Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

A big day for the LDs and the PM – politicalbetting.com

1234568

Comments

  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    Sandpit said:

    Mortimer said:

    Pippa Crerar
    @PippaCrerar
    ·
    36m
    Important. Whitty warns further restrictions may be needed dependent on data due between Xmas/NY.

    ===

    As I have posted before, it's lockdown on 3rd Jan. Brace.

    What's the point? Supposedly with its doubling rate we'll have all had it by Christmas Day.

    So what's the point in locking down in January, once we've all had it? And if we haven't all had it, then clearly its not doubling as claimed.
    We are already in a de facto lockdown as people's behaviour reacts to Whitty and his colleagues
    You may be. But I can still:

    1) run my business
    2) see friends
    3) have a pint

    You see the difference? Restrictions aren't necessary.
    Of course you can but you may soon be on your own
    "So what's the point in locking down in January, once we've all had it?"

    They'll still lockdown even though we are past the peak of cases.
    There is no need for a formal lockdown, public behaviour will effectively create it anyway
    Which is what @rcs1000 has long argued.

    The businesses affected, mostly in hospitality and entertainment, really don’t like that situation though. Many of them would rather be ordered closed by government, as government would then be obliged to support them financially.
    It’s true - what Big G is proposing does hang the businesses ordering stock, opening their doors, out to dry (I won’t use the Boris bad language version of same thing)
  • TazTaz Posts: 10,704
    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    I am actually under the weather, just thought it was a cold.

    Coughing and feeling unwell in general, not the worst thing I've had

    Sounds like Omicron. Have you ordered a PCR test? Unless you've got a car the testing centres around London are a mission to get to.
    Love this - thought it was just a cold, not the worst you've had? Sounds like Omicron!
    It is amazing the powers of diagnosis some people possess. Without even a face to face meeting or a triage.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    eek said:

    Sandpit said:

    kinabalu said:

    Nigelb said:

    Sandpit said:

    F1: Mercedes drop their appeal of the rejection of their protest, a few hours before the FIA Gala.

    https://twitter.com/MercedesAMGF1/status/1471419870680125441

    Sounds like some sort of deal done behind the scenes again, really not good for the sport.

    No, I think they had little option but to take the high road.
    Carrying on with the action would have been a disaster for them, win or lose.
    Definitely. It would have looked OTT and any 'win' wouldn't have been. They played it spot on. Consensus that it was unfair is established. Sport is littered with such. It's a perverse part of the attraction in a sense. F1 21 will be talked about for years.
    In 30 or 40 years’ time, I’ll be able to tell my young grandkids that I was there, on that fateful evening in Abu Dhabi… ;)
    The day Lewis was robbed of the championship and then gracefully retired.

    Toto Wolff seems to be dropping hints that Lewis will not be returning next season.
    Hamilton was knighted this week, which seems a bit premature if he plans to drive next year. But why should Mercedes drop him? Maybe the year after if young George is up to snuff.
    It's not Mercedes dropping him, the question is more will Lewis retire - which he may do if the car isn't good enough or because he wants to spend more time doing other things.

    Equally it could just be Mercedes applying pressure to F1 - think what the sport may look like in Lewis isn't there,
  • Mr. JohnL, I agree with the general principle a sportsman should only be knighted after he's retired but given both Andy Murray and Chris Hoy got knighted while still active I fear that the precedent has been set.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    edited December 2021
    MaxPB said:

    maaarsh said:

    Presume we've already covered the fact that the 1 death that 'put paid to the idea this was a milder variant' was a 70something anti-vaxxer.

    Not many tears being shed for him in my house.

    Where did you see that?
    See Carlotta's post for link.

    Given they've only managed to find 15 omicron hospital patients so far, wouldn't be surprised if he had a bit of delta as well, but who really cares if he didn't take basic steps to protect himself.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    Sandpit said:

    Mortimer said:

    Pippa Crerar
    @PippaCrerar
    ·
    36m
    Important. Whitty warns further restrictions may be needed dependent on data due between Xmas/NY.

    ===

    As I have posted before, it's lockdown on 3rd Jan. Brace.

    What's the point? Supposedly with its doubling rate we'll have all had it by Christmas Day.

    So what's the point in locking down in January, once we've all had it? And if we haven't all had it, then clearly its not doubling as claimed.
    We are already in a de facto lockdown as people's behaviour reacts to Whitty and his colleagues
    You may be. But I can still:

    1) run my business
    2) see friends
    3) have a pint

    You see the difference? Restrictions aren't necessary.
    Of course you can but you may soon be on your own
    "So what's the point in locking down in January, once we've all had it?"

    They'll still lockdown even though we are past the peak of cases.
    There is no need for a formal lockdown, public behaviour will effectively create it anyway
    Which is what @rcs1000 has long argued.

    The businesses affected, mostly in hospitality and entertainment, really don’t like that situation though. Many of them would rather be ordered closed by government, as government would then be obliged to support them financially.
    That's the issue - when ordered to close hospitality / entertainment receive Government money to cover their costs.

    No Government order and it's just survival of those who have enough money to keep on going.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,263



    If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    Didn't see that and I agree he goes OTT too (he's an LD, innit :)). But attributing barmy views to people is marginally less bad than calling them names.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    maaarsh said:

    Never wanted a Lib Dem gain before. I feel dirty.

    Think how dirrrrrty Big John Knows is now, he prefers Boris over Starmer these days.

    Why would Labour take Big John back?
  • HYUFD said:

    Bank of England increases interest rates from 0.1% to 0.25% in face of rising inflation

    https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1471451021327179776?s=20

    But why? First of all, .25% is hardly likely to turn spenders into savers. Secondly, this is not classic inflation but is largely driven by Covid disrupting supply chains and fuel prices going through the roof. Thirdly, there is risk of skewering economic recovery.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,772
    edited December 2021
    Pulpstar said:

    maaarsh said:

    I've just tested positive so that's Christmas probably fucked

    Don't worry, once every one in the country has it on the 24th we can then end quaranteen as a pointless load of bollocks.
    One of my daughters had to train somebody who had a negative LFT. After a few days the trainee had another test and showed positive. At this point she admitted that initially she had had TWO tests, one positive, one negative and decided that the negative one was right.

    So now my daughter's Xmas may well be stuffed thanks to this thoughtless moron...
    The Gov't need to REALLY REALLY emphasise that if you get a positive LFT - even if you have other negative ones that you really really will be positive.
    The "accuracy" of LFTs is all about false negatives.
    That was my understanding as well and I sought and obtained the adjournment of a jury trial on that basis. There is a non minimal chance that a negative result is wrong, especially if self administered, but there is almost no chance that a positive test is wrong.
  • darkagedarkage Posts: 4,746
    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Very strong rebuke from Chris Whitty to people who say Covid lockdowns have somehow set back cancer or other care - common trope in right-wing press. Whitty says they have "no understanding of health", and that the claim is a "complete inversion of reality". https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1471437931118219264/photo/1

    Did Whitty really say common trope in right wing press ?
    Sorry but Whitty is talking bollocks. The official figures from the NHS show that waiting times for cancer diagnosis and treatment have increased massively, as have treatments for just about everything else - a lot of it due to people being unable to see their GPs during lockdowns.

    I have a lot of time for Whitty generally but on this he is clearly losing the plot.
    Because of the pandemic. Not because of lockdowns.
    Lockdowns -> less COVID pressure -> more NHS capacity -> more ability to treat cancer/other care.
    Wrong. Social distancing -> Less NHS capacity -> Less ability to treat cancer/other care.

