The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
It's not just that, it's "with covid" and "from covid". The fact is that countries use different metrics to track it. The UK's is just particularly generous.
I see, so the UK uniquely sets up a definition for Covid deaths that makes us look worse than everywhere else. It's a view I suppose but I'm not buying it.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
It's not just that, it's "with covid" and "from covid". The fact is that countries use different metrics to track it. The UK's is just particularly generous.
I see, so the UK uniquely sets up a definition for Covid deaths that makes us look worse than everywhere else. It's a view I suppose but I'm not buying it.
One of my colleagues wrote a policy analysis paper in the run up the Indyref about how the SNP's plan for the Bank of England to an independent Scotland's lender of last resort was legally impossible.
One key point, only the Chancellor of the Exchequer can set the targets/guidelines for the Governor, it would be illegal for him to follow another country's targets and guidelines, and no one ever answered the question what happens if the Chancellor and an Independent Scotland set contradictory targets.
Now my colleague is one of the country's leading experts of banking and financial services laws.
He was denounced by the likes of Tim Rideout, because they knew better, my friend was talking shite.
When my colleague asked for evidence to the contrary, well it led to abusive emails and phone calls to my colleague.
You mean, someone said something they didn't like and they immediately began to growl and foam at the mouth? I'm shocked, Sir, shocked.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
It's not just that, it's "with covid" and "from covid". The fact is that countries use different metrics to track it. The UK's is just particularly generous.
I see, so the UK uniquely sets up a definition for Covid deaths that makes us look worse than everywhere else. It's a view I suppose but I'm not buying it.
Read @MaxPB's recent comment on this. The UK is the only country where covid deaths exceed excess deaths.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
It's not just that, it's "with covid" and "from covid". The fact is that countries use different metrics to track it. The UK's is just particularly generous.
I see, so the UK uniquely sets up a definition for Covid deaths that makes us look worse than everywhere else. It's a view I suppose but I'm not buying it.
Now who has the agenda. You want to believe that the UK has uniquely handled this worse than other countries. It hasn't. You want to see the worst and you're simply ignoring actual data points such as excess deaths (the only comparable international statistic) where the UK places middlingly.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
”Who champions the little guy now that Trump is gone?
Sir Andrew Cook, chairman of leading British manufacturer William Cook Group, bemoans the fact that the parties of the left no longer stand up for the little guy”
Off topic. But the Grenfell enquiry is revealing some pretty unsavoury blind eye turning and wilful ignorance in the interests of keeping costs low*. A lot of buck passing right now. Who will hold it when the music stops? Someone should, but doubtless won't.
*Ironically it's probably going to cost several multiples of the original savings. Turns out to be long term cheaper to spend extra on cladding that doesn't burn easily. Who could have ever imagined?
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
I think the assumption is that most countries report the number dying pretty accurately.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
They are the most difficult to game with "pneumonia deaths" as the US, Russia and others do. Some countries have unfortunately stopped reporting them because it made them look bad.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
That's where the excess deaths over and above an average come into consideration.
Indeed, although not as bad we have had very bad years very recently.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
I think the assumption is that most countries report the number dying pretty accurately.
But why, if an interrogation of them would reveal that the Covid death tally figure is almost certainly suspect?
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
I think the assumption is that most countries report the number dying pretty accurately.
But why, if an interrogation of them would reveal that the Covid death tally figure is almost certainly suspect?
Otherwise the excess death figures would not look any different from the covid death figures?
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries. The same is true regarding the way we identified and reported on the so-called UK strain.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries.
I doubt that fully explains the scale of our problems, even if it would place in a slightly less harsh context.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
I think the assumption is that most countries report the number dying pretty accurately.
But why, if an interrogation of them would reveal that the Covid death tally figure is almost certainly suspect?
It's not easy to hide dead bodies and death certificates. Not impossible but even Russia has had to release pretty damning stats on it which show 3x as many excess deaths as they have declared COVID deaths.
What's most interesting about UK excess deaths is that they have now fallen behind COVID deaths on the death certificate, that speaks to what many of us were saying in the first wave that COVID has definitely killed off people with low life expectancies of under a year, I wonder whether that will be true in the second wave as well. I don't think so because the cohort is on average a bit younger.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
Yes, it is hard to fudge how many people are dead.
In the UK (and Australia and elsewhere) we have seen very few influenza cases compared to normal years precisely because the social distancing to prevent Covid spread also prevents influenza spread. Many US states trying to depoliticise Covid deaths have seen not that many official Covid deaths but lots of influenza or pneumonia deaths - more than normal, where we're seeing less than normal.
You can bump Covid deaths into being pneumonia deaths to hide the fact people have died from Covid if that's all you're measuring - but unless you're going to stop reporting who is alive and who is dead, or you're going to pretend the dead are still alive - then excess deaths have to be much more accurate.
These seems to be a number of inhaler based preventions and treatments that seem promising.
