don't understand what they are saying.

    I'm reminded of Dom Cumming's assertion that most MPs are so dense they do not even know the probability of flipping a coin heads twice in a row.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    Stocky said:

    Stocky said:

    Stocky said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model.

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000.

    If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    If there are that many with Omicron it must be mild if the vast majority of that isn't translating into positive tests.
    Mild....it must be so mild millions of people aren't going to even have a clue they have it over the next week and it will be through the whole population in a couple of weeks.
    Fingers crossed
    If we've got 200,000 new cases a day already, then it has to be mild. We would already have had substantial numbers and it should have started generating hospitalisations. In fact, you'd expect to be seeing at least 2000 a day by next Saturday.
    Yes - feeling a bit more positive this evening. Makes a change.
    Suspect that's a false positive tbh.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,747

    Leon said:

    Ayahuasca

    Fuckin hell

    Did you shit yourself....
    Did you converse with the elves?
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 78,188
    Interesting fred here

    Everyone is thinking that Omicron should replace delta.

    But what if it doesn't ?

    https://twitter.com/trvrb/status/1470420195567030274
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590
    Stocky said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    1m new cases a day is obviously absurd,. How thick are they? They don't understand what they are saying.

    I'm reminded of Dom Cumming's assertion that most MPs are so dense they do not even know the probability of flipping a coin two heads in a row.
    They can manage 2 heads. It's asking them the odds of flipping the same twice in a row which brings out the idiots.
  • Stocky said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    SwatIsaid. So about 1 million in UK have Covid currently if Omi is 20% of the total.
    Well that confirms it then.

    The ONS estimate is that 1 in 55 in England have Covid currently isn't it? Lets round that to a million.

    20% of that would be 200k.

    So clearly that's what is meant and anyone who is saying otherwise is innumerate and doesn't understand what they're saying.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 38,802
    Polruan said:

    Only slightly off-topic, but has anyone else had problems with the NHS Covid pass app today? Mine currently says that it's expired (for the domestic version) and that no records are found (for the travel version). I'm 10 days from a positive PCR test, which I guess could explain it, but expected that to generate a message explicitly stating that I'd recently tested positive or similar, not just to break it. Any other similar experiences?

    Aren't you vaccinated?
  • PolruanPolruan Posts: 2,083
    maaarsh said:

    Stocky said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    1m new cases a day is obviously absurd,. How thick are they? They don't understand what they are saying.

    I'm reminded of Dom Cumming's assertion that most MPs are so dense they do not even know the probability of flipping a coin two heads in a row.
    They can manage 2 heads. It's asking them the odds of flipping the same twice in a row which brings out the idiots.
    Or particularly the odds of flipping heads again immediately after the last one came up heads.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,747
    Stocky said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    What is the positivity rate at the moment? - is it possible that stacks have it and are getting symptoms - so they are aware - but are testing negative?
    We’re at 5%. Saff is at circa 30%.
  • maaarsh said:

    Stocky said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    1m new cases a day is obviously absurd,. How thick are they? They don't understand what they are saying.

    I'm reminded of Dom Cumming's assertion that most MPs are so dense they do not even know the probability of flipping a coin two heads in a row.
    They can manage 2 heads. It's asking them the odds of flipping the same twice in a row which brings out the idiots.
    But ask them about flipping houses and they're freaking savants.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 10,213

    Stocky said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    SwatIsaid. So about 1 million in UK have Covid currently if Omi is 20% of the total.
    Well that confirms it then.

    The ONS estimate is that 1 in 55 in England have Covid currently isn't it? Lets round that to a million.

    20% of that would be 200k.

    So clearly that's what is meant and anyone who is saying otherwise is innumerate and doesn't understand what they're saying.
    So all we need now is for MPs to point out that Covid is deffo mild now/ vaccines are working and vote against Plan B ????????????
  • Personal Statement

    With respect to Time, this is to notify all PBers and etc., etc., that yours truly is announcing, pronouncing and promulgating (but NOT proroguing) on behalf of me, myself, I and all other appropriate pronouns, that henceforth I am adopting, adapting and imposing REVISED NEWFOUNDLAND NON-STANDARD TIME.