    Had there been no lockdown, there'd have been less capacity reductions, more deaths, and the NHS would now be running at full capacity and with less demand as there's zero demand from the dead.
    Go back and reread your posts from when Boris introduced the lockdowns, if I remember rightly you understood then that the purpose was to protect NHS capacity & save lives.
    And I was wrong to accept that. Mea culpa, I made a mistake.

    I believed it when it was claimed that this would be for weeks or months, not years. Had I known it would be for years I would have said no and we should have adopted the Swedish model.

    I apologise for my mistake then. @contrarian was right and I was wrong.

    If I knew then what I know now I would never have supported it. If I had a TARDIS and were to be PM in March 2020 then I would have say no lockdown, no disruption to education, no measures to "protect the NHS". None of it. It was a mistake and it wasn't worth it.

    Had this ended when we'd done vaccines then fair enough, but it didn't. It was a horrible mistake we'll be paying with for generations to come. We should have let the virus run its course naturally and let anyone who is afraid of it hide away.
    Fair enough - you've changed your view. But you're speaking from frustration rather than logic I think.

    The lockdowns saved tens of thousands of lives, and massively reduced the pressures on the NHS compared to otherwise.
    My position on all this is as follows. Do I want to agree to the end of liberty and a biosurveillance state to control a virus with a less than 1% fatality rate? No I don't. But the public overwhelmingly do, so I reluctantly go along with it.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,257

    Selebian said:

    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Very strong rebuke from Chris Whitty to people who say Covid lockdowns have somehow set back cancer or other care - common trope in right-wing press. Whitty says they have "no understanding of health", and that the claim is a "complete inversion of reality". https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1471437931118219264/photo/1

    Did Whitty really say common trope in right wing press ?
    I think that he is losing patience.
    So - why are there documented cases of people who missed early cancer diagnosis who have died who probably shouldn't have?

    Unless he is arguing some technical point that it wasn't the actual lockdown it was people's reluctance to come forward even though the GP was available and so was the hospital?

    I suspect that he was looking at stats like this: https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/totalcancerdeathsintheukin2019and2020

    There is no evidence at all that more people are dying of cancer yet. Its a bit like the statistics we were discussing yesterday that showed that all of the isolation and depression of lockdown seems to have reduced suicides, not increased them.
    I do wonder whether Covid will have directly averted some cancer deaths in the sense of getting there first. The link seems to be underlying cause. If you have terminal (or uncertain prognosis) cancer but with some time to live, but die from an acute infection of Covid then Covid will go down as the underlying cause I would have thought. For cancer to be underlying cause there would have to be a more direct link (say you're immuno-compromised and die from an infection that would not normally be serious, but I'm not sure that would be applied for Covid).

    Edit: still no evidene of increased cancer deaths, of course. But some of those could take some time to show up if e.g. missed screening/opportunities to diagnose. Cancer can take some time, particularly if there is some treatment, even a bit late (e.g. surgical removal of the primary but it turns out to have spread)
    Just a moment's search found that in April 2019 200,000 people were referred to a consultant with a suspected cancer. In April 2020 that was less than 80,000. So there are 120,000 people in one month who should have been seen by a specialist to check if they had cancer but were not. The idea this is not adversely affecting outcomes is ludicrous.
    Yes, I agree. The age profile would be interesting. It is possible that some of those missing referrals are for people killed by Covid instead (i.e. before they got the symptoms that led to referral) but on any back of the envelope calculation that can only account for a smallish minority. There must be tens of thousands who simply didn't get to the doctor, put it off, or were missed due to phone rather than in person appointments. Another interesting thing would be the outcome of those referrals - if the share of referrals resulting in a cancer diagnosis has gone up then it may be that although fewer were referred, they were better selected. However, I do fear that won't turn out to be the case.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,184
    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,458

    Nigelb said:

    I've just tested positive so that's Christmas probably fucked

    Is there anybody in London who doesn't have covid at the moment? Seems like every London based PBer has it.
    The anecdotage over the last month does suggest a considerably higher rate of infection than anything previously on PB.
    I think its becoming pretty clear double jabbed isn't now offering much protection from infection.
    But lots of people are experiencing pretty mild symptoms. So thats a good thing.
    Exactly. However the other day I was ridiculed for suggesting that the vaccine certificate for entry to events was pointless now. No it is worse than pointless as it creates spreading events. Just typical that it was a good idea when the Govt didn't mandate it and they do mandate it now when it isn't working.
  • Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed
  • TazTaz Posts: 10,704



    If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    Didn't see that and I agree he goes OTT too (he's an LD, innit :)). But attributing barmy views to people is marginally less bad than calling them names.
    I thought he was now supporting the SNP as of the last week or so.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,587

    Cookie said:

    kinabalu said:

    Anecdote:

    One of our London offices held a staff Christmas party on Friday. Looks like it was a super spreader event.

    Every event is now a superspreader event, especially in London, unless one is very lucky.

    And yet the remaining few pray-the-pox-away advocates insist there should not only be no advice for people to Be Careful but all these events should happen regardless.
    Of course they should!

    Don't pray the pox away. Accept it, embrace it. Its here, its endemic, get your vaccine and take your chances.
    So people who are ill with Covid should go out and party. Or people who's immediate family or colleagues are ill.

    Riiiiight.
    If they want to, if they'd party with a cold or cough, why not?

    We're all getting it anyway.
    You seem to have totally gone, Philip. Not a man to have alongside in the trenches. No longer picturing you as Christian Bale. What I'm seeing now is a chicken minus its head.
    I think Philips's been pretty consistent that lockdowns do more harm than good. This isn't him losing his head, this is him reiterating the same point more and more insistently.
    To use the trenches analogy, he's in favour of leaving the trench despite the presence of enemy fire because the trench is filling with acid. He's simply taking a different view to you about which of two not particularly attractive options is the wrong one.

    Instinctively I agree with him. I have to be careful, because emotionally it's the answer I want - I have kids who will be hurt by lockdowns and no-one in my family is in ill-health - am I deciding on the answer I want and then selecting the arguments to justify it? (Everyone does this to some extent). And I am also in danger on settling on this position because I have previously been against lockdown - am I simply placing too great a premium on consistency? Again, everyone does this to some extent.
    But thinking it through, I think I am in still in Philip's boat. To me, the main argument in favour of NPIs at the moment is the danger that we all get it at once, which would be, er inconvenient. But Chris Whitty seems(?) to be suggesting it will peak early (early Jan?) then fall quickly (we hope). To all extents and purposes we are all going to get it at once anyway. NPIs will flatten the sombrero almost not at all.
    But I am also glad not to be the one to have to make the decisions. It's easy for me and Philip to anonymously (or nonymously, in his case) opine on the internet on what should happen - harder when you have a job and a reputation at stake. And while it's not great to be in a state where outcomes are being dictated by what makes the decision-makers least likely to look bad, better that than being in the situation where decision-makers don't care at all what the public think.
    When he was a paid up Johnson fanboi he was up for lockdown 1 as I recall.
    And I've put my hand up and said I was wrong to support it.

    We all make mistakes, I'm happy to own mine.

    Had I known it would last for years, I wouldn't have.
    OMG!

    Did no one tell you, we could go back to work circa Easter? No wonder you've been getting more and more frustrated banging away on your angry keyboard 24/7 instead of working.