This is what is perplexing me. With all the obviously important concentration on and publicity of vaccines, surely an equally important part of the equation is treatment and cure. If we can treat and cure Covid infection then surely most of the issues go away. Why is treatment a poor cousin and why the hell aren't this kind of thing being more widely used? If it seems to work and the treatment won't make things worse why not use it wholescale for God's sake?
I wonder if it's a combination of medical caution, expense and possibly difficulty of manufacture/consequent scarcity of many of these treatments. The first two factors at least certainly apply in the case of budesonide. Husband tells me that (a) it's a powerful steroid - the inhalers are, therefore, only given to severe asthmatics - and (b) that they would cost a bomb to buy if it wasn't for the magic of NHS prescriptions.
That budesonide might have a positive effect in Covid patients comes as no surprise. Doctors have been describing Covid-19 as an inflammatory illness since the early days of the pandemic, IIRC. Budesonide inhalers are an anti-inflammatory treatment for the lungs.
All TV and movies have, qualitatively, declined. I am sure of it. This is an obvious by-product of the Pandemic. Networks are desperate for anything new to shove on the screens, so they will accept feeble crap that - during the Golden Age (which ended last year)- would have been cancelled.
It is most melancholy.
I am reminded of that column in Rome, which was first erected in the 2nd century AD, or whenever, and at the base is sculpted with ease and grace and style, recording Roman victories. Towards the top, the sculpting becomes embarrassingly clumsy, in the 4th-5th century, as the Romans literally forgot how to carve stone, and the civilisation that enabled high artistry was extinguished.
We may be near that point in the West. I hope I am wrong.
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
He’s certainly not leftwing or liberal, either economically or socially. He’s a bigot, in fact, who thinks sex before marriage is a sin.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries. The same is true regarding the way we identified and reported on the so-called UK strain.
Out of interest, the south African paper about AZN not stopping Saffers COVID....is it actually available? They briefed the FT in a similar fashion and the paper wasn't available on the day they did all the media.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries. The same is true regarding the way we identified and reported on the so-called UK strain.
Not the perfidious foreigners at it again
Do you think the statistics are faked or something?
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
There are three objectives, you've omitted one.
They are to minimise deaths, minimise the economic impact and minimise the duration of the pandemic.
If we roll out our vaccines a few months earlier than the rest of Europe then yes that will cut short the duration by a matter of months.
It will also save lives, it will also allow us to have a few months fewer of closure and a few months more of recovery.
For seasonal hospitality businesses many companies will have faced a horrendous and unprecedented situation of essentially three winters in a row. The vaccine means hopefully we can have a spring and summer this year. For unvaccinated nations they could be facing a fourth then fifth winter this year instead.
If you think we might end our pandemic months earlier and that won't filter through to the deathtoll and economic figures then that is frankly not credulous.
Of course the vaccination process will have an impact on deaths and the economy but my point is that if we are still at the top end of the deaths per million and the top end of the fall in GDP at the end of it all then the government has failed and the fact that we rolled out vaccines quickly simply means that we didn't fail as badly as we would have.
We're not going to be though.
There are already coming out new forecasts that the UK could regain its lost economic output by the end of the year. Due to sluggish Q1 we'll still be down annualised, but we could by Q4 be back to pre-pandemic levels.
That is remarkable - and it is not being projected for the likes of France, Spain, Italy and Portugal etc or even Germany that are still dealing with the pandemic months after us.
Our recovery will begin faster and harder than other countries.
And - so long as you have a Vaccination certificate in your passport - stuff here will be open to the foreign visitor wanting to sample life and culture and all the stuff still locked down in their own countries.
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
Since there's currently believed to be almost no Brazilian or South African Covid in the country, the UK mass surveillance figures aren't going to tell us anything new about efficacy against these variants, one would assume.
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
He’s certainly not leftwing or liberal, either economically or socially. He’s a bigot, in fact, who thinks sex before marriage is a sin.
That's not bigotry, it is an opinion, unless he seeks to legally and personally impose it on others. It is very wearying: this outlawing of mere opinions.
The Greeks and Romans - civilisations we much admire - were quite acceptant of adult-child sex. Which we now find abhorrent. I think we have got it right and they got it wrong, but mine is still a passing opinion, or at most a temporarily settled perspective.
There was, of course, a big difference to the decisions of some regulators to take a perhaps overly cautious approach due to what they considered insufficient data, and what Macron and some German politicians have been up to, which is to deliberately seek to undermine public confidence in one of the major vaccines that they are still planning to use, for the purpose of political gamesmanship.
I'd love to see the official data from that study, especially the AZ data on severe symptoms, hospitalisation and death for over 65s, by now at least 2m over 70s will have single jab immunity to it and it shouldn't take longer than a few days to track infections for the cohort just as they have been doing in Israel.
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
He’s certainly not leftwing or liberal, either economically or socially. He’s a bigot, in fact, who thinks sex before marriage is a sin.
