Sorry to go off-topic so soon, but I'd just done a big post on the previous thread. I thought I'd have a look at the false positives issue while using actual maths rather than Tobymaths.
Assuming: Sensitivity set to 80% as reported (so 20% false negatives from actual cases)
Specificity is under discussion, so using the logic that you can't have more false positives than measured positives and looking at the positivity rate at the lowest prevalence (4th July, by the cases measured, was 0.349%, and this wasn't uniquely low - 12 of the days between the start of July and mid-August had sub-0.4% positivity) to set an upper bound. Assuming that the UK wasn't totally covid free and some people (of those singled out as most at risk of having it from symptoms and exposure) would get true positives, I assigned 0.3% as the highest plausible false positive rate; so specificity set to 99.7%.
Using the Bayes theorem and using the measured positivity as a reasonable prior for the prevalence in the sample, and then iterating by taking the calculated true positives, dividing them by the number of samples for a calculated prevalence to improve the prior, and iterating 30 times until the prevalence in was equal to the prevalence out to within less than a thousandth of a percentage point.
We get this:
It's quite hard to present enough information in this sort of range, but:
- The dark gold/brown columns are the measured cases (the reported cases from testing) - The black columns are the expected false positives - The green columns are the expected false negatives - The red columns are the net error (the amount by which the measured and true cases differ - take away the false positives (people without covid who were incorrectly reported as having it) and add the false negatives (people with covid who were tested and incorrectly reported as being clear) - The see-through columns are the calculated true cases, when false positives and negatives are taken into account.
Conclusions: - When the virus is at very low levels, we'll see up to a few hundred extra cases per day incorrectly reported (if the false positive rate is about as high as is reasonably plausible) - When it starts to increase, the false positives and false negatives balance out - When it gets to a reasonably high spread (ie the start of September), the false negatives start to outweight the false positives, and we end up underreporting cases - The false negatives will be currently outweighing false positives to the tune of a few thousand cases
One further worrying conclusion: false positives and false negatives mean that the rate of true cases has been increasing faster than reported cases (I doubt that Toby and co meant for this to be the case):
Does this take account of the false positive rate changing? It might be statistical not very significant, but personally I find it difficult to believe that the chaos in track and trace and the intense pressure is not leading to more mistakes being made in the labs now than back in July.
When true prevalence increases, the false positive rate becomes a lot less significant. Even if setting it to five times greater, the net error will be insignificant at current levels of prevalence (and that would be assuming that the false negatives are unaffected (the latest date I used is the 19th, and false negatives would still outweigh the false positives.
I see the decision written by Beer loving Kavanaugh has had at least 3 black-and-white factual errors in it so far.
It wouldn't surprise me if Kavanaugh gets persuaded to step down at some point. He seems like an accident waiting to happen. I also think we are likely to see pragmatic conservatives like Roberts move to the left a bit to maintain public confidence in SCOTUS. I doubt if the court will prove quite as crazy right wing as some people fear. I also doubt the Democrats will add additional justices but it may prove useful leverage to keep the threat in the back pocket.
The threat is only there for as long as the Democrats control both the Senate and the Oval Office.
The moment they lose either the threat is gone. There is a very, very narrow window of opportunity here to act. Once the GOP contain a blocking majority in the Senate what would constrain the SCOTUS?
I see the decision written by Beer loving Kavanaugh has had at least 3 black-and-white factual errors in it so far.
It wouldn't surprise me if Kavanaugh gets persuaded to step down at some point. He seems like an accident waiting to happen. I also think we are likely to see pragmatic conservatives like Roberts move to the left a bit to maintain public confidence in SCOTUS. I doubt if the court will prove quite as crazy right wing as some people fear. I also doubt the Democrats will add additional justices but it may prove useful leverage to keep the threat in the back pocket.
The threat is only there for as long as the Democrats control both the Senate and the Oval Office.
The moment they lose either the threat is gone. There is a very, very narrow window of opportunity here to act. Once the GOP contain a blocking majority in the Senate what would constrain the SCOTUS?