    You might have left it too late this time before the next lockdown however.
  • maaarsh said:

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
    How many "cases" would we not know about if people weren't taking tests?

    We're having a casedemic because we're looking for cases, not necessarily because people are very sick with it.
  • Tim Spector is quite positive about the situation and doesn't believe the horror predictions from the government models in terms of million cases a day and many 1000s of hospitalisations per day.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,013
    edited December 2021

    I've just tested positive so that's Christmas probably fucked

    Sorry :(

    But why be sorry? Philip wants you to go out and infect as many people as you can.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 76,274
    edited December 2021

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
  • rkrkrkrkrkrk Posts: 7,881

    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Very strong rebuke from Chris Whitty to people who say Covid lockdowns have somehow set back cancer or other care - common trope in right-wing press. Whitty says they have "no understanding of health", and that the claim is a "complete inversion of reality". https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1471437931118219264/photo/1

    Did Whitty really say common trope in right wing press ?
    Sorry but Whitty is talking bollocks. The official figures from the NHS show that waiting times for cancer diagnosis and treatment have increased massively, as have treatments for just about everything else - a lot of it due to people being unable to see their GPs during lockdowns.

    I have a lot of time for Whitty generally but on this he is clearly losing the plot.
    Because of the pandemic. Not because of lockdowns.
    Lockdowns -> less COVID pressure -> more NHS capacity -> more ability to treat cancer/other care.
    Wrong. Social distancing -> Less NHS capacity -> Less ability to treat cancer/other care.

    Had there been no lockdown, there'd have been less capacity reductions, more deaths, and the NHS would now be running at full capacity and with less demand as there's zero demand from the dead.
    Go back and reread your posts from when Boris introduced the lockdowns, if I remember rightly you understood then that the purpose was to protect NHS capacity & save lives.
    That was indeed the purpose and of course it is legitimate to say that it probably did given death rates would have been far higher without the lockdowns. But to do as Whitty did this morning and claim there have been no adverse effects from lockdown on cancer rates just doesn't fit the facts.

    Edit. I got caught by a phone call and posted before I had finished.

    Moreover I would suggest it is entirely possible that as Philip suggests we may come out the other side of this and find that the 'cure' including lockdown has killed more people than the virus itself.
    You're mixing up pandemic & lockdown. The pandemic has harmed cancer service provision. The lockdown has helped cancer service provision. I really can't think of more ways to say this.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    edited December 2021

    .

    Bank of England raises base rate

    Incoming statement from Sunak.

    " More ice waiter please".
    Yes, I think we need to get on with this. I personally don't think Brand Boris is going to be withdrawn from the market but there has to be a chance it is, and that it'll be replaced by Brand Rishi. Therefore it's important to make sure that brand is tarnished and now is the time to be doing it. I hope Team SKS are on to this. If not, I'm available on a consulting contract.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    Just a point about focussing on London hospitalisation, which went up a bit earlier in the week. Given the London specific graph on delta vs Omicron shows delta was growing in London over the last 3 weeks, and that nationwide only 15 omicron hospital cases have been announced so far, I think we have to assume the current increase is delta driven.

    If it accelerates signficantly in the next 5-7 days then that will be fair enough to attribute to Omicron, but we're not there yet.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830

    maaarsh said:

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
    How many "cases" would we not know about if people weren't taking tests?

    We're having a casedemic because we're looking for cases, not necessarily because people are very sick with it.
    The ONS tracker series gets round that problem, but I don't know how up to date it is.
  • Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
  • rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Very strong rebuke from Chris Whitty to people who say Covid lockdowns have somehow set back cancer or other care - common trope in right-wing press. Whitty says they have "no understanding of health", and that the claim is a "complete inversion of reality". https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1471437931118219264/photo/1

    Did Whitty really say common trope in right wing press ?
    Sorry but Whitty is talking bollocks. The official figures from the NHS show that waiting times for cancer diagnosis and treatment have increased massively, as have treatments for just about everything else - a lot of it due to people being unable to see their GPs during lockdowns.

    I have a lot of time for Whitty generally but on this he is clearly losing the plot.
    Because of the pandemic. Not because of lockdowns.
    Lockdowns -> less COVID pressure -> more NHS capacity -> more ability to treat cancer/other care.
    Wrong. Social distancing -> Less NHS capacity -> Less ability to treat cancer/other care.

    Had there been no lockdown, there'd have been less capacity reductions, more deaths, and the NHS would now be running at full capacity and with less demand as there's zero demand from the dead.
    Go back and reread your posts from when Boris introduced the lockdowns, if I remember rightly you understood then that the purpose was to protect NHS capacity & save lives.
    That was indeed the purpose and of course it is legitimate to say that it probably did given death rates would have been far higher without the lockdowns. But to do as Whitty did this morning and claim there have been no adverse effects from lockdown on cancer rates just doesn't fit the facts.

    Edit. I got caught by a phone call and posted before I had finished.

    Moreover I would suggest it is entirely possible that as Philip suggests we may come out the other side of this and find that the 'cure' including lockdown has killed more people than the virus itself.
    You're mixing up pandemic & lockdown. The pandemic has harmed cancer service provision. The lockdown has helped cancer service provision. I really can't think of more ways to say this.
    What evidence do you have of that?

    Lockdown just dragged out cases so that the NHS was dealing with Covid for longer, and at reduced capacity.

    Had there been no lockdown then we'd have smashed through NHS capacity with Covid cases, more of whom would have died, but then for the rest of the time the NHS could have been doing its actual job.
  • Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    Honestly the government should, with permission from the family, be spreading the message about this fool dying of stupidity as far and wide as possible. They're making such a big deal about big Omi being able to kill just the same as Delta and are making such a huge deal about vaccines, showing that the only known death from Omicron is a stupid antivaxver conspiracy who died from his own stupidity.
  • Would just like to point out, lateral flow up nose was negative but two on tonsils were positive, test there if in doubt
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    Taz said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Anyone interested in posting their predictions for the North Shropshire by-election? We had one 2 weeks ago for Old Bexley & Sidcup, with NP-MP compiling the entries on that occasion.

    Lib Dem - 45 - winning here
    Tory - 38
    Labour - 7
    Re-whatever - 5
    The rest - 5
    That's mine bit with Con and LD reversed.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,772

    HYUFD said:

    Bank of England increases interest rates from 0.1% to 0.25% in face of rising inflation

    https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1471451021327179776?s=20

    But why? First of all, .25% is hardly likely to turn spenders into savers. Secondly, this is not classic inflation but is largely driven by Covid disrupting supply chains and fuel prices going through the roof. Thirdly, there is risk of skewering economic recovery.
    Surely your first and third points are inconsistent?

    What this is about is the direction of travel and future intentions. And an economy with over 1m job vacancies arguably doesn't need that much stimulation.
  • Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
  • Taz said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Anyone interested in posting their predictions for the North Shropshire by-election? We had one 2 weeks ago for Old Bexley & Sidcup, with NP-MP compiling the entries on that occasion.

