First up this essentially assumes 100% turnout, many neighbours won't vote - nevertheless the question begs an answer, is your neighbour a Trumper or a Bidenite….
Given in the US a random pair of neighbours are more likely than not to vote the same way given urban-rural polarisation of the vote and so forth, this is either
i. Projection
or
ii. People disliking/not knowing their neighbours.
Was a similar question ever asked in the midterms, or in 2016 ?
Trafalgar asked the question in their 2016 state polling as used it to weight their topline result, and if you cherry pick their results it looked a good approach.
A very simple point which you’d think both government and a few posters here might have considered. It’s entirely natural that a number of students will underperform their predictions. For government therefore to disadvantage particular students at random via an algorithm is neither natural nor fair.
Going on teachers' forecasts would however have also have disadvantaged particular students at random, and many more of them, through the opposite mechanism of grade inflation. I'm not sure there's any answer to this. In fact it's not even clear what the question is - if it is 'What is the best algorithm for getting a reasonable approximation to what the exams would have produced', then the algorithm is not bad on average (although of course unfair in many individual cases). Some critics of the government, such as Angela Rayner, seem to be arguing that the question should be something different: 'Can we fake up the results to make disadvantaged schools look better than they are?'.
A couple of relevant twitter threads on this. First one is on the non-scandal of teacher overprediction; Sam Feedman was one of Gove's spads at education;
The other is on what's beginning to look like the square-windows-in-the-airplane fatal flaw. Once Ofqual had decided the grade curve for a subject at a school, they seem to have systematically rounded down, to protect their grade curve. So if a school might have expected 1.8 A*s, it was only allowed 1. Furthermore (because Ds and Es are quite rare these days), if a student fell off the bottom of grade C, they could go all the way to a U,
Given that plenty of subjects at plenty of schools weren't adjusted at all, this doesn't look like a sustainable position for the government (except that, as we know, this government doesn't seem to care about the sustainability of its position, because it isn't 2024 yet.)
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
The discussion re 500,000 deaths misses a much bigger point, which SAGE were most concerned with.
At low numbers, they get the best care available. That is true, for example, of the Diamond Princess.
At higher numbers the death rate increases because we would no longer have the resources to cope. In addition excess deaths from other causes would stack up, as "normal" stroke/heart attack patients were unable to access care.
Correct. That's why excess deaths matter, in a very serious pandemic many of the deaths won't even be directly due to the disease.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
Frankly whether its 50K or 60K or 70k deaths it is just not worth the damage done in jobs, the economy, morale, education (look at the poor kids yesterday re a level results -not had at least a chance to do an exam) and countless other areas. Can the country please stop obsessing about this not very fatal illness that is no worse than a bad flu year - It is frankly ridiculous and shows badly up our twitter based virtue signalling culture.
In this century alone we have gone into war knowing the death toll will be higher than anything covid 19 does on the basis that concepts of freedom are more important . Not sure why the government and a lot of the twitter chattering class and media think different know in that we have turned into a cult that has to preserve end of life (even very low quality end of life) above everything else (be it 18 year old life chances, jobs , travel etc, the warmth of human greeting )
We haven't had a "its just the flu" in a while...
Stop twisting words - Its clear I did not say it was just flu - just the consequences are the same as a bad flu year
That is an "it's just the flu" argument"!
Remember the deaths and hospitalisations have been kept low because of the lockdown. No-one seriously claims that the numbers would have been at "bad flu year" levels had there been no lockdown.
You may be right but there are a number of scientific voices now being raised regarding the effectiveness of a lockdown. This guy may be completely mad but his views are gaining ground.
Future lockdowns will be more nuanced, as so much more is known about the contagion of the Sars-Cov-2 virus, its prevelance in the population and the effects of Covid-19.
In February/March we only knew that the virus was spreading very rapidly, killing people, putting prime ministers in hospital and breaking health care systems. A strong lockdown was absolutely the right response given the information at the time, evidenced by the UK's delaying by just one week compared to other equivalent european countries.
I don"t see why they wouldn't be? Protects funded by the EU and the Scottish Government are.
Which made such an impact in the EU referendum...
In Scotland?
Projects invariably include a plaque or similar detailing their funding, and this invariably includes the flag or emblem of those organisations. When the UK was in the EU, our subs (correct me if I'm wrong) came from the UK Govt., and then the EU kindly gave us some of or money back with projects emblazoned with their flag - quite a few in Scotland. That situation was a convenient one for the SNP. Not suggesting it won them elections, but it was a nice arrangement. Do they now expect the UK Government to disguise it's involvement in funding projects because...reasons?
Because the arses are just using our money , and trying to make out it is largesse and that we are paupers. They can stick their UK union plaques and projects up their arses.
Well yes, but that's the case with the Scottish Government, and all the quangos like HIE. Spending our money and expecting to be thanked for it is pretty much what Governments do.
Well I doubt they get that many thanks, more brickbats. This will backfire big time on Bozo the clown , he is hated already and thinking he can pretend that he can take credit for spending our money will make us want to stay a colony is barking. He can F*** right off, the plaques will go in the bin.
It's non news Malc. All those projects carry the same type of plaques. There's absolutely no reason why the UK Government should deliberately hide its involvement, other than for the SNP's political convenience
Lucky, it will go down like a bucket of sick. Uptick in Yes support guaranteed. These thick goons just don't get that rubbing people's noses in it does not win friends.
Malc. If the UK government offers £50 million in conjunction with another £50 million from the Scots government on a project, as recently mentioned in Northern Scotland, than it is correct for it to be jointly badged just as it would now if it was the EU
The amount of fury coming from the Nationalists indicates just how much they do not like it
G, them trying to take credit for giving us back some of our own money is pathetic, bit like having a whole wall of their new Governor General's HQ in Edinburgh as a union jack. These people are morons of the first order.
Malc. You are blinkered if you do not accept the UK government have invested billions in Scotland saving jobs and business support way beyond the ability of a Scots government to undertake and above and beyond the Barnett formula
that is bollox G, we have paid in a surplus over last 50 years and yet they take a fortune in interest for money we did not borrow , but don't apply interest to England as they claim Bank of England is theirs. It is Scottish money being spent.
The discussion re 500,000 deaths misses a much bigger point, which SAGE were most concerned with.
At low numbers, they get the best care available. That is true, for example, of the Diamond Princess.
At higher numbers the death rate increases because we would no longer have the resources to cope. In addition excess deaths from other causes would stack up, as "normal" stroke/heart attack patients were unable to access care.
Correct. That's why excess deaths matter, in a very serious pandemic many of the deaths won't even be directly due to the disease.
Also, flu doesn't cause long-term disability to the same degree as covid. That paper on how many "asymptomatics" ended up being hearing-damaged was a particularly shocking revelation.
I don"t see why they wouldn't be? Protects funded by the EU and the Scottish Government are.
Which made such an impact in the EU referendum...
In Scotland?
Projects invariably include a plaque or similar detailing their funding, and this invariably includes the flag or emblem of those organisations. When the UK was in the EU, our subs (correct me if I'm wrong) came from the UK Govt., and then the EU kindly gave us some of or money back with projects emblazoned with their flag - quite a few in Scotland. That situation was a convenient one for the SNP. Not suggesting it won them elections, but it was a nice arrangement. Do they now expect the UK Government to disguise it's involvement in funding projects because...reasons?
Because the arses are just using our money , and trying to make out it is largesse and that we are paupers. They can stick their UK union plaques and projects up their arses.
Well yes, but that's the case with the Scottish Government, and all the quangos like HIE. Spending our money and expecting to be thanked for it is pretty much what Governments do.
