"Not that concerned about Omicron (at least, not yet. Hopefully this post won't come back and bite me).
- "Vaccine escape" should better be termed "immunity erosion" because it's never a binary on/off but a gradual drift (both Alpha and Delta have immunity erosion over the original strain, for example). And whilst mutations are in the areas associated with that, no-one knows how they'll interact with each other (Additive? Cancelling?). And if, say, it's at the level of Beta - well, three doses of Pfizer gave better protection from Beta than two doses against the original strain. - In addition, a huge chunk of the boosted here will have heterologous vaccine immunity: from two different methods (adenovector/AZ plus mRNA/Pfizer or Moderna). That's demonstrated to give broader-based immunity against potential mutations - T-cell mediated immunity gives excellent protection against severe disease even if the virus gets past the antibody line of defence, and it's not mutating away from that - If it's a transmissibility advantage, Delta's already at the point way beyond the inflection line on the graph, where big increases in transmissibility give limited movement of the herd immunity threshold. An R0 of 6 gives an HiT of 83%; one of 12 (double the level) gives an HiT of 92%. Getting 9% more of us immune is a far smaller step than getting 83% of us immune. (The estimates of a 500% boost in transmissibility currently fail the sniff test with me. Measles is the most infectious one we know with an R0 of 15-18. One of 36 (which a 500% transmissibility would indicate) would be astonishing - I don't know if it could be possible)
... and we're at a point where the level of immunity in the population is such as to push Delta's R down from 6 to just over 1 with negligible restrictions, so we're not far off that 83% area.
I can't see the need for and significant restrictions coming back now. Obviously they help to reduce transmission while in use (you'd have to be eyebrow-deep in denial to deny that they work for that), but at this point, would they be necessary?
We're already trucking along well with boosters, and another chunk of the population have two-dose-plus-breakthrough immunity (hybrid immunity, which is considerably better than 2-dose immunity even if not quite up there with 3-dose immunity).
I think the message should just be Keep Calm And Carry On Boosting "
However, I didn't have the responsibility of making the call. And I could easily have been misled by wishful thinking.
One thing that is hard for non-Americans (and even many Americans) ot understand is that there is no "American model" of health care.
Instead, there are a bunch of different systems, which can be understood historically, but do not together make a single system as, for example, the NHS does.
First, there is private insurance for workers, usually paid by employers, though there are still a few plans run by unions. (This became important during WW II, when wage controls kept employers from competing in the usual way for scarce workers.) The plans vary -- to put it mildly. A few are so generous that the Obama administration wanted to penalize these "Cadillac" plans.
Second, there is the immense Medicare single-payer system for old folks, with its parts A, B, C, and D*.
Third, there are 52 (50 states, Puerto Rico, and DC) Medicaid single-payer systems for poor folks. (Some, of course, are eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid.)
Fourth, there is the Veteran's Adminstration system, which is something like your NHS, in that doctors and nurses are employees of the government,
Fifth, there is the Indian Health Service, where the doctors and nurses are, like the VA and NHS, employees of the government.
Sixth, there are health savings accounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_savings_account (When governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels set these up for state employees. They have been very popular there, appear to have cut medical expenses, and, if anything, improved outcomes. They might not do as well with a less educated population.)
And, there are other smaller ones.
I say this, not to defend all these systems -- which I don't -- but to ask you to understand the complexity, and perhaps even learn from our mistakes.
(*Full disclosure: I am enrolled in parts A and C of Medicare.)
It seems in America that you should be covered by your parents plan aged 0-18 and then your employer until retirement (but with expensive employee deductions and premiums) and then Medicare.
Medicaid if you're poor throughout, and not working, but I understand that cover is very basic. The other trouble is the "between jobs" piece.
