Covid 19 of course originated in China and unless the Chinese ban live meat markets and bat experiments further viruses may break out there again.
Trump has at least now declared a state of emergency, he has also banned flights and states are starting to shut schools in the US too so now they are taking harder measures than we are
Even you seem half hearted in defending the idiotic Trump
How do we know for certain it was a meat market and not government military research into genetic weapons? We are only trusting what we were told.
On the family isolation issue, I think this is where the schools being open idea comes in. Students up to eighteen will have parents who are fifty or younger in the vast majority of cases. This then puts them all in the herd immunity attempt. They want the children to pass it on to parents.
Of course, there are some who are older and who would need to be isolated in the home (maybe community isolation with friends or older relatives would be a good thing, rather than individually?). Also, parents with underlying conditions would have to do the same.
That leaves any household with no parent who is low risk as being a problem. Maybe get other relatives or families to temporarily adopt?
Musing out loud, but these strategies need to be shared rather than letting people just do what they want piecemeal. There is still an important government role here as a national pandemic response.
I thought Hunt's suggestion was very sensible. To run schools with much more flexibility for the next few months.
Getting sixth formers to do some of the childcare and even teaching would make sense to me.
Sorry, what? Making 17 year olds responsible for the safety and teaching of infants? No.
In a genuine emergency, it might be possible to use them under supervision to keep legal ratios of adults to children,
It is however something I would personally only consider as a desperate last resort.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
This kind of explains the different approaches in Europe and Asia. Generals always want to fight the last war. In Asia the experts are fighting SARS. In Europe they're fighting the WW1 flu pandemic.
The time to be making this point was January. It's too late now.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
This kind of explains the different approaches in Europe and Asia. Generals always want to fight the last war. In Asia the experts are fighting SARS. In Europe they're fighting the WW1 flu pandemic.
Worth bearing in mind we still don't have any sort of vaccine for SARS so there is a major flaw in the Asian approach.
On the family isolation issue, I think this is where the schools being open idea comes in. Students up to eighteen will have parents who are fifty or younger in the vast majority of cases. This then puts them all in the herd immunity attempt. They want the children to pass it on to parents.
Of course, there are some who are older and who would need to be isolated in the home (maybe community isolation with friends or older relatives would be a good thing, rather than individually?). Also, parents with underlying conditions would have to do the same.
That leaves any household with no parent who is low risk as being a problem. Maybe get other relatives or families to temporarily adopt?
Musing out loud, but these strategies need to be shared rather than letting people just do what they want piecemeal. There is still an important government role here as a national pandemic response.
I thought Hunt's suggestion was very sensible. To run schools with much more flexibility for the next few months.
Getting sixth formers to do some of the childcare and even teaching would make sense to me.
Sorry, what? Making 17 year olds responsible for the safety and teaching of infants? No.
You might not have not noticed but there are plenty of 17 year old parents around, and until this generation the average age of babysitters would have been under 17.
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
Covid 19 of course originated in China and unless the Chinese ban live meat markets and bat experiments further viruses may break out there again.
Trump has at least now declared a state of emergency, he has also banned flights and states are starting to shut schools in the US too so now they are taking harder measures than we are
Even you seem half hearted in defending the idiotic Trump
How do we know for certain it was a meat market and not government military research into genetic weapons? We are only trusting what we were told.
In war a differential is advantage, all sorts are tried. WW2 had a fart weapon, in future there will be a genetic pneumonia weapon.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
Nobody with a fever will ever be allowed to fly again. A quick temperature check with a remote thermometer will become as normal as showing your passport. And breathing in and holding it for 10 seconds without coughing is a handy enough test to see those with an active issue in their lungs.
So do we have an idea yet how dangerous covid is to younger people that may have underlying health conditions or be disabled? Because its just old people who can have underlying risks.
November is a long way away so I'm taking this with a pinch of salt. All sorts of things could happen before then, not least of which could be the worst of the infection passes over America and then Trump passes an emergency stimulus and lifts restrictions just in time.
Also, we had a Herdson article just a few weeks ago tipping buying Sanders when he was odds on - and we know what happened next.
Things that look inevitable one week can look very different the next.
With respect, I didn't say it was inevitable and I did say that the White House bet was the better value, because "Trump’s typically self-centred and quite possibly grossly inadequate reaction to the coronavirus outbreak, should now be favourite in a head-to-head with Trump, the president’s skill at negative campaigning notwithstanding".
The Sanders call was the wrong one but it's the first wrong one I've made in a long time; I hope I can be forgiven that and the previous record taken into account?
I did, however, foresee where Covid-19 was going in the US, and what that would mean for Trump politically, and for the US economy.
I didn't say you said it was inevitable - just that it can look that way.
My point is that the dislike of Trump is so strong it can cloud our judgement.
I think what @SouthamObserver said earlier is fair. The culture wars in the US are so embedded that I can't see his base deserting even if casualties are in the low millions.
They'll blame someone else.
That doesn't mean he'll win but I could still see it being a close fight.
That's all true. But pre-Covid-19, I was tipping Trump to be re-elected so I don't think I was too clouded by a dislike of the man (which I do have).
What I was misled by was a particularly poor campaign event by Biden where he just seemed done in. That, combined with deteriorating polling and fundraising (and the early voting for Super Tuesday, much of which would be in pre-SC), made me think that he wouldn't recover his situation. I also thought that the candidates in for SC would see it through to ST, only a few days later, having invested what they had in it.
Like I say, you can't get them all right.
You still haven't got it wrong yet. Although Trump is doing a sterling job of ensuring he isn't re-elected.
Harold Wilson's old adage about a week being a long time in politics has been superseded by an hour being a long time in politics.
Well, I'm tipping Trump to lose now so I won't take any credit for the earlier prediction if it does turn out to be right.
I trust your judgement. If your new projection is accurate, the world will become a safer place.
I am aware that Presidential Elections don't stop for world wars, but is there any mechanism Trump could adopt with the approval of Congress that could postpone the election for a year or four?
No, the elections are in the constitution, as is the expiry of the presidents term on 20 January 2021.
November is a long way away so I'm taking this with a pinch of salt. All sorts of things could happen before then, not least of which could be the worst of the infection passes over America and then Trump passes an emergency stimulus and lifts restrictions just in time.
Also, we had a Herdson article just a few weeks ago tipping buying Sanders when he was odds on - and we know what happened next.
Things that look inevitable one week can look very different the next.