Well I doubt they get that many thanks, more brickbats. This will backfire big time on Bozo the clown , he is hated already and thinking he can pretend that he can take credit for spending our money will make us want to stay a colony is barking. He can F*** right off, the plaques will go in the bin.
It's non news Malc. All those projects carry the same type of plaques. There's absolutely no reason why the UK Government should deliberately hide its involvement, other than for the SNP's political convenience
Lucky, it will go down like a bucket of sick. Uptick in Yes support guaranteed. These thick goons just don't get that rubbing people's noses in it does not win friends.
Malc. If the UK government offers £50 million in conjunction with another £50 million from the Scots government on a project, as recently mentioned in Northern Scotland, than it is correct for it to be jointly badged just as it would now if it was the EU
The amount of fury coming from the Nationalists indicates just how much they do not like it
Quite. It suggests that Johnson is on to something.
The same Nats who are objecting to this have never objected to there being EU flags adorning projects "funded" by the EU, notwithstanding the case for that is much weaker - i.e. the fact that the UK on aggregate gets back only about a 1/3rd of the UK's gross contribution made to the EU's coffers.
Away you halfwit , only thing he is on to is annoying even more people. I sometimes wonder if some posters on here are really as stupid as they make out or just blind followers of the cult.
Malc.
You have nailed it
. 'Blind followers of a cult' is just perfect for the SNP
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
You sound as if you would be prepared to stand in the middle lane of the M1, because "people will die of something"
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
Sure, but we are talking about excess deaths. So when we say the UK has had 60,000 excess deaths so far this year we do mean on top of the normal deaths from heart disease, cancer, dementia, influenza and so on. Yes many of those people would have died this year or next, but it doesn't change the fact that so far this year about 0.1% more of the population has died than would be expected, and that is despite a lockdown, it could easily have been double or triple that.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I LOLed when I looked up the curent Swedish 7-day average Covid deaths.
The last 14 days of Sweden data is heavily lagged.
But the serious point is Sweden positive cases is going up and New Intensive care cases is going up. Unless this is a temp blip that would filter through to an increase in deaths in about a month.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
Look, Sean was talking rubbish about the 2 million deaths. As he usually does when he’s had a few.
But if we hadn’t had a lockdown, given how infectious this disease is and how brutal its impact can be 500,000 deaths does not seem impossible or ridiculous. Or to put it another way, even with strongly tightened health protocols the real death rate in this country probably stands at north of sixty thousand, which would make it the worst public health disaster since 1919.
Admittedly, we could have kept it lower but for the care homes scandal, which will end with people in court and hopefully in prison. But that is a separate question.
The key point is, we cannot know for certain what would have happened without a lockdown, because we had one. In our case, it certainly did start suppressing this disease. In Sweden, Norway and Finland, it was probably less urgent for them to lock down as they don’t live in each others’ pockets.
Actually, I still think it does. There isn't a single scrap of evidence from anywhere that suggests that UK deaths could have reached anywhere near that level.
It is also worth remembering that in the worst years, regular winter flu has killed up to 30,000.
My estimate, written on my office wall back in March, is 200,000 to 300,000 UK covid deaths. This back-of-a-fag-packet estimate was based on the vast majority getting it at some point and a 0.5% - 0.75% fatality rate.
The recorded case/death CFR is 13.2%, but we had massive underrecording of cases early doors so it'll be much lower. 0.5% is plausible, there's a hard floor if you look at some of the New York boroughs of around 0.1% or so from memory.
Yes, also the recorded case/death 13.2% doesn`t take into account the "died with" v "died of" discrepancy, which I think is large.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
Frankly whether its 50K or 60K or 70k deaths it is just not worth the damage done in jobs, the economy, morale, education (look at the poor kids yesterday re a level results -not had at least a chance to do an exam) and countless other areas. Can the country please stop obsessing about this not very fatal illness that is no worse than a bad flu year - It is frankly ridiculous and shows badly up our twitter based virtue signalling culture.
In this century alone we have gone into war knowing the death toll will be higher than anything covid 19 does on the basis that concepts of freedom are more important . Not sure why the government and a lot of the twitter chattering class and media think different know in that we have turned into a cult that has to preserve end of life (even very low quality end of life) above everything else (be it 18 year old life chances, jobs , travel etc, the warmth of human greeting )
We haven't had a "its just the flu" in a while...
Stop twisting words - Its clear I did not say it was just flu - just the consequences are the same as a bad flu year
Looking around the world, it is obvious that is vapid bilge. Lockdown or no lockdown, Covid-19 changes social and economic behaviour in ways that flu does not.
Yes, though it is also true that flu is far more serious than than generally appreciated due to the fact that many people chalk a cold down as being flu. I`ve never had flu and I never want to get it. Double or treble that wish when it comes to Covid 19.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
Look, Sean was talking rubbish about the 2 million deaths. As he usually does when he’s had a few.
But if we hadn’t had a lockdown, given how infectious this disease is and how brutal its impact can be 500,000 deaths does not seem impossible or ridiculous. Or to put it another way, even with strongly tightened health protocols the real death rate in this country probably stands at north of sixty thousand, which would make it the worst public health disaster since 1919.
Admittedly, we could have kept it lower but for the care homes scandal, which will end with people in court and hopefully in prison. But that is a separate question.
The key point is, we cannot know for certain what would have happened without a lockdown, because we had one. In our case, it certainly did start suppressing this disease. In Sweden, Norway and Finland, it was probably less urgent for them to lock down as they don’t live in each others’ pockets.
Actually, I still think it does. There isn't a single scrap of evidence from anywhere that suggests that UK deaths could have reached anywhere near that level.
It is also worth remembering that in the worst years, regular winter flu has killed up to 30,000.
My estimate, written on my office wall back in March, is 200,000 to 300,000 UK covid deaths. This back-of-a-fag-packet estimate was based on the vast majority getting it at some point and a 0.5% - 0.75% fatality rate.
The recorded case/death CFR is 13.2%, but we had massive underrecording of cases early doors so it'll be much lower. 0.5% is plausible, there's a hard floor if you look at some of the New York boroughs of around 0.1% or so from memory.
I think that the CFR of 1.4% in the early reports from Wuhan has proven fairly accurate. Maybe reduced to circa 1% with medical advances and obviously varying greatly with age.
I bow to your knowledge, Foxy, but I`m surprised you say 1%. We have no idea how many have had it with unreported mild or no symptoms. I`d be surprised if it higher than 0.25% which is a fair bit lower than the 0.5 -0.75% guesstimate that I was working with originally.
Don't worry - by the time the next election comes around the people impacted will be in their first jobs and have discovered how much their lower grades and resultant university choices impacted their life time income.
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
Sure, but we are talking about excess deaths. So when we say the UK has had 60,000 excess deaths so far this year we do mean on top of the normal deaths from heart disease, cancer, dementia, influenza and so on. Yes many of those people would have died this year or next, but it doesn't change the fact that so far this year about 0.1% more of the population has died than would be expected, and that is despite a lockdown, it could easily have been double or triple that.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
The coronavirus called the common cold is deadly, didn't you know?
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
Sure, but we are talking about excess deaths. So when we say the UK has had 60,000 excess deaths so far this year we do mean on top of the normal deaths from heart disease, cancer, dementia, influenza and so on. Yes many of those people would have died this year or next, but it doesn't change the fact that so far this year about 0.1% more of the population has died than would be expected, and that is despite a lockdown, it could easily have been double or triple that.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
We've all got to die sometime. We have to learn to live with this condition and adapt to it. As we do with any other endemic. We cannot all live our lives locked away from everyone.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
The national lottery of death.....
Except that rather than being one in umpteen million and costing you money, the COVID-19 lottery is one in a thousand and free to enter.
