Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
Perhaps laughing at Boris Johnson is all they have left?
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
Well exactly.
The problem is that hasn't been done by SAGE. Instead they ran all the scenarios where X presented a catastrophe then only showed those. They didn't show scenarios based on X where it didn't result in a catastrophe, despite that being plausible too.
They should show the full picture, not half of it, then let people make an informed and educated decision. Instead they're trying to pull the wool over the eyes and make it a fait accompli in the worst practices of Sir Humphrey.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
As I remember it, in the first lockdown that was the case in Wales with areas of supermarkets being barriered of because they contained hardware rather than foodstuffs.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Sure, but if (some of) variables A,B and C are stochastic, then you don't have a "scenario" as such, because the model outputs all possible future outcomes. Clearly, the models are accounting for the variables being uncertain, because they're quoting ranges for the output metrics.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
The other day, I mentioned an anti-vaxxer I know from school. This is his latest missive:
"Dr Robert Malone, inventor of MRNA and DNA vaccines, tell people NOT to vaccinate their children with the Covid-19 vaccine for at least 5 years, until the research and testing has been done:"
Followed by a link to a TikTok video.
Facebook have added a 'Covid vaccines work' banner underneath the post.
From my (limited) knowledge, there's a fair bit wrong in it.
He didn't invent mRNA vaccines at all. Katarin Kariko did.
An elderly acquaintance has not only refused to have vaccinations but refuses to have a lateral flow test - "I read somewhere that they contain nasty particles". Her carer developed Covid this morning, so she is taking precautions: "I breathe in essential oils and then sneeze out the nasty stuff".
There are a lot of delusions out there, urged on by nutters on the internet.
I recommend Chlorine Pentaflouride. One small glass and I guarantee that you'll not worry about COVID for the rest of your life.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
No you've missed the point. Absolutely I 100% agree that the scenarios should be on things like "do nothing" etc.
The problem isn't that the optimistic scenarios have been excluded, the problem is that the baseline scenarios have been excluded. As per Fraser Nelson's article the evidence on the severity of Omicron, which is already available from South Africa and has been used in the JP Morgan modelling wasn't used by SAGE.
That scenario was excluded as Medley said because the results didn't fit. They were only presenting catastrophe scenarios, so baseline scenarios (not optimistic ones) were excluded if they didn't show a catastrophe.
There's more other false and dodgy assumptions as Max has gone into great detail with.
This isn't about saying we should be cherry-picking optimistic or pessimistic, we shouldn't be doing either. Reasonable scenarios using accurate data weren't included in the data dump because they didn't present a catastrophe - that's not science that's fiddling with data.
OK, we're more or less agreeing now, except you're still stuck on using "scenarios" to mean "input parameters". Omicron being less severe than Delta is not a scenario; it's something the modellers have to make a call on either way, and they have chosen to downweight the evidence that it might be more benign, and cover that by putting in a large secondary uncertainty around their mean estimate. That is not the same as "excluding baseline scenarios", whatever that means. The wide ranges given show that all future outcomes are still included, it's just that the probabilities are different than if they'd not downweighted the evidence for Omicron being benign.
It is a scenario, a plausible one. The point of having a logistic regression model is that you can change multiple inputs and see what happens in each different scenario. The government modellers have been asked by some unknown party to not create scenarios where Omicron doesn't cause the NHS to collapse despite there being many plausible, likely I'd say at this point, ones where it won't.
No, I don't think that's true. I think you are basing this on the off-the-cuff Twitter exchange between Fraser Nelson and Graham Medley, and I think this is based on the two sides not understanding what the other means by "scenario".
No I think we understand full well what scenario means.
The question is why the scenarios which don't result in catastrophe aren't included in the SAGE evidence. Scenarios that don't result in catastrophe are just as much evidence as those that do, if they've got reasonable input parameters.
In modelling you're supposed to be choosing your inputs, not your outputs. Once you start choosing your outputs and working backwards from there you've got a problem.
Good header, Richard. I don’t believe for a moment that disliking the direction of travel on Covid was the real reason for Frost’s resignation. Rather he realised that he wasn’t going to be able to maintain the bluster any longer.
He has said that pretty clearly and unambiguously. I'd have guessed otherwise, but as he's said it so clearly I think I have to believe what he says.
Many cabinet ministers have said one thing is the reason for their resignation when it's actually another. In any case, normally there's more than one reason. As we saw today, the Cabinet have blocked any restrictions. Moreover, Frost's departure seems to have been agreed some time ago, when this wasn't on the horizon.
What people say and what they actually do are two different things.
Give me 'many' examples then.
Every cabinet minister who ever wrote "to spend more time with my family"?
I mean, these people entered politics specifically to get away from their families.
Again - examples are good.
One of Mrs Thatcher;s Ministers, a famously dry Tory (others will remember his name) said, when recalled to the Cabinet, "I am doing this in order to spend less time with my family".
Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
As I remember it, in the first lockdown that was the case in Wales with areas of supermarkets being barriered of because they contained hardware rather than foodstuffs.
Are you sure it wasn't just clothes? Or was Wales particularly daft? My local DIY shop has stayed open throughout (England, though).
"‘Presumably others are modelling the harms caused by restrictions, including economic harms,’ says Professor Graham Medley, chairman of the Sage modelling committee."
Spectator blog
Fecking genuine
It's a reasonable assumption though don't you think ?
Gov't has massive resources to hand, the impacts of lockdown ought to be calculated somewhere...
You’d hoped he’d asked the question though rather than just assuming
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
No you've missed the point. Absolutely I 100% agree that the scenarios should be on things like "do nothing" etc.
The problem isn't that the optimistic scenarios have been excluded, the problem is that the baseline scenarios have been excluded. As per Fraser Nelson's article the evidence on the severity of Omicron, which is already available from South Africa and has been used in the JP Morgan modelling wasn't used by SAGE.
That scenario was excluded as Medley said because the results didn't fit. They were only presenting catastrophe scenarios, so baseline scenarios (not optimistic ones) were excluded if they didn't show a catastrophe.
There's more other false and dodgy assumptions as Max has gone into great detail with.
This isn't about saying we should be cherry-picking optimistic or pessimistic, we shouldn't be doing either. Reasonable scenarios using accurate data weren't included in the data dump because they didn't present a catastrophe - that's not science that's fiddling with data.
OK, we're more or less agreeing now, except you're still stuck on using "scenarios" to mean "input parameters". Omicron being less severe than Delta is not a scenario; it's something the modellers have to make a call on either way, and they have chosen to downweight the evidence that it might be more benign, and cover that by putting in a large secondary uncertainty around their mean estimate. That is not the same as "excluding baseline scenarios", whatever that means. The wide ranges given show that all future outcomes are still included, it's just that the probabilities are different than if they'd not downweighted the evidence for Omicron being benign.
It is a scenario, a plausible one. The point of having a logistic regression model is that you can change multiple inputs and see what happens in each different scenario. The government modellers have been asked by some unknown party to not create scenarios where Omicron doesn't cause the NHS to collapse despite there being many plausible, likely I'd say at this point, ones where it won't.