With respect, I didn't say it was inevitable and I did say that the White House bet was the better value, because "Trump’s typically self-centred and quite possibly grossly inadequate reaction to the coronavirus outbreak, should now be favourite in a head-to-head with Trump, the president’s skill at negative campaigning notwithstanding".
The Sanders call was the wrong one but it's the first wrong one I've made in a long time; I hope I can be forgiven that and the previous record taken into account?
I did, however, foresee where Covid-19 was going in the US, and what that would mean for Trump politically, and for the US economy.
I didn't say you said it was inevitable - just that it can look that way.
My point is that the dislike of Trump is so strong it can cloud our judgement.
I think what @SouthamObserver said earlier is fair. The culture wars in the US are so embedded that I can't see his base deserting even if casualties are in the low millions.
They'll blame someone else.
That doesn't mean he'll win but I could still see it being a close fight.
That's all true. But pre-Covid-19, I was tipping Trump to be re-elected so I don't think I was too clouded by a dislike of the man (which I do have).
What I was misled by was a particularly poor campaign event by Biden where he just seemed done in. That, combined with deteriorating polling and fundraising (and the early voting for Super Tuesday, much of which would be in pre-SC), made me think that he wouldn't recover his situation. I also thought that the candidates in for SC would see it through to ST, only a few days later, having invested what they had in it.
Like I say, you can't get them all right.
You still haven't got it wrong yet. Although Trump is doing a sterling job of ensuring he isn't re-elected.
Harold Wilson's old adage about a week being a long time in politics has been superseded by an hour being a long time in politics.
Well, I'm tipping Trump to lose now so I won't take any credit for the earlier prediction if it does turn out to be right.
I trust your judgement. If your new projection is accurate, the world will become a safer place.
No, you should always do your own research and come to your own view.
Those can be informed by others, but you shouldn't automatically adopt their conclusions. Particularly since your second sentence shows the sympathies around which a risk of confirmation bias could be based.
With all due respect I am reasonably well versed. Mr Herdson's track record is impressive and I take his predictions seriously.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
On the flip side if this is as bad as it might be, expect people to want to move out of cities, whats the point of living in a crowded place if you cant go to busy places and have fun?
I remain sceptical about the figures worldwide. Last time I looked Turkey, for instance, was declaring 2 cases but I have been told via someone in the capital that there are hundreds of cases in Ankara alone.
The Chinese situation now looks great but what would actually be stopping a totalitarian regime that badly wants to save face simply not testing people are attributing most deaths to other causes?
[*] China has often been known to bamboozle foreign journalists, so what he's seeing may or may not be typical...
That interviewee is one of the most convincing I've ever seen - really impressive technique. More importantly, explaining exactly how China appears to have cracked it is fascinating. I agree with the point that we now have to see what happens when they graduallylift the restrictions. But from where they started (and where we are about to arrive at) it's a good place to get to..
What is interesting is the Chinese approach to this, is lot of "quick and inaccurate" methods including tech, but using it to funnel individuals towards more and more accurate / expensive / time consuming approaches.
South Korea has done something similar with a road side test then funnel into the gold standard screen programme.
The move fast and break stuff of Silicon Valley.
In the West, we have for always taken the approach of gold standard approach to test once when it comes to medicine.
That last sentence is not totally true when it comes to screening tests. With these tests, so many asymptomatic people are being tested that you will be picking up thousands of positives, and the vast majority of these will be false positives, no matter how good the sensitivity and specificity of the test is.
What is important is that the follow-up test after a positive screnning test is what you call a gold standard test. Being positives in both tests is then very likely to be a true positive.
On the family isolation issue, I think this is where the schools being open idea comes in. Students up to eighteen will have parents who are fifty or younger in the vast majority of cases. This then puts them all in the herd immunity attempt. They want the children to pass it on to parents.
Of course, there are some who are older and who would need to be isolated in the home (maybe community isolation with friends or older relatives would be a good thing, rather than individually?). Also, parents with underlying conditions would have to do the same.
That leaves any household with no parent who is low risk as being a problem. Maybe get other relatives or families to temporarily adopt?
Musing out loud, but these strategies need to be shared rather than letting people just do what they want piecemeal. There is still an important government role here as a national pandemic response.
I thought Hunt's suggestion was very sensible. To run schools with much more flexibility for the next few months.
Getting sixth formers to do some of the childcare and even teaching would make sense to me.
Sorry, what? Making 17 year olds responsible for the safety and teaching of infants? No.
You might not have not noticed but there are plenty of 17 year old parents around, and until this generation the average age of babysitters would have been under 17.
Yeah, and how do the lives of the children born to those 17 year olds tend to turn out?
No, you should always do your own research and come to your own view.
Those can be informed by others, but you shouldn't automatically adopt their conclusions. Particularly since your second sentence shows the sympathies around which a risk of confirmation bias could be based.
Of course you should try and totally separate what you WANT to happen from your assessment of the probability that it will. I try very hard to do that but where I fail I tend to err on the side of OVERestimating the likelihood of things happening that I do NOT want to happen. An "emotional hedge" if you like. Looking on the bleak side creates more room for a pleasant surprise.
So that is NEGATIVE confirmation bias.
Which if we apply to my superforecast of Trump thrashed in WH2020 - something I very much DO want to happen - makes it all the more compelling.
Anybody who heard the hot mic footage won't be in the slightest surprised. It was like he had just done a shift on QVC, not announced to the nation the biggest threat for a 100 years.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Christ, you are like a dog with a bone. Having a non-manchild as US President would help too.
November is a long way away so I'm taking this with a pinch of salt. All sorts of things could happen before then, not least of which could be the worst of the infection passes over America and then Trump passes an emergency stimulus and lifts restrictions just in time.
Also, we had a Herdson article just a few weeks ago tipping buying Sanders when he was odds on - and we know what happened next.
Things that look inevitable one week can look very different the next.
With respect, I didn't say it was inevitable and I did say that the White House bet was the better value, because "Trump’s typically self-centred and quite possibly grossly inadequate reaction to the coronavirus outbreak, should now be favourite in a head-to-head with Trump, the president’s skill at negative campaigning notwithstanding".
The Sanders call was the wrong one but it's the first wrong one I've made in a long time; I hope I can be forgiven that and the previous record taken into account?
I did, however, foresee where Covid-19 was going in the US, and what that would mean for Trump politically, and for the US economy.