But it isn't, we know it isn't. Your chances are greatly enhanced or reduced depending on your age, weight, health conditions and ethnicity. For me, at my age, I have far greater odds than that. My 94 year old Grandmother has far worse odds.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
Look, Sean was talking rubbish about the 2 million deaths. As he usually does when he’s had a few.
But if we hadn’t had a lockdown, given how infectious this disease is and how brutal its impact can be 500,000 deaths does not seem impossible or ridiculous. Or to put it another way, even with strongly tightened health protocols the real death rate in this country probably stands at north of sixty thousand, which would make it the worst public health disaster since 1919.
Admittedly, we could have kept it lower but for the care homes scandal, which will end with people in court and hopefully in prison. But that is a separate question.
The key point is, we cannot know for certain what would have happened without a lockdown, because we had one. In our case, it certainly did start suppressing this disease. In Sweden, Norway and Finland, it was probably less urgent for them to lock down as they don’t live in each others’ pockets.
Actually, I still think it does. There isn't a single scrap of evidence from anywhere that suggests that UK deaths could have reached anywhere near that level.
It is also worth remembering that in the worst years, regular winter flu has killed up to 30,000.
My estimate, written on my office wall back in March, is 200,000 to 300,000 UK covid deaths. This back-of-a-fag-packet estimate was based on the vast majority getting it at some point and a 0.5% - 0.75% fatality rate.
The recorded case/death CFR is 13.2%, but we had massive underrecording of cases early doors so it'll be much lower. 0.5% is plausible, there's a hard floor if you look at some of the New York boroughs of around 0.1% or so from memory.
I think that the CFR of 1.4% in the early reports from Wuhan has proven fairly accurate. Maybe reduced to circa 1% with medical advances and obviously varying greatly with age.
I bow to your knowledge, Foxy, but I`m surprised you say 1%. We have no idea how many have had it with unreported mild or no symptoms. I`d be surprised if it higher than 0.25% which is a fair bit lower than the 0.5 -0.75% guesstimate that I was working with originally.
Replying to one of these. I think we do have a decent idea how many have been infected due to population surveillance surveys.
Numbers out recently (last week?) were at around 6% nationwide, and 13% in London.
I hear from that there is more information due out soon, drawing on wider info sources. There has been sample testing going on, for example, of blood from donor clinics, since the start of the pandemic.
I'd also point out that the way we had people apocalypto-panicking early on was because they did silly things like take the Case Fatality Rate of people tested or people in hospitals and assumed it would apply to the entire population.
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
Sure, but we are talking about excess deaths. So when we say the UK has had 60,000 excess deaths so far this year we do mean on top of the normal deaths from heart disease, cancer, dementia, influenza and so on. Yes many of those people would have died this year or next, but it doesn't change the fact that so far this year about 0.1% more of the population has died than would be expected, and that is despite a lockdown, it could easily have been double or triple that.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
We've all got to die sometime. We have to learn to live with this condition and adapt to it. As we do with any other endemic. We cannot all live our lives locked away from everyone.
We are adapting and living with it.
The only people who aren't are the 60,000 fatalities.
1 - More asymptomatic transmission thought to be happening than is in the numbers, eg in pubs.
2 - PHE will be the scapegoat no matter what - perhaps to be split between health service, and the new unitary Councils that are on the Govt agenda. But we all know that, as that is how politics works. Though in some places unitary councils will go down like cold sick.
3 - An observation of masks on the Tube. Compliance high but not universal, and the notable group not complying being young (up to 30s) black men, contributing a significant number of non-compliants. Not BAME, not women, not Asian, not older - young black men.
4 - Real worry that this is less under control than it looks.
Personally I am really worried about the large indoors spaces opening up, and sports audiences. Very reckless.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
Look, Sean was talking rubbish about the 2 million deaths. As he usually does when he’s had a few.
But if we hadn’t had a lockdown, given how infectious this disease is and how brutal its impact can be 500,000 deaths does not seem impossible or ridiculous. Or to put it another way, even with strongly tightened health protocols the real death rate in this country probably stands at north of sixty thousand, which would make it the worst public health disaster since 1919.
Admittedly, we could have kept it lower but for the care homes scandal, which will end with people in court and hopefully in prison. But that is a separate question.
The key point is, we cannot know for certain what would have happened without a lockdown, because we had one. In our case, it certainly did start suppressing this disease. In Sweden, Norway and Finland, it was probably less urgent for them to lock down as they don’t live in each others’ pockets.
Actually, I still think it does. There isn't a single scrap of evidence from anywhere that suggests that UK deaths could have reached anywhere near that level.
It is also worth remembering that in the worst years, regular winter flu has killed up to 30,000.
My estimate, written on my office wall back in March, is 200,000 to 300,000 UK covid deaths. This back-of-a-fag-packet estimate was based on the vast majority getting it at some point and a 0.5% - 0.75% fatality rate.
The recorded case/death CFR is 13.2%, but we had massive underrecording of cases early doors so it'll be much lower. 0.5% is plausible, there's a hard floor if you look at some of the New York boroughs of around 0.1% or so from memory.
I think that the CFR of 1.4% in the early reports from Wuhan has proven fairly accurate. Maybe reduced to circa 1% with medical advances and obviously varying greatly with age.
I bow to your knowledge, Foxy, but I`m surprised you say 1%. We have no idea how many have had it with unreported mild or no symptoms. I`d be surprised if it higher than 0.25% which is a fair bit lower than the 0.5 -0.75% guesstimate that I was working with originally.
Replying to one of these. I think we do have a decent idea how many have been infected due to population surveillance surveys.
Numbers out recently (last week?) were at around 6% nationwide, and 13% in London...
And about 3% of over 65s. It was a large (over 100k) and fairly representative population survey (for test reasons it excluded children).
I don"t see why they wouldn't be? Protects funded by the EU and the Scottish Government are.
Which made such an impact in the EU referendum...
In Scotland?
Projects invariably include a plaque or similar detailing their funding, and this invariably includes the flag or emblem of those organisations. When the UK was in the EU, our subs (correct me if I'm wrong) came from the UK Govt., and then the EU kindly gave us some of or money back with projects emblazoned with their flag - quite a few in Scotland. That situation was a convenient one for the SNP. Not suggesting it won them elections, but it was a nice arrangement. Do they now expect the UK Government to disguise it's involvement in funding projects because...reasons?
Because the arses are just using our money , and trying to make out it is largesse and that we are paupers. They can stick their UK union plaques and projects up their arses.
Well yes, but that's the case with the Scottish Government, and all the quangos like HIE. Spending our money and expecting to be thanked for it is pretty much what Governments do.
Well I doubt they get that many thanks, more brickbats. This will backfire big time on Bozo the clown , he is hated already and thinking he can pretend that he can take credit for spending our money will make us want to stay a colony is barking. He can F*** right off, the plaques will go in the bin.
It's non news Malc. All those projects carry the same type of plaques. There's absolutely no reason why the UK Government should deliberately hide its involvement, other than for the SNP's political convenience
Lucky, it will go down like a bucket of sick. Uptick in Yes support guaranteed. These thick goons just don't get that rubbing people's noses in it does not win friends.
Malc. If the UK government offers £50 million in conjunction with another £50 million from the Scots government on a project, as recently mentioned in Northern Scotland, than it is correct for it to be jointly badged just as it would now if it was the EU
The amount of fury coming from the Nationalists indicates just how much they do not like it
Quite. It suggests that Johnson is on to something.
The same Nats who are objecting to this have never objected to there being EU flags adorning projects "funded" by the EU, notwithstanding the case for that is much weaker - i.e. the fact that the UK on aggregate gets back only about a 1/3rd of the UK's gross contribution made to the EU's coffers.