Your daily reminder that the man who waltzed off with the Parthenon marbles, on behalf of the British Empire, was Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin and 11th Earl of Kincardine, born in Broomhall, Fife, Scotland
Don't let facts get in the way of racism,
@StuartDickson seems to be the only example of a pure, unabashed racist on PB. He fears, loathes and despises the English, simply because they are English, and it applies to all English people. He’s really not a great advert for Scottish Nationalism, yet his Nat friends all tolerate and encourage him, which is rather telling
The strange thing is, if you can somehow force Mr Dickson onto other subjects, he’s often quite interesting. The summer habits of the Swedes. Uses for snowberries. Involuntary nudism
Yet, also a racist. And unapologetic
Don't think he's ever unapologetically bigged up Nick Griffin, Tommy Robinson or Putin, or called for the internment of Muslims.
No one is saying he has. He has, however, openly stated his hatred of England and English people. Not all racists are the same.
Yep, but I'm saying someone has and all the HE DID A ANTI ENGLISH RAYZISM!!! types on PB don't give a fuck.
And yet again you are moved to defend your fellow Nat, come what may, and without a blink of shame
Perhaps because you share Stuart Dickson’s anti-English racism? But you are more domesticated, so you don’t let it show. He is feral. Gone to savagery in the wilds of Skane
On this occasion seems more like TUD is attacking you, rather than actually defending SD, who is obviously another idiot.
Well, I’ve just asked TUD if @StuartDickson is actually a racist. He seems close to admitting it, finally. The big question of the morning. Is @StuartDickson a racist
Let’s see what @Theuniondivvie says. Whether he can - belatedly - admit it
I suspect he isn't. I suspect you are.
Clear enough?
I'm actually in agreement with TUD here.
Because Stuart isn't a racist. There's no suggestion he despises people based on skin colour.
He's a xenophobe. He hates everyone except Scots and Swedes (and I'm not always sure about the latter). He especially hates the English, and can't understand why everyone else doesn't.
And it does affect his judgement really badly and lead him to make bizarre statements, such as claiming Scotland provides England with power or water, or that it's full of oil that's being stolen, or that English power bills are six times that of Europe, or that Britain uses more energy than Sweden.
Which is why any time he posts something that is even tangentially about England in particular, assume he's lying or wrong because he invariably is.
So race is just skin colour? How about anti-Semitism against Ashkenazi Jews, is that therefore not racism? The pale Jews who died in Belsen, were they not the victims of racism?
Absurd
If you despise someone simply because of their nationality/culture/origin, that is a species of racism. Despising people because of their skin pigmentation is ANOTHER species of racism
Official definitions of racism, used in the U.K. and elsewhere include prejudice against nationality.
So, if someone abuses a Polish man for being Polish, that is counted as a racism.
I wonder how "coloured" you have to be for @ydoethur before you can be an acceptable victim of racism? Mahogany brown? Middle beige? Ecru? Pale tan?
Perhaps he has an actual colour chart
In your case, of course, they just have to be sort of lightly tanned.
Daft definition if Malmesbury is correct though, and merely proves governments are incapable of using language properly.
Can you define "race" then? If you can define "racism" then you can surely define "race"?
Everybody seems to think the NHS is unsustainable, but I doubt there’s any unity behind what might replace it.
I think the rather boring, awful answer is likely more money, but those figures I posted yesterday on the significant lack of capital expenditure versus peer systems points to a grand and systemic misallocation of funds.
I'm no NHS cheerleader. But it does have one undeniable benefit over its counterparts elsewhere, which is that it is cheap. Whether it is good value is more debatable, but my view is that it is (at the risk of falling into the trap of setting the American model up as the only alternative, the American model is awful, awful value for money; incentives are set up to introduce things which patients don't value.)
Is there a way of keeping the value for money while improving the quality? My view is that the way to do so would be to introduce notional charging, similar to the way we pay for prescriptions (I think this may be what the Irish do, but my understanding of this is slight). Free at the point of use isn't, in my view, supportable in the long term without adding increasing levels of tax burden to the working population. I'm very open to changing my mind on this however.
The NHS is cheap because it rations care by access through two bottlenecks (GP referrals and hospital waiting lists) to match workload to capacity. We are seeing what happens when those bottlenecks become obstructed.
I think that's spot on.
Sure doesn't feel cheap though, although it is when you experience it.
One thing that is hard for non-Americans (and even many Americans) ot understand is that there is no "American model" of health care.
Instead, there are a bunch of different systems, which can be understood historically, but do not together make a single system as, for example, the NHS does.