    Which is the legally-observed time wherever I am at that moment (whenever that is) PLUS or MINUS ONE-HALF HOUR whichever suits me best.
  • stodgestodge Posts: 13,874
    MaxPB said:


    Nah, looks like it's 200k currently infected with Omicron, at least that's what the Guardian have from a non-political source which is probably more trustworthy. It also aligns with the ONS estimate and the testing scheme. That's 1m active cases, or about 90k per day, up from about 80k per day last week.

    As always, simple old @stodge is having problems finding his way through the thicket of contradictory information having forgotten the machete of comprehension.

    If you have a million cases of Omicron and 0.5% are serious, that means, according to my shonky maths, 5,000 serious cases. I don't know the capacities of ICUs, the number of ventilators, the amount of oxygen available.

    If you have possibly 10-20 million vulnerable people (those who've not had the booster minus those who will have achieved some immunity via previous infection) then you're looking at between 50 and 100 thousand serious cases.

    Do we have the capacity to deal with a sudden rush of such cases even if, for the overwhelming majority, Omicron is mild? This is where I struggle - it's fortunate it is mild, it's fortunate the booster vaccination provides such a high level of protection but there are so many who seem at risk and this variant seems so powerful in terms of being transmitted.

    I don't know - there's an undercurrent on here saying the Government has vastly over-reacted and no changes need to be made - yet I'm increasingly of the view the current response - a slight tightening of restriction allied with a big push in vaccination - seems to be the most valid.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021
    Pulpstar said:

    Interesting fred here

    Everyone is thinking that Omicron should replace delta.

    But what if it doesn't ?

    https://twitter.com/trvrb/status/1470420195567030274

    We have evidence from other countries now showing it following the same pattern as SA e.g. Denmark, so seems unlikely that SA is unique because of having Beta vs Europe having Delta.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,368

    France did 800,000 boosters on Friday. In the last week they've averaged 600,000 a day. For the second time running, the UK has squandered its early advantage.

    The UK has already boosted the vulnerable and France is playing catchup from a much worse position. For the nth time running, you are making a fallacious argument.
    You are the one making a fallacious point. When did I ever say that France was in a much better position than us?

    I don't know about you, but personally I am capable of understanding four separate points simultaneously:

    1. We started jabbing earlier than France, and started boosting earlier (although of course we needed to start boosting earlier, because our earlier start on the first two jabs meant we were getting into the vaccine effectiveness waning earlier).
    2. However, we squandered much of that advantage, in that we haven't completed the programme before midwinter, when we could have done.
    3. It's now a race against time to get more boosters into arms, made much worse by Omicron.
    4. Currently, France's rate of getting boosters into arms is much higher than ours, showing that it can be done.

    Four whole points. I know it's hard, but if you really, really try you might manage it.
    Point 1 is false. France started earlier than us, as you can see from the stories below or the graph I helpfully provided for you above.

    Sept 1st: France on Wednesday started administering booster shots of COVID-19 vaccine. France is the first big EU country to introduce widespread booster shots

    https://apnews.com/article/europe-health-france-coronavirus-pandemic-coronavirus-vaccine-5c89993c0c81d0e0ae2fa056ad9db0d7

    Sept 16th: COVID-19 booster vaccine campaign begins in England

    https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/covid-19-booster-vaccine-campaign-begins-england-2021-09-16/

    Your remaining points are spurious. We haven't squandered anything but are enjoying the benefits of a higher level of protection among vulnerable people. If it's a race against time, we've already won. France is having to go faster now because they messed up their initial rollout and are now suffering the consequences with a surge in hospitalisations beyond our level last February.

    I know it's hard, but you really, really might try to keep your unthinking Francophilia under control.
    Blimey, you've turned into some kind of Leave EU nutter. It's 'unthinking Francophilia' to point to one international comparison when making a point about the current UK rate of boosting?

    I wasn't even making any point about France particularly. My point was about the UK. But if you want my opinion on how France's vaccination programme has been compared with ours, the answer is that ours has been very much better overall, especially the quick start a year ago, and also in prioritising key groups.

    Or is that unacceptable Francophobia to say that?
    The second most impressive Damascene conversion since St Paul. Boris Johnson of course takes the title after consulting letters A and B in 2016.
  • PolruanPolruan Posts: 2,083
    MaxPB said:

    Polruan said:

    Only slightly off-topic, but has anyone else had problems with the NHS Covid pass app today? Mine currently says that it's expired (for the domestic version) and that no records are found (for the travel version). I'm 10 days from a positive PCR test, which I guess could explain it, but expected that to generate a message explicitly stating that I'd recently tested positive or similar, not just to break it. Any other similar experiences?