No, I don't think that's true. I think you are basing this on the off-the-cuff Twitter exchange between Fraser Nelson and Graham Medley, and I think this is based on the two sides not understanding what the other means by "scenario".
Hmm, that's what he said and what they've presented, that Omicron will manifest identical symptoms to Delta despite it being just as likely (if more more likely) that it is less severe, three studies have now shown that.
And once again, there's nothing stopping them from saying "we have new data, wait while we rerun the model, give is 20 minutes" I mean I've literally done that and delayed a board meeting because the deck was outdated in a few key places, even though we only got the new data a couple of hours before the board were due to meet.
Today’s Cabinet exposed divisions on how to battle Omicron and Johnson’s faltering standing. Before the meeting, government officials were readying restriction plans for next week.
One Tory observer suggests the PM has “lost control of the cabinet”.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
Well, you have to weigh the likelihood of:
a) having argued for remain, some killer fact right at the end of the campaign actually changed her mind; b) to be on the winning side she has managed to delude herself that she would now have supported leave all along; c) to have a ministerial career in the current climate she is simply pretending, hiding her real views; d) she has no views of her own and simply chooses whatever position appears to be in her self-interest at the time (now, who does that remind us of?)
or, I suppose, that she was always a closet leaver but thought remain would win and under Cameron went remain for reason c)
Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
As I remember it, in the first lockdown that was the case in Wales with areas of supermarkets being barriered of because they contained hardware rather than foodstuffs.
Are you sure it wasn't just clothes? Or was Wales particularly daft? My local DIY shop has stayed open throughout (England, though).
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
By making sure the values of X (and Y and Z) cover the full range of possibilities, not just the ones you think will produce the modelling outputs you want. By excluding the possibility that Omicron will not produce the same level of health issues as previous variants they are picking and choosing the characteristics of the variant to get the outputs they want. As I said, that is not science.
X/Y/Z aren't things you can ascribe probabilities to. They are decisions taken by Government at the outset. As per my previous posts, the model does account for the possibility that Omicron is more benign than Delta - this results in outcomes towards the lower end of the ranges quoted in the outputs.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
No you've missed the point. Absolutely I 100% agree that the scenarios should be on things like "do nothing" etc.
The problem isn't that the optimistic scenarios have been excluded, the problem is that the baseline scenarios have been excluded. As per Fraser Nelson's article the evidence on the severity of Omicron, which is already available from South Africa and has been used in the JP Morgan modelling wasn't used by SAGE.
That scenario was excluded as Medley said because the results didn't fit. They were only presenting catastrophe scenarios, so baseline scenarios (not optimistic ones) were excluded if they didn't show a catastrophe.
There's more other false and dodgy assumptions as Max has gone into great detail with.
This isn't about saying we should be cherry-picking optimistic or pessimistic, we shouldn't be doing either. Reasonable scenarios using accurate data weren't included in the data dump because they didn't present a catastrophe - that's not science that's fiddling with data.
OK, we're more or less agreeing now, except you're still stuck on using "scenarios" to mean "input parameters". Omicron being less severe than Delta is not a scenario; it's something the modellers have to make a call on either way, and they have chosen to downweight the evidence that it might be more benign, and cover that by putting in a large secondary uncertainty around their mean estimate. That is not the same as "excluding baseline scenarios", whatever that means. The wide ranges given show that all future outcomes are still included, it's just that the probabilities are different than if they'd not downweighted the evidence for Omicron being benign.
The problem with that being that they are acting as if there is no downside to excluding those more optimistic inputs. But by doing so they are making the social, economic, mental and health consequences all the worse because they are prioritising combating a possibly non existent threat over the other health aspects.
Just adding some tonal balance to this debate by saying I absolutely agree with this, although in their defence it appears that it also isn't in the modellers' remit, so it may be someone else's fault it's not being done.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Sure, but if (some of) variables A,B and C are stochastic, then you don't have a "scenario" as such, because the model outputs all possible future outcomes. Clearly, the models are accounting for the variables being uncertain, because they're quoting ranges for the output metrics.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
I don't know how the specific government model works, they've never let it be peer reviewed so I couldn't say. I just know how it works in general, at least the likely logistic regression that they're using. It allows for multiple inputs to be weighted to give an output of likelihood to happen for a given desired measure.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
Today’s Cabinet exposed divisions on how to battle Omicron and Johnson’s faltering standing. Before the meeting, government officials were readying restriction plans for next week.
One Tory observer suggests the PM has “lost control of the cabinet”.
Meanwhile, in Holland, it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
Actually Brexit is not an issue for many especially if the NI Protocol can be resolved
Brexiters are usually either economically inactive, or sufficiently rich that they could afford to be.
Today’s Cabinet exposed divisions on how to battle Omicron and Johnson’s faltering standing. Before the meeting, government officials were readying restriction plans for next week.
One Tory observer suggests the PM has “lost control of the cabinet”.
A PM should not “have control of his Cabinet”. It is supposed to be the collection of the best minds in the governing party to thrash out the Executive’s best policy course.
Well done to all involved if we have finally returned to this state, after the ego mania years of May and Brown, government by quad of Cameron and Johnson and whatever the fuck it was Blair thought he was doing.
Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
As I remember it, in the first lockdown that was the case in Wales with areas of supermarkets being barriered of because they contained hardware rather than foodstuffs.
Are you sure it wasn't just clothes? Or was Wales particularly daft? My local DIY shop has stayed open throughout (England, though).
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
No you've missed the point. Absolutely I 100% agree that the scenarios should be on things like "do nothing" etc.
The problem isn't that the optimistic scenarios have been excluded, the problem is that the baseline scenarios have been excluded. As per Fraser Nelson's article the evidence on the severity of Omicron, which is already available from South Africa and has been used in the JP Morgan modelling wasn't used by SAGE.
That scenario was excluded as Medley said because the results didn't fit. They were only presenting catastrophe scenarios, so baseline scenarios (not optimistic ones) were excluded if they didn't show a catastrophe.
There's more other false and dodgy assumptions as Max has gone into great detail with.
This isn't about saying we should be cherry-picking optimistic or pessimistic, we shouldn't be doing either. Reasonable scenarios using accurate data weren't included in the data dump because they didn't present a catastrophe - that's not science that's fiddling with data.
OK, we're more or less agreeing now, except you're still stuck on using "scenarios" to mean "input parameters". Omicron being less severe than Delta is not a scenario; it's something the modellers have to make a call on either way, and they have chosen to downweight the evidence that it might be more benign, and cover that by putting in a large secondary uncertainty around their mean estimate. That is not the same as "excluding baseline scenarios", whatever that means. The wide ranges given show that all future outcomes are still included, it's just that the probabilities are different than if they'd not downweighted the evidence for Omicron being benign.
The problem with that being that they are acting as if there is no downside to excluding those more optimistic inputs. But by doing so they are making the social, economic, mental and health consequences all the worse because they are prioritising combating a possibly non existent threat over the other health aspects.
Just adding some tonal balance to this debate by saying I absolutely agree with this, although in their defence it appears that it also isn't in the modellers' remit, so it may be someone else's fault it's not being done.
I will quite accept that they are working under instruction from the DoH. But if they had any respect for the science then seeing what is being done with their modelling I would expect them to say no.