First, there is private insurance for workers, usually paid by employers, though there are still a few plans run by unions. (This became important during WW II, when wage controls kept employers from competing in the usual way for scarce workers.) The plans vary -- to put it mildly. A few are so generous that the Obama administration wanted to penalize these "Cadillac" plans.
Second, there is the immense Medicare single-payer system for old folks, with its parts A, B, C, and D*.
Third, there are 52 (50 states, Puerto Rico, and DC) Medicaid single-payer systems for poor folks. (Some, of course, are eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid.)
Fourth, there is the Veteran's Adminstration system, which is something like your NHS, in that doctors and nurses are employees of the government,
Fifth, there is the Indian Health Service, where the doctors and nurses are, like the VA and NHS, employees of the government.
Sixth, there are health savings accounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_savings_account (When governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels set these up for state employees. They have been very popular there, appear to have cut medical expenses, and, if anything, improved outcomes. They might not do as well with a less educated population.)
And, there are other smaller ones.
I say this, not to defend all these systems -- which I don't -- but to ask you to understand the complexity, and perhaps even learn from our mistakes.
(*Full disclosure: I am enrolled in parts A and C of Medicare.)
One thing that is hard for non-Americans (and even many Americans) ot understand is that there is no "American model" of health care.
Instead, there are a bunch of different systems, which can be understood historically, but do not together make a single system as, for example, the NHS does.
First, there is private insurance for workers, usually paid by employers, though there are still a few plans run by unions. (This became important during WW II, when wage controls kept employers from competing in the usual way for scarce workers.) The plans vary -- to put it mildly. A few are so generous that the Obama administration wanted to penalize these "Cadillac" plans.
Second, there is the immense Medicare single-payer system for old folks, with its parts A, B, C, and D*.
Third, there are 52 (50 states, Puerto Rico, and DC) Medicaid single-payer systems for poor folks. (Some, of course, are eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid.)
Fourth, there is the Veteran's Adminstration system, which is something like your NHS, in that doctors and nurses are employees of the government,
Fifth, there is the Indian Health Service, where the doctors and nurses are, like the VA and NHS, employees of the government.
Sixth, there are health savings accounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_savings_account (When governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels set these up for state employees. They have been very popular there, appear to have cut medical expenses, and, if anything, improved outcomes. They might not do as well with a less educated population.)
And, there are other smaller ones.
I say this, not to defend all these systems -- which I don't -- but to ask you to understand the complexity, and perhaps even learn from our mistakes.
(*Full disclosure: I am enrolled in parts A and C of Medicare.)
It seems in America that you should be covered by your parents plan aged 0-18 and then your employer until retirement (but with expensive employee deductions and premiums) and then Medicare.
Medicaid if you're poor throughout, and not working, but I understand that cover is very basic. The other trouble is the "between jobs" piece.
And if you're employer is a cheap bastard and doesn't give you proper cover which is why so many working poor in the US have awful healthcare outcomes.
The US system is a disaster, worse than the NHS, which really goes to show how bad it is. I don't understand the focus on the US when there's so many viable models in Europe which have an element of personal risk liability as well as state subsidy and cover.
One thing on NHS (lack of) efficiency. Appointments. Been awaiting a referral since September and got the letter this week, with appointment on date that I'm out of the country. Phoned up to change, took several goes to get through and eventually a call back after leaving a message. Appointment cancelled, a new one (at some unknown date) will be issued by post.
This is nuts. A system, such as for vaccinations, in which you could get alerted when you're near the top of the queue and choose your own appointment would eliminate so much wasted time. Staff booking and re-booking appointments, having time on the phone answering and calling back, probably reduce missed appointments (if the person can choose something convenient, rather than making do with something they can probably make work as cancelling is such a hassle). Eliminate sending out appointments in post...
Small things, but it would also eliminate a lot of frustration on everyone's behalf.
What you describe is a system known as "partial booking" which we have done for years.
It has some advantages, but a couple of disadvantages
1) Demand for appointments exceeds capacity so all the slots go to the fastest fingers, with none left.