    Aren't you vaccinated?
    Three times over, hence the confusion. I wondered if they withdraw certification privileges while you're in the post-PCR isolation period (my isolation ended today because >10 day from onset of symptoms but I'm on something like day 7 from positive PCR test).
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 4,664

    Stocky said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    SwatIsaid. So about 1 million in UK have Covid currently if Omi is 20% of the total.
    Well that confirms it then.

    The ONS estimate is that 1 in 55 in England have Covid currently isn't it? Lets round that to a million.

    20% of that would be 200k.

    So clearly that's what is meant and anyone who is saying otherwise is innumerate and doesn't understand what they're saying.
    As above, if it is 200k total that implies 60k today with the doubling rate as it is, because half the cases would have been in the last two days.

    Did he mean 1m current cases with Omicron 20% of the new ones? That would be much more believable.
  • MaxPB said:

    Polruan said:

    Only slightly off-topic, but has anyone else had problems with the NHS Covid pass app today? Mine currently says that it's expired (for the domestic version) and that no records are found (for the travel version). I'm 10 days from a positive PCR test, which I guess could explain it, but expected that to generate a message explicitly stating that I'd recently tested positive or similar, not just to break it. Any other similar experiences?

    Aren't you vaccinated?
    My Covid pass shows two jabs, yesterday's booster and November's positive PCR, presumably for countries where you can use your "recovered" status. It also let's me download them all to Google Pay which will be a bit more convenient.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,829
    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."
  • https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.

    Schools close on Friday anyway. I have absolutely no worries that they're going to close early, that's simply not happening.

    But if they think of not reopening them in the new year I'd be furious.

    Though we're keeping ours off school for the first week back anyway. Taking them on holiday and I don't feel remotely guilty about it, they've been buggered about with for two years now by this hokey-cokey, they can have a week on holiday instead.
  • GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 21,298
    edited December 2021
    MattW said:

    I have some well-connected and prestigious friends who had lunch with Keir recently.

    They left impressed by his tenacity on the internal clean-up job after Corbyn’s disastrous tenure (apparently something of personal mission given Keir’s family circumstances), but not at all convinced he has yet figured out a vision, let alone one he can sell to middle Britain.

    Oh, and apparently Keir and Sir Ed are in regular contact. The tacit alliance is live and kicking.

    Not wanting to be especially contentious, but what are his plans to finish the clean-up job?

    I’m not enough of a Labour Kremlinologist to adjudge whether it is complete or not, but I do feel that stain of anti-semitism has evaporated.

    Keir’s main internal issue these days must be with Angela Rayner, but my informant assured me she would STFU with Labour’s improving ratings.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021
    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    It makes absolutely no sense....

    200k a day omicron today, it’s doubling every 2-3 days.

    That implies 6.4million infections a day in 10-15 days.

    Excuse me if I think that’s a bit far fetched

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470487518055444490?t=oLRfpiXHsFQ9RuK9VifI9g&s=19

    Think about it logically, even a infection to hospital ratio of 0.1% (it won’t be that low) means 6400 admissions a day, by end of month.

    0.5% 35,000 admissions a day.

    I mean if this model says 200k a day now and that doubling time…..

    Something is wrong.

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470493374704721932?t=udLNkB5iliDSbzbHyCKVyg&s=19
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,368
    ydoethur said:

    HYUFD said:

    Lawrence Fox being as off the wall as ever. Apparently not getting a booster is standing up for human rights

    https://twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1470460573737435147?s=20

    He's a dork. What was Billie Piper thinking?
    Perhaps she didn't realise that being a massive cock is not a guarantee of having a massive cock?
    I teed that up for you and you smashed it straight and true down the middle of the fairway. Good shot Sir!
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590
    stodge said:

    MaxPB said:


    Nah, looks like it's 200k currently infected with Omicron, at least that's what the Guardian have from a non-political source which is probably more trustworthy. It also aligns with the ONS estimate and the testing scheme. That's 1m active cases, or about 90k per day, up from about 80k per day last week.

    As always, simple old @stodge is having problems finding his way through the thicket of contradictory information having forgotten the machete of comprehension.