    Lib Dem - 45 - winning here
    Tory - 38
    Labour - 7
    Re-whatever - 5
    The rest - 5
    My guess: Con 41 LD 40 Lab 8 Re-x 5 Others 5.
    My Guess:
    LD45, Con 28, Lab 17, oth10

  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,268
    kinabalu said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    STOP FUCKING WHINGEING

    Still on the hallucinogenics?
    No. I’ve just had enough. I’m sitting in the sunlit garden next to my Antony Gormley statue in this billionaire’s garden in the Balearics, sipping an early cocktail, and then I come on here and it’s WHINGE WHINGE WHINGE WHINGE Oh property ladder this Oh my pension that Oh my hamster’s got AIDS in his perineum and I am Scottish WHAT CAN I DO WHY WON’T THE GOVERNMENT HELP BLAH BLAH BLAH

    Enough. Get up off your pimply bottoms, go to the drinks cabinet, pour yourself a stiff one, sit down, sip your drink, then get up again, go to the drinks cabinet and pour yourself a second, and then finally sit down and think about everything and get it all in perspective and then stand up again and go to the drinks cabinet and pour yourself the entire bottle
    I've just been swimming. Omicron didn't stop me. It's the sort of man I am. Live is for living not cowering away under the duvet.
    Good man. I do not say that lightly. Or, indeed, particularly truthfully

    But, good man
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    DavidL said:

    Pulpstar said:

    maaarsh said:

    I've just tested positive so that's Christmas probably fucked

    Don't worry, once every one in the country has it on the 24th we can then end quaranteen as a pointless load of bollocks.
    One of my daughters had to train somebody who had a negative LFT. After a few days the trainee had another test and showed positive. At this point she admitted that initially she had had TWO tests, one positive, one negative and decided that the negative one was right.

    So now my daughter's Xmas may well be stuffed thanks to this thoughtless moron...
    The Gov't need to REALLY REALLY emphasise that if you get a positive LFT - even if you have other negative ones that you really really will be positive.
    The "accuracy" of LFTs is all about false negatives.
    That was my understanding as well and I sought and obtained the adjournment of a jury trial on that basis. There is a non minimal chance that a negative result is wrong, especially if self administered, but there is almost no chance that a positive test is wrong.
    28% of negs are false negs, only about 1% of positives are false.

    https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/how-likely-positive-lateral-flow-test-covid-19-be-wrong
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 75,842
    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391

    maaarsh said:

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
    How many "cases" would we not know about if people weren't taking tests?

    We're having a casedemic because we're looking for cases, not necessarily because people are very sick with it.
    Yep, outside of London case growth is considerably behind test growth. In London there does seem to be a wave of 20-40 year olds getting colds which test positive.

    Numbers likely to go through the roof between now and xmas as that effect spreads, but still waiting for evidence it will cause any real problems to healthcare, and once we hit xmas and people lose the incentive to test, we could see a very spectacular fall.

    Johannesberg cases are now falling, 30% down on last week yesterday, but not sure how far behind them we are.
  • Mr. eek, less of a threat than it was.

    Hamilton's a big star but Verstappen is too. Russell also has great potential on the track (his Sakhir stand in was excellent).

    The cars next year matter the most so it remains to be seen how things stack up, but the idea any one driver is essential to F1 is nonsense.
  • Taz said:



    If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    Didn't see that and I agree he goes OTT too (he's an LD, innit :)). But attributing barmy views to people is marginally less bad than calling them names.
    I thought he was now supporting the SNP as of the last week or so.
    1. I'm a member of the LibDems
    2. I'm tactically voting SNP in the GE
    3. Have been given the OK to still be in the party and vote against the party. By an impeccable authority on such matters
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,094
    edited December 2021
    Brains Trust:

    My PT needs his second COVID jab in order to compete in an international sports competition in the USA in the New Year. He had his first 5 weeks ago, and cannot go to the local GP immediately because he has just moved house and needs to register etc. A GP could probably refer him.

    Walk-ins won't do him as it requires an 8 week interval.

    How to do this, and get jab 2 this side of Christmas/New Year? Are there any routes through the system?

    (I can't comment on why the first one waited until November, except to note that he is fully pro-vax, and will have a good reason.)
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    edited December 2021
    IshmaelZ said:

    DavidL said:

    Pulpstar said:

    maaarsh said:

    I've just tested positive so that's Christmas probably fucked

    Don't worry, once every one in the country has it on the 24th we can then end quaranteen as a pointless load of bollocks.
    One of my daughters had to train somebody who had a negative LFT. After a few days the trainee had another test and showed positive. At this point she admitted that initially she had had TWO tests, one positive, one negative and decided that the negative one was right.

    So now my daughter's Xmas may well be stuffed thanks to this thoughtless moron...
    The Gov't need to REALLY REALLY emphasise that if you get a positive LFT - even if you have other negative ones that you really really will be positive.
    The "accuracy" of LFTs is all about false negatives.
    That was my understanding as well and I sought and obtained the adjournment of a jury trial on that basis. There is a non minimal chance that a negative result is wrong, especially if self administered, but there is almost no chance that a positive test is wrong.
    28% of negs are false negs, only about 1% of positives are false.

    https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/how-likely-positive-lateral-flow-test-covid-19-be-wrong
    You're saying out of the 95% of tests that come back negative, 28% of those are really positive, so the real prevalence is 5x higher?

    That could only possibly work in an environment where prevalence is at least 28%, in which case game over already.

    So if we tested the whole country, 99% of the positives and 28% of the negatives would have covid?
  • EndillionEndillion Posts: 4,960

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    They reported the first Omicron cases at basically the same time we did, and all their vaccine doses have been Pfizer, which is supposedly the worst position to be in. They are way ahead on boosters (started administering them about the same time we were finishing up with first doses and are now pretty much done) but they have a significant percentage of people totally unvaccinated, and a smaller-but-still-significant percentage who refused the booster.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,084
    Interest rates have actually gone up. Well I never.
  • Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Garages are just licenses to print money.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 76,274
    edited December 2021

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
    You won't get seriously ill has been the claim. 90-95% reduction in hospitalisation was always the claim against previous variants. Even when released AZN 70% efficacy against infection and Pfizer / Moderna numbers were agains symptomatic infection.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    IanB2 said:

    Interest rates have actually gone up. Well I never.

    Don't they know there's a plague on!?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,587
    kinabalu said:

    .

    Bank of England raises base rate

    Incoming statement from Sunak.

    " More ice waiter please".
    Yes, I think we need to get on with this. I personally don't think Brand Boris is going to be withdrawn from the market but there has to be a chance it is, and that it'll be replaced by Brand Rishi. Therefore it's important to make sure that brand is tarnished and now is the time to be doing it. I hope Team SKS are on to this. If not, I'm available on a consulting contract.
    Maybe he couldn't hear the No 10 Chrimbo parties last year in the room below his flat because he...er...was 6000 miles away.

    Who knows?
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391

    Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Garages are just licenses to print money.
    Still amazed the same business can do test and repairs. I pay for a service just as insurance against them screwing me.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    Taz said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    I am actually under the weather, just thought it was a cold.

    Coughing and feeling unwell in general, not the worst thing I've had

    Sounds like Omicron. Have you ordered a PCR test? Unless you've got a car the testing centres around London are a mission to get to.
    Love this - thought it was just a cold, not the worst you've had? Sounds like Omicron!
    It is amazing the powers of diagnosis some people possess. Without even a face to face meeting or a triage.
    Absolutely. I can tell you from here that lump of blue mold growing on your back, like you are turning into a silvery scaled alien bug, is merely Plaque psoriasis. Nothing to worry about.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,184

    maaarsh said:

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
    How many "cases" would we not know about if people weren't taking tests?

    We're having a casedemic because we're looking for cases, not necessarily because people are very sick with it.
    It's definitely the case that there's been a sharp uptick in testing - presumably not least because people are testing before social interactions much more (I'm seeing my sister-in-law and her partner on Saturday, just prior to them going to Australia so her partner can see her parents for the first time in two years - REALLY don't want to kaibosh that).