Away you halfwit , only thing he is on to is annoying even more people. I sometimes wonder if some posters on here are really as stupid as they make out or just blind followers of the cult.
I can think of a word for those who display an irrational and often pathological hatred for people who hail from somewhere other than their area, a trait which is common to many supporters of nationalist parties across the world including many supporters of yours. It's not "halfwit". I really don't care if Johnson is going to annoy those sort of people.
If that doesn't include you Malc, I suggest you try and give us some rational reasons for disagreeing with Big G, rather than just throwing insults around.
Why the questions about the Shapps family and quarantine. Mr Shapps can make sexy time with Mrs Shapps and then go about his job normally. He does not have to self-isolate as he did not travel with them. Even if what she has got (if anything) he will catch.
Covid 19 is not a nice thing obviosuly to have sweeping through a country but Brazil will get herd immunity (like Sweden ) faster than lockdown countries - They will then be better placed in a number of ways next year
That would take about 0.6 to 1.2 million dead Brazilians, and 120 million potentially facing a lifetime of chronic disease, in order to reach herd immunity. That sounds like quite a high price for a slightly better economy if you ask me.
Death is not something that covid -19 invented .People will die of something , a lot of stopping covid deaths merely push a low quality life in terms of health a bit further down the path a little (by having a lockdown stopping the economy and education and access to other health issues). I think the media would do a better service to remind people how many people normally die in high population countries a year. No perspective in the media or government at all
Sure, but we are talking about excess deaths. So when we say the UK has had 60,000 excess deaths so far this year we do mean on top of the normal deaths from heart disease, cancer, dementia, influenza and so on. Yes many of those people would have died this year or next, but it doesn't change the fact that so far this year about 0.1% more of the population has died than would be expected, and that is despite a lockdown, it could easily have been double or triple that.
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
We've all got to die sometime. We have to learn to live with this condition and adapt to it. As we do with any other endemic. We cannot all live our lives locked away from everyone.
No-one's suggesting that we need to. Unless you've been in full-on quarantine since it all started and are going to remain there forever, regardless of when the vaccine is rolled out?
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
Frankly whether its 50K or 60K or 70k deaths it is just not worth the damage done in jobs, the economy, morale, education (look at the poor kids yesterday re a level results -not had at least a chance to do an exam) and countless other areas. Can the country please stop obsessing about this not very fatal illness that is no worse than a bad flu year - It is frankly ridiculous and shows badly up our twitter based virtue signalling culture.
In this century alone we have gone into war knowing the death toll will be higher than anything covid 19 does on the basis that concepts of freedom are more important . Not sure why the government and a lot of the twitter chattering class and media think different know in that we have turned into a cult that has to preserve end of life (even very low quality end of life) above everything else (be it 18 year old life chances, jobs , travel etc, the warmth of human greeting )
We haven't had a "its just the flu" in a while...
Stop twisting words - Its clear I did not say it was just flu - just the consequences are the same as a bad flu year
Looking around the world, it is obvious that is vapid bilge. Lockdown or no lockdown, Covid-19 changes social and economic behaviour in ways that flu does not.
Yes, though it is also true that flu is far more serious than than generally appreciated due to the fact that many people chalk a cold down as being flu. I`ve never had flu and I never want to get it. Double or treble that wish when it comes to Covid 19.
Never had the flu? Gosh. I'd say that marks you out as a bit special.
Why the questions about the Shapps family and quarantine. Mr Shapps can make sexy time with Mrs Shapps and then go about his job normally. He does not have to self-isolate as he did not travel with them. Even if what she has got (if anything) he will catch.
I suspect the objective of the policy is to stop people going on holiday in the first place.
Sounds like a crude and ignorant stereotype of people in independent schools.
I know someone who went to one because the state system could not properly deal with bullying, or deal with special needs to help catch up. Parents had to do the no posh holidays etc thing for some years.
The person I am thinking of is currently in final year at Uni, having caught up reasonably successfully with much parental help.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
This is not like a bad winter flu at all. The fatality rate is evidently much higher (likely around 1%), and it is far from over.
Unless, of course, we have effective vaccines.
What we still don't know though is what proportion of the population have natural immunity. If say 2/3rds of the population are not susceptible to the virus, then an infection rate of 6% will itself have gone some significant way towards limiting the capacity of the virus to reproduce going forward, when combined with limited changes in behaviour of the population.
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I suspect that will be the case for many nations. It still won't make their approach incorrect.
Many have the notion that Sweden has achieved herd immunity.
Seriously?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
This is not like a bad winter flu at all. The fatality rate is evidently much higher (likely around 1%), and it is far from over.
Unless, of course, we have effective vaccines.
What we still don't know though is what proportion of the population have natural immunity. If say 2/3rds of the population are not susceptible to the virus, then an infection rate of 6% will itself have gone some significant way towards limiting the capacity of the virus to reproduce going forward, when combined with limited changes in behaviour of the population.
The intensity of some of the local outbreaks such as in the sandwich factory yesterday suggest there is little natural immunity.
But isn´t that the French system anyway? They accept into the universities anyody who qualifies, and then cut down numbers once they can see what they have got. The UK tradition is to put up the barriers first, then hardly ever fail those who have been admitted.
It seems to me that this year they ought to go for the French model.
This is not like a bad winter flu at all. The fatality rate is evidently much higher (likely around 1%), and it is far from over.
Unless, of course, we have effective vaccines.
What we still don't know though is what proportion of the population have natural immunity. If say 2/3rds of the population are not susceptible to the virus, then an infection rate of 6% will itself have gone some significant way towards limiting the capacity of the virus to reproduce going forward, when combined with limited changes in behaviour of the population.
And if 0/3rds are "naturally immune," then it won't have done.
If a significant proportion were naturally immune, you'd expect subsequent outbreaks in the heavily affected areas to spread far less than in less affected areas. We don't see that at all.
Meanwhile, the author of the study on cross-reactive T-cells has taken to social media to try to slap down people who claim it means there's significant immunity to catching Covid-19.
After calling out people "making dangerous claims about herd immunity" based on it, he's emphasised (and the capitalisation for emphasis below is his, not mine):
- "these memory cells MAY impact people’s responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection, or COVID-19 vaccines."
- "We SPECULATE that it is conceivable that these T cells may potentially reduce COVID-19 disease severity, based on things we know about flu and T cells."
- "Additionally, even if our most optimistic speculations about crossreactive T cell memory were found to be correct, it would mean that just as many people would get infected with SARS-CoV-2, but fewer would become severely ill and die from COVID-19"
- "T cells generally don’t completely prevent infections, they limit disease (make it shorter and/or less serious). Thus, wearing a mask is much more effective than hoping you and the people around you have pre-existing T cell memory. Wearing a mask stops infections."
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I suspect that will be the case for many nations. It still won't make their approach incorrect.
Many have the notion that Sweden has achieved herd immunity.
Seriously?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
Sweden has to be wrong, or the entire framework of the disease you have set up in your mind, all the sacrifices you have made and are still prepared to make and the avid way you have swallowed every piece of government propaganda, all turn to dust.
Did anyone on here retake their A-levels and spend an extra year at school?
Not something I considered at the time (and luckily* I got what I needed), but I know a few who did (one now a junior doctor thanks to it), and it worked out well for all of them in the long-run.
*I do mean luckily. I somehow got a D on one final paper. My whole class did. Never got to the bottom of what happened there - several got re-marks that stayed the same.
I think there are two different issues with "enforcement" of quarantine.
1) People who break it on a massive scale by going to work/school etc. Would expect employers/schools to send them home if they know about it. And good luck keeping a young child quiet about where they were on holiday a week ago
2) People who break it, period. The actual rules on quarantine are ludicrously strict. You CANNOT leave the house for any virtually any reason, even a walk in the immediate vicinity (except to shops where absolutely essential).