He's also not overly fond of bastards, which could make it harder to find acceptance in the PB Tory community.
There was, of course, a big difference to the decisions of some regulators to take a perhaps overly cautious approach due to what they considered insufficient data, and what Macron and some German politicians have been up to, which is to deliberately seek to undermine public confidence in one of the major vaccines that they are still planning to use, for the purpose of political gamesmanship.
Which makes this news even more delicious. I cannot wait to see them eat crow on this one.
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
He’s certainly not leftwing or liberal, either economically or socially. He’s a bigot, in fact, who thinks sex before marriage is a sin.
That's not bigotry, it is an opinion, unless he seeks to legally and personally impose it on others. It is very wearying: this outlawing of mere opinions.
The Greeks and Romans - civilisations we much admire - were quite acceptant of adult-child sex. Which we now find abhorrent. I think we have got it right and they got it wrong, but mine is still a passing opinion, or at most a temporarily settled perspective.
Wait til robot sex arrives - quite soon.
We can be pretty confident of what the view on that will be, given the plethora of speculative fiction touching on the subject.
Of course, you could do it now, if just takes a bit more effort.
There was, of course, a big difference to the decisions of some regulators to take a perhaps overly cautious approach due to what they considered insufficient data, and what Macron and some German politicians have been up to, which is to deliberately seek to undermine public confidence in one of the major vaccines that they are still planning to use, for the purpose of political gamesmanship.
Which makes this news even more delicious. I cannot wait to see them eat crow on this one.
It just makes me feel even angrier that people are dying all over Europe while regulators and politicians have dithered over an actually life saving vaccine, not just potentially, it's actually saving lives now in this country.
Indeed. We need to see the research but The Sun has a great record of nailing these sorts of exclusives. Every so often it ventures outside its comic-populist comfort zone and pins down a proper story. ...
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
You can work this out (Sort of)
Median time to death is 13 days[1]. The peak of cases on 9th Jan saw a 7 day moving average of 59660 cases. The 7 day moving average peak of deaths on Jan 23rd was 1248 deaths, Jan 22nd (13 days after the 9th) was 1241 - they're not so far apart of course. It represents a 2% mortality rate. Maybe loads of people really are asymptomatic - so say 100,000 caught the virus that day.
There were 530,841 deaths in the UK in 2019 (Non pandemic year). Which means you can expect 1454 people to die each day.
Our population is 68,102,885 which means in a random sample of 59660 people, the expected deaths in 1 year is 465. In one day that would be just over 1 death. If you want to include the asymptomatic guess (100k), maybe you can stretch to 2 deaths 'with Covid' per day. Tilt it by age etc - perhaps you'll reach 5 deaths or so on an unlucky day for your 100,000 people.
It's a tremendously low figure, the number dieing AFTER 28 days because of Covid will swamp it - see the various graphs in [1].
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
But this bastard virus spreads so fast, in its new incarnation, and can also reinfect people with prior history of infection, I therefore fear you are being a bit blase.
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
It is not a glorious outcome: it will hurt. But is it good, compared to the possible alternatives? Definitely, YES
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
You're about, what, late 30s? 40ish? Welcome to Being a Tory
Not so. In the mid 60s most UK households did not own cars or telephones - the latter was still seen as very middle class. Many still lacked appliances such as fridges and washing machines.
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
You can work this out (Sort of)
Median time to death is 13 days[1]. The peak of cases on 9th Jan saw a 7 day moving average of 59660 cases. The 7 day moving average peak of deaths on Jan 23rd was 1248 deaths, Jan 22nd (13 days after the 9th) was 1241 - they're not so far apart of course. It represents a 2% mortality rate. Maybe loads of people really are asymptomatic - so say 100,000 caught the virus that day.
There were 530,841 deaths in the UK in 2019 (Non pandemic year). Which means you can expect 1454 people to die each day.
Our population is 68,102,885 which means in a random sample of 59660 people, the expected deaths in 1 year is 465. In one day that would be just over 1 death. If you want to include the asymptomatic guess (100k), maybe you can stretch to 2 deaths 'with Covid' per day. Tilt it by age etc - perhaps you'll reach 5 deaths or so on an unlucky day for your 100,000 people.
It's a tremendously low figure, the number dieing AFTER 28 days because of Covid will swamp it - see the various graphs in [1].
Can you use a random sampling in that way? You are more likely to be tested for covid if you enter hospital for whatever reason, and you are more likely to be in hospital if you are older.
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
But this bastard virus spreads so fast, in its new incarnation, and can also reinfect people with prior history of infection, I therefore fear you are being a bit blase.
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
The more effective the vaccines are, the better the case for pulling up the drawbridge. Any resultant harm will pale into insignificance compared with that of endless lockdown, or a constant cycle of regular lockdowns.
Besides anything else, the Government's two stated priorities have been 1. to stop the NHS keeling over and 2. to get children back into school. Imported SuperCovid could imperil the healthcare system and result in children