    What we need is the ONS figures, which always come after a small delay. It will be interesting to see them when we next get them.
  • TazTaz Posts: 10,704

    Taz said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    I am actually under the weather, just thought it was a cold.

    Coughing and feeling unwell in general, not the worst thing I've had

    Sounds like Omicron. Have you ordered a PCR test? Unless you've got a car the testing centres around London are a mission to get to.
    Love this - thought it was just a cold, not the worst you've had? Sounds like Omicron!
    It is amazing the powers of diagnosis some people possess. Without even a face to face meeting or a triage.
    Absolutely. I can tell you from here that lump of blue mold growing on your back, like you are turning into a silvery scaled alien bug, is merely Plaque psoriasis. Nothing to worry about.
    Thanks for that, it is reassuring, I wonder if I will get a part in the new reboot of Doctor Who coming up ?
  • TazTaz Posts: 10,704

    Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Garages are just licenses to print money.
    As is being a plumber. £230 quid to replace an expansion vessel. Bloody useless Baxi junk
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    Cookie said:

    maaarsh said:

    Interesting Israel not seeing any real uptick in cases. Now is that their booster programe or restrictions or got lucky not much omicron (yet)?

    Probably the later - evidence now very strong that it spreads like nobodies business.

    But the evidence that it's not causing a big healthcare problem where it becomes dominant is also sufficiently strong that if it pointed in the other direction we would all be under house arrest.
    How many "cases" would we not know about if people weren't taking tests?

    We're having a casedemic because we're looking for cases, not necessarily because people are very sick with it.
    It's definitely the case that there's been a sharp uptick in testing - presumably not least because people are testing before social interactions much more (I'm seeing my sister-in-law and her partner on Saturday, just prior to them going to Australia so her partner can see her parents for the first time in two years - REALLY don't want to kaibosh that).

    What we need is the ONS figures, which always come after a small delay. It will be interesting to see them when we next get them.
    Unfortunately this time (or fortunately if you need to distract an electorate), the cycle time for Omicron means this whole thing will be done before ONS publish data on a relevant time period.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,094

    Andy_JS said:

    Anyone interested in posting their predictions for the North Shropshire by-election? We had one 2 weeks ago for Old Bexley & Sidcup, with NP-MP compiling the entries on that occasion.

    With zero knowledge of the ground game;

    LDs 42
    Cons 38
    Lab. 10
    Others 10

    Turnout a low 30%. If turnout is high, Cons just scrape through.
    I'm updating my prediction.

    A tie LD Tory +/- one percent.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,884
    Question for those who know more than me. A colleagues wife has had lingering covid fatigue (about 6 weeks after the infection). She received a flu jab and within 24 hours began to feel much more normal. My colleague asked if it could be a kick to the immune system (the flu jab) aiding the covid recovery, to which replied that I had no idea...
    Is it possible?
  • TazTaz Posts: 10,704

    Taz said:



    If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    Didn't see that and I agree he goes OTT too (he's an LD, innit :)). But attributing barmy views to people is marginally less bad than calling them names.
    I thought he was now supporting the SNP as of the last week or so.
    1. I'm a member of the LibDems
    2. I'm tactically voting SNP in the GE
    3. Have been given the OK to still be in the party and vote against the party. By an impeccable authority on such matters
    Cheers, I saw you posted it earlier in the week.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,084
    edited December 2021
    Why are we playing Australia again when we lost to them already?

    The cricket team would be better looking for someone to play down at their own level.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 24,587
    Hugh Schofield on WATO saying the French have banned us due to panic over Johnson's "Tsunami" rhetoric.
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 75,842

    Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Garages are just licenses to print money.
    The big ones are all rip offs, KwikFit probably the worst. Good small independent garages are worth their weight in gold though.
  • This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    The interest rate rise probably closes the door on a lockdown, would be weird for the Bank to be simultaneously raising rates and printing money to fund another round of fiscal support.

    Boris really is boxed in now, he's got to hope that big Omi is no more than a paper tiger and the doom monger scientists are as wrong as they were in July. Can't see Rishi going for £40bn per month in open ended economic support measures if the Bank has shut the door on free money and simply no way the party will fund £100bn+ in a support package funded by tax rises.
  • RattersRatters Posts: 756
    Next BoE rate hike (to 0.5%) now priced in to happen as soon as 3 February and likely 1% by the end of 2022.

    This all increases the interest paid on the BoE's stock of nearly £900bn gilts (which is paid at the BoE base rate). That means a 1% rise in rates increases government spending by c.£9bn a year.


  • If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    You repeatedly say that you want people to die. As a consequence of having no restrictions on your personal liberties. OK, you've said "if I die, I die". But you aren't expecting it. You aren't looking at your daughter thinking "my actions / approach may kill her. But if she dies she dies, liberty is worth more than [her] death" Or if you are you have a very different way to deal with immediate loved ones than most especially when you say you take a bullet for her.

    So you clearly aren't expecting her to die or wanting her to die - you'd take a bullet to protect her. So therefore it is *other people* you expect to die. Someone else's daughter/son/parent/partner.

    You can't claim civility when that is your approach.
  • If Lib Dems take this seat, I'm going to make a prediction that 2024 will lead to them making a significant number of gains and likely going into C&S with Labour
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    IanB2 said:

    Why are we playing Australia again when we lost to them already?

    The cricket team would be better looking for someone to play down at their own level.

    There are no good cricket teams anymore.

    Either English or Australian team from 2005 would 5-0 batter both these sides.
  • Taz said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    I am actually under the weather, just thought it was a cold.

    Coughing and feeling unwell in general, not the worst thing I've had

    Sounds like Omicron. Have you ordered a PCR test? Unless you've got a car the testing centres around London are a mission to get to.
    Love this - thought it was just a cold, not the worst you've had? Sounds like Omicron!
    It is amazing the powers of diagnosis some people possess. Without even a face to face meeting or a triage.
    Absolutely. I can tell you from here that lump of blue mold growing on your back, like you are turning into a silvery scaled alien bug, is merely Plaque psoriasis. Nothing to worry about.
    One (and perhaps the only) good thing about this plague is that thanks to all the toys @Foxy told us to buy at the start, I was able to upload temperature, pulse, blood pressure, lung flow, and blood oxygen to my GP's web site for an instant diagnosis. Saved at least an hour schlepping over there and hanging about in a germ-filled waiting room.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,851
    edited December 2021
    Pulpstar said:

    kinabalu said:

    Nigelb said:

    Sandpit said:

    F1: Mercedes drop their appeal of the rejection of their protest, a few hours before the FIA Gala.

    https://twitter.com/MercedesAMGF1/status/1471419870680125441

    Sounds like some sort of deal done behind the scenes again, really not good for the sport.

    No, I think they had little option but to take the high road.
    Carrying on with the action would have been a disaster for them, win or lose.
    Definitely. It would have looked OTT and any 'win' wouldn't have been. They played it spot on. Consensus that it was unfair is established. Sport is littered with such. It's a perverse part of the attraction in a sense. F1 21 will be talked about for years.
    Yes, poor sporting decisions need to be left on the track, field or racetrack. The one exception is cheating found after the event - where the winner should be stripped; unless it's horse racing. Never understood why Camelot wasn't retrospectively awarded the triple crown tbh.
    He damn well should have been. I was there to see it and my dad - they live next to the track - had baked a special cake with "Camelot Leger Triple Crown 2012" on it. What a sad 'tea' that was when we got back to the house. Sitting in total silence picking at this cake.