2) Some groups of patients respond poorly to such systems, so never make contact. This is particularly so for those with mental health issues, learning disabilities, non-english speakers, techno-illiterates, frail elderly etc. These are groups already with worse health outcomes.
Whilst I understand (1) I'm not sure why that doesn't happen with phone calls. I've often missed all the slots for the day.
What I want is to be able to be able to throw my hat into the ring (and wait to hear when I might be able to get an appointment) and if I can't get through they don't even know I'm trying.
Everybody seems to think the NHS is unsustainable, but I doubt there’s any unity behind what might replace it.
I think the rather boring, awful answer is likely more money, but those figures I posted yesterday on the significant lack of capital expenditure versus peer systems points to a grand and systemic misallocation of funds.
Part of the answer is some kind of insurance system which encourages healthy living. The NHS has more demand on it than other systems because there is no punishment for living a shitty lifestyle. All across Europe healthcare systems do take into account a person's life choices and ultimately poor ones are not shoved onto society at large to pay, there's much more personal responsibility.
That may make some people uncomfortable but the reality is the UK is a fat, unhealthy nation and that is a direct consequence of the NHS removing any economic downsides of becoming fat and unhealthy.
I agree that we should take that problem seriously, but I don't think you can seriously argue that it's a direct consequence of the NHS. The US has an even bigger problem and nobody could accuse their health system of removing any economic downsides of being unhealthy.
Everybody seems to think the NHS is unsustainable, but I doubt there’s any unity behind what might replace it.
I think the rather boring, awful answer is likely more money, but those figures I posted yesterday on the significant lack of capital expenditure versus peer systems points to a grand and systemic misallocation of funds.
Part of the answer is some kind of insurance system which encourages healthy living. The NHS has more demand on it than other systems because there is no punishment for living a shitty lifestyle. All across Europe healthcare systems do take into account a person's life choices and ultimately poor ones are not shoved onto society at large to pay, there's much more personal responsibility.
That may make some people uncomfortable but the reality is the UK is a fat, unhealthy nation and that is a direct consequence of the NHS removing any economic downsides of becoming fat and unhealthy.
I agree that we should take that problem seriously, but I don't think you can seriously argue that it's a direct consequence of the NHS. The US has an even bigger problem and nobody could accuse their health system of removing any economic downsides of being unhealthy.
I’m sure the NHS is in the mix, but British health is probably impacted more directly by an over-reliance on private cars and an over-abundance of processed food.
The later is now thought to be *the* factor behind the global rise of obesity, as we can just access calories much more efficiently and deliciously than before.
Everybody seems to think the NHS is unsustainable, but I doubt there’s any unity behind what might replace it.
I think the rather boring, awful answer is likely more money, but those figures I posted yesterday on the significant lack of capital expenditure versus peer systems points to a grand and systemic misallocation of funds.
Part of the answer is some kind of insurance system which encourages healthy living. The NHS has more demand on it than other systems because there is no punishment for living a shitty lifestyle. All across Europe healthcare systems do take into account a person's life choices and ultimately poor ones are not shoved onto society at large to pay, there's much more personal responsibility.
That may make some people uncomfortable but the reality is the UK is a fat, unhealthy nation and that is a direct consequence of the NHS removing any economic downsides of becoming fat and unhealthy.
I agree that we should take that problem seriously, but I don't think you can seriously argue that it's a direct consequence of the NHS. The US has an even bigger problem and nobody could accuse their health system of removing any economic downsides of being unhealthy.
I’m sure the NHS is in the mix, but British health is probably impacted more directly by an over-reliance on private cars and an over-abundance of processed food.
The later is now thought to be *the* factor behind the global rise of obesity, as we can just access calories much more efficiently and deliciously than before.
I'd say both those things are a far greater problem in America, where essentially people don't really walk or ride at all and it's impossible to do anything without a car.
Here, I'd say iPhones and gadgets contribute to addictive and sedentary entertainment, particularly amongst the youth.
One general difference between the US and UK; In the US, nurses and pharmacists administer most vaccine injections, not doctors. My first two COVID shots (or, if you prefer, "jabs") were given by nurses; the later ones by pharmacists. (When I mentioned this to pharmacists here, they were surprised and, I thought, one of them seemed a bit amused.)