I don't honestly think the judges would want to put the Court's reputation at risk with a string of silly decisions. That really would be an incitement for the politicians to intervene , one way or another.
Kavanaugh is a Knut, but even he will want to keep his head down for a bit.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
CNN: Senate seats likely to switch Dem, grouped in order of likelihood (most to least):
Colorado Michigan
Arizona Maine North Carolina
Iowa Montana
South Carolina
Alabama
Georgia
They have Iowa and Montana down as the toss ups, everything above leaning Dem and everything below leaning Rep
Alabama & Michigan both have incumbent DEMOCRATIC senators on 2020 ballot; think Alabama will flip (back) to Republicans (Sen. Doug Jones's victory in 2018 was (ironically) evidence for divine intervention, and that Michiganders will keep Sen. Gary Peters.
As for rest of list, if ranked in order of likelihood for Democratic pickup, my take is:
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
If we're thinking about the introduction of the tier systems, that was 15 days ago, so too recent to see an effect in the death rates.
CNN: Senate seats likely to switch Dem, grouped in order of likelihood (most to least):
Colorado Michigan
Arizona Maine North Carolina
Iowa Montana
South Carolina
Alabama
Georgia
They have Iowa and Montana down as the toss ups, everything above leaning Dem and everything below leaning Rep
The Dems are defending Michigan. It shouldn't be on that list in terms of seats likely to switch. Alabama "switches" to the Dems only if you ignore the result of the unusual by-election when the Dems won it.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
CNN: Senate seats likely to switch Dem, grouped in order of likelihood (most to least):
Colorado Michigan
Arizona Maine North Carolina
Iowa Montana
South Carolina
Alabama
Georgia
They have Iowa and Montana down as the toss ups, everything above leaning Dem and everything below leaning Rep
The Dems are defending Michigan. It shouldn't be on that list in terms of seats likely to switch. Alabama "switches" to the Dems only if you ignore the result of the unusual by-election when the Dems won it.
Yes, you're right. From the write up it looks as if CNN is flagging that this one might go the other way.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
If we're thinking about the introduction of the tier systems, that was 15 days ago, so too recent to see an effect in the death rates.
True, though the case numbers have resumed their rise after a pause, so there's little sign of respite there.
I focused on the death figures because at a rate of +50% per week it will quickly escalate if it turns out any slowdown in the case numbers is due to testing bottlenecks/other reasons.
His stump speeches during his first bid for the Presidency were among the best political speeches I have ever heard. That one in Greenville, where he uses the long story about one voice changing a room was masterful.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
* and you are.
I think it's reasonable to do so when comparing with the same day of the week before.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
* and you are.
I think it's reasonable to do so when comparing with the same day of the week before.
Noooooooooooooooooooo...it really isn't. How many f##king times do we have to do this. We see time and time again days where there are back filled deaths, which can come from weeks ago and are added in one big lump. The very least you need to use rolling 7-day average, but even then, the above still stands and it can be wildly inaccurate to make claims like 50% increase in deaths.
Thus, we use day of death, wait for scripters to put to the graphs to get an idea of what is going on.
You'd have thought dealing with the police was a former DPP's chosen specialised subject. Then you'd wonder whether a senior figure at BTP has an historical grudge over an "insufficient evidence" decision from a few years back.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
* and you are.
I think it's reasonable to do so when comparing with the same day of the week before.
Noooooooooooooooooooo...it really isn't. How many f##king times do we have to do this. We see time and time again days where there are back filled deaths, which can come from weeks ago and are added in one big lump. The very least you need to use rolling 7-day average, but even then, the above still stands and it can be wildly inaccurate to make claims like 50% increase in deaths.
Thus, we use day of death, wait for scripters to put to the graphs to get an idea of what is going on.
It's not like I'm comparing a Tuesday number with a Monday number. I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's good enough for getting a sense of whether this is a good news day or a bad news day.
One of my mates has got Covid, the first person I actually know that has got it, and my football match is called off on Saturday as the other team have a few players with it
One of my nieces has, apparently, gone down with it today. Prison officer, and apparently it's 'rife' at the prison where she works, in the NW. Two children one of whom seems to have started showing symptoms. Husband seems OK at the moment.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
* and you are.