I didn't say you said it was inevitable - just that it can look that way.
My point is that the dislike of Trump is so strong it can cloud our judgement.
I think what @SouthamObserver said earlier is fair. The culture wars in the US are so embedded that I can't see his base deserting even if casualties are in the low millions.
They'll blame someone else.
That doesn't mean he'll win but I could still see it being a close fight.
That's all true. But pre-Covid-19, I was tipping Trump to be re-elected so I don't think I was too clouded by a dislike of the man (which I do have).
What I was misled by was a particularly poor campaign event by Biden where he just seemed done in. That, combined with deteriorating polling and fundraising (and the early voting for Super Tuesday, much of which would be in pre-SC), made me think that he wouldn't recover his situation. I also thought that the candidates in for SC would see it through to ST, only a few days later, having invested what they had in it.
Like I say, you can't get them all right.
You still haven't got it wrong yet. Although Trump is doing a sterling job of ensuring he isn't re-elected.
Harold Wilson's old adage about a week being a long time in politics has been superseded by an hour being a long time in politics.
Well, I'm tipping Trump to lose now so I won't take any credit for the earlier prediction if it does turn out to be right.
I trust your judgement. If your new projection is accurate, the world will become a safer place.
I am aware that Presidential Elections don't stop for world wars, but is there any mechanism Trump could adopt with the approval of Congress that could postpone the election for a year or four?
No, the elections are in the constitution, as is the expiry of the presidents term on 20 January 2021.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Not just China, all across Asian. What I didn't realise until recently is these markets aren't full of animals from just that region, they are literally from all four corners of the earth. Thus they are putting into contact animals that naturally would never interact and raise the possibility of intermingling of diseases that never would in the natural world.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The live meat markets and wet markets for fish are going to be incredibly hard to ban because of the way that patronage works in China. There will always be demand and there will always be someone to bribe. The only way to do it is to seek a total cultural change and that is a question of years, not months.
One thing the government should not be accused of is making this up as they go along. They have been working on this plan since the start of January. It is clear many other countries haven't.
Cherry picking, and spin, but you can’t call him a liar because the note is true in that best day since 2008 coincided with the measures he announced. Big announcements of retaliatory measures do normally have effect.
@DavidL makes a good point (one that I've wanted to mention for a while) about a constructive approach to Corona, making sure our own personal health is tip top for better outcomes. If you get through the first part of this Dr. Berg clip (he explains very basically what a virus is), there is some good info on how to boost the immune system.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
Yep - I can't see another way. And a vaccine is not arriving any time soon.
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
It would be an encouragement to relocate to more affordable areas.
I actually saw a bit of news today (not watched much for some time now). The delinquent angle of 'u-turn' nonsense was rather dispiriting. Just because the Government isn't doing something on a given day that doesn't mean doing it at any time later is a u-turn, especially when they've specifically said it's something they've been looking at doing in the near future.
This is where I don't understand the plan to not test anybody but those hospitalized. Unless they aren't being 100% honest with the public and they will be sampling, but don't want 1000s of people ringing 111 demanding they get a test.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The live meat markets and wet markets for fish are going to be incredibly hard to ban because of the way that patronage works in China. There will always be demand and there will always be someone to bribe. The only way to do it is to seek a total cultural change and that is a question of years, not months.
In which case travel bans and restrictions must be imposed on Chinese travel and quarantine for travellers to China must be imposed until they do
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
All my colleagues who regularly WFH have turned bedrooms, garages or sheds into offices.
But there will soon be another capacity problem, I fear. I doubt many companies have enough VPN termination points to accommodate all their employees. If your company asks you to get off the VPN between accessing the intranet, then that is why.
I actually saw a bit of news today (not watched much for some time now). The delinquent angle of 'u-turn' nonsense was rather dispiriting. Just because the Government isn't doing something on a given day that doesn't mean doing it at any time later is a u-turn, especially when they've specifically said it's something they've been looking at doing in the near future.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Not just China, all across Asian. What I didn't realise until recently is these markets aren't full of animals from just that region, they are literally from all four corners of the earth. Thus they are putting into contact animals that naturally would never interact and raise the possibility of intermingling of diseases that never would in the natural world.
I think Boris is pursuing the correct tactics. Bring in the experts and listen to them. They might be wrong but it is defensible. If he did anything else, it would give the armchair 'experts' an extra stick to beat him with.
There is still a political element to some of the criticisms, but there always will be. If he took notice of the assorted thickos jostling to shout loudest, they'd still criticise him for pandering to ignorance.
What’s disappointing is things like Ian Donald’s thread above. Thoughtful and useful thread. And then he added at the end “way to clever for Boris Johnson to have thought of”. Unnecessary and unhelpful. Johnson is listening to the specialists in this area and making a judgement on the right strategy.
It’s a gutsy call and I hope it goes right. For all our sakes.
So do I. FWIW I didn't criticise Johnson and his advisors after their press conference, and I don't think I'm especially politically motivated on this issue. But I'm coming to feel that we've made the wrong decision.
Not so much because I disbelieve the idea that a tough crackdown will just postpone the issue and the virus will reappear. But because I think that even if that's true, it will buy time to prepare - possibly effective treatment or a vaccine, certainly specialised infection-handling units set up across the country, and certainly careful planning of how restrictions are handled.
We are trying to follow a theory - that mass infection in a controlled way will help in the long term - while scrambling with measures on the hoof to respond to each day's pressures. that doesn't sound like a good way to tackle it, and the downside, as David says, is that the strategy inevitably means many more deaths in the short term.
I don't blame Boris for this - he's taking advice, as he should. But despite their convincing manner, I'm increasingly doubtful that the advisors are right.
(Dloes it matter what I think? Nah. But we're just discussing it for interest here0
My view is that at this point we have to trust the decsions that are being made. That means having to trust that those making then are doing so on the best advice and for the right reasons. I am confident that is the case in the UK (and across Europe, even though the decisions being reached are different). If I were in the US I would not be remotely confident.
Perhaps one of the reasons why other governments aren't contemplating the herd immunity solution is that they fear their populations wouldn't accept it because it sounds grim to the untutored, even though it's designed to reduce the overall number of serious cases. The UK government has decided to trust people to understand it.
On the family isolation issue, I think this is where the schools being open idea comes in. Students up to eighteen will have parents who are fifty or younger in the vast majority of cases. This then puts them all in the herd immunity attempt. They want the children to pass it on to parents.