This is absurd to the point of ridiculousness on a relative risk basis compared to what is going on elsewhere in the country. It was designed for people much earlier in the crisis having come into probable proven contact with an infected individual, not a country with allegedly relatively high infection rates. What is even more absurd is that the quarantine doesn't apply to people who live in your house but who weren't on holiday with you. So a person living on their own, coming into contact with nobody, probably uninfected isn't even allowed to go for a walk around the block. A person living with somebody else can however pass it on to somebody they live with, who is free to do whatever they want, spreading it to whoever they wish.
Who designs these rules???
Probably the same modellers who built a model that predicted 500k dead in UK alone.
As a worst case with no action taken to stop the spread.
Considering we have had about 50k deaths with about 7% of the country infected and the NHS never overwhelmed it seems quite plausible that if we had seen the worst case of the NHS overwhelmed and 50% infected then 500k deaths would be quite plausible as a worst case.
What's ridiculous about that?
40k deaths, and no-one really knows how many have been infected. The counter to your challenge is that nothing like it (in terms of death rate) has happened anywhere in the world.
I dont believe there is any possibility that, even had we done nothing at all, we'd be looking at death rates of half to two million.
That's because the worst case scenario is with inaction and there was never going to be inaction. It's like saying if you're driving at 70mph and see a stopped car ahead of you that if you don't break or change lanes the worst case scenario is you hit that car at 70mph and die. If you break then you don't say I avoided an accident so I clearly didn't need to break.
That's an analogy fail along the lines of many such similar offered up during Brexit.
Italy did next to nothing in the early weeks when the virus was spreading through Lombardy - they had a terrible regional crisis with overflowing hospitals, but no sign of a death rate approaching anywhere near those sorts of levels. Similarly in Iran - one of the earliest outbreaks - where the 'action' they were taking included going out and licking shrines and the like. I well remember Eadric linking to Twitter videos of people dropping dead in the street and suggesting Iran may be hiding deaths on a truly epic scale - yet nothing along those lines has emerged since then.
Iran was hiding deaths on an epic scale. Its ‘officially released’ figures were one-third of the official figures, which probably still undercount the number of deaths.
Some way short of the equivalent of two million UK deaths, nevertheless. Indeed, treble Iran's declared deaths and you are still only just above the actual declared rate in the UK
No model said two million deaths. The derided model actually said 250k deaths without a lockdown and we had a lockdown and about 50k deaths.
Iran has a third of our rate of elderly population.
It's still nonsense, though.
The Diamond Princess had nearly three thousand mostly elderly passengers confined together for a whole fortnight in the worst possible conditions for virus transmission with no special restrictions for Coronavirus. The death toll finished at fourteen, with NONE of the thousand or so crew dying despite nearly 150 of them catching the virus.
Apply the same proportionate death rate among the passenger base to the elderly population of the UK (say the 16% of so who are over age 65) and you project a death rate in the region of 50,000. Not 500,000 and certainly not 2,000,000.
No model said two million. In fact I can't recall a model saying 500,000 I thought it was 250,000 that Ferguson's model said.
Given we're already above 50,000 by excess deaths I believe with a lockdown then more is certainly very, very possible without one.
This is not like a bad winter flu at all. The fatality rate is evidently much higher (likely around 1%), and it is far from over.
Unless, of course, we have effective vaccines.
What we still don't know though is what proportion of the population have natural immunity. If say 2/3rds of the population are not susceptible to the virus, then an infection rate of 6% will itself have gone some significant way towards limiting the capacity of the virus to reproduce going forward, when combined with limited changes in behaviour of the population.
We do have some idea about that. The prevalence of cross reactive antibodies from other coronaviruses in the general population seems to be fairly low (around 10-15%), and significantly higher in young children (25-30%). It’s also thought (though there’s no certainty on this) that doesn’t make you ‘immune‘ - it’s likely than you can still be infected (and potentially infectious), but you’re probably going to be one of the asymptomatic or very mildly ill.
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I suspect that will be the case for many nations. It still won't make their approach incorrect.
Many have the notion that Sweden has achieved herd immunity.
Seriously?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
Sweden has to be wrong, or the entire framework of the disease you have set up in your mind, all the sacrifices you have made and are still prepared to make and the avid way you have swallowed every piece of government propaganda, all turn to dust.
Its sad really.
I do note you've abandoned any simulation of trying to reason in favour of just blaring out what you want to be true in the hope of sympathetic magic somehow taking over.
Obviously some of us are still able to travel - here's where you've been ever since the start:
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Totally randomly I thought I would give you my top 10 records:
1. Bad U2 2. Nite Club - The Specials 3. Dr Jimmy - The Who 4. Home - American Music Club 5. Elvis Presley and America - U2 6. The only one I know - The Charlatans 7. Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival 8. I am I said - Neil Diamond 9. Heart of Gold - Neil Young 10. Space Age Love Song - A Flock of Seagulls
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Typical red top journalism. What's that got to do with Shapps, the transport secretary, or Prince Charles visiting?
But isn´t that the French system anyway? They accept into the universities anyody who qualifies, and then cut down numbers once they can see what they have got. The UK tradition is to put up the barriers first, then hardly ever fail those who have been admitted.
It seems to me that this year they ought to go for the French model.
That's the same France that we are imposing quarantine on because they apparently have let COVID infections run out of control.
Watching the commentariat rage against a government that is basically doing pretty much what they want really is funny.
The other day Piers Morgan apparently criticised the government for the depth of the recession he would have made even deeper by an even more draconian lockdown.
The discussion re 500,000 deaths misses a much bigger point, which SAGE were most concerned with.
At low numbers, they get the best care available. That is true, for example, of the Diamond Princess.
At higher numbers the death rate increases because we would no longer have the resources to cope. In addition excess deaths from other causes would stack up, as "normal" stroke/heart attack patients were unable to access care.
Yes - this is a key point. The view as taken that we could not countenance a situation whereby potentially many people would get the disease and be unable to access treatment of either the curative or palliative variety due to the health system collapsing under the strain. Hence the lockdown, which if not imposed would have de facto happened anyway - except in a less controlled manner - since a frightened population would have acted to protect themselves.
Looking at now, I think decisions are being driven by the expectation of a vaccine within a year. Given that timeframe the objective is to minimize (within the bounds of practicality) the spread of the virus in the interim. If there were pessimism about a vaccine, I think the calculus changes and so would the objective. In that (unhappy) event rather than minimize the virus we would prioritize "normality" more - i.e. seek to relax things to the maximum extent compatible with the NHS and social care system not being overwhelmed.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
But isn´t that the French system anyway? They accept into the universities anyody who qualifies, and then cut down numbers once they can see what they have got. The UK tradition is to put up the barriers first, then hardly ever fail those who have been admitted.
It seems to me that this year they ought to go for the French model.
That's not true for the Écoles normales supérieures. To enter those illustrious institutions students spend two years (hypokhâgne/khâgne) just learning how to take the ridiculously competitive and difficult entrance exam for the ENS.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Typical red top journalism. What's that got to do with Shapps, the transport secretary, or Prince Charles visiting?
Big 'man of firm principle' G didn't differentiate, perhaps you should ask him to specify which element he was bleating about.
Malc, any chance you could write a header to explain how Scotland’s finances work and how the UK government is robbing Scotland blind, I’m sure others would like to understand where you are coming from.
Whenever I hear things from the SNP regarding tax and finance I am instantly reminded about this song
The sad truth for the SNP is that all their dreams are based on oil wealth and wealth from oil is a story that has been and is virtually gone.