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
By making sure the values of X (and Y and Z) cover the full range of possibilities, not just the ones you think will produce the modelling outputs you want. By excluding the possibility that Omicron will not produce the same level of health issues as previous variants they are picking and choosing the characteristics of the variant to get the outputs they want. As I said, that is not science.
X/Y/Z aren't things you can ascribe probabilities to. They are decisions taken by Government at the outset. As per my previous posts, the model does account for the possibility that Omicron is more benign than Delta - this results in outcomes towards the lower end of the ranges quoted in the outputs.
Based on the published comments over the last few days I think that assumption - that they are including the possibility that Omicron is more benign - is incorrect. The modelled results, as Max has pointed out, seems to exclude that possibility.
Meanwhile, in Holland, it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
Actually Brexit is not an issue for many especially if the NI Protocol can be resolved
Brexiters are usually either economically inactive, or sufficiently rich that they could afford to be.
Anxious families and businesses are in limbo tonight after Boris Johnson warned he could slap Covid restrictions on Christmas at any moment - but Cabinet backlash over data stopped the lockdown juggernaut....
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
No you've missed the point. Absolutely I 100% agree that the scenarios should be on things like "do nothing" etc.
The problem isn't that the optimistic scenarios have been excluded, the problem is that the baseline scenarios have been excluded. As per Fraser Nelson's article the evidence on the severity of Omicron, which is already available from South Africa and has been used in the JP Morgan modelling wasn't used by SAGE.
That scenario was excluded as Medley said because the results didn't fit. They were only presenting catastrophe scenarios, so baseline scenarios (not optimistic ones) were excluded if they didn't show a catastrophe.
There's more other false and dodgy assumptions as Max has gone into great detail with.
This isn't about saying we should be cherry-picking optimistic or pessimistic, we shouldn't be doing either. Reasonable scenarios using accurate data weren't included in the data dump because they didn't present a catastrophe - that's not science that's fiddling with data.
OK, we're more or less agreeing now, except you're still stuck on using "scenarios" to mean "input parameters". Omicron being less severe than Delta is not a scenario; it's something the modellers have to make a call on either way, and they have chosen to downweight the evidence that it might be more benign, and cover that by putting in a large secondary uncertainty around their mean estimate. That is not the same as "excluding baseline scenarios", whatever that means. The wide ranges given show that all future outcomes are still included, it's just that the probabilities are different than if they'd not downweighted the evidence for Omicron being benign.
It is a scenario, a plausible one. The point of having a logistic regression model is that you can change multiple inputs and see what happens in each different scenario. The government modellers have been asked by some unknown party to not create scenarios where Omicron doesn't cause the NHS to collapse despite there being many plausible, likely I'd say at this point, ones where it won't.
No, I don't think that's true. I think you are basing this on the off-the-cuff Twitter exchange between Fraser Nelson and Graham Medley, and I think this is based on the two sides not understanding what the other means by "scenario".
Hmm, that's what he said and what they've presented, that Omicron will manifest identical symptoms to Delta despite it being just as likely (if more more likely) that it is less severe, three studies have now shown that.
And once again, there's nothing stopping them from saying "we have new data, wait while we rerun the model, give is 20 minutes" I mean I've literally done that and delayed a board meeting because the deck was outdated in a few key places, even though we only got the new data a couple of hours before the board were due to meet.
On your second point: totally agree in principle; I would go further and add that there's no reason they can't rerun the model in real time so the decision makers can ask for further "what-if" style runs. However, it's plausible that huge operational inefficiencies in the way the modelling output is presented to policymakers makes this impossible.
On the first: I've been through the exchange several times and I think it's as I said: Medley is interpreting "scenario" to mean "what happens if we reran the model with Omicron definitely being mild", to which the answer if obviously, "nothing, but we don't know that for certain, so why would be run that?" Nelson is misunderstanding that a "scenario" means a run of the model, not part of the input set, and therefore asking why they wouldn't include it in the inputs. Medley misses the question, because in his mind, they are doing that, just capturing it in the volatility, not the best estimate.
Anxious families and businesses are in limbo tonight after Boris Johnson warned he could slap Covid restrictions on Christmas at any moment - but Cabinet backlash over data stopped the lockdown juggernaut....
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
Totally off topic, I see Novavax has now been approved by Indonesia, the Philippines, and the EU.
Don't know if they can actually *make* the vaccine, but nice to know it's approved. It's also a protein based vaccine, so it's nice to spread the technological risk around a bit.
Fraser Nelson: "So we have an asteroid that may hit the Earth?" Scientist: "Yes. And we have no idea how likely it is - only that it's heading towards us. NORAD were too busy tracking Santa Claus." Fraser Nelson: "But it may miss." Scientist: "Yes." Fraser Nelson: "So why are you only modelling what will happen if it hits?" Scientist: "Because the decision-makers need to consider what to do if the worst comes to the worst." Fraser Nelson: "But they might not have to do anything if it doesn't hit." Scientist: "But it may. And they need to think about what they'd do." Fraser Nelson: "Why didn't you model the fact it might miss?" Scientist: "Because that doesn't really help the decision-makers."
That Fraser Nelson article in the Spectator is really a whole load of nothing IMO. What the scientist said makes sense.
What a load of crap.
If the government are considering locking us down because of the virus then they need to know what's likely to happen with the virus. If the models say that the NHS isn't likely to be overwhelmed but those models are disregarded in favour of those that say it is, then that's operating with false information.
It's not (see TimT's reply).
It is.
If the government is weighing up their response then they need the full information. ' If the full information says for instance there's a 99.9% chance that the NHS won't be overwhelmed, but there's a 0.1% chance that it is - then do you seriously think the government should only be shown the 0.1% scenario without any qualification of caveat or rating of how likely it is?
They should get the full information, and be allowed to judge with full knowledge whether the risk of these so-called "never events" are worth acting over or not. If they don't have the full information, then they can't weigh that up.
"If the full information says for instance there's a 99.9% chance that the NHS won't be overwhelmed, but there's a 0.1% chance that it is"
But that's not what Nelson was talking about (although he moved onto that at the end). He was talking about a lack of a model that replicated some of JP Morgan's modelling, not the probabilities of any scenario.
Nelson was talking about modelling that used data that the scientists had recognised. But since this model didn't give "the right" answer it was disregarded.
If you decide in advance to disregard all models that don't give a certain outcome, then you've prejudiced your work in advance.
I might suggest you reread what I (and especially TimT) have written.
There is no point in presenting reasonable scenarios where the decision-makers need to do nothing, because that's pointless. The decision-makers need to know the scenarios where they may have to do things, so they can consider them.
The probabilities may come later.
I assumed when Max and others were going on about the Nelson article, that the scientist had said something outrageous. Instead he said something utterly sensible, and Nelson has either misunderstood the point of the modelling, or is deliberately shit-stirring. The scientist should have explained a little better, though.
No this is utterly wrong. If you have a whole range of possible scenarios and you only present the ones that result in action then you are taking the responsibility for decision making away from the politicians and giving it to the unelected scientists. By removing the scenarios where nothing needs to be done you are forcing the politicians into a position where they either do something - even if it is probably unnecessary - or they can be accused of ignoring the evidence as it was presented to them. It is absolutely vital that the advisors present all possible scenarios and weigh them for the decision makers.