I think it's reasonable to do so when comparing with the same day of the week before.
Noooooooooooooooooooo...it really isn't. How many f##king times do we have to do this. We see time and time again days where there are back filled deaths, which can come from weeks ago and are added in one big lump. The very least you need to use rolling 7-day average, but even then, the above still stands and it can be wildly inaccurate to make claims like 50% increase in deaths.
Thus, we use day of death, wait for scripters to put to the graphs to get an idea of what is going on.
It's not like I'm comparing a Tuesday number with a Monday number. I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's good enough for getting a sense of whether this is a good news day or a bad news day.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
Deaths reported up 50% on a week before and highest reported in a day since 27th May. How confident is Johnson that he's done enough to stop the increase?
I hope you aren't quoting the daily death figures (rather than when people died) for your comparison are you*....because that results in 2 weeks banishment to Conservative Home...
* and you are.
I think it's reasonable to do so when comparing with the same day of the week before.
Noooooooooooooooooooo...it really isn't. How many f##king times do we have to do this. We see time and time again days where there are back filled deaths, which can come from weeks ago and are added in one big lump. The very least you need to use rolling 7-day average, but even then, the above still stands and it can be wildly inaccurate to make claims like 50% increase in deaths.
Thus, we use day of death, wait for scripters to put to the graphs to get an idea of what is going on.
It's not like I'm comparing a Tuesday number with a Monday number. I'm not saying it's perfect, but it's good enough for getting a sense of whether this is a good news day or a bad news day.
Again, no it really isn't.
Summoning The KrakenThe Lawyer In His Wife's Kimono With The Baseball Bat
367 deaths reported ain't good even if it's a Tuesday.
Using day of reporting, not date of death. We had days during the first wave that had very large numbers because there was a significant backfilling of deaths from upto 2-3 months previous. The amount of backfilling from day to day is totally inconsistent, so it is not valid to simply saying crickey big number to today compared to insert another day, and try to make any prediction of the future.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
I'll offer as States: Georgia, N & S Carolina, Virginia & W. Virginia and Maryland. Unless you're including New York as well.
There's also Louisiana, named after a French king.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
You should start a campaign to rename places Higher Latitude Carolina, and so on.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
I once went to Pittsburgh for a conference. Very taken to find the old blockhouse at the river convergence.
Do the comparison with specimen date figures and show me the difference. When you're comparing now to August it doesn't make much difference to the change. You're comforting yourself by complaining about the minutiae of the statistics when there are big picture issues.
367 deaths reported ain't good even if it's a Tuesday.
Using day of reporting, not date of death.
Because today's actual deaths won't be known for ages yet. There'll be backdating to today weeks from now, it's even worse than cases backdating.
The level of backdating is totally inconsistent, thus it isn't valid to try to compare a headline number with another day in history. You MUST use when people actually died.
Do the comparison with specimen date figures and show me the difference. When you're comparing now to August it doesn't make much difference to the change. You're comforting yourself by complaining about the minutiae of the statistics when there are big picture issues.
There has consistently been shown significant differences. There are charts all over the internet showing / explaining this issue.
Ever wondered how many total deaths (including non-covid) would be reported to day? People die every day - we need to stop fixating on just covid. How many cancer deaths? How many heart attacks?
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
I'll offer as States: Georgia, N & S Carolina, Virginia & W. Virginia and Maryland. Unless you're including New York as well.
There's also Louisiana, named after a French king.
New York should be included as the "York" part is not directly for the city in northern England but for the first proprietor of the colony after it was seized from the Dutch, James, Duke of York, later to reign briefly as James II and VII.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
At the moment there seems a lack of forward looking modern suggestions from either side. The future where AI / ML revolutionizes many middle class skilled jobs in the way mechanisation and outsourcing hit factory work is coming down the line, and the "solutions" seems to be between keep calm and carry on, capitalism with work it out vs a return to socialist big government owning the industry and centrally planning solutions...and we must go Green, that will create millions of jobs (subsidised by the tax payer), all sorted.