    There was precedent in racing too. The Aga had an Oaks win nullified. It led to him boycotting English racing for years, all his horses going to Ireland and France.

    As for the F1, it would be different if Race Control had fixed it for MV/RB due to corruption. But this wasn't the case. They bent the rules in order to put a dramatic finish on for the watching world. If it'd been mid season, or the title had've been already decided, they wouldn't have done it. It was that, not a specific desire for Ham to lose and Ves to win.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391

    If Lib Dems take this seat, I'm going to make a prediction that 2024 will lead to them making a significant number of gains and likely going into C&S with Labour

    I'm sure they'll feel loads of confidence and be willing to offer plenty of supply to a party that has been leafletting that the Lib Dems are in 3rd.
  • Ratters said:

    Next BoE rate hike (to 0.5%) now priced in to happen as soon as 3 February and likely 1% by the end of 2022.

    This all increases the interest paid on the BoE's stock of nearly £900bn gilts (which is paid at the BoE base rate). That means a 1% rise in rates increases government spending by c.£9bn a year.

    True - though not on debt owned by the BofE. Do we know how much debt is actual debt - i.e. money we have to pay someone else?
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,884

    This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    Fits the only person I know hadn't had the vaccine - an engineer who attended our site. Hadn't got round to it. Even had a booking but didn't go. Muppet.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 76,274
    edited December 2021

    This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    Its total bullshit....1000s of covid vaccination centres have been open 6-7 days a week for long hours for 12.months. anybody claiming i didn't get round to it / couldn't fit it in, it just lying. It takes 30 mins max and you can take your kids in if you need to. There is no way among those same people they haven't been shopping during that time etc.
  • maaarsh said:

    If Lib Dems take this seat, I'm going to make a prediction that 2024 will lead to them making a significant number of gains and likely going into C&S with Labour

    I'm sure they'll feel loads of confidence and be willing to offer plenty of supply to a party that has been leafletting that the Lib Dems are in 3rd.
    Them or the Tories
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603

    This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    "Hadn't got round to it yet" is such a mealy mouthed response to not having got it and covering up a well of antivax sentiment in those who say it. Chris Whitty being far too kind, IMO.
  • RattersRatters Posts: 756
    MaxPB said:

    The interest rate rise probably closes the door on a lockdown, would be weird for the Bank to be simultaneously raising rates and printing money to fund another round of fiscal support.

    Boris really is boxed in now, he's got to hope that big Omi is no more than a paper tiger and the doom monger scientists are as wrong as they were in July. Can't see Rishi going for £40bn per month in open ended economic support measures if the Bank has shut the door on free money and simply no way the party will fund £100bn+ in a support package funded by tax rises.

    Agreed. Monetary stimulus and printing money to support spending when inflation was <2% was easy enough to justify. Almost impossible at 5% inflation given the BoE's mandate is very much focussed on managing inflation.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,268

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
    You won't get seriously ill has been the claim. 90-95% reduction in hospitalisation was always the claim against previous variants. Even when released AZN 70% efficacy against infection and Pfizer / Moderna numbers were agains symptomatic infection.
    We’re STILL waiting for the efficacy of the vax (x1 and x2) against hospitalisation/death re Omicron. And the booster too?

    This seems to be crucial info. We know OMICRON THE SLIMMER OF THE YEAR has overwhelmed the vaxxed in terms of infection, but beyond that?
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,184



    If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    Didn't see that and I agree he goes OTT too (he's an LD, innit :)). But attributing barmy views to people is marginally less bad than calling them names.
    I'm not sure I agree Nick. I think attributing barmy views to people is worse. It's what the ten commandments calls 'bearing false witness'. It's habitually viewed as one of the less fashionable commandments along with coveting the neighbour's ox; but I'd actually say it's the biggie. Tarnishing someone's reputation. I'd rather be showered with malcolmg's creative abuse - which people understand for what it is - than have someone saying that my views were what they were not.
    Of course, there are matters of degree, and sometimes these things are said in fun or sport, and on this board what we say is of little consequence (though we should treat those with the confidence to use their real-world names with a little more respect). It's not like taking out a double page advert in the Times. But nor is it something we should treat too lightly.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415

    Taz said:

    maaarsh said:

    MaxPB said:

    I am actually under the weather, just thought it was a cold.

    Coughing and feeling unwell in general, not the worst thing I've had

    Sounds like Omicron. Have you ordered a PCR test? Unless you've got a car the testing centres around London are a mission to get to.
    Love this - thought it was just a cold, not the worst you've had? Sounds like Omicron!
    It is amazing the powers of diagnosis some people possess. Without even a face to face meeting or a triage.
    Absolutely. I can tell you from here that lump of blue mold growing on your back, like you are turning into a silvery scaled alien bug, is merely Plaque psoriasis. Nothing to worry about.
    One (and perhaps the only) good thing about this plague is that thanks to all the toys @Foxy told us to buy at the start, I was able to upload temperature, pulse, blood pressure, lung flow, and blood oxygen to my GP's web site for an instant diagnosis. Saved at least an hour schlepping over there and hanging about in a germ-filled waiting room.
    Brilliant 👍🏻 Good old Foxy.

    If Leicester start winning again though, he’ll be financially ruined 😕

  • EndillionEndillion Posts: 4,960
    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    rkrkrk said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Very strong rebuke from Chris Whitty to people who say Covid lockdowns have somehow set back cancer or other care - common trope in right-wing press. Whitty says they have "no understanding of health", and that the claim is a "complete inversion of reality". https://twitter.com/joncstone/status/1471437931118219264/photo/1

    Did Whitty really say common trope in right wing press ?
    Sorry but Whitty is talking bollocks. The official figures from the NHS show that waiting times for cancer diagnosis and treatment have increased massively, as have treatments for just about everything else - a lot of it due to people being unable to see their GPs during lockdowns.

    I have a lot of time for Whitty generally but on this he is clearly losing the plot.
    Because of the pandemic. Not because of lockdowns.
    Lockdowns -> less COVID pressure -> more NHS capacity -> more ability to treat cancer/other care.
    Wrong. Social distancing -> Less NHS capacity -> Less ability to treat cancer/other care.

    Had there been no lockdown, there'd have been less capacity reductions, more deaths, and the NHS would now be running at full capacity and with less demand as there's zero demand from the dead.
    Go back and reread your posts from when Boris introduced the lockdowns, if I remember rightly you understood then that the purpose was to protect NHS capacity & save lives.
    That was indeed the purpose and of course it is legitimate to say that it probably did given death rates would have been far higher without the lockdowns. But to do as Whitty did this morning and claim there have been no adverse effects from lockdown on cancer rates just doesn't fit the facts.

    Edit. I got caught by a phone call and posted before I had finished.