Nurses generally administer them here. 2 of my covid shots were from Nurses, one from a volunteer. Pharmacists often give flu jabs too - just rock up to Boots and get one. So I don't think there's much difference and I'm surprised by your pharmacists' reaction.
In all my life, in the U.K., I’ve never had an injection from a doctor. Always a nurse. Up until COVID, where am I had a couple of doses from pharmacists.
In fact, in the run up to the vaccination roll out, I believe there were jokes going around, among the medics, about doctors being roped in to give injections - along the lines of “will the senior consultants remember which end goes in the patient?”
We may be about to see what happens when a nation of 1.4bn experiences the near- collapse of its health system, as happened in Hong Kong
Hong Kong has experienced 11,000 deaths in a province of 7.4m, about 0.14% of the population (intriguingly close to the proposed IFR of Latest Covid: 0.1%)
There are differences: Hong Kong is rich, which China is not, it has an excellent health system (which nearly broke down); China's health system is much sketchier. But China has had ample time to prepare, and it has seen what happened in Hongkers
If 60-70% of Chinese get Covid this winter we should expect 3-4 million people to die, following the pattern of Hong Kong - but the Chinese are forewarned
Could get quite hairy
Yes, although it's easy to get blinded by the sheer numbers of Chinese people that there are. That would be equivalent to 150,000 - 200,000 British people dying. Which is pretty much what happened. Obviously bad, but not as bad as bad as 3-4 million sounds.
Yes, 10 million people die every year in China, so 3m dead in a winter is horrible but not Black Death horrible. China will cope with the deaths
The problem is the potential for collapsing healthcare, and all that will follow from that
China apparently has a poor GP system, so people generally go to hospitals for almost anything. That could be a nasty pinchpoint
Irony is we didn't have a collapsing healthcare system during Covid but arguably do now.
I think there's a good argument for HMG to Nightingale the next 3-5 years just to get on top of the backlog.
Why would a bunch of beds in a sports stadium/exhibition venue, with no staff, help?
Your daily reminder that the man who waltzed off with the Parthenon marbles, on behalf of the British Empire, was Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin and 11th Earl of Kincardine, born in Broomhall, Fife, Scotland
Don't let facts get in the way of racism,
@StuartDickson seems to be the only example of a pure, unabashed racist on PB. He fears, loathes and despises the English, simply because they are English, and it applies to all English people. He’s really not a great advert for Scottish Nationalism, yet his Nat friends all tolerate and encourage him, which is rather telling
The strange thing is, if you can somehow force Mr Dickson onto other subjects, he’s often quite interesting. The summer habits of the Swedes. Uses for snowberries. Involuntary nudism
Yet, also a racist. And unapologetic
Don't think he's ever unapologetically bigged up Nick Griffin, Tommy Robinson or Putin, or called for the internment of Muslims.
No one is saying he has. He has, however, openly stated his hatred of England and English people. Not all racists are the same.
Yep, but I'm saying someone has and all the HE DID A ANTI ENGLISH RAYZISM!!! types on PB don't give a fuck.
And yet again you are moved to defend your fellow Nat, come what may, and without a blink of shame
Perhaps because you share Stuart Dickson’s anti-English racism? But you are more domesticated, so you don’t let it show. He is feral. Gone to savagery in the wilds of Skane
On this occasion seems more like TUD is attacking you, rather than actually defending SD, who is obviously another idiot.
Well, I’ve just asked TUD if @StuartDickson is actually a racist. He seems close to admitting it, finally. The big question of the morning. Is @StuartDickson a racist
Let’s see what @Theuniondivvie says. Whether he can - belatedly - admit it
I suspect he isn't. I suspect you are.
Clear enough?
I'm actually in agreement with TUD here.
Because Stuart isn't a racist. There's no suggestion he despises people based on skin colour.
He's a xenophobe. He hates everyone except Scots and Swedes (and I'm not always sure about the latter). He especially hates the English, and can't understand why everyone else doesn't.