Surely this is something the SNP would welcome given the by products of oil include plastics, diesel and petrol. Products which cause anxiety to some of the very state funded lobbyists the SNP panders to.
Ignorance of Scotland on here is breathtaking. Two posts here that are just pathetic and ignorant.
Are the SNP not fully on board with tackling the twin evils of plastic carrier bags and the combustion Engiine ? HAve they not banned petrol and diesel fuelled cars at some point in the future which will, no doubt, be pulled forward at the behest of their lobbyists ?
OIl revenue does not form any major part of their finances, it is a dwindling small bonus, the real money from it has gone to other people outside Scotland. They are being prevented implementing significant replacements by poor management from the RAJ.
Don't worry - by the time the next election comes around the people impacted will be in their first jobs and have discovered how much their lower grades and resultant university choices impacted their life time income.
No they won't! A 21/22 year old will have no idea whatsoever what their position would have been in the counterfactual world where they got a marginally higher grade and went to a fractionally better university.
I don't mean to diminish the issue, but your assertion is just so obviously wrong and made for effect.
Totally randomly I thought I would give you my top 10 records:
1. Bad U2 2. Nite Club - The Specials 3. Dr Jimmy - The Who 4. Home - American Music Club 5. Elvis Presley and America - U2 6. The only one I know - The Charlatans 7. Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival 8. I am I said - Neil Diamond 9. Heart of Gold - Neil Young 10. Space Age Love Song - A Flock of Seagulls
Malc, any chance you could write a header to explain how Scotland’s finances work and how the UK government is robbing Scotland blind, I’m sure others would like to understand where you are coming from.
Whenever I hear things from the SNP regarding tax and finance I am instantly reminded about this song
The sad truth for the SNP is that all their dreams are based on oil wealth and wealth from oil is a story that has been and is virtually gone.
Surely this is something the SNP would welcome given the by products of oil include plastics, diesel and petrol. Products which cause anxiety to some of the very state funded lobbyists the SNP panders to.
Ignorance of Scotland on here is breathtaking. Two posts here that are just pathetic and ignorant.
Are the SNP not fully on board with tackling the twin evils of plastic carrier bags and the combustion Engiine ? HAve they not banned petrol and diesel fuelled cars at some point in the future which will, no doubt, be pulled forward at the behest of their lobbyists ?
OIl revenue does not form any major part of their finances, it is a dwindling small bonus, the real money from it has gone to other people outside Scotland. They are being prevented implementing significant replacements by poor management from the RAJ.
Don't worry - by the time the next election comes around the people impacted will be in their first jobs and have discovered how much their lower grades and resultant university choices impacted their life time income.
No they won't! A 21/22 year old will have no idea whatsoever what their position would have been in the counterfactual world where they got a marginally higher grade and went to a fractionally better university.
I don't mean to diminish the issue, but your assertion is just so obviously wrong and made for effect.
I thought half those coming out of Uni ending up working in pubs or such like in any case. Only ones guaranteed riches are the toffs.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
More likely, the different ways that they were adjusted.
Most sixth forms will have a big enough A Level maths cohort to be put through the Ofqual algorithm, so the stats match last year. (For cohorts larger than 15, the teacher grades seem to have been ignored totally; the grades are just the teacher rank order mapped onto the grade curve Ofqual predicted from past performance.) Many further maths cohorts will be small enough that teacher assessment was used, either in full or in part.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I suspect that will be the case for many nations. It still won't make their approach incorrect.
Many have the notion that Sweden has achieved herd immunity.
Seriously?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
Sweden has to be wrong, or the entire framework of the disease you have set up in your mind, all the sacrifices you have made and are still prepared to make and the avid way you have swallowed every piece of government propaganda, all turn to dust.
Its sad really.
I do note you've abandoned any simulation of trying to reason in favour of just blaring out what you want to be true in the hope of sympathetic magic somehow taking over.
Obviously some of us are still able to travel - here's where you've been ever since the start:
I follow,. and have always followed, the estimable professor Gupta and the Oxford team. I asrgued for their views on here months ago.
And why wouldn't I, when their predictions have turned out to be almost completely correct, and almost exactly on the timescale they suggested.
Now professor Gupta is warning that continued social distancing and masking up risk weakening our immune systems for something else to cut a swathe through the population.
And again, I agree with her. Why wouldn't I, considering how very right she has been?
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Typical red top journalism. What's that got to do with Shapps, the transport secretary, or Prince Charles visiting?
Big 'man of firm principle' G didn't differentiate, perhaps you should ask him to specify which element he was bleating about.
Shapps was out for his eyetest , he was not breaking quarantine really.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Typical red top journalism. What's that got to do with Shapps, the transport secretary, or Prince Charles visiting?
Big 'man of firm principle' G didn't differentiate, perhaps you should ask him to specify which element he was bleating about.
Shapps was out for his eyetest , he was not breaking quarantine really.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
More likely, the different ways that they were adjusted.
Most sixth forms will have a big enough A Level maths cohort to be put through the Ofqual algorithm, so the stats match last year. (For cohorts larger than 15, the teacher grades seem to have been ignored totally; the grades are just the teacher rank order mapped onto the grade curve Ofqual predicted from past performance.) Many further maths cohorts will be small enough that teacher assessment was used, either in full or in part.
Ironic that it's maths that is affected by the algorithm!
This really is astonishing. It's a long time since I did Further Maths, but if you're getting an A you should be hitting high 90s or even 100% in the normal Maths A level.
Did anyone on here retake their A-levels and spend an extra year at school?
Not something I considered at the time (and luckily* I got what I needed), but I know a few who did (one now a junior doctor thanks to it), and it worked out well for all of them in the long-run.
*I do mean luckily. I somehow got a D on one final paper. My whole class did. Never got to the bottom of what happened there - several got re-marks that stayed the same.
Yes, I retook mine - though I went to college for the extra year rather than stay at the school sixth form. No regrets, and no negative long-term impact. Funnily enough, I think I benefited from the 'wasted year'. I was better prepared for university, academically and, more importantly, socially - I'd grown up a lot. Incidentally, the college teaching was better than at school, and I did very well second time round.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
Do we have the pb sages on claiming the teachers in England are cheats and liars and same therefore as per the Scottish teachers verdict last week.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
That's an anomaly created by the adjustments that otherwise just doesn't make sense.
Imagine if the sum is (A+B)+C=10. Based on those results the person has got the first bit A+B wrong yet has got the complete answer both right including the working out.
In any sensible year 99.99% of people with a particular grade in further maths will have at least that grade (if not higher) in A level maths.
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
Do we have the pb sages on claiming the teachers in England are cheats and liars and same therefore as per the Scottish teachers verdict last week.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
Even after the adjustments? Oh, the argument is maths has been adjusted down too much, rather than teachers predicting too high grades for further maths.
That's an anomaly created by the adjustments that otherwise just doesn't make sense.
Imagine if the sum is (A+B)+C=10. Based on those results the person has got the first bit A+B wrong yet has got the complete answer both right including the working out.
In any sensible year 99.99% of people with a particular grade in further maths will have at least that grade (if not higher) in A level maths.
Couldn't it also be created by overestimates by the teachers?
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
I don't think he was a sceine net skipper..
Seine net of course but does not alter the fact he rejected everything about Scots nationalism.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
Political activist on social media tend to be a loud and unpleasant bunch but it is a special kind of unpleasant that many Cybernats seem to subscribe to.
Again on education the whinging of the commentariat really is astonishing.
They backed the shutting down of schools. Argued against any even partial re-openings. Back Unions and teachers in their quest not to resume teaching or to resume it on their own terms. Gave zero criticism to state school teachers who left their pupils to rot whilst the private sector kept educating theirs.