CNN: Senate seats likely to switch Dem, grouped in order of likelihood (most to least):
Colorado Michigan
Arizona Maine North Carolina
Iowa Montana
South Carolina
Alabama
Georgia
They have Iowa and Montana down as the toss ups, everything above leaning Dem and everything below leaning Rep
Alabama & Michigan both have incumbent DEMOCRATIC senators on 2020 ballot; think Alabama will flip (back) to Republicans (Sen. Doug Jones's victory in 2018 was (ironically) evidence for divine intervention, and that Michiganders will keep Sen. Gary Peters.
As for rest of list, if ranked in order of likelihood for Democratic pickup, my take is:
Colorado
Arizona & Maine
Iowa & North Carolina
Georgia & Montana
South Carolina
The Senate election is very interesting this year. If Biden wins, it would be surprising if Democrats didn't pick up at least three at the same time (two net as Alabama is as good as gone). Anything above that, and there are quite a lot of very close ones, is control.
It's also quite likely to mean control for the full four years at least, as the map provides very few opportunities for the Republicans in 2022, so there is a lot at stake. There are only 12 Democrat defences in 2022 and none of them in red states. Arizona (assuming Kelly wins next week in the special election) would be the only genuinely purple state with a Democrat incumbent. Pennsylvania and North Carolina have retiring GOP incumbents, while Ron Johnson in Wisconsin is undecided on 2022 and likely to be vulnerable. Never say never in a mid-term, but it looks a good map for Democrats even if they are behing on national vote by then. 2024 is a much better map for the GOP, of course.
I thought we'd see 30k today, so maybe a positive sign?
Or just shite testing?
So far case numbers have correlated to hospitalisations and deaths almost exactly, testing is widespread enough to catch any trends, however, I'm extremely wary of calling something on one day of data. We saw something like this two weeks ago and then last week the numbers got higher.
On a previous thred, some discussion of English place names replicated across the global landscape.
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
I once went to Pittsburgh for a conference. Very taken to find the old blockhouse at the river convergence.
Of course, one of those states named after a monarch has its capital named after another, and 2 counties named after one prime minister's son, and another after the son's wife.
Major bragging rights prize for the name of the State, capital, and three counties.
Latest Trafalgar polling good for Trump. Level in Pennslyvannia, ahead where he needs to defend further south. They got it right last time.The quiet reserved Rrepublican voters are being found. There could well be some very red faces next week.
367 deaths reported ain't good even if it's a Tuesday.
Using day of reporting, not date of death. We had days during the first wave that had very large numbers because there was a significant backfilling of deaths from upto 2-3 months previous. The amount of backfilling from day to day is totally inconsistent, so it is not valid to simply saying crickey big number to today compared to insert another day, and try to make any prediction of the future.
The backfilling was more of a problem in the period after the peak as it "hid the decline". It's less of a problem on this side of the curve, though, obviously, neglecting it does put you further from perfection.
But then, by the ONS figures, this data series misses out loads of the deaths anyway, so perfection in treatment of the data is a bit of a red herring. Nothing is perfect.
Latest Trafalgar polling good for Trump. Level in Pennslyvannia, ahead where he needs to defend further south. They got it right last time.The quiet reserved Rrepublican voters are being found. There could well be some very red faces next week.
Time to get a coffee, take the dogs for a walk, and find other things to do ...
367 deaths reported ain't good even if it's a Tuesday.
Using day of reporting, not date of death. We had days during the first wave that had very large numbers because there was a significant backfilling of deaths from upto 2-3 months previous. The amount of backfilling from day to day is totally inconsistent, so it is not valid to simply saying crickey big number to today compared to insert another day, and try to make any prediction of the future.
The backfilling was more of a problem in the period after the peak as it "hid the decline". It's less of a problem on this side of the curve, though, obviously, neglecting it does put you further from perfection.
But then, by the ONS figures, this data series misses out loads of the deaths anyway, so perfection in treatment of the data is a bit of a red herring. Nothing is perfect.