And it does affect his judgement really badly and lead him to make bizarre statements, such as claiming Scotland provides England with power or water, or that it's full of oil that's being stolen, or that English power bills are six times that of Europe, or that Britain uses more energy than Sweden.
Which is why any time he posts something that is even tangentially about England in particular, assume he's lying or wrong because he invariably is.
So race is just skin colour? How about anti-Semitism against Ashkenazi Jews, is that therefore not racism? The pale Jews who died in Belsen, were they not the victims of racism?
Absurd
If you despise someone simply because of their nationality/culture/origin, that is a species of racism. Despising people because of their skin pigmentation is ANOTHER species of racism
Official definitions of racism, used in the U.K. and elsewhere include prejudice against nationality.
So, if someone abuses a Polish man for being Polish, that is counted as a racism.
I wonder how "coloured" you have to be for @ydoethur before you can be an acceptable victim of racism? Mahogany brown? Middle beige? Ecru? Pale tan?
Perhaps he has an actual colour chart
In your case, of course, they just have to be sort of lightly tanned.
Daft definition if Malmesbury is correct though, and merely proves governments are incapable of using language properly.
It makes sense because otherwise you’d have people saying anti-semitism isn’t racist, therefore not bad. It also makes sense because the same kind of hate is involved, and often the usual suspects are doing it.
The classic of that genre is to look at the side hobbies of the KKK…
Generally the modern definition for legal stuff is ethnic group, religion or nationality.
So a hating on a white Muslim is still racist.
IIRC people have gone to prison as commuting racist assault for attacking people for being Polish.
A entire nation forced itself into OCD weirdness. All those beautiful faces and smiles not being seen
Tbf mask-wearing was rife amongst east Asian countries even before Covid.
No it wasn't. Jeez. You do know who you are talking to?!
I've travelled all over Asia, I go to Thailand every winter (plague allowing), I lived in Japan for a few months. I know Asia REALLY well - better than any continent outside Europe
At most during a cold winter with lots of bugs you would see 5% of people wearing masks, or maybe 10% during epic pollution
Now Japan is 99% mask wearing, all the time, everywhere. It is a tragic situation
The difference being that mask wearing was at least a thing in the far east, whereas it was not here. And notably it is now very few people here who are still wearing masks.
We were asked to mask up for my wife's latest scan last week. I have no issue with this. Healthcare settings are disease central anyway (hospitals, no matter how well cleaned, are not healthy places).
But in general life? No thanks.
The Japanese are at least debating their madness. But they are mad
"At "Beethoven's 9th with a Cast of 10,000" in #Japan, most of the choir wore face masks and sang with fans around their necks. It is shameful that Japan is the only country in the world that does such an abnormal thing."
"Japan has relaxed some of their crowd cheering restrictions starting at 1/4 for Wrestle Kingdom in the Tokyo Dome.
Masks are still required, you can cheer, boo, count along with the referee but not sing or yell too loud."
It may seem daft, but Japan despite its elderly population did probably do amongst the best through covid, managing minimal lockdown restrictions, minimal economic impact and minimal deaths. Masking was part of that.
Everybody seems to think the NHS is unsustainable, but I doubt there’s any unity behind what might replace it.
I think the rather boring, awful answer is likely more money, but those figures I posted yesterday on the significant lack of capital expenditure versus peer systems points to a grand and systemic misallocation of funds.
I'm no NHS cheerleader. But it does have one undeniable benefit over its counterparts elsewhere, which is that it is cheap. Whether it is good value is more debatable, but my view is that it is (at the risk of falling into the trap of setting the American model up as the only alternative, the American model is awful, awful value for money; incentives are set up to introduce things which patients don't value.)
Is there a way of keeping the value for money while improving the quality? My view is that the way to do so would be to introduce notional charging, similar to the way we pay for prescriptions (I think this may be what the Irish do, but my understanding of this is slight). Free at the point of use isn't, in my view, supportable in the long term without adding increasing levels of tax burden to the working population. I'm very open to changing my mind on this however.
I remember hearing an interview with an elderly French political grandee (possibly ex-ambassador) saying "The great problem with the British is their difficulty in seeing the difference between 'a bargain' and 'cheap'."