It is not utterly wrong. It is presenting the scenarios that need stuff doing about them.
"Present all possible scenarios"
And how many different scenarios is that? Ten? a hundred? A thousand?
The scientists are saying: "these are the sh*t scenarios. These are the ones that, if they occur, we will need to take actions on." Presenting scenarios that need no action is pointless - because there are no actions required. It doesn't mean the politicians are being told these will happen, or that these are the only scenarios. They are the ones to worry about.
It's not that they're saying these are the only scenarios that may happen; or the probabilities of them happening; they're the ones the politicians really need to worry about.
It's simple stuff.
FPT
The problem is that right now people think the most optomistic scenario from SAGE is for a peak of 3000 admissions a day, as that is their lowest model. Except other models suggest this is NOT the lowest possible. The narrative is running that if we do nothing, we will definitely see a minimum of 3000 admissions a day. It’s dishonest. I’m not blaming the scientists entirely here, I want to know what instructions they are getting.
Then I'd blame those telling the people that this is the issue without a fair grasp on what SAGE and SPI-M-O are doing, or their terms of reference, or the specifics of decision making during a period of ignorance but with the possibility of a Never Event (as described by TimT).
That would be the attention-seekers of the media and some Twitter commentators. Who grab stuff, skim it for an attention-grabbing takeaway line, and plaster it everywhere they can.
Why use knowingly incorrect data points for model inputs, though? However you cut it that's just bad practice and now they've managed to lose their last ounce of credibility with the politicians. The fault lies with whoever is asking for them to do that, sure, but also with them for not having the professional integrity to flag that up as bad practice. They're being asked to put their finger on the scale so someone can use their findings to push the lockdown decision making process forwards. As it turned out Cabinet took exception to being presented data that has no basis in reality.
Which knowingly incorrect parameters? Looking at the Warwick paper, they had several possible Ve figures against potential levels of immune escape and booster effectiveness (high to low), and it was written and updated on the 11th of December.
TimT explained the parameters of the decision-making process in conditions of high uncertainty and with credible possibilities of a Never Event, and it follows exactly that process.
So it could either be that process, with the criteria of a Never Event as laid down over a decade ago in the last Labour Government, or its a cabal of evil scientists or a secret civil servant with a fetish for lockdowns who’s not been sprung yet.
I hate lockdowns. I personally incline to the view that there will not be a need for them. But I agree that the probabilities involved are still unclear, and that they should ensure that they have the options on the table, together with what they would or would not do, as well as the costs for them, all clearly laid out.
And, of course, as Paul Mainwood drily observed a few days ago: if we do want to adjust for a variable severity, we can simply do the less-than-arcane procedure of “multiply by a constant” against the outcomes.
For one of the three vaccine efficacy tables, they used the one not based on observation and used the 85% which used an additional 6x reduction in antibody binding efficiency. The second and slightly more contentious one is not using our own study data which gives Omicron a different manifestation of symptoms than Delta, get the central forecast simply assumes that Omicron manifests identical symptoms to Delta.
The issue I have with the kind of modelling here is that Omicron isn't an unknown unknown. We know things about it, we know fairly well what vaccine efficacy is, we know with a reasonable degree of certainty that it manifests as an upper respiratory tract virus than a lower respiratory tract one like Delta.
It's simply not right to ask the decision makers to form an opinion on the right way forwards if the best available data isn't being used and instead guesswork that we know to be worse is being used. I understand the need for expediency and that in a situation where exponential growth is a factor acting late can mean it's too late to act. I do understand that they are under pressure. However, there's simply no need to put their finger on the scales, whoever asked them to do that is trying to force a decision on lockdown and it's spectacularly back fired on them because now the politicians have lost all confidence in the modelling. The 7k central forecast from the summer had already hurt their credibility now it's completely destroyed because they have been found to be fiddling the numbers for some as yet unknown DoH bod who wants to guide the process in a specific direction.
On the whole idea of the "never scenario" it's fanciful that anything that comes with COVID is now in that category.
I also agree that we probably won't need a lockdown. My issue is that the data for that scenario isn't being presented to the politicians when it absolutely should be. It's not an unlikely scenario that Omicron is a paper tiger, yet our politicians are given that option because the unnamed party in the DoH has deemed it irrelevant to the decision making process and asked the modellers not to give their findings for that scenario. It would be a piece of piss to do it as well.
There was never a “7k central forecast” in the summer as anyone who ever read the fucking document in question knew.
True, but why have it in there then? Just like these unlikely to pass scenarios all it does is sap their credibility. You've fairly outlined why the modelling isn't bad, yet the politicians are making decisions based on 600-6000 deaths per day.
It was in there, as it made clear, because they’d just had a surge of R=1.5 in Scotland and therefore couldn’t rule it out as a scenario for the UK as a whole. So they put it as the highest plausible scenario.
Considering it plausible because it had literally just been happening in Scotland, although they were pointing more at the R=1.1 route.
As they said at the time and in the explanation of what each of the scenarios were.
I get why the media ignored the explanation (attention-grabbing) but if politicians who are being presented with the scenarios and having the experts answer questions on hand and still be unable to understand, then such idiots shouldn’t be anywhere near any position of power or decision-making.
But a sustained 1.1 also didn't happen and a sustained 1.5 was never plausible, it was, in fact, implausible yet presented as something to plan against.
We're lucky that the politicians ignored the summer forecasts because they'd have insisted on silly measures like indoor distancing and vaccine passports which have been of no help in Europe and in fact may have been counter productive as it hasn't allowed them to build a natural immunity wall in the unvaccinated.
As to your other points, your faith and trust in people who you have no possible way of removing from the levers of power is worrying. Politicians may be flawed (and this set particularly so) yet we still have some way of making the decision on whether or not we want to do what they say. The unnamed bod in the DoH putting his fingers on the scale and presenting the politicians with a range unlikely scenarios and not also presenting the likely scenarios, well we have no way of removing this person from power, no way of holding them accountable to us.
That makes me instinctively wary of of them and sceptical about what their motives are. I know what Labour's motives are, I know what the Tories motives are, they told me at length in ab election campaign. We have an unelected tyranny of experts, maybe you're happy to live like that, I'm not. Quite frankly, our views on this differ too much, I'm extremely worried that the UK and its people are too happy to simply hand our freedoms to these unknown experts with no guarantees they'll be happy to give them back again.
So yes, colour me very sceptical about anyone who is pushing a very narrow set of possible outcomes while excluding other more favourable ones. There's simply no need for it.
As to the other point, I understand the data came later than the report, that's a reason to tell the decision makers - "we have new key data inputs for our model, please await our new results while we rerun the scenarios with the new data" not a reason to run with the outdated model and present simply incorrect scenarios that will now never come to pass.
One of the two of us has bothered to actually read the reports and models. The other bases his opinions on media and commentator reports of them.
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
Today’s Cabinet exposed divisions on how to battle Omicron and Johnson’s faltering standing. Before the meeting, government officials were readying restriction plans for next week.