Of course, there are some who are older and who would need to be isolated in the home (maybe community isolation with friends or older relatives would be a good thing, rather than individually?). Also, parents with underlying conditions would have to do the same.
That leaves any household with no parent who is low risk as being a problem. Maybe get other relatives or families to temporarily adopt?
Musing out loud, but these strategies need to be shared rather than letting people just do what they want piecemeal. There is still an important government role here as a national pandemic response.
I thought Hunt's suggestion was very sensible. To run schools with much more flexibility for the next few months.
Getting sixth formers to do some of the childcare and even teaching would make sense to me.
Sorry, what? Making 17 year olds responsible for the safety and teaching of infants? No.
In a genuine emergency, it might be possible to use them under supervision to keep legal ratios of adults to children,
It is however something I would personally only consider as a desperate last resort.
Am I right in thinking that if you go back a couple of centuries Public schools would have had one or two masters who taught the older boys, who in turn taught the younger ones?
What a disappointment. With no Premier League football today I thought the next best thing was to be part of the panic buyers at my local Waitrose. Well there were only 3/4 other shoppers and almost all the shelves were full. What's happening to this country?
Morrison’s in Burntwood was the opposite. I went in at 8 to beat the panic buyers. Car park was full and the shelves were half empty. All Fray Bentos pies and most tinned fish had vanished. Two packets of yeast left. Hardly any soap. Bloody hoarders had barely left enough for me to fill two shopping trollies to meet my own simple needs.
Sainsbury's today -- no tissues, toilet rolls or kitchen rolls. No soap. No frozen fish. Not much paracetamol and no aspirin or ibuprofen. No Coke. Probably around twice as many shoppers as last Saturday. ETA no Dettol.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The live meat markets and wet markets for fish are going to be incredibly hard to ban because of the way that patronage works in China. There will always be demand and there will always be someone to bribe. The only way to do it is to seek a total cultural change and that is a question of years, not months.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Not just China, all across Asian. What I didn't realise until recently is these markets aren't full of animals from just that region, they are literally from all four corners of the earth. Thus they are putting into contact animals that naturally would never interact and raise the possibility of intermingling of diseases that never would in the natural world.
Agreed but China is the epicentre of this
Those markets should have been banned already, I'm somewhat shocked if they haven't been.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
Give people a CV test from infected areas before travelling. It's perfectly possible.
Pay to set up safe areas for refugees next to the countries they are fleeing from. Something that should have been done years ago. If not we can have quarantined areas set up here for exactly that purpose.
Herd immunity is useless once the virus mutates, which it will.
On the family isolation issue, I think this is where the schools being open idea comes in. Students up to eighteen will have parents who are fifty or younger in the vast majority of cases. This then puts them all in the herd immunity attempt. They want the children to pass it on to parents.
Of course, there are some who are older and who would need to be isolated in the home (maybe community isolation with friends or older relatives would be a good thing, rather than individually?). Also, parents with underlying conditions would have to do the same.
That leaves any household with no parent who is low risk as being a problem. Maybe get other relatives or families to temporarily adopt?
Musing out loud, but these strategies need to be shared rather than letting people just do what they want piecemeal. There is still an important government role here as a national pandemic response.
I thought Hunt's suggestion was very sensible. To run schools with much more flexibility for the next few months.
Getting sixth formers to do some of the childcare and even teaching would make sense to me.
Sorry, what? Making 17 year olds responsible for the safety and teaching of infants? No.
In a genuine emergency, it might be possible to use them under supervision to keep legal ratios of adults to children,
It is however something I would personally only consider as a desperate last resort.
Am I right in thinking that if you go back a couple of centuries Public schools would have had one or two masters who taught the older boys, who in turn taught the younger ones?
The honest answer is, I don’t know. It seems possible. Certainly that was the way the circulating schools in Wales worked in the eighteenth century.
What a disappointment. With no Premier League football today I thought the next best thing was to be part of the panic buyers at my local Waitrose. Well there were only 3/4 other shoppers and almost all the shelves were full. What's happening to this country?
Morrison’s in Burntwood was the opposite. I went in at 8 to beat the panic buyers. Car park was full and the shelves were half empty. All Fray Bentos pies and most tinned fish had vanished. Two packets of yeast left. Hardly any soap. Bloody hoarders had barely left enough for me to fill two shopping trollies to meet my own simple needs.
Sainsbury's today -- no tissues, toilet rolls or kitchen rolls. No soap. No frozen fish. Not much paracetamol and no aspirin or ibuprofen. No Coke. Probably around twice as many shoppers as last Saturday. ETA no Dettol.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The puzzling thing is presumably these wet markets have existed in China for hundreds or even thousands of years, and they can't have been causing problems all that time since otherwise they wouldn't have lasted so long — unless there were occasional outbreaks of disease/viruses that were incredibly localised, before the advent of mass travel.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
Give people a CV test from infected areas before travelling. It's perfectly possible.
Pay to set up safe areas for refugees next to the countries they are fleeing from. Something that should have been done years ago. If not we can have quarantined areas set up here for exactly that purpose.
Herd immunity is useless once the virus mutates, which it will.
It's not 'useless', and you're awfully opinionated for someone on their 5th post.
I remain sceptical about the figures worldwide. Last time I looked Turkey, for instance, was declaring 2 cases but I have been told via someone in the capital that there are hundreds of cases in Ankara alone.
The Chinese situation now looks great but what would actually be stopping a totalitarian regime that badly wants to save face simply not testing people are attributing most deaths to other causes?
[*] China has often been known to bamboozle foreign journalists, so what he's seeing may or may not be typical...
That interviewee is one of the most convincing I've ever seen - really impressive technique. More importantly, explaining exactly how China appears to have cracked it is fascinating. I agree with the point that we now have to see what happens when they graduallylift the restrictions. But from where they started (and where we are about to arrive at) it's a good place to get to..
What is interesting is the Chinese approach to this, is lot of "quick and inaccurate" methods including tech, but using it to funnel individuals towards more and more accurate / expensive / time consuming approaches.
South Korea has done something similar with a road side test then funnel into the gold standard screen programme.
The move fast and break stuff of Silicon Valley.
In the West, we have for always taken the approach of gold standard approach to test once when it comes to medicine.
That last sentence is not totally true when it comes to screening tests. With these tests, so many asymptomatic people are being tested that you will be picking up thousands of positives, and the vast majority of these will be false positives, no matter how good the sensitivity and specificity of the test is.