It keeps coming back to mind when I think of government services, housebuilding, energy storage, etc etc etc depressing etc etc.
That is a very good way of looking at it.
At the moment of course we pay a lot (in overall tax) for crap service and outcomes across the board, with few highlights. And now we're so deep into the mire we cannot afford to get out of trap of spending more for worse.
The ideal solution would be to develop a time machine, go back a few decades and not vote for "more services for less tax by sweating the assets harder". Since that option isn't open to us, it's going to be painful.
I suspect you would not be happy with votings for less services for less taxes. A lot of people would be happy to vote so because the vast majority of people dont on the whole see or interact with a lot of services the state perform. For example the only service that most see from their local council is bin collection and a bit of highways stuff maybe some education if you have kids. Most don't goto libraries or any of the social services style of thing that councils provide
Comments
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/3663145#Comment_3663145
"Not that concerned about Omicron (at least, not yet. Hopefully this post won't come back and bite me).
- "Vaccine escape" should better be termed "immunity erosion" because it's never a binary on/off but a gradual drift (both Alpha and Delta have immunity erosion over the original strain, for example). And whilst mutations are in the areas associated with that, no-one knows how they'll interact with each other (Additive? Cancelling?). And if, say, it's at the level of Beta - well, three doses of Pfizer gave better protection from Beta than two doses against the original strain.
- In addition, a huge chunk of the boosted here will have heterologous vaccine immunity: from two different methods (adenovector/AZ plus mRNA/Pfizer or Moderna). That's demonstrated to give broader-based immunity against potential mutations
- T-cell mediated immunity gives excellent protection against severe disease even if the virus gets past the antibody line of defence, and it's not mutating away from that
- If it's a transmissibility advantage, Delta's already at the point way beyond the inflection line on the graph, where big increases in transmissibility give limited movement of the herd immunity threshold. An R0 of 6 gives an HiT of 83%; one of 12 (double the level) gives an HiT of 92%. Getting 9% more of us immune is a far smaller step than getting 83% of us immune.
(The estimates of a 500% boost in transmissibility currently fail the sniff test with me. Measles is the most infectious one we know with an R0 of 15-18. One of 36 (which a 500% transmissibility would indicate) would be astonishing - I don't know if it could be possible)
... and we're at a point where the level of immunity in the population is such as to push Delta's R down from 6 to just over 1 with negligible restrictions, so we're not far off that 83% area.
I can't see the need for and significant restrictions coming back now. Obviously they help to reduce transmission while in use (you'd have to be eyebrow-deep in denial to deny that they work for that), but at this point, would they be necessary?
We're already trucking along well with boosters, and another chunk of the population have two-dose-plus-breakthrough immunity (hybrid immunity, which is considerably better than 2-dose immunity even if not quite up there with 3-dose immunity).
I think the message should just be Keep Calm And Carry On Boosting "
However, I didn't have the responsibility of making the call. And I could easily have been misled by wishful thinking.
Medicaid if you're poor throughout, and not working, but I understand that cover is very basic. The other trouble is the "between jobs" piece.
Sure doesn't feel cheap though, although it is when you experience it.
The US system is a disaster, worse than the NHS, which really goes to show how bad it is. I don't understand the focus on the US when there's so many viable models in Europe which have an element of personal risk liability as well as state subsidy and cover.
What I want is to be able to be able to throw my hat into the ring (and wait to hear when I might be able to get an appointment) and if I can't get through they don't even know I'm trying.
The later is now thought to be *the* factor behind the global rise of obesity, as we can just access calories much more efficiently and deliciously than before.
Here, I'd say iPhones and gadgets contribute to addictive and sedentary entertainment, particularly amongst the youth.
In fact, in the run up to the vaccination roll out, I believe there were jokes going around, among the medics, about doctors being roped in to give injections - along the lines of “will the senior consultants remember which end goes in the patient?”
The classic of that genre is to look at the side hobbies of the KKK…
Generally the modern definition for legal stuff is ethnic group, religion or nationality.
So a hating on a white Muslim is still racist.
IIRC people have gone to prison as commuting racist assault for attacking people for being Polish.