    If you have a million cases of Omicron and 0.5% are serious, that means, according to my shonky maths, 5,000 serious cases. I don't know the capacities of ICUs, the number of ventilators, the amount of oxygen available.

    If you have possibly 10-20 million vulnerable people (those who've not had the booster minus those who will have achieved some immunity via previous infection) then you're looking at between 50 and 100 thousand serious cases.

    Do we have the capacity to deal with a sudden rush of such cases even if, for the overwhelming majority, Omicron is mild? This is where I struggle - it's fortunate it is mild, it's fortunate the booster vaccination provides such a high level of protection but there are so many who seem at risk and this variant seems so powerful in terms of being transmitted.

    I don't know - there's an undercurrent on here saying the Government has vastly over-reacted and no changes need to be made - yet I'm increasingly of the view the current response - a slight tightening of restriction allied with a big push in vaccination - seems to be the most valid.
    Those with only 2 doses don't have zero protection. Omicron evades antibodies well, but not t-cells. And those with only 2 doses are much more likely to be in demographics with low intrinsic risk anyway. If you gave a million 25 year olds Omicron, you wouldn't get 5000 on ventilators even with no vaccines, and we have loads of vaccines with 95% antibody (and therefore t-cell) coverage.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    MaxPB said:

    Polruan said:

    Only slightly off-topic, but has anyone else had problems with the NHS Covid pass app today? Mine currently says that it's expired (for the domestic version) and that no records are found (for the travel version). I'm 10 days from a positive PCR test, which I guess could explain it, but expected that to generate a message explicitly stating that I'd recently tested positive or similar, not just to break it. Any other similar experiences?

    Aren't you vaccinated?
    Just reminded me to check mine as we're off to see Bill Bailey on Thursday. Worked fine and you can now add it to the Apple Wallet, which is cool.
  • eekeek Posts: 28,368
    edited December 2021

    MaxPB said:



    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
    He did,

    But much worse, he's worked at Deutsche Bank.
    First job after graduation or later on?

    If the former you have to give him the benefit of the doubt depending on how quickly he escaped.
  • Stocky said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Would imply this is all over in about 10 days, and that South Africa should have peaked last week if it goes that quick. Again reality is proving very unruly.
    https://twitter.com/mtp_ms/status/1470484705552355334?s=20

    image
    That's what I guessed. 200k cumulative is world's apart from 200k daily.

    One is believable, the other is not.
    SwatIsaid. So about 1 million in UK have Covid currently if Omi is 20% of the total.
    Well that confirms it then.

    The ONS estimate is that 1 in 55 in England have Covid currently isn't it? Lets round that to a million.

    20% of that would be 200k.

    So clearly that's what is meant and anyone who is saying otherwise is innumerate and doesn't understand what they're saying.
    As above, if it is 200k total that implies 60k today with the doubling rate as it is, because half the cases would have been in the last two days.

    Did he mean 1m current cases with Omicron 20% of the new ones? That would be much more believable.
    Probably. All those numbers are believable.

    Probably taken 20% being Omicron, 1 million total, and got 200k by multiplying 1 million by 20%.

    Anyone who handles numbers needs to understand the importance of the sniff test. 200k daily doesn't get even close to passing it.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.

    Schools close on Friday anyway. I have absolutely no worries that they're going to close early, that's simply not happening.

    But if they think of not reopening them in the new year I'd be furious.

    Though we're keeping ours off school for the first week back anyway. Taking them on holiday and I don't feel remotely guilty about it, they've been buggered about with for two years now by this hokey-cokey, they can have a week on holiday instead.
    I can't imagine the truancy police will be chasing you tbf.
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 4,839
    edited December 2021
    The 200,000 Omicron and 1,000,000 total figures obviously aren't case rates per day - that's crackers - but the 1,000,000 could be derived from the estimated total number of people who had contracted Covid-19 in the week ending 1 December, as per the most recent ONS estimates (published on the 10th.)

    Perhaps Javid, or more likely whoever has prepared these numbers for him, has simply taken the ONS figure and then used a best guess estimate for the proportion of total Covid-19 cases that are presently caused by Omicron? (The ONS bulletin doesn't venture a guess for the week ending 1 Dec, save to say that the total numbers are assumed to have been very small at that time.) Given that the Prime Minister said earlier today that Omicron is about to overtake Delta as the dominant variant in London, an estimate of 20% of cases being Omicron for the country as a whole doesn't seem implausible.