What is important is that the follow-up test after a positive screnning test is what you call a gold standard test. Being positives in both tests is then very likely to be a true positive.
Which is what the Chinese were doing. I’m sceptical about the claim, but they were, for example (and according to the WHO mission) running up to 200 patients a day through each CAT scan machine at the height of the outbreak, looking for the characteristic ‘ground glass’ shadow on the lungs.
I think Boris is pursuing the correct tactics. Bring in the experts and listen to them. They might be wrong but it is defensible. If he did anything else, it would give the armchair 'experts' an extra stick to beat him with.
There is still a political element to some of the criticisms, but there always will be. If he took notice of the assorted thickos jostling to shout loudest, they'd still criticise him for pandering to ignorance.
What’s disappointing is things like Ian Donald’s thread above. Thoughtful and useful thread. And then he added at the end “way to clever for Boris Johnson to have thought of”. Unnecessary and unhelpful. Johnson is listening to the specialists in this area and making a judgement on the right strategy.
It’s a gutsy call and I hope it goes right. For all our sakes.
So do I. FWIW I didn't criticise Johnson and his advisors after their press conference, and I don't think I'm especially politically motivated on this issue. But I'm coming to feel that we've made the wrong decision.
Not so much because I disbelieve the idea that a tough crackdown will just postpone the issue and the virus will reappear. But because I think that even if that's true, it will buy time to prepare - possibly effective treatment or a vaccine, certainly specialised infection-handling units set up across the country, and certainly careful planning of how restrictions are handled.
We are trying to follow a theory - that mass infection in a controlled way will help in the long term - while scrambling with measures on the hoof to respond to each day's pressures. that doesn't sound like a good way to tackle it, and the downside, as David says, is that the strategy inevitably means many more deaths in the short term.
I don't blame Boris for this - he's taking advice, as he should. But despite their convincing manner, I'm increasingly doubtful that the advisors are right.
(Dloes it matter what I think? Nah. But we're just discussing it for interest here0
A few points (apologies if long!):
First, if (and it is an if) our cases are geographically distributed we will cope better with the epidemic as there will not be so much local stress on the system (presently we have 25% cases in London with 15% population so that's probably our most likely cluster). This will definitely help the NHS cope.
Second, we are, naturally as a population, taking social distancing measures here that will slow down the spread quite a lot but not eliminate it - this will also flatten the peak.
Third, we assume that those infected will be distributed equally across the population: but in my experience the elderly and infirm are already beginning to isolate / take many additional precautions so the number of serious cases requiring ICU will be lower than asserted by a straight multiplication of the number infected (essentially it's all about conditional probabilities rather than independent events).
Fourth, we can (and will at some point) of course pivot towards a lockdown at any point - in Italy, this started when they had 5,000 cases (of which the majority [>60%] were in Lombardy - see https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51858987 for some nice illustration; presently Madrid has 60% of cases in Spain I think, so is in a similar position). We are about 10 days behind this time point in terms of number of cases.
The good news is that like Italy and China, if we do go into lockdown we will see similar results - high growth in number of new cases for a few days after lockdown and then constant (linear) growth for a period before decline.
The challenge is that locking down now, when we do not have a geographical localisation in terms of case number nor the number of cases of other countries, might indeed lead to a larger future peak as once the lockdown stops the virus will almost immediately return. Holding off on these measures for another week or so (especially with the lack of an extreme local cluster) could thus be beneficial in the longer term without necessarily any increase in mortality relative to other countries.
This epidemic is unpredictable, but it could be than when we get to say 100,000 cases there is a severe lockdown of the UK as in Hubei/Italy. The number of cases might go down a bit so the lockdown might be eased but the cases could increase again. This could continue indefinitely until we run out of money and are forced to lift the lockdowns. Then the epidemic would run its course. Is it possibly inevitable that this disease will infect most people eventually so that little will be gained by locking down the country for long?
What a disappointment. With no Premier League football today I thought the next best thing was to be part of the panic buyers at my local Waitrose. Well there were only 3/4 other shoppers and almost all the shelves were full. What's happening to this country?
Morrison’s in Burntwood was the opposite. I went in at 8 to beat the panic buyers. Car park was full and the shelves were half empty. All Fray Bentos pies and most tinned fish had vanished. Two packets of yeast left. Hardly any soap. Bloody hoarders had barely left enough for me to fill two shopping trollies to meet my own simple needs.
Sainsbury's today -- no tissues, toilet rolls or kitchen rolls. No soap. No frozen fish. Not much paracetamol and no aspirin or ibuprofen. No Coke. Probably around twice as many shoppers as last Saturday. ETA no Dettol.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
just taken my 5 year old to the lejeplads (play area?) anyway pretty much all her friends and parents from her nursery are there! critcising the UK approach a la Farage or Piers Morgan might make people who detest the govt feel better - but it doesn't seem to me that the modelling which shows it has little effect to shut schools too early is somehow negligent or wilfully evil as a lot of people are hinting at.
In Denmark we are further along the path than the UK hence more measures are being taken but it's not a different approach actually despite what some in the UK media are saying.
Yep - I can't see another way. And a vaccine is not arriving any time soon.
The tenor of the debate on a vaccine is that 2021 is likely, 2022 at latest. That to me IS soon.
If we can have confidence in a vaccine within a couple of years (but can we?) then IMO the time to buy the Footsie is coming up. Maybe now.
'2022 at the latest' - I think it's risky to talk about the certainty of a vaccine being available by a specific date when there's no guarantee that's going to be the case.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
President Trump's other problem is the GOP's antipathy to government action. An emergency extension to Medicaid to everyone for Covid-19 testing and treatment, for instance, would not be well received by a party struggling to cripple Obamacare.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Not just China, all across Asian. What I didn't realise until recently is these markets aren't full of animals from just that region, they are literally from all four corners of the earth. Thus they are putting into contact animals that naturally would never interact Cand raise the possibility of intermingling of diseases that never would in the natural world.
Agreed but China is the epicentre of this
Those markets should have been banned already, I'm somewhat shocked if they haven't been.
It’s quite likely they will be heavily regulated instead. Banning them will just mean they carry on in a messier and underground manner.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The puzzling thing is presumably these wet markets have existed in China for hundreds or even thousands of years, and they can't have been causing problems all that time since otherwise they wouldn't have lasted so long — unless there were occasional outbreaks of disease/viruses that were incredibly localised, before the advent of mass travel.