One Tory observer suggests the PM has “lost control of the cabinet”.
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Sure, but if (some of) variables A,B and C are stochastic, then you don't have a "scenario" as such, because the model outputs all possible future outcomes. Clearly, the models are accounting for the variables being uncertain, because they're quoting ranges for the output metrics.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
I don't know how the specific government model works, they've never let it be peer reviewed so I couldn't say. I just know how it works in general, at least the likely logistic regression that they're using. It allows for multiple inputs to be weighted to give an output of likelihood to happen for a given desired measure.
The key question for me is: is it
a) a fully stochastic model, e.g. whereby vaccine effectiveness follows (say) a Normal distribution with mean 85% and SD of 5%, and the ranges are arrived at by sampling the 2.5th and 97.5th percentiles of the outputs; or b) deterministic, eg vaccine effectiveness is assumed to be 85% in the base case, and they arrive at the ranges by modelling something like 75% for the higher end and 95% for the upper end
If it's A, then it's understandable that Medley misunderstood the intended meaning of "scenario". Because it's not meaningful in the context of a model that, by default, models all possible outcomes for a given policy decision. If it's B, then things get a bit murkier for me.
Totally off topic, I see Novavax has now been approved by Indonesia, the Philippines, and the EU.
Don't know if they can actually *make* the vaccine, but nice to know it's approved. It's also a protein based vaccine, so it's nice to spread the technological risk around a bit.
I think it also makes quite a few people eligible who aren't for viral vector or mRNA. I think the MHRA approval is coming soon too. It only took them an extra 8 months to get approved than they had pencilled in.
On manufacturing, they say 50-60m doses per month. I find that unlikely.
No10 is waiting for new data from Imperial College London, which will shed more light on the severity of Omicron, to arrive tomorrow before making a final call.
No10 is waiting for new data from Imperial College London, which will shed more light on the severity of Omicron, to arrive tomorrow before making a final call.
Tee hee. That’s how I’d expect my 1 year old to look if he was pretending to use an old fashioned phone. I can see what people mean now when they call her the female Boris. Trouble for her is the joke’s been told better before. And the joke is also now as in vogue as Jim Davidson’s riffs on foreigners.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
By making sure the values of X (and Y and Z) cover the full range of possibilities, not just the ones you think will produce the modelling outputs you want. By excluding the possibility that Omicron will not produce the same level of health issues as previous variants they are picking and choosing the characteristics of the variant to get the outputs they want. As I said, that is not science.
X/Y/Z aren't things you can ascribe probabilities to. They are decisions taken by Government at the outset. As per my previous posts, the model does account for the possibility that Omicron is more benign than Delta - this results in outcomes towards the lower end of the ranges quoted in the outputs.
Based on the published comments over the last few days I think that assumption - that they are including the possibility that Omicron is more benign - is incorrect. The modelled results, as Max has pointed out, seems to exclude that possibility.
No, that's definitely wrong. The presence of ranges in the published output means they must be including it, at least in the volatility. Indeed, my main criticism of the output is that the ranges quoted are so wide as to render the exercise pointless - they're wide because the modellers just don't have any credible information yet to make them narrower.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Sure, but if (some of) variables A,B and C are stochastic, then you don't have a "scenario" as such, because the model outputs all possible future outcomes. Clearly, the models are accounting for the variables being uncertain, because they're quoting ranges for the output metrics.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
I don't know how the specific government model works, they've never let it be peer reviewed so I couldn't say. I just know how it works in general, at least the likely logistic regression that they're using. It allows for multiple inputs to be weighted to give an output of likelihood to happen for a given desired measure.
The key question for me is: is it
a) a fully stochastic model, e.g. whereby vaccine effectiveness follows (say) a Normal distribution with mean 85% and SD of 5%, and the ranges are arrived at by sampling the 2.5th and 97.5th percentiles of the outputs; or b) deterministic, eg vaccine effectiveness is assumed to be 85% in the base case, and they arrive at the ranges by modelling something like 75% for the higher end and 95% for the upper end
If it's A, then it's understandable that Medley misunderstood the intended meaning of "scenario". Because it's not meaningful in the context of a model that, by default, models all possible outcomes for a given policy decision. If it's B, then things get a bit murkier for me.
I don't understand why anyone would go with option A, though. If you're trying to model specific outputs then surely option B makes a lot more sense, but then again, I'm not an infectious disease modeller so maybe there's other factors I don't know about. 🤷♂️
Meanwhile, in Holland it is illegal to go to a pub or a restaurant, shop for clothes or even (and I find this hard to believe) hardware, which has never been the case in the UK.
As I remember it, in the first lockdown that was the case in Wales with areas of supermarkets being barriered of because they contained hardware rather than foodstuffs.
Are you sure it wasn't just clothes? Or was Wales particularly daft? My local DIY shop has stayed open throughout (England, though).
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
That's one possible purpose of modelling.
Another purpose would be entirely causally different i.e. "what will happen that we might then have to do something about".
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Sure, but if (some of) variables A,B and C are stochastic, then you don't have a "scenario" as such, because the model outputs all possible future outcomes. Clearly, the models are accounting for the variables being uncertain, because they're quoting ranges for the output metrics.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
I don't know how the specific government model works, they've never let it be peer reviewed so I couldn't say. I just know how it works in general, at least the likely logistic regression that they're using. It allows for multiple inputs to be weighted to give an output of likelihood to happen for a given desired measure.
The key question for me is: is it
a) a fully stochastic model, e.g. whereby vaccine effectiveness follows (say) a Normal distribution with mean 85% and SD of 5%, and the ranges are arrived at by sampling the 2.5th and 97.5th percentiles of the outputs; or b) deterministic, eg vaccine effectiveness is assumed to be 85% in the base case, and they arrive at the ranges by modelling something like 75% for the higher end and 95% for the upper end
If it's A, then it's understandable that Medley misunderstood the intended meaning of "scenario". Because it's not meaningful in the context of a model that, by default, models all possible outcomes for a given policy decision. If it's B, then things get a bit murkier for me.
I don't understand why anyone would go with option A, though. If you're trying to model specific outputs then surely option B makes a lot more sense, but then again, I'm not an infectious disease modeller so maybe there's other factors I don't know about. 🤷♂️
Fair enough. My day job is almost entirely based on A (with some of B thrown in to answer side questions, on occasion). I am therefore looking at what output and other information is available, and interpreting it as having come from similar models to A. I suspect you are doing similar, with B.
Considering that the unvaccinated are likely to be younger, and conversely the boosted to be older, those numbers are extremely encouraging.
They are amazing. Largely pre-Omicron, presumably, but a factor of 61 gives you a hell of a margin for any sample differences or difference between variants.
No10 is waiting for new data from Imperial College London, which will shed more light on the severity of Omicron, to arrive tomorrow before making a final call.
They also need to look at case trends. It’s been growing fast, yes, but seems to be levelling off already in London or at least no longer doubling every few days.
Well. Today was the end of PM Johnson. He is a puppet of the Cabinet now. He was a puppet of the Opposition and back benches, but the set is now complete. He will remain as a figurehead, but only in the absence of anyone obviously better. That he was a moderating influence on his Party all along seems to have passed many by. We are at the beginning of the end of the complete Brexification/UKIPisation of the Tory Party.