Now they are wondering why the system is in a total mess....??
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
Political activist on social media tend to be a loud and unpleasant bunch but it is a special kind of unpleasant that many Cybernats seem to subscribe to.
My Scots wife has become thoroughly ashamed of them and their anti English bile and not one of the Cybernats on here speak for her
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
I don't think he was a sceine net skipper..
Seine net of course but does not alter the fact he rejected everything about Scots nationalism.
Don't worry - by the time the next election comes around the people impacted will be in their first jobs and have discovered how much their lower grades and resultant university choices impacted their life time income.
No they won't! A 21/22 year old will have no idea whatsoever what their position would have been in the counterfactual world where they got a marginally higher grade and went to a fractionally better university.
I don't mean to diminish the issue, but your assertion is just so obviously wrong and made for effect.
I thought half those coming out of Uni ending up working in pubs or such like in any case. Only ones guaranteed riches are the toffs.
Well you thought wrong. The median graduate salary (that's median - your typical student from a typical uni) is ten grand higher than non-graduates. For recent graduates, the gap is only about five grand but grows over their career. Some spend a while in jobs for which they are overqualified... but the figures indicate the large majority get decent starter-level jobs.
I know you come from a particular angle and can't see an axe without wanting to grind it, but it's that sort of myth-perpetuating, wildly inaccurate nonsense that discourages young people from making the effort with education.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
I don't think he was a sceine net skipper..
Seine net of course but does not alter the fact he rejected everything about Scots nationalism.
No offence, but what's that got to do with 2020?
My late father in law warned of the destructive nature of nationalism and though that was 50 years ago it is still relevant today and is evidenced by the increasing attacks on all things English
Did anyone on here retake their A-levels and spend an extra year at school?
Not something I considered at the time (and luckily* I got what I needed), but I know a few who did (one now a junior doctor thanks to it), and it worked out well for all of them in the long-run.
*I do mean luckily. I somehow got a D on one final paper. My whole class did. Never got to the bottom of what happened there - several got re-marks that stayed the same.
Yes, I retook mine - though I went to college for the extra year rather than stay at the school sixth form. No regrets, and no negative long-term impact. Funnily enough, I think I benefited from the 'wasted year'. I was better prepared for university, academically and, more importantly, socially - I'd grown up a lot. Incidentally, the college teaching was better than at school, and I did very well second time round.
Much rarer now than it used to be- as are GCSE resits beyond English and Maths. Don't remember the details (and I've been out of schools for a while), but my memory is that the funding and accountability arrangements really work against them.
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
I suspect that will be the case for many nations. It still won't make their approach incorrect.
Many have the notion that Sweden has achieved herd immunity.
Seriously?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
Sweden has to be wrong, or the entire framework of the disease you have set up in your mind, all the sacrifices you have made and are still prepared to make and the avid way you have swallowed every piece of government propaganda, all turn to dust.
Its sad really.
I do note you've abandoned any simulation of trying to reason in favour of just blaring out what you want to be true in the hope of sympathetic magic somehow taking over.
Obviously some of us are still able to travel - here's where you've been ever since the start:
I follow,. and have always followed, the estimable professor Gupta and the Oxford team. I asrgued for their views on here months ago.
And why wouldn't I, when their predictions have turned out to be almost completely correct, and almost exactly on the timescale they suggested.
Now professor Gupta is warning that continued social distancing and masking up risk weakening our immune systems for something else to cut a swathe through the population.
And again, I agree with her. Why wouldn't I, considering how very right she has been?
Professor Gupta generally gets a more balanced write up in the Indian press, than she does here. Too much of the reporting in the UK is skewed by the media's determination to sensationalise.
It's worth reading her comments in this piece from the Indian media.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
Political activist on social media tend to be a loud and unpleasant bunch but it is a special kind of unpleasant that many Cybernats seem to subscribe to.
My Scots wife has become thoroughly ashamed of them and their anti English bile and not one of the Cybernats on here speak for her
The lack of condemnation of the anti English bile from the SNP high command rather damns them.
How is it acceptable for their supporters to stand by the border with signs and placards demanding the English keep out of Scotland.
Cybernats and SNP supporters, by and large, are happy to justify and excuse their bigotry.
Fuck me, first Shapps, then Sun reptiles stalking rescue workers, and now Chuck and his entourage. Stoney's cup runneth over (with what is yet to be ascertained).
Yeah, it's shocking how intolerant we are of Sun hacks chasing rescue workers for statements and doorstepping the family of the dead driver. Not too happy about someone who broke lockdown while suffering from Covid dragging his sorry arse about the place either.
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
No.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
Political activist on social media tend to be a loud and unpleasant bunch but it is a special kind of unpleasant that many Cybernats seem to subscribe to.
My Scots wife has become thoroughly ashamed of them and their anti English bile and not one of the Cybernats on here speak for her
The lack of condemnation of the anti English bile from the SNP high command rather damns them.
How is it acceptable for their supporters to stand by the border with signs and placards demanding the English keep out of Scotland.
Cybernats and SNP supporters, by and large, are happy to justify and excuse their bigotry.
Comments
https://twitter.com/libby_brooks/status/1294155638889754624?s=20
https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1294032966293827585
The other is on what's beginning to look like the square-windows-in-the-airplane fatal flaw. Once Ofqual had decided the grade curve for a subject at a school, they seem to have systematically rounded down, to protect their grade curve. So if a school might have expected 1.8 A*s, it was only allowed 1. Furthermore (because Ds and Es are quite rare these days), if a student fell off the bottom of grade C, they could go all the way to a U,
https://twitter.com/A_Weatherall/status/1294012623776817158
Given that plenty of subjects at plenty of schools weren't adjusted at all, this doesn't look like a sustainable position for the government (except that, as we know, this government doesn't seem to care about the sustainability of its position, because it isn't 2024 yet.)
In 4 weeks time Sweden is going to see an increase in its 7-day average Covid deaths.
In February/March we only knew that the virus was spreading very rapidly, killing people, putting prime ministers in hospital and breaking health care systems.
A strong lockdown was absolutely the right response given the information at the time, evidenced by the UK's delaying by just one week compared to other equivalent european countries.
https://twitter.com/alexhern/status/1294204326173450240
You have nailed it
. 'Blind followers of a cult' is just perfect for the SNP
I don't know why people are so blasé about this, it could be you.
But the serious point is Sweden positive cases is going up and New Intensive care cases is going up. Unless this is a temp blip that would filter through to an increase in deaths in about a month.
We need to stop them coming in the first place - and then to massively increase the number of refugees we do take.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/lifestyle/health/comedian-ed-gamble-reveals-having-16495632
Sadly life is full of risks and by age ~100 it has a fatality rate of 100%.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/institute-of-global-health-innovation/Ward-et-al-120820.pdf
And only around 3% of over 65s.
This is not like a bad winter flu at all. The fatality rate is evidently much higher (likely around 1%), and it is far from over.
Unless, of course, we have effective vaccines.
Numbers out recently (last week?) were at around 6% nationwide, and 13% in London.
I hear from that there is more information due out soon, drawing on wider info sources. There has been sample testing going on, for example, of blood from donor clinics, since the start of the pandemic.
I'd also point out that the way we had people apocalypto-panicking early on was because they did silly things like take the Case Fatality Rate of people tested or people in hospitals and assumed it would apply to the entire population.
The only people who aren't are the 60,000 fatalities.
1 - More asymptomatic transmission thought to be happening than is in the numbers, eg in pubs.
2 - PHE will be the scapegoat no matter what - perhaps to be split between health service, and the new unitary Councils that are on the Govt agenda. But we all know that, as that is how politics works. Though in some places unitary councils will go down like cold sick.