Mass travel has certainly made virus outbreaks from them much more dangerous
I actually saw a bit of news today (not watched much for some time now). The delinquent angle of 'u-turn' nonsense was rather dispiriting. Just because the Government isn't doing something on a given day that doesn't mean doing it at any time later is a u-turn, especially when they've specifically said it's something they've been looking at doing in the near future.
The quality of the media on this is shocking
As I think Nick said the other day, too many in the media look at journalism as a branch of entertainment. Perhaps because it is easier than hard research, followed up by sharp writing. On this Covid-19 issue at least, they need to have a very long hard look at their product and think "WTF am I doing here?" Gotcha moments, manufacturing Govt. U-turns, pontificating against experts in their field - just STOP IT.
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
All my colleagues who regularly WFH have turned bedrooms, garages or sheds into offices.
As I say many of us choose to turn a bedroom into an office etc. However, a 23 year old with a modest bedroom in a 4 person shared house will find it much more of a burden to work 20+ hours at home than a 55 year old whose eldest daughter graduated last year.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
Not just China, all across Asian. What I didn't realise until recently is these markets aren't full of animals from just that region, they are literally from all four corners of the earth. Thus they are putting into contact animals that naturally would never interact Cand raise the possibility of intermingling of diseases that never would in the natural world.
Agreed but China is the epicentre of this
Those markets should have been banned already, I'm somewhat shocked if they haven't been.
It’s quite likely they will be heavily regulated instead. Banning them will just mean they carry on in a messier and underground manner.
I thought the point of an autocracy was being able to get people to do what you want them to. They can lock down a whole province, surely they can ban these hell holes and punish those who flout the ban severely?
Surprised Sky Sports haven’t bought the rights to the last week of the Pakistan Super League Cricket.
Sky 732 might be in your normal subscription.
Cheers yes I have that. I Guess it wouldn’t be worth Sky getting the rights as people can just watch it on there... the localised Pepe chicken ads would go unseen too!
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
As an aside, am reading Hastings’ Vietnam. I hadn’t realised Churchill had turned down a US request for assistance in intervening back in 1954 (I knew about Wilson doing the same the following decade). Puts an interesting slant on Suez.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Well, that’s what I was wondering. We have a gmail client and we’ve been urged to look at the conference function. I was wondering if you could give me feedback on how it worked but it sounds as though your systems are different.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Well, that’s what I was wondering. We have a gmail client and we’ve been urged to look at the conference function. I was wondering if you could give me feedback on how it worked but it sounds as though your systems are different.
Do most of your pupils have their own electronic devices?
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
'2022 at the latest' - I think it's risky to talk about the certainty of a vaccine being available by a specific date when there's no guarantee that's going to be the case.
Indeed.
But I'm focused on when the stock market becomes a screaming buy - since with the right timing it will constitute a once in a blue moon investment opportunity - and a reasonable answer to the question "What is the probability of a vaccine becoming available in the next 2 years?" is key to making that judgement.
I'm told that China is re-opening. Even Hubei/Wuhan
a) they need to get the economy moving again (and there is going to be a huge demand for things like medical supplies, which cynically big business to be had and from a humanitarian perspective to try and help save as many people as possible).
b) they are now in full propaganda mode, the great leader, the party, the nation have defeated this disease.
We are in the middle of a profound crisis and PB is debating Sky Sports subscriptions.
Never change PB.
Just another issue in a never ending line of them
Nothing is going to be the same post covid 19
WFH will become the norm for many,
Many companies will have been forced over the technology hurdle for employees to work at home and will embrace it afterwards. I supsect that many other companies will look at their drop in productivity in the next month and use that as an argument against it. How honest they will be about productivity lost to skyving, and how much to the economic hit of the crisis is another matter.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
All my colleagues who regularly WFH have turned bedrooms, garages or sheds into offices.
As I say many of us choose to turn a bedroom into an office etc. However, a 23 year old with a modest bedroom in a 4 person shared house will find it much more of a burden to work 20+ hours at home than a 55 year old whose eldest daughter graduated last year.
Buy shares in Regus. Business will at the very least be highly tempted to reduce corporate office space after this. But teams will still need to meet, individuals like you describe will want to work not just at home...
I actually saw a bit of news today (not watched much for some time now). The delinquent angle of 'u-turn' nonsense was rather dispiriting. Just because the Government isn't doing something on a given day that doesn't mean doing it at any time later is a u-turn, especially when they've specifically said it's something they've been looking at doing in the near future.
The quality of the media on this is shocking
As I think Nick said the other day, too many in the media look at journalism as a branch of entertainment. Perhaps because it is easier than hard research, followed up by sharp writing. On this Covid-19 issue at least, they need to have a very long hard look at their product and think "WTF am I doing here?" Gotcha moments, manufacturing Govt. U-turns, pontificating against experts in their field - just STOP IT.
One of Ben Goldacre's comments about the MMR Furore was that the science journalists would be writing sensible, measured and evidence based articles which were tucked away on page 25, contradicted in the same issue by sensationalist articles written by news journalists, which were being printed on the front page.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Well, that’s what I was wondering. We have a gmail client and we’ve been urged to look at the conference function. I was wondering if you could give me feedback on how it worked but it sounds as though your systems are different.
Do most of your pupils have their own electronic devices?
Pretty well all of them have smart phones of one description or another. How useful they would be for streaming lessons is another question.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Be a little cautious of Teams; my Teams using team finds that it sometimes looses or heavily delays messages between users. Just because someone doesn't respond then it doesn't mean they're on the skive.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
Give people a CV test from infected areas before travelling. It's perfectly possible.
Pay to set up safe areas for refugees next to the countries they are fleeing from. Something that should have been done years ago. If not we can have quarantined areas set up here for exactly that purpose.
Herd immunity is useless once the virus mutates, which it will.
It's not 'useless', and you're awfully opinionated for someone on their 5th post.
Well I am happy to be corrected, but my limited understanding it that with viruses you only gain an immunity to one strain and when it mutates you can still get infected. So like the flu for example.
I didn't realise there was a threshold for posts before opinions are encouraged.