When we actually have date of deaths, we should use them. I highly doubt the academic tweeting this would get away with this kind of stuff in paper they try to publish, as the peer review would saying hey, "good enough", when "better" is available isn't acceptable.
Pretty bog-standard othering there. English left-wing intellectualism is a part of the culture of the country. So is football, and Gothic fiction, and dogging, and caravan holidays, and all those other things that are done by some but not by others. If you can't get on with each other you have no hope as a country. That means accepting what's in your midst even if you don't like it, and not pretending that just because someone isn't like you they mustn't belong to the same land.
TBH I was worried in 2016 as soon as the Dixville Notch and Harts Location counts came in just after midnight showing a handful of net extra votes going Trump's way and Clinton losing ground. Don't underestimate the ability of ultra small samples to act as straws in the wind. There's only about 40 votes in the two combined but it can still act as a mini-tracker given that it's by and large the same lot voting each time. I'll be worried again if Biden doesn't pick up any there in 2020.
12 day symptomatic infection time average makes for around 45k new infections per day at the moment, probably a bit higher as there are fewer people at the end of the funnel than at the beginning.
We have had Circuit Breaker, Fire Break, now "Lockdown Light"....
Angela Merkel is drawing up plans for a so-called 'lockdown light' in which bars and restaurants would shut but most schools would stay open, German media says.
Merkel is due to hold talks with regional leaders on Wednesday amid rapidly rising coronavirus infections in Germany, with her economy minister warning that cases could soon reach 20,000 per day.
According to Bild, the 'lockdown light' would see schools and kindergartens remain open except in areas with particularly high infection numbers, unlike in the spring when they were shut down across the country.
I mean, the ONS weekly data is showing a consistent 43% rise week on week since early September which is a near perfect 2 week doubling so even if they've flunked it they are not far off reality.
Ever wondered how many total deaths (including non-covid) would be reported to day? People die every day - we need to stop fixating on just covid. How many cancer deaths? How many heart attacks?
Well, it's about 1500 a day in England and Wales, varying by time of year.
367 isn't necessarily a straight increment on that as some of those 367 will have had underlying conditions so serious that their time would've been around now even without COVID. But the excess death data suggests it isn't a totally unfair estimate. And that's a big proportion of total deaths and a big excess death rate over time.
I agree about the need for some perspective, but equally we shouldn't understate it either. It's a very major cause of excess deaths, with continuing risk of spiralling out of control such that those who have it quite badly, but who are not beyond saving, are significantly more likely to die due to capacity constraints.
And all that is before considering those who survive but with long term damage to their health.
Comments
Even if setting it to five times greater, the net error will be insignificant at current levels of prevalence (and that would be assuming that the false negatives are unaffected (the latest date I used is the 19th, and false negatives would still outweigh the false positives.
Kavanaugh is a Knut, but even he will want to keep his head down for a bit.
As for rest of list, if ranked in order of likelihood for Democratic pickup, my take is:
Colorado
Arizona & Maine
Iowa & North Carolina
Georgia & Montana
South Carolina
Looks very promising...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/27/covid-vaccine-uk-oxford-university-astrazeneca-works-in-all-ages-trials-suggest
Jesus that guy is good.
* and you are.
https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1321121110004539392?s=20
I focused on the death figures because at a rate of +50% per week it will quickly escalate if it turns out any slowdown in the case numbers is due to testing bottlenecks/other reasons.
"Starmer’s office said he spoke to a member of the British Transport Police at the scene and provided a badge number of the officer concerned.
A spokeswoman for the force confirmed an off-duty police community support officer witnessed the collision and provided Starmer with their details."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/oct/27/questions-raised-about-keir-starmer-collision-with-cyclist
https://twitter.com/HTScotPol/status/1321123269664296960?s=20
Thus, we use day of death, wait for scripters to put to the graphs to get an idea of what is going on.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/oct/27/questions-raised-about-keir-starmer-collision-with-cyclist
Also plenty of individual Brits commemorated in US via state, city, county, town & township names.
Starting with no less than six states named after English-UK monarchs (including one before he ascended the throne) - can you name them? No googling!