    This is all rather reminiscent of that guessing game that was played when that shit-stirring German hack came up with the 8% efficacy value for the AZ vaccine, isn't it? If I've guessed correctly, is there a prize?
  • Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    Somebody is going to have egg on their face.

    If that's what was meant by the actual statisticians, I'll eat my words.

    Screw up in somebody's understanding there.
  • moonshinemoonshine Posts: 5,747
    eek said:

    MaxPB said:



    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
    He did,

    But much worse, he's worked at Deutsche Bank.
    First job after graduation or later on?

    If the former you have to give him the benefit of the doubt depending on how quickly he escaped.
    He was pretty senior. I know multiple people that worked for him. They weren’t overly complementary on his strategic awareness but he seems a good bloke at heart.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,590
    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I said either Javid or the Guardian were being unbelievably stupid, and I'm happy to confirm it's Javid.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,148
    edited December 2021

    Personal Statement

    With respect to Time, this is to notify all PBers and etc., etc., that yours truly is announcing, pronouncing and promulgating (but NOT proroguing) on behalf of me, myself, I and all other appropriate pronouns, that henceforth I am adopting, adapting and imposing REVISED NEWFOUNDLAND NON-STANDARD TIME.

    Which is the legally-observed time wherever I am at that moment (whenever that is) PLUS or MINUS ONE-HALF HOUR whichever suits me best.

    We need to know your pronouns, in Ancient Newfoundlandian.
  • FairlieredFairliered Posts: 4,931
    Alistair said:

    ATM I’m scared about what the Scottish Government will announce tomorrow. Particularly as they are a bunch of puritans who think that pubs, and those that use them, are sinful. I hope they don’t copy Norway,

    At the moment pub owners are getting zero support even as their bookings melt away.

    If the government mandates something then their will have to be financial relief.
    Unless they view hospitality as expendable - like the oil and gas industry.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021
    We definitely have a winner over the two week firebreak model.....

    Boris' claims over the definitely not a party are more believable than these stats.
  • maaarsh said:

    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I said either Javid or the Guardian were being unbelievably stupid, and I'm happy to confirm it's Javid.
    Or its the UKHSA press secretary who got in touch with the Guardian.

    No way the statisticians meant that. Its bollocks.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 28,368

    What a clusterfuck of an omni-shambles.....

    I haven't seen Starmer's speech yet. Was it that bad?
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,485

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    On those numbers everyone in the whole country would have had omi by Christmas Monday. Or some such.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,829

    maaarsh said:

    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I said either Javid or the Guardian were being unbelievably stupid, and I'm happy to confirm it's Javid.
    Or its the UKHSA press secretary who got in touch with the Guardian.

    No way the statisticians meant that. Its bollocks.
    At least the Graun stepped back and checked.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,991
    edited December 2021

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    On those numbers everyone in the whole country would have had omi by Christmas Monday. Or some such.
    we all be on our 3rd infection......
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I cannot see that entry on their Covid feed. Have they perhaps taken it down?
  • FairlieredFairliered Posts: 4,931

    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    It makes absolutely no sense....

    200k a day omicron today, it’s doubling every 2-3 days.

    That implies 6.4million infections a day in 10-15 days.

    Excuse me if I think that’s a bit far fetched

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470487518055444490?t=oLRfpiXHsFQ9RuK9VifI9g&s=19

    Think about it logically, even a infection to hospital ratio of 0.1% (it won’t be that low) means 6400 admissions a day, by end of month.

    0.5% 35,000 admissions a day.

    I mean if this model says 200k a day now and that doubling time…..

    Something is wrong.

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470493374704721932?t=udLNkB5iliDSbzbHyCKVyg&s=19
    How long before some politician, journalist or member of iSage extrapolates the number of cases until it is greater than the total UK population?
  • eekeek Posts: 28,368

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.

    Schools close on Friday anyway. I have absolutely no worries that they're going to close early, that's simply not happening.

    But if they think of not reopening them in the new year I'd be furious.