2) I fundamentally disagree with the assumption that everyone is going to catch the disease eventually. China and Singapore have show that the R0 of the disease can be reduced to much lower than 1 with sufficient government policies during lock down. Yes after restrictions are lifted then the R0 will rise by up again, but this could be reduced with policies like social distancing, working from home more often and self isolating as soon as you develop any symptoms at all. Once multiple testing kits are freely available and sent to every household, people can be tested immediately if they have symptoms or have been in contact with someone who has the virus. All these measures reduce R0 in the population when it is not locked down.
When new outbreaks happen then further lock downs will be required, but they can be more localised and of shorter duration as the national number of cases is gradually reduced. The idea is to get the long term R0 to less than 1 with general policy and targeted lock downs, so eventually the disease can be eliminated completely. For foreign travel, only allow this openly to other countries with similar controls and as more countries get under control too then gradually open the borders to them as well. Optional travel with 14 day quarantine from higher risk areas can be allowed. Eventually a corona virus test before boarding can become standard in every country.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
And we need China to ban live meat markets and bat experiments to avoid new viruses emerging from there
The puzzling thing is presumably these wet markets have existed in China for hundreds or even thousands of years, and they can't have been causing problems all that time since otherwise they wouldn't have lasted so long — unless there were occasional outbreaks of disease/viruses that were incredibly localised, before the advent of mass travel.
Until 20 years ago, China was much poorer, the population were much more spread out with much higher percentage living in rural areas and not allowed to travel between regions without special permission (let alone go abroad).
So less chance of spread even within China, let alone abroad. People didn't live as long so their deaths just put down to how things are. And of course without the internet, the state could suppress any local issues.
I'm told that China is re-opening. Even Hubei/Wuhan
a) they need to get the economy moving again (and there is going to be a huge demand for things like medical supplies, which cynically big business to be had and from a humanitarian perspective to try and help save as many people as possible).
b) they are now in full propaganda mode, the great leader, the party, the nation have defeated this disease.
Which is when they will be at their greatest risk. As will true information on whether this fires back up again. If they claim it hasn't, will that put pressure on Boris to change tactics?
What a disappointment. With no Premier League football today I thought the next best thing was to be part of the panic buyers at my local Waitrose. Well there were only 3/4 other shoppers and almost all the shelves were full. What's happening to this country?
Morrison’s in Burntwood was the opposite. I went in at 8 to beat the panic buyers. Car park was full and the shelves were half empty. All Fray Bentos pies and most tinned fish had vanished. Two packets of yeast left. Hardly any soap. Bloody hoarders had barely left enough for me to fill two shopping trollies to meet my own simple needs.
Sainsbury's today -- no tissues, toilet rolls or kitchen rolls. No soap. No frozen fish. Not much paracetamol and no aspirin or ibuprofen. No Coke. Probably around twice as many shoppers as last Saturday. ETA no Dettol.
By midweek I’m guessing the shelves will be full and the stores empty of customers....
I actually saw a bit of news today (not watched much for some time now). The delinquent angle of 'u-turn' nonsense was rather dispiriting. Just because the Government isn't doing something on a given day that doesn't mean doing it at any time later is a u-turn, especially when they've specifically said it's something they've been looking at doing in the near future.
I was given some information about an upcoming step from a friend.
It will be interesting to see if the press will claim it is a u turn when it happens
I'm told that China is re-opening. Even Hubei/Wuhan
From the people I know there, sort of. There have already been reports of CCP officials fudging output numbers to hit central targets. The real issue is that media reporting is substantially under the control of the CCP so there is a stage 1 filtering effect.
“A couple of key takeaways from our analysis of early Covid-19 dynamics in Wuhan:
“We estimated that the control measures introduced there – unprecedented interventions that will have had a huge social and psychological toll – reduced transmission by around 55 per cent in space of 2 weeks.
“There’s evidence that the vast majority of the population is still susceptible in Wuhan – we estimated around 95 per cent at end of January. As soon as control measures are lifted, there is the risk of new introduced cases – and another outbreak.
“It’s easy to say ‘let's just do what Wuhan did’, but the measures there have involved a change to daily life that really has been unimaginable in scale and impact. And as we’ve seen, China cannot sustain them indefinitely."
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Well, that’s what I was wondering. We have a gmail client and we’ve been urged to look at the conference function. I was wondering if you could give me feedback on how it worked but it sounds as though your systems are different.
Do most of your pupils have their own electronic devices?
Pretty well all of them have smart phones of one description or another. How useful they would be for streaming lessons is another question.
Phones are probably too small to be honest.
It is going to put a strain on the Wi-fi, so I may have to resort to the usual cover work methods
I am lucky in that I have finished the A-level and GCSE courses. Those classes have a bundle of past papers to keep them going.
So you are going to basically shut off Africa permanently? I am afraid this is pie in the sky stuff.
I am confident that they will be able to control the disease there eventually too.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
It isn't going to happen in the next decade if not longer. Not without herd immunity which is exactly what you are opposing.
If is a choice between multiple deaths for some with potentially life changing illness for the rest of us and having restrictions to travel to and from Africa for a decade then I would choose the latter, as I think would most people.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
You won't have that choice. Just as with Trump's idiotic fly ban on the EU, people will always find ways around it. And what about all the refugees? Are you going to start shooting them to stop them getting into Europe? (Note I am not making any claims on refugees being infected, just pointing out the obvious conclusions of your strategy)
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
Give people a CV test from infected areas before travelling. It's perfectly possible.
Pay to set up safe areas for refugees next to the countries they are fleeing from. Something that should have been done years ago. If not we can have quarantined areas set up here for exactly that purpose.
Herd immunity is useless once the virus mutates, which it will.
It's not 'useless', and you're awfully opinionated for someone on their 5th post.
Well I am happy to be corrected, but my limited understanding it that with viruses you only gain an immunity to one strain and when it mutates you can still get infected. So like the flu for example.
I didn't realise there was a threshold for posts before opinions are encouraged.
Your last sentence did make me laugh out loud
It's certainly an interesting take that you need to reach a certain post threshold before you can express an opinion.
On a personal note, at the urging of my Head of Department and with the approval of the Head I am going to be working from home from Monday. I have some underlying health issues and was in hospital with pneumonia only last November. Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
What email client does your school use?
Outlook I think. All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
Be a little cautious of Teams; my Teams using team finds that it sometimes looses or heavily delays messages between users. Just because someone doesn't respond then it doesn't mean they're on the skive.
All I’m really hoping for is something a bit better than “read this page, make notes and then try these questions”.