Considering that the unvaccinated are likely to be younger, and conversely the boosted to be older, those numbers are extremely encouraging.
Those numbers are incredible, especially for boosters. Hopefully that holds for Omicron as well.
Well, Moderna released some preliminary numbers re Omicron today that are highly encouraging.
The question is "how quickly" will protection wane. With all the first gen vaccines, we have seen it protection against symptomatic Covid coming down by about 10 percentage points every three months. Now, some of this variant related, and some waning efficiency, but the big question to me is will a third shot really slow that down?
If so, great. If not, we're all on annual/semi-annual Covid shots. (Which is really not the end of the world.)
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Oh dear. You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. 'Multiple input logistic regression' lolz.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Its my understanding the Japan one was better on certain provisions, but yes there were the Aus/NZ ones too. The complaints of "opening up our farming industry" are hypocritical, if you believe in protectionism then you should want on tariffs on European produce etc too. I think opening ourselves up to competition is a good thing.
The Aus/NZ ones aren't the end of the road either. Remember that Remainers used to say that trade deals would take seven years, the Aus one certainly didn't, but other negotiations are underway.
CPTPP looks like the absolutely massive one that would be great to have and if we joined the CPTPP that would be a market even bigger than the entire EU itself. Truss has begun the work on that, so again she knows the potential.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
Well. Today was the end of PM Johnson. He is a puppet of the Cabinet now. He was a puppet of the Opposition and back benches, but the set is now complete. He will remain as a figurehead, but only in the absence of anyone obviously better. That he was a moderating influence on his Party all along seems to have passed many by. We are at the beginning of the end of the complete Brexification/UKIPisation of the Tory Party.
Yes the ERG/CRG lunatic fringe are running things now.
BigRich has been doing too much to support the local pub industry to make sensible comments tonight, but: has the South African cases number been mentioned? 8,511 that's supper low, this thing, omicron, is burning out so quickly its stilly!
I think you, @NerysHughes and I are the only people who give a shit about what's going on in South Africa.
Me too. I’m just fed up of people not understanding frustration that it looks like SAGE isn’t providing modelling data based on omicron being milder, for whatever reason. So not bothering to post.
I've rejoined the Tory Party to partake in this leadership contest.
Truss for me, us republican Tories need to stick together.
How long until you qualify to vote in the leadership election - as that could easily be early January at the present rate.
Three months. But I may get an immediate vote, I was a member for 23 years, and my membership only lapsed last year.
FWIW - I think Boris Johnson is secure until May at least, the locals might be the tipping point if it is a very bad night.
Still has to be a danger that there is a meltdown over COVID restrictions. They kicked the can today, but seems like there isn't much collective responsibility in the cabinet.
Actually I think Boris Johnson has played a blinder today.
If Omicron is as bad as SAGE think it will be, he'll put the blame squarely on the cabinet refuseniks.
According to @JosiasJessop we will never know how bad SAGE think it will be, as they're under no obligation or responsibility to say how it will be.
Their only responsibility apparently is to forward the worst case catastrophising they can come up with, while anything that they think will happen should be binned if it isn't a catastrophe.
So maybe no action is entirely the right response to how bad they think it will be and we should have that attitude towards SAGE indefinitely going forwards because apparently they'll never tell us if things are going to be OK in their expectations.
I really, really think you ned to go back to the last thread, read, and think. That's not what I'm saying at all.
Please don't misrepresent me.
You were saying, were you not, that only the catastrophic scenarios should be presented?
The scenario of what they think will happen, using the most accurate data available, as explained well by @MaxPB above was not in the SAGE scenarios. Why not? Why should they not present what they think will happen, using the best available data?
There isn't one "never event" in question here, there's two. And under the principle that advisors advise and ministers decide, the best available modelling should be presented without prejudice to what outcome it gives so that the ministers can make an informed decision.
If you wish to provide worst case scenarios AS WELL as central scenarios that's entirely reasonable. And since we have two worst cases here (an NHS collapse, and an unnecessary lockdown) it would make sense to show what assumptions are required for scenarios for both of those.
Instead the results from one catastrophe has been cherry picked without the central scenarios being shown, or the other side.
You and Max keep using the word "scenarios" wrong (or at least in a sense I have never seen it used, in modelling terms). The "scenarios" are things like: Do Nothing, Impose Some Restrictions, Full Lockdown. The complaint you are making seems to be that the model input parameters are biased towards pessimism, because the modellers are excluding data sources which would result in more optimistic selections.
There is no value in modelling scenarios in which we remove restrictions, because no-one is suggesting that. There is a good argument (an excellent one, actually) that we should be modelling based on realistic, rather than pessimistic, parameters, because otherwise we are overstating the chances of Bad Outcomes, and hence giving them too much weight when making policy decisions. However, it is wrong to say that they aren't capturing non-catastrophic scenarios, because the models are stochastic by nature, and are designed to model all possible future outcomes. In addition, if the secondary uncertainty around the mean parameters is high enough, you are also capturing the possibility that the more favourable view of the parameters is actually true. It's just that, because the mean parameters are artificially pessimistic, the midpoint of the ranges produced, and - especially - the worst case outcomes, will look worse than if you picked something more "realistic".
The advisors should present all possible likely outcomes of their models including ones where no further action is needed or restrictions are completely lifted - so long as any of their models indicate these outcomes. They should advise which of the modelled outcomes are more likely or less likely but they should certainly not be excluding outcomes because they are not worst case. It is for elected politicians to make decisions about which models they wish to consider but they need to be shown the full selection and then make an informed decision on that basis.
Only showing the worst outcomes is the scientists forcing the politicians to follow a particular preferred route even if that outcome is unlikely and irrespective of what the costs are to the country. It is a ludicrous way to manage a pandemic and all it will do is destroy any last vestiges of trust in the modelling or the advice.
That's not how the models work (to my understanding). You feed in a set of inputs, which includes a particular policy decision, like Do Nothing, or Impose Lockdown. The model spits out a set of probability-weighted outcomes, and the outputs are summarised and presented to policymakers. All possible outcomes are included which are relevant to those inputs. You can't get the model to tell you whether you should take action or not, because that's an input to the model, not an outcome.
Deciding what answer you want before you do the modelling is not science. If that is what they are doing then we should chuck the whole lot out.
The purpose of the modelling is to answer questions like "If we do X, what will happen?" If you model that for several different values of X, you can then decide which one to do.
How else would you decide?
No, the point of modelling is to say if we do X while variables A, B, and C are true, false or in between what happens. That's the model scenario. No one is running a simple single input linear regression model, it will be at minimum a multiple input logistic regression with reasonable weighting for vaccine efficacy, transmission and virulence/severity.
Oh dear. You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. 'Multiple input logistic regression' lolz.
What's wrong with that? It appears to be one of the tools they are using to model the growth of the variant.
Well. Today was the end of PM Johnson. He is a puppet of the Cabinet now. He was a puppet of the Opposition and back benches, but the set is now complete. He will remain as a figurehead, but only in the absence of anyone obviously better. That he was a moderating influence on his Party all along seems to have passed many by. We are at the beginning of the end of the complete Brexification/UKIPisation of the Tory Party.