Another group of nobs that generated many US place names were prime ministers.
Most famously Pittsburgh (aka Fort Pitt aka Fort Duquesne) named in honor of William Pitt the Elder (aka Earl of Chatham) following British victory over the French in North America in war waged and won under his leadership. His name is further scattered across America for example Pittsylvania County, VA, whose county seat is Chatham.
In fact, EVERY British PM from Sir Robert Walpole to the Duke of Grafton gave some bit of the US its current name. However, this tradition ended abruptly - for some reason - with Lord North.
Though would NOT be shocked if some PBers (and you know who you are) are prepared to argue vehemently (and interminably) that places like North Atterbury, Mass and North Bend, WA were dubbed in honor of this wise & far-seeing statesman.
https://twitter.com/TonyGuoga/status/1321121638063181825
What exactly did the centaurs do to her, I wonder?
367 deaths reported ain't good even if it's a Tuesday.
There's also Louisiana, named after a French king.
Or just shite testing?
I think it's just the daily tracker bouncing about rather than a 'correction' – will probably be Trump +3 tomorrow then Biden +1 the following day...
Yes, my good enough, spur of the moment analysis was not statistically perfect, but perhaps it was good enough.
https://inews.co.uk/us-election-2020/us-election-results-2020-when-announced-vote-date-delay-who-won-trump-biden-735394
It's also quite likely to mean control for the full four years at least, as the map provides very few opportunities for the Republicans in 2022, so there is a lot at stake. There are only 12 Democrat defences in 2022 and none of them in red states. Arizona (assuming Kelly wins next week in the special election) would be the only genuinely purple state with a Democrat incumbent. Pennsylvania and North Carolina have retiring GOP incumbents, while Ron Johnson in Wisconsin is undecided on 2022 and likely to be vulnerable. Never say never in a mid-term, but it looks a good map for Democrats even if they are behing on national vote by then. 2024 is a much better map for the GOP, of course.
Testing capacity for 26th October - 447,723 (big jump - new lab coming on line?)
Testing capacity for 26th September - 281,076
Tests actually done on 26th October - 261,855
which is 58% of capacity.
Major bragging rights prize for the name of the State, capital, and three counties.
At what point should we stop being relatively calm?
There could well be some very red faces next week.
But then, by the ONS figures, this data series misses out loads of the deaths anyway, so perfection in treatment of the data is a bit of a red herring. Nothing is perfect.
https://twitter.com/cricketwyvern/status/1321133463341334530?s=20
https://twitter.com/CyberpunkGame/status/1321128432370176002?s=20
If you can't get on with each other you have no hope as a country. That means accepting what's in your midst even if you don't like it, and not pretending that just because someone isn't like you they mustn't belong to the same land.
Mr Meeks replied......
49/43
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/presidential-polls-trump-biden
51/40
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/27/cnbc-all-america-economic-survey-biden-still-holds-a-big-lead-over-trump-but-race-could-tighten.html
https://covid.joinzoe.com/data#levels-over-time
Angela Merkel is drawing up plans for a so-called 'lockdown light' in which bars and restaurants would shut but most schools would stay open, German media says.
Merkel is due to hold talks with regional leaders on Wednesday amid rapidly rising coronavirus infections in Germany, with her economy minister warning that cases could soon reach 20,000 per day.
According to Bild, the 'lockdown light' would see schools and kindergartens remain open except in areas with particularly high infection numbers, unlike in the spring when they were shut down across the country.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8885063/Coronavirus-Germany-Plans-lockdown-light-amid-surge-infections.html
367 isn't necessarily a straight increment on that as some of those 367 will have had underlying conditions so serious that their time would've been around now even without COVID. But the excess death data suggests it isn't a totally unfair estimate. And that's a big proportion of total deaths and a big excess death rate over time.
I agree about the need for some perspective, but equally we shouldn't understate it either. It's a very major cause of excess deaths, with continuing risk of spiralling out of control such that those who have it quite badly, but who are not beyond saving, are significantly more likely to die due to capacity constraints.
And all that is before considering those who survive but with long term damage to their health.