    Though we're keeping ours off school for the first week back anyway. Taking them on holiday and I don't feel remotely guilty about it, they've been buggered about with for two years now by this hokey-cokey, they can have a week on holiday instead.
    I can't imagine the truancy police will be chasing you tbf.
    I wouldn't bet on that - from September Covid has been recorded as illness rather than a special case so school attendance figures are in many cases disastrous and some head teachers have reason to fear that the resultant low attendances percentages will be used to justify firing them.
  • Carnyx said:

    maaarsh said:

    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I said either Javid or the Guardian were being unbelievably stupid, and I'm happy to confirm it's Javid.
    Or its the UKHSA press secretary who got in touch with the Guardian.

    No way the statisticians meant that. Its bollocks.
    At least the Graun stepped back and checked.
    Yes credit for them for that.

    The UKHSA or whoever has dropped a bollock here should be ashamed of themselves.

    Its transparently obvious what the real meaning of the stats is. Yes they could mean 200k per day, but far more likely is whoever is 'clarifying' has misunderstood themselves and is clarifying with a misunderstanding.

    Garbage in/garbage out.
  • https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.

    Schools close on Friday anyway. I have absolutely no worries that they're going to close early, that's simply not happening.

    But if they think of not reopening them in the new year I'd be furious.

    Though we're keeping ours off school for the first week back anyway. Taking them on holiday and I don't feel remotely guilty about it, they've been buggered about with for two years now by this hokey-cokey, they can have a week on holiday instead.
    Have you asked for leave or are you just doing it anyway.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 23,148
    eek said:

    MaxPB said:



    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    Could 200,000 be a mistake for 20,000? I mean what's an odd zero to an Oxbridge arts grad, eh? Zero means nothing right?
    Didn't The Saj go to Exeter?
    He did,

    But much worse, he's worked at Deutsche Bank.
    First job after graduation or later on?

    If the former you have to give him the benefit of the doubt depending on how quickly he escaped.
    AGes 32-41. Ended up as an MD. Left in 2009.

    Oooops.

    :smiley:
  • CharlesCharles Posts: 35,758

    A question: what is the status of the Nichtingale Hospitals? Are they all mothballed or returned to other uses?

    If the government was really worried about large numbers of hospitalisations, then I'd expect them to be getting them ready for action - if only in a preliminary manner/

    They have no staff. They never had any staff.
    They were a PR stunt, that's all.
    They were a contingency plan. For the dying. Stick them on a ventilator and sedate them. Minimise staff.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663

    MaxPB said:

    Well....Hugo says he asked, and they said definitely daily new omicron infections....i call bullshit on their model. They actually want us to believe we are running at 1 million new cases of covid per day at the moment. Lets say omicron is 40% rather than 20%, we still have to believe testing is picking up a tiny fraction of covid cases.....

    UKHSA modelling suggests that the number of people who catch the Omicron variant in Britain today is likely to be around 200,000. If this is at all accurate it means the daily confirmed case count will inevitably pass its previous record before Xmas.

    https://twitter.com/HugoGye/status/1470475744673513472?t=T-AHIZWkiOA13As_uz6RAQ&s=19

    I mean if that's the case then we're surely in the clear or all fucked already? 1m cases per day is laughable.
    Tbh it seems like so many of the models we have seen so far, my favourite being a circuit breaker will save anywhere between 600 and 109,000 lives in the next 3 months.....when with no vaccines and it ripped through the population, we hadn't had 50k dearhs in 6 months. The thought two weeks of lockdown could save 100k lives in 12 weeks is so laughable those people shouldn't be anywhere near mathematical modelling for the government.

    Tom Whipple
    @whippletom
    Someone at UKHSA does need to clarify the claim by Javid that there are 200k daily Omicron infections. Given they're also saying it isn't even dominant - ie there are a lot more delta- it implies we might as well pack up now and give up on the NHS...
    Government sources now doubling down on @sajidjavid's 200,000 new Omicron cases a day claim.

    Just to emphasise the implications: The Health Secretary said in his *very next sentence* that this was 20% of UK cases.

    So, they are saying 1m new cases a day.

    Really?
    https://twitter.com/PaulMainwood/status/1470486858014597129?s=20
    On those numbers everyone in the whole country would have had omi by Christmas Monday. Or some such.
    Perhaps each person has it 100 times ;-)
  • Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    It makes absolutely no sense....

    200k a day omicron today, it’s doubling every 2-3 days.

    That implies 6.4million infections a day in 10-15 days.