Mass travel has certainly made virus outbreaks from them much more dangerous
Yeah, because the plague of Justinian and the Black Death were totally not more serious than Covid-19.
That was mass travel by rats
Pangolins being not quite so cosmopolitan ?
The classic case, of course, being the post 1492 Americas, where up to 90% of the indigenous populations disappeared over the next couple of centuries.
I'm told that China is re-opening. Even Hubei/Wuhan
a) they need to get the economy moving again (and there is going to be a huge demand for things like medical supplies, which cynically big business to be had and from a humanitarian perspective to try and help save as many people as possible).
b) they are now in full propaganda mode, the great leader, the party, the nation have defeated this disease.
Which is when they will be at their greatest risk. As will true information on whether this fires back up again. If they claim it hasn't, will that put pressure on Boris to change tactics?
I am not sure the British public will accept an app that spies on your every movement and exclude you from society if the AI says you are a potential carrier.
Because this is China's approach to trying to ensure they don't have another implosion. If the system explodes again, they won't be able to hide it.
They will be able to massage the figures (if required) to claim reasonably low levels of new cases, and I think that is their plan. Get people back working, fire fight any hotspots quickly and rush to create a vaccine which they will give to the population without the usual years of trials.
It will be move fast, break stuff. If the vaccine has side effects or isn't 100% effective, the party will probably see that as better than risking a Wuhan episode again.
And they will keep working at it and treatments, and if they need to give people 2-3-4 loads of different vaccines, they will do it.
Comments
It is however something I would personally only consider as a desperate last resort.
But as I mentioned a corona virus test before boarding would have to be in place otherwise.
I also worry about companies starting to insist that employees work much more at home, and these employees feel forced into turning a spare room into a work room, or to rent a 2 bedroom flat rather than a 1 bedroom flat, or devoting 4 square meters of their shared house bedroom to their work. I made the conscious choice to rent a flat with a room I can call an office, in part beause I can afford to. Many others are not in a position to do that, especially in SE England where rents and house prices are so high.
This is without considering that it could be us shut off from the outside world if we don't eliminate the disease.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/13/politics/trump-stock-market-gains-signed-photo/index.html
As long as the virus is endemic somewhere in the world your strategy fails. We either need a vaccine or we need herd immunity. Those are the only two ways we are going to ever get back to anything approaching normal life.
What is important is that the follow-up test after a positive screnning test is what you call a gold standard test. Being positives in both tests is then very likely to be a true positive.
So that is NEGATIVE confirmation bias.
Which if we apply to my superforecast of Trump thrashed in WH2020 - something I very much DO want to happen - makes it all the more compelling.
Good thread on the UK Govt plan.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cjUOpvmDE7k
I make sauerkraut myself (yay!) - definitely a great new skill to learn during a period of social distancing...
This is where I don't understand the plan to not test anybody but those hospitalized. Unless they aren't being 100% honest with the public and they will be sampling, but don't want 1000s of people ringing 111 demanding they get a test.
But there will soon be another capacity problem, I fear. I doubt many companies have enough VPN termination points to accommodate all their employees. If your company asks you to get off the VPN between accessing the intranet, then that is why.
If we can have confidence in a vaccine within a couple of years (but can we?) then IMO the time to buy the Footsie is coming up. Maybe now.
Pay to set up safe areas for refugees next to the countries they are fleeing from. Something that should have been done years ago.
If not we can have quarantined areas set up here for exactly that purpose.
Herd immunity is useless once the virus mutates, which it will.
I’m sceptical about the claim, but they were, for example (and according to the WHO mission) running up to 200 patients a day through each CAT scan machine at the height of the outbreak, looking for the characteristic ‘ground glass’ shadow on the lungs.
Looks like I’m going to have to learn how to live stream lessons...
In Denmark we are further along the path than the UK hence more measures are being taken but it's not a different approach actually despite what some in the UK media are saying.
Banning them will just mean they carry on in a messier and underground manner.
And indeed according to an even higher authority - President Donald Trump himself.
All the pupils should have iPads or laptops, and I will be using Teams to send them notes. I am hoping that I can also use the chat function to answer questions during the lessons.
I hadn’t realised Churchill had turned down a US request for assistance in intervening back in 1954 (I knew about Wilson doing the same the following decade). Puts an interesting slant on Suez.
But I'm focused on when the stock market becomes a screaming buy - since with the right timing it will constitute a once in a blue moon investment opportunity - and a reasonable answer to the question "What is the probability of a vaccine becoming available in the next 2 years?" is key to making that judgement.
b) they are now in full propaganda mode, the great leader, the party, the nation have defeated this disease.
I didn't realise there was a threshold for posts before opinions are encouraged.
So less chance of spread even within China, let alone abroad. People didn't live as long so their deaths just put down to how things are. And of course without the internet, the state could suppress any local issues.
It will be interesting to see if the press will claim it is a u turn when it happens
“A couple of key takeaways from our analysis of early Covid-19 dynamics in Wuhan:
“We estimated that the control measures introduced there – unprecedented interventions that will have had a huge social and psychological toll – reduced transmission by around 55 per cent in space of 2 weeks.
“There’s evidence that the vast majority of the population is still susceptible in Wuhan – we estimated around 95 per cent at end of January. As soon as control measures are lifted, there is the risk of new introduced cases – and another outbreak.
“It’s easy to say ‘let's just do what Wuhan did’, but the measures there have involved a change to daily life that really has been unimaginable in scale and impact. And as we’ve seen, China cannot sustain them indefinitely."
Telegraph
It is going to put a strain on the Wi-fi, so I may have to resort to the usual cover work methods
I am lucky in that I have finished the A-level and GCSE courses. Those classes have a bundle of past papers to keep them going.
It's certainly an interesting take that you need to reach a certain post threshold before you can express an opinion.
The classic case, of course, being the post 1492 Americas, where up to 90% of the indigenous populations disappeared over the next couple of centuries.
Because this is China's approach to trying to ensure they don't have another implosion. If the system explodes again, they won't be able to hide it.
They will be able to massage the figures (if required) to claim reasonably low levels of new cases, and I think that is their plan. Get people back working, fire fight any hotspots quickly and rush to create a vaccine which they will give to the population without the usual years of trials.
It will be move fast, break stuff. If the vaccine has side effects or isn't 100% effective, the party will probably see that as better than risking a Wuhan episode again.
And they will keep working at it and treatments, and if they need to give people 2-3-4 loads of different vaccines, they will do it.