    Moreover I would suggest it is entirely possible that as Philip suggests we may come out the other side of this and find that the 'cure' including lockdown has killed more people than the virus itself.
    You're mixing up pandemic & lockdown. The pandemic has harmed cancer service provision. The lockdown has helped cancer service provision. I really can't think of more ways to say this.
    This is an idealised view of the world based on what "should" have happened. It isn't true in reality, because:
    - Lockdown changed people's behaviour, and therefore lots of people who should have sought medical help, didn't, because they (somewhat understandably) misunderstood, misinterpreted or just didn't see the Government advice to still go to a hospital if they felt they needed to. The outcomes for those people will now be worse than if they had sought advice in the first instance.
    - Large numbers of people found it almost impossible to see their GPs for referrals during lockdown, even at times when there were very few Covid cases around and there was no obvious reason for the GPs to not be seeing patients. We can only speculate on the reasons for this, but in general Covid provided an easy excuse for many individuals and organisations to simply not do their jobs for a while ("we can't do that right now because of the pandemic"), and it seems plausible that some GP surgeries were included in that trend.
  • El_CapitanoEl_Capitano Posts: 3,870

    Taz said:

    Andy_JS said:

    Anyone interested in posting their predictions for the North Shropshire by-election? We had one 2 weeks ago for Old Bexley & Sidcup, with NP-MP compiling the entries on that occasion.

    Lib Dem - 45 - winning here
    Tory - 38
    Labour - 7
    Re-whatever - 5
    The rest - 5
    My guess: Con 41 LD 40 Lab 8 Re-x 5 Others 5.
    My Guess:
    LD45, Con 28, Lab 17, oth10

    I hadn't realised you were actually Ed Daveyboy.


  • If I get it and die, I get it and die.

    We're all going to get it you bleeding idiot. Chris Whitty said that six months ago, so I'm not saying anything Chris Whitty hasn't already said. But I forget you're the moron who expect an "exit" from Covid.

    But yes, liberty is worth more than death.

    "Idiot", "moron" and no doubt more in other posts from you that I can't be bothered to read - can't you discuss the issue as though you weren't drunk? You come across like George Galloway on speed.
    No.

    You snipped out the post I was responding to which was "Which as usual is you advocating that Other People die so that you can have "liberty"."

    If Rochdale wants to keep falsely claiming I am advocating that Other People die, then I'm content to call him a moron in reply. I'll be civilised with anyone that is civilised themselves.

    I note you don't call him out, only me for responding to him. Funny that!
    You repeatedly say that you want people to die. As a consequence of having no restrictions on your personal liberties. OK, you've said "if I die, I die". But you aren't expecting it. You aren't looking at your daughter thinking "my actions / approach may kill her. But if she dies she dies, liberty is worth more than [her] death" Or if you are you have a very different way to deal with immediate loved ones than most especially when you say you take a bullet for her.

    So you clearly aren't expecting her to die or wanting her to die - you'd take a bullet to protect her. So therefore it is *other people* you expect to die. Someone else's daughter/son/parent/partner.

    You can't claim civility when that is your approach.
    Death is part of the Circle of Life.

    I suggest you sit down, shut up, watch the Lion King and then come back to me. Hakuna Matata.
  • This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    When I had my first jab, there was a long queue but you could see people dropping out as the school day ended. And many people are in jobs where they can't just nip out for a couple of hours but have to book a whole day off to get jabbed. Things are a bit better now with extended hours and weekends but it is still not ideal.
  • murali_smurali_s Posts: 3,037
    Andy_JS said:

    Anyone interested in posting their predictions for the North Shropshire by-election? We had one 2 weeks ago for Old Bexley & Sidcup, with NP-MP compiling the entries on that occasion.

    LD 39
    C 35
    L 17
    Ref 5
    Oth 4

  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,184
    Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Indeed. If the small (and indeed large) businesses had taken the approach to covid that the public sector has we would have starved to death three weeks into this.
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    https://twitter.com/AlmondsburyCre1/status/1471462425224523785

    Almondsbury Creative
    @AlmondsburyCre1
    Gone from 120 booked for Christmas Afternoon tea this Saturday to 0, yes zero. The industry is being devastated yet again with absolutely no support.

    Another selfish pig who isn't willing to do WHATEVER IT TAKES.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,772
    IanB2 said:

    Why are we playing Australia again when we lost to them already?

    The cricket team would be better looking for someone to play down at their own level.

    Unfortunately Freuchie CC were not available to give them a game due to Covid restrictions.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 76,274
    edited December 2021
    Leon said:

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
    You won't get seriously ill has been the claim. 90-95% reduction in hospitalisation was always the claim against previous variants. Even when released AZN 70% efficacy against infection and Pfizer / Moderna numbers were agains symptomatic infection.
    We’re STILL waiting for the efficacy of the vax (x1 and x2) against hospitalisation/death re Omicron. And the booster too?

    This seems to be crucial info. We know OMICRON THE SLIMMER OF THE YEAR has overwhelmed the vaxxed in terms of infection, but beyond that?
    I was talking to covidHorseBattery about the claims that people were saying you never got covid due to vaccination (in the past). That was never the claim. It was made absolutely clear in terms of efficacy against infection vs hospitalisation, time and time again. And made clear what efficacy /effectiveness meant i.e. 90% doesn't mean 9/10 won't, it versus unvaccinated.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,268
    MaxPB said:

    This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    "Hadn't got round to it yet" is such a mealy mouthed response to not having got it and covering up a well of antivax sentiment in those who say it. Chris Whitty being far too kind, IMO.
    Yes, quite, political correct delusionality

    Simply a lie, or he is a gullible lefty fool
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391
    Cookie said:

    Pulpstar said:

    Cookie said:

    Three anecdotes from the outside world:
    1) Took the car for an MOT on Tuesday. As requested by the sign on the door, put my mask on as I went into the garage office when I went to pick it up. 'No need for that' the proprietor cheerfully assured me. 'You're the only one all day who's bothered'. He was cheerfully belligerent in his opposition to any more covid measures 'or this place won't be running any longer'. He'd had his booster jab because his dad had told him he had to or he wouldn't be coming for Christmas dinner.

    2) Conversation with a friend of mine at school drop-off yesterday. He embodies the red wall. Historically labour from a working class family, he's been less and less enamoured of them over the last ten years and was repelled by Corbyn. Thinks Starmer is a berk. But his view on the current shenanigans was as follows (read this in a broad, incredulous, Mancunian accent): "do you not think they've gone absolutely way over the top to this latest one? Is he [Boris] just trying to get sacked? He's just doing f*ck-up after f*ck-up."

    3) My youngest's infant school did her nativity play yesterday. I cannot conceive of anyone who could care more about the edcuation, welfare, wellbeing and happiness of the children in his care than the headmaster of this school. It is really, really important to him that normality continues for the children in that school. Anyway, I was really pleased it went ahead: it is my tenth, and last, nativity play as a parent - they don't do it in the junior's. And it was brilliant. And my youngest - who is a complicated little character: neither the competent, reliable demeanour of my oldest or the confident, outgoing character of my middle daughter - had one line, and was barely audible, and fidgeted throughout, but despite her nerves she did it, and she sang the songs and followed the cues, and I was prouder of her than I ever was of either of the older two's objectively much better performances.
    So anyway, well done to the school for going ahead regardless. Parents had to be masked (much to the apologies of the head, who reported it as a condition from DfE and TRafford public health for these to go ahead) but a small price to pay for such a momentous event.
    But I reported my joy at this to colleagues later in the day, and there was quite a lot of surprise and some disapproval that the event had been allowed to take place. It's a public sector organisation, with quite a lot of keenness for lockdown, and I didn't getthe impression that hostility was aimed at me personally - but there was more than a bit of the hint that the school were being selfish and/or self-indulgent in going ahead with a nativity play. Which I think is a shame.