    Excuse me if I think that’s a bit far fetched

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470487518055444490?t=oLRfpiXHsFQ9RuK9VifI9g&s=19

    Think about it logically, even a infection to hospital ratio of 0.1% (it won’t be that low) means 6400 admissions a day, by end of month.

    0.5% 35,000 admissions a day.

    I mean if this model says 200k a day now and that doubling time…..

    Something is wrong.

    https://twitter.com/ThatRyanChap/status/1470493374704721932?t=udLNkB5iliDSbzbHyCKVyg&s=19
    How long before some politician, journalist or member of iSage extrapolates the number of cases until it is greater than the total UK population?
    Leon will have to have it 5 different times in a day to up the numbers.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,829

    Carnyx said:

    Re those folk being snotty about the Graun earlier - this is what their feed says:

    "55m ago
    19:46
    Late update: The UK Health Security Agency has been in touch to offer final confirmation as to what Sajid Javid meant when he told MPs earlier that “the current number of daily infections are around 200,000”. He did mean that it is estimated that 200,000 people are getting infected with the Omicron variant every day. That is what we thought originally, but we took down the headline on the post (see 4.19am) after it was suggested he meant something else, and it has taken a while to get clarity from officials. A UKHSA spokesperson said Javid was “referring to the number of new infections today [13 December] based on modelling, not the number who are currently infected”. I have amended the wording in the summary as a result."

    I cannot see that entry on their Covid feed. Have they perhaps taken it down?
    No, still there when I refresh. As of 2053. Or 7 minutes before two bells in the evening watch.

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2021/dec/13/uk-covid-live-nhs-appointments-postponed-help-omicron-booster-jabs-boris-johnson-latest-updates
  • https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/dec/13/covid-news-live-boris-johnson-warns-of-omicron-tidal-wave-south-african-president-tests-positive

    Schools in England should not be closing early for Christmas unless they have been told it is “necessary” on public health grounds, the British government has said.

    The Prime Minister’s official spokesman indicated that schools would be kept open unless there is an “absolute public health emergency”, PA reports.


    So, expect schools to close from Wednesday then.

    Schools close on Friday anyway. I have absolutely no worries that they're going to close early, that's simply not happening.

    But if they think of not reopening them in the new year I'd be furious.

    Though we're keeping ours off school for the first week back anyway. Taking them on holiday and I don't feel remotely guilty about it, they've been buggered about with for two years now by this hokey-cokey, they can have a week on holiday instead.
    Have you asked for leave or are you just doing it anyway.
    Just doing it.

    Haven't decided whether I'll tell them this week, or call them on the first day back and leave a voicemail.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 34,663
    Charles said:

    A question: what is the status of the Nichtingale Hospitals? Are they all mothballed or returned to other uses?

    If the government was really worried about large numbers of hospitalisations, then I'd expect them to be getting them ready for action - if only in a preliminary manner/

    They have no staff. They never had any staff.
    They were a PR stunt, that's all.
    They were a contingency plan. For the dying. Stick them on a ventilator and sedate them. Minimise staff.
    Maybe. And tbf in the early days there were bound to be some blind alleys. So I take it back.
  • stodgestodge Posts: 13,874
    maaarsh said:


    Those with only 2 doses don't have zero protection. Omicron evades antibodies well, but not t-cells. And those with only 2 doses are much more likely to be in demographics with low intrinsic risk anyway. If you gave a million 25 year olds Omicron, you wouldn't get 5000 on ventilators even with no vaccines, and we have loads of vaccines with 95% antibody (and therefore t-cell) coverage.

    Unfortunately, we have an unknown number of figure with no vaccine protection at all. Some of these might have achieved immunity via infection while others might have simply been able to evade earlier versions of the virus but might not be so lucky with Omicron.

    Some of these unvaccinated people are going to contract Omicron and while, as we've said, for the vast majority, it's mild for the older unvaccinated it's a real risk. Again, do we have any sense of the numbers?

    We know there are older unvaccinated people - shouldn't we be focusing all our efforts on getting this group to have one vaccine rather than piling up boosters for those who, by your definition, are statistically unlikely to have a problem with Omicron?

    The cynic might argue it looks good for the Government to boast high booster vaccination numbers but shouldn't the effort be getting into some communities where anti-vaccination rhetoric has taken root and challenge that and get those who have so far eschewed the vaccination to take it?

This discussion has been closed.