3 - An observation of masks on the Tube. Compliance high but not universal, and the notable group not complying being young (up to 30s) black men, contributing a significant number of non-compliants. Not BAME, not women, not Asian, not older - young black men.
4 - Real worry that this is less under control than it looks.
Personally I am really worried about the large indoors spaces opening up, and sports audiences. Very reckless.
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/1294220343419326470?s=20
It was a large (over 100k) and fairly representative population survey (for test reasons it excluded children).
Like A levels are a prospective boyfriend or something.
If that doesn't include you Malc, I suggest you try and give us some rational reasons for disagreeing with Big G, rather than just throwing insults around.
Unless you've been in full-on quarantine since it all started and are going to remain there forever, regardless of when the vaccine is rolled out?
I know someone who went to one because the state system could not properly deal with bullying, or deal with special needs to help catch up. Parents had to do the no posh holidays etc thing for some years.
The person I am thinking of is currently in final year at Uni, having caught up reasonably successfully with much parental help.
Perhaps: asymptomatic transmission thought to be higher than we might expect.
Should we beware the ides of March too?
Is the end nigh?
Will this wind be so mighty as to lay low the mountains of the eeeeearrrthhhh?
Wow, that's taking wishful thinking and dialling it up to 12.
Have they stopped to wonder why Sweden have continued to maintain all their measures? Do they think it's just for fun?
Not to mention this apparent fantasy they have that Sweden have done virtually nothing and continued to live life as always. Comparing the actual measures, they're rather less different from us right now than most people would suspect.
I think it's one of those "use a single word for a whole category of possibilities and pretend everything in that category is exactly the same and everything out of it shares no traits with it" things. There's probably a snazzy term for it, because we see it all the time in all sorts of areas.
We called what we did a "lockdown," but no-one came around with a key and locked me in. I was outside literally every day of the lockdown, completely within the rules and guidelines. So were every member of my family.
We were going to takeaways during the latter period of "lockdown," which is something I'd not have thought if I'd just heard the term.
It seems to me that this year they ought to go for the French model.
And if 0/3rds are "naturally immune," then it won't have done.
If a significant proportion were naturally immune, you'd expect subsequent outbreaks in the heavily affected areas to spread far less than in less affected areas. We don't see that at all.
Meanwhile, the author of the study on cross-reactive T-cells has taken to social media to try to slap down people who claim it means there's significant immunity to catching Covid-19.
After calling out people "making dangerous claims about herd immunity" based on it, he's emphasised (and the capitalisation for emphasis below is his, not mine):
- "these memory cells MAY impact people’s responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection, or COVID-19 vaccines."
- "We SPECULATE that it is conceivable that these T cells may potentially reduce COVID-19 disease severity, based on things we know about flu and T cells."
- "Additionally, even if our most optimistic speculations about crossreactive T cell memory were found to be correct, it would mean that just as many people would get infected with SARS-CoV-2, but fewer would become severely ill and die from COVID-19"
- "T cells generally don’t completely prevent infections, they limit disease (make it shorter and/or less serious). Thus, wearing a mask is much more effective than hoping you and the people around you have pre-existing T cell memory. Wearing a mask stops infections."
Its sad really.
Not something I considered at the time (and luckily* I got what I needed), but I know a few who did (one now a junior doctor thanks to it), and it worked out well for all of them in the long-run.
*I do mean luckily. I somehow got a D on one final paper. My whole class did. Never got to the bottom of what happened there - several got re-marks that stayed the same.
The prevalence of cross reactive antibodies from other coronaviruses in the general population seems to be fairly low (around 10-15%), and significantly higher in young children (25-30%).
It’s also thought (though there’s no certainty on this) that doesn’t make you ‘immune‘ - it’s likely than you can still be infected (and potentially infectious), but you’re probably going to be one of the asymptomatic or very mildly ill.
I do note you've abandoned any simulation of trying to reason in favour of just blaring out what you want to be true in the hope of sympathetic magic somehow taking over.
Obviously some of us are still able to travel - here's where you've been ever since the start:
Still, you managed to turn on a sixpence and give your support to BJ, so you'd just about tolerate anything.
Totally randomly I thought I would give you my top 10 records:
1. Bad U2
2. Nite Club - The Specials
3. Dr Jimmy - The Who
4. Home - American Music Club
5. Elvis Presley and America - U2
6. The only one I know - The Charlatans
7. Fortunate Son - Creedence Clearwater Revival
8. I am I said - Neil Diamond
9. Heart of Gold - Neil Young
10. Space Age Love Song - A Flock of Seagulls
Have a great afternoon!
Watching the commentariat rage against a government that is basically doing pretty much what they want really is funny.
The other day Piers Morgan apparently criticised the government for the depth of the recession he would have made even deeper by an even more draconian lockdown.
That is where we are.
Looking at now, I think decisions are being driven by the expectation of a vaccine within a year. Given that timeframe the objective is to minimize (within the bounds of practicality) the spread of the virus in the interim. If there were pessimism about a vaccine, I think the calculus changes and so would the objective. In that (unhappy) event rather than minimize the virus we would prioritize "normality" more - i.e. seek to relax things to the maximum extent compatible with the NHS and social care system not being overwhelmed.
They are being prevented implementing significant replacements by poor management from the RAJ.
I don't mean to diminish the issue, but your assertion is just so obviously wrong and made for effect.
Most sixth forms will have a big enough A Level maths cohort to be put through the Ofqual algorithm, so the stats match last year. (For cohorts larger than 15, the teacher grades seem to have been ignored totally; the grades are just the teacher rank order mapped onto the grade curve Ofqual predicted from past performance.) Many further maths cohorts will be small enough that teacher assessment was used, either in full or in part.
I just find the intolerance from the SNP very sad and reflect on my late father in law, who was a highly successful Scots sceine net skipper rejecting all to do with nationalism 50 years ago
And why wouldn't I, when their predictions have turned out to be almost completely correct, and almost exactly on the timescale they suggested.
Now professor Gupta is warning that continued social distancing and masking up risk weakening our immune systems for something else to cut a swathe through the population.
And again, I agree with her. Why wouldn't I, considering how very right she has been?
This really is astonishing. It's a long time since I did Further Maths, but if you're getting an A you should be hitting high 90s or even 100% in the normal Maths A level.
Imagine if the sum is (A+B)+C=10. Based on those results the person has got the first bit A+B wrong yet has got the complete answer both right including the working out.
In any sensible year 99.99% of people with a particular grade in further maths will have at least that grade (if not higher) in A level maths.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/08/13/teachers-accused-submitting-implausibly-high-predicted-grades/
They backed the shutting down of schools. Argued against any even partial re-openings. Back Unions and teachers in their quest not to resume teaching or to resume it on their own terms. Gave zero criticism to state school teachers who left their pupils to rot whilst the private sector kept educating theirs.
Now they are wondering why the system is in a total mess....??
I know you come from a particular angle and can't see an axe without wanting to grind it, but it's that sort of myth-perpetuating, wildly inaccurate nonsense that discourages young people from making the effort with education.
Go back to your lives, says Rishi Sunak in the Standard, as the government ups the swingeing punishments for doing just that.
It really is quite, quite extraordinary.
It's worth reading her comments in this piece from the Indian media.
https://www.inventiva.co.in/stories/meghashree/how-coronavirus-is-likely-to-end-most-of-us-wont-even-need-the-vaccine/
How is it acceptable for their supporters to stand by the border with signs and placards demanding the English keep out of Scotland.
Cybernats and SNP supporters, by and large, are happy to justify and excuse their bigotry.
https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/health/coronavirus/stay-fk-away-convoy-scottish-nationalists-attempt-blockade-english-border-2904148