    On the MOT garage. God bless the small businesses, the bedrock of Britain.
    Indeed. If the small (and indeed large) businesses had taken the approach to covid that the public sector has we would have starved to death three weeks into this.
    Quite - Food retail is a real emergency service, far more necessary to the preservation of life than hospitals, and thank goodness the government doesn't run it.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 37,603
    Leon said:

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
    You won't get seriously ill has been the claim. 90-95% reduction in hospitalisation was always the claim against previous variants. Even when released AZN 70% efficacy against infection and Pfizer / Moderna numbers were agains symptomatic infection.
    We’re STILL waiting for the efficacy of the vax (x1 and x2) against hospitalisation/death re Omicron. And the booster too?

    This seems to be crucial info. We know OMICRON THE SLIMMER OF THE YEAR has overwhelmed the vaxxed in terms of infection, but beyond that?
    2x AZ or Pfizer comes in at ~65% depending on age and time since vax against hospitalisation, that's at least 6 months post second dose as well for the early sample. No word on single dose or triple dose just yet. I expect triple dose efficacy to be very, very good.
  • This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    Its total bullshit....1000s of covid vaccination centres have been open 6-7 days a week for long hours for 12.months. anybody claiming i didn't get round to it / couldn't fit it in, it just lying. It takes 30 mins max and you can take your kids in if you need to. There is no way among those same people they haven't been shopping during that time etc.
    30 minutes max plus a couple of hours to get there and back on the bus, with half-day or even a full day off work because not everyone's an upper middle class professional who can take a long lunch at the drop of a syringe.
  • maaarsh said:

    https://twitter.com/AlmondsburyCre1/status/1471462425224523785

    Almondsbury Creative
    @AlmondsburyCre1
    Gone from 120 booked for Christmas Afternoon tea this Saturday to 0, yes zero. The industry is being devastated yet again with absolutely no support.

    Another selfish pig who isn't willing to do WHATEVER IT TAKES.

    What? Go bankrupt for the good of the country?
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    maaarsh said:

    https://twitter.com/AlmondsburyCre1/status/1471462425224523785

    Almondsbury Creative
    @AlmondsburyCre1
    Gone from 120 booked for Christmas Afternoon tea this Saturday to 0, yes zero. The industry is being devastated yet again with absolutely no support.

    Another selfish pig who isn't willing to do WHATEVER IT TAKES.

    *BREAKING NEWS

    Rishi Sunak has resigned from the Tory Government, and joined the Beach Boys (as a second MP job)
  • maaarshmaaarsh Posts: 3,391

    maaarsh said:

    https://twitter.com/AlmondsburyCre1/status/1471462425224523785

    Almondsbury Creative
    @AlmondsburyCre1
    Gone from 120 booked for Christmas Afternoon tea this Saturday to 0, yes zero. The industry is being devastated yet again with absolutely no support.

    Another selfish pig who isn't willing to do WHATEVER IT TAKES.

    What? Go bankrupt for the good of the country?
    That's what a certain poster on here would do, if that's what it took.
  • TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 40,950


    There is danger, life has danger.

    Lets spin the question on its head. Lets say this wave is allowed to rip through the population. What is the realistic worst case scenario? Don't just say "the NHS might collapse", how many excess deaths are we talking about caused by the NHS collapsing? A thousand? Five thousand? Ten thousand? Two million?

    How much QALY are we talking about? Lets quantify it. How does that compare to natural deaths that would occur anyway?

    Then lockdown restrictions and screwing over the livelihoods of people like Miss Cyclefree Jr and millions more like her. How much damage is that? How much pain and suffering is that causing?

    We've triply-vaccinated the vulnerable already. Either the vaccines work, or they don't. Hundreds of thousands die every single year anyway. Since the virus started close to a million have died from natural causes, the last years of which have been messed around with by lockdown. Those final years are never going to be brought back, the education disrupted, the businesses disrupted, none of that is coming back either.

    Let die whoever dies. Let live whoever lives.

    But you are saying that as an absolute, which is barmy. Suppose it were to turn out that Omicron has a nasty kick to it, not yet evident because it only shows up a few weeks after infection, which has the effect of making it very dangerous to children. Are you seriously suggesting that, as an absolute thing, irrespective of the avoidable death of thousands of children, we should just 'Let die whoever dies'?

    You are just being bonkers. No sane person can be absolute about this, it all depends on the degree of danger.
    Yes I am absolutely 100% saying that. Unequivocally and unabashedly.

    No matter the danger. People die, get over it already. We fucked over 3 academic years of education. We have destroyed two years of business. For 67 million people we've had two years of damage.

    Even if you believe the badly-calculated claim that the average 'death' had 10 years life expectancy left (I don't) two years lost for 67 million people is 134 million years of damage. We'd have had to have 13 million excess deaths to make up for that and its nowhere close to that.

    Pre-vaccinations restrictions were borderline justifiable to me, but if I'd known they'd have dragged on for two years I'd have said they were not justifiable at all. Post-vaccinations it is madness. The damage of restrictions is worse than a fraction of 1% of people dying.
    @contrarian knew.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 76,274
    edited December 2021

    This sounds depressingly plausible;

    Whitty says that very few unvaccinated are anti-vaxxers. As well as convincing them that jabs work and don't have serious side effects, he says convenience is key.

    When he was last on the wards and treating unvaxxed, "an awful lot of them said they hadn't got round to it yet"


    https://twitter.com/Smyth_Chris/status/1471440412153896961?t=amP94u8D6WCbyeqqAc8NZA&s=19

    Obviously, "haven't got round to it" is a rubbish excuse, but is there more that could have been done? The rollout seems to have lost oomph somewhere, albeit picked up again now.

    Its total bullshit....1000s of covid vaccination centres have been open 6-7 days a week for long hours for 12.months. anybody claiming i didn't get round to it / couldn't fit it in, it just lying. It takes 30 mins max and you can take your kids in if you need to. There is no way among those same people they haven't been shopping during that time etc.
    30 minutes max plus a couple of hours to get there and back on the bus, with half-day or even a full day off work because not everyone's an upper middle class professional who can take a long lunch at the drop of a syringe.
    They don't know anybody with a car, nobody....not a friend... relative...nobody....and you could book way into the future, at your convenience, over the course of 12 months, even younger adults been 6 months. So you could plan to get it around work. Also very few people live or work more than a handful of miles from one.

    You might be able to find the odd edge case, but 3-5 million, bullshit. That isn't the reason the vast majority haven't got jabbed.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,268
    MaxPB said:

    Leon said:

    Just to correct you, I'm triple jabbed

    When did you get your third jab? Take a week to kick in.
    The 3rd
    Well fingers crossed you system should be absolutely pumped and primed to fight it off.
    I feel under the weather so probably that's why. But a long cry from "you won't get ill if you have the jab" like we heard from a few muppets at the start
    You won't get seriously ill has been the claim. 90-95% reduction in hospitalisation was always the claim against previous variants. Even when released AZN 70% efficacy against infection and Pfizer / Moderna numbers were agains symptomatic infection.
    We’re STILL waiting for the efficacy of the vax (x1 and x2) against hospitalisation/death re Omicron. And the booster too?

    This seems to be crucial info. We know OMICRON THE SLIMMER OF THE YEAR has overwhelmed the vaxxed in terms of infection, but beyond that?
    2x AZ or Pfizer comes in at ~65% depending on age and time since vax against hospitalisation, that's at least 6 months post second dose as well for the early sample. No word on single dose or triple dose just yet. I expect triple dose efficacy to be very, very good.
    Ta. Against omicron specifically? I haven’t seen that data. Highly encouraging if true. Link?
This discussion has been closed.