Why is he a puppet of the Cabinet? We live in a cabinet-based governing system. It may have been forgotten in recent years but here we are now.
Tee hee. That’s how I’d expect my 1 year old to look if he was pretending to use an old fashioned phone. I can see what people mean now when they call her the female Boris. Trouble for her is the joke’s been told better before. And the joke is also now as in vogue as Jim Davidson’s riffs on foreigners.
After a few years of suffering someone who fancies himself as king, we really don’t need someone who fancies herself as queen.
Considering that the unvaccinated are likely to be younger, and conversely the boosted to be older, those numbers are extremely encouraging.
Those numbers are incredible, especially for boosters. Hopefully that holds for Omicron as well.
Well, Moderna released some preliminary numbers re Omicron today that are highly encouraging.
The question is "how quickly" will protection wane. With all the first gen vaccines, we have seen it protection against symptomatic Covid coming down by about 10 percentage points every three months. Now, some of this variant related, and some waning efficiency, but the big question to me is will a third shot really slow that down?
If so, great. If not, we're all on annual/semi-annual Covid shots. (Which is really not the end of the world.)
Also depends on how asymptomatic infection.
If people are getting occasional 'free boosters' then there might be increasing long term protection built.
If so, great. If not, we're all on annual/semi-annual Covid shots. (Which is really not the end of the world.)
If it ends up that we all (or at least the older ones amongst us) need annual or semi-annual boosters, that would be perfectly manageable. Vaccination is not hard to do, you can train people up to do it quite quickly, and if you know you've got to do it regularly on a large scale, you can set up the premises and the infrastructure to do it routinely and quite cheaply, I'd have thought. It would surely be much, much less expensive and difficult than arranging that people get a regular dental appointment, for example.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
I thought the animal welfare rules were uniform across the EU, when we were in it. Obviously Aus/NZ don't have to abide by the rules.
Me on the phone my dad this morning: "Everyone I know has got Omicron, or knows someone with Omicron. Everyone's Christmas plans are up in the air. Everyone's depressed"
My dad: "This the worst I've seen the English cricket team in my lifetime"
No10 is waiting for new data from Imperial College London, which will shed more light on the severity of Omicron, to arrive tomorrow before making a final call.
They also need to look at case trends. It’s been growing fast, yes, but seems to be levelling off already in London or at least no longer doubling every few days.
As soon as it starts levelling off they'll ignore it and find somewhere it is still increasing.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
I thought the animal welfare rules were uniform across the EU, when we were in it. Obviously Aus/NZ don't have to abide by the rules.
If you believe that, you'll believe anything.
Aus/NZ have to meet our standards to export to us. Its always been possible for them to export to us if they meet our standards, which is why you can find their meet on our shelves already, but you don't find US chlorinated chicken.
The difference is that there are tariffs and quotas on their goods currently even if they meet our standards.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
I thought the animal welfare rules were uniform across the EU, when we were in it. Obviously Aus/NZ don't have to abide by the rules.
I think there are minimum standards that some people exceed (as we did, and as the Danes do).
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
The EU is pretty atrocious on many aspects of animal welfare. Certainly significantly worse than the UK. So I am not sure using that as a benchmark for new trade deals really tells us much at all. Nick Palmer will have a better handle on this.
Harry Cole @MrHarryCole · 24m Tory big beasts including Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss and Kwarsi Kwarteng resisted new restrictions without clearer data on the surging Omicron variant and the threat to hospitals..
Harry Cole @MrHarryCole · 22m But hopes are rising that the window to do so is now too narrow to ruin Christmas - but puts New Year’s Eve celebrations into serious doubt.
Considering that the unvaccinated are likely to be younger, and conversely the boosted to be older, those numbers are extremely encouraging.
Those numbers are incredible, especially for boosters. Hopefully that holds for Omicron as well.
Well, Moderna released some preliminary numbers re Omicron today that are highly encouraging.
The question is "how quickly" will protection wane. With all the first gen vaccines, we have seen it protection against symptomatic Covid coming down by about 10 percentage points every three months. Now, some of this variant related, and some waning efficiency, but the big question to me is will a third shot really slow that down?
If so, great. If not, we're all on annual/semi-annual Covid shots. (Which is really not the end of the world.)
I had already come to the conclusion that annual jabs as a minimum would be the norm. As I said the other day, we need to set up a separate inoculation agency that deals with all jabs, both routine and extraordinary, outside of the normal NHS/GP system and which has dedicated funding for that purpose.
One gets the impression Liz Truss is particularly disliked by Remainers because she used to be a Remainer herself and then switched to Leave as soon as the result was in.
No, you get that impression, I'm not sure anyone else does.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
One of the arguments why Brexit was a good idea was that we'd be able to negotiate our own trade deals.
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
The only new deals she worked out as far as I am aware were with Aus/NZ and Japan. Aus and NZ were worth diddley squat to our industries and severly opened up our farming industry to cheaper meat due to poorer animal treatment. Japan's deal was worse than what we had with Japan as part of the EU, and the rest of the deals are short term roll over deals which need to be renewed again.
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
Do Australia/NZ have worse animal welfare than the EU? I mean, I know there are some good places inside the EU (like Denmark), but my understanding is that - in aggregate - they are well below UK levels.
Comments
We have that AND we can go to the pub to do it.
The problem is that hasn't been done by SAGE. Instead they ran all the scenarios where X presented a catastrophe then only showed those. They didn't show scenarios based on X where it didn't result in a catastrophe, despite that being plausible too.
They should show the full picture, not half of it, then let people make an informed and educated decision. Instead they're trying to pull the wool over the eyes and make it a fait accompli in the worst practices of Sir Humphrey.
Some may question her damascene conversion to LEAVE as soon as the result came in given how strongly she supported REMAIN and the Prime Minister at the time but I'm sure that's coincidental.
The clear conviction she has that LEAVE was the correct decision seemingly simply because it was the one favoured by the electorate (or at least those who voted) is intriguing. A more nuanced "I didn't agree with the vote but I respect it and I will do my best to make it work in the interests of the whole country" might have sounded better but perhaps that's not how the Conservative Party functions these days.
One succeeds perhaps by continually displaying the zeal of the convert.
If you have a link that explains how the models work, please can you post it? It is possible that I've simply misunderstood how they work, but I haven't been able to find an explanation online.
The question is why the scenarios which don't result in catastrophe aren't included in the SAGE evidence. Scenarios that don't result in catastrophe are just as much evidence as those that do, if they've got reasonable input parameters.
In modelling you're supposed to be choosing your inputs, not your outputs. Once you start choosing your outputs and working backwards from there you've got a problem.
And once again, there's nothing stopping them from saying "we have new data, wait while we rerun the model, give is 20 minutes" I mean I've literally done that and delayed a board meeting because the deck was outdated in a few key places, even though we only got the new data a couple of hours before the board were due to meet.
One Tory observer suggests the PM has “lost control of the cabinet”.
https://www.ft.com/content/ebba9620-eb98-46ba-a474-1114c0b7cb29
a) having argued for remain, some killer fact right at the end of the campaign actually changed her mind;
b) to be on the winning side she has managed to delude herself that she would now have supported leave all along;
c) to have a ministerial career in the current climate she is simply pretending, hiding her real views;
d) she has no views of her own and simply chooses whatever position appears to be in her self-interest at the time (now, who does that remind us of?)
or, I suppose, that she was always a closet leaver but thought remain would win and under Cameron went remain for reason c)
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/22/supermarkets-in-wales-to-sell-only-essentials-during-lockdown
Remainers claimed that not only could we not negotiate our own trade deals, but we'd be so desperate that we wouldn't even be able to match the EU's trade deals . . . and to be fair when Liam Fox was International Trade Secretary he was so incapable of getting agreements signed, that seemed like it could be plausible.
Truss not only shot the Fox that we couldn't get agreements signed, she's been at the very forefront of working towards getting newer and better agreements signed.
As such a Damascene Conversion for her seems entirely reasonable. She knows better than anyone in the country the capacity for post-Brexit trade agreements that the UK can sign because she's literally been walking the walk.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/south-africa/
Well done to all involved if we have finally returned to this state, after the ego mania years of May and Brown, government by quad of Cameron and Johnson and whatever the fuck it was Blair thought he was doing.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/17100048/boris-johnson-covid-christmas-restrictions/
Festive hell 🧵
On the first: I've been through the exchange several times and I think it's as I said: Medley is interpreting "scenario" to mean "what happens if we reran the model with Omicron definitely being mild", to which the answer if obviously, "nothing, but we don't know that for certain, so why would be run that?" Nelson is misunderstanding that a "scenario" means a run of the model, not part of the input set, and therefore asking why they wouldn't include it in the inputs. Medley misses the question, because in his mind, they are doing that, just capturing it in the volatility, not the best estimate.
Don't know if they can actually *make* the vaccine, but nice to know it's approved. It's also a protein based vaccine, so it's nice to spread the technological risk around a bit.
https://twitter.com/KevinPascoe/status/1473026249752813574/photo/1
The other bases his opinions on media and commentator reports of them.
There was a report that CFR was now about 10% what is was in SA although a Danish study puts it at 40% (1.5% down to 0.6% total) for omicron.
Thatcher was prepared to listen to her Cabinet. It made her a better PM and when she stopped doing so, it was time for her to go.
If Boris is, then he might be more capable than it had seemed on recent days.
a) a fully stochastic model, e.g. whereby vaccine effectiveness follows (say) a Normal distribution with mean 85% and SD of 5%, and the ranges are arrived at by sampling the 2.5th and 97.5th percentiles of the outputs; or
b) deterministic, eg vaccine effectiveness is assumed to be 85% in the base case, and they arrive at the ranges by modelling something like 75% for the higher end and 95% for the upper end
If it's A, then it's understandable that Medley misunderstood the intended meaning of "scenario". Because it's not meaningful in the context of a model that, by default, models all possible outcomes for a given policy decision. If it's B, then things get a bit murkier for me.
So when he inevitably caves, especially if the caseload goes bad...
On manufacturing, they say 50-60m doses per month. I find that unlikely.
But many around the table feel the health lobby has won and it is only a matter of WHEN rule of six etc return...
https://twitter.com/MrHarryCole/status/1473054403229851650
Unvaccinated: 451 cases per 100k
Vaccinated: 134 cases per 100k
Boosted: 48 cases per 100k
Unvaccinated: 6.1 deaths per 100k
Vaccinated: 0.5 deaths per 100k
Boosted: 0.1 deaths per 100k
https://twitter.com/ryanstruyk/status/1472932495092232201
And if many of them feel that way, surely it won't happen.
The new leader of Chile is a Socialist
The current Labour leader said he was a Socialist when seeking the leadership.
He will not reassert that now
She talks a good game, which I suppose will please some tory members of a certain age, and she hasn't really upset anyone I suppose.
No clarity in the week before Christmas for a second year in a row
Film by @mollie_malone1 https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1473055967617167362/video/1
https://twitter.com/gavinesler/status/1473056139554217986
He is a puppet of the Cabinet now. He was a puppet of the Opposition and back benches, but the set is now complete.
He will remain as a figurehead, but only in the absence of anyone obviously better.
That he was a moderating influence on his Party all along seems to have passed many by.
We are at the beginning of the end of the complete Brexification/UKIPisation of the Tory Party.
The question is "how quickly" will protection wane. With all the first gen vaccines, we have seen it protection against symptomatic Covid coming down by about 10 percentage points every three months. Now, some of this variant related, and some waning efficiency, but the big question to me is will a third shot really slow that down?
If so, great. If not, we're all on annual/semi-annual Covid shots. (Which is really not the end of the world.)
The Aus/NZ ones aren't the end of the road either. Remember that Remainers used to say that trade deals would take seven years, the Aus one certainly didn't, but other negotiations are underway.
CPTPP looks like the absolutely massive one that would be great to have and if we joined the CPTPP that would be a market even bigger than the entire EU itself. Truss has begun the work on that, so again she knows the potential.
Must be the first time in a very long time when cabinet government actually meant something.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/mrc-gida/2021-12-16-COVID19-Report-49.pdf
If people are getting occasional 'free boosters' then there might be increasing long term protection built.
Let's hope some actual real world data is input into the infernal mathematical machine.
Make a nice change.
Election Maps UK
@ElectionMapsUK
·
7h
Westminster Voting Intention (Wales):
LAB: 39% (+2)
CON: 26% (-5)
PLC: 13% (-2)
RFM: 7% (+1)
GRN: 6% (+1)
LDM: 3% (-1)
Via
@YouGov
, 13-16 Dec.
Changes w/ 13-16 Sep.
My dad: "This the worst I've seen the English cricket team in my lifetime"
https://twitter.com/elle_hunt/status/1472880114300039168
CRG
About 2/3 overlap I reckon
Aus/NZ have to meet our standards to export to us. Its always been possible for them to export to us if they meet our standards, which is why you can find their meet on our shelves already, but you don't find US chlorinated chicken.
The difference is that there are tariffs and quotas on their goods currently even if they meet our standards.
@MrHarryCole
·
24m
Tory big beasts including Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss and Kwarsi Kwarteng resisted new restrictions without clearer data on the surging Omicron variant and the threat to hospitals..
@MrHarryCole
·
22m
But hopes are rising that the window to do so is now too narrow to ruin Christmas - but puts New Year’s Eve celebrations into serious doubt.
18 29 4,083,982
30 39 3,824,496
40 49 2,915,465
50 54 1,023,108
55 59 805,022
60 64 476,378
65 69 252,858
70 74 166,695
75 79 112,690
80+ 196,129
Total 13,856,823
The number for the over 40s is 5,948,345
I may have slightly libelled the EU.
The Animal Protection Index (https://api.worldanimalprotection.org/) grades countries on A to G.
"A" appears to be impossible to get, but there are a few countries with "B"s: the UK, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden.
There are then quite a lot more countries with "C"s - New Zealand, and the rest of the EU, mainly.
And then there are the "D"s: the US and Australia are there.
In last place, with a "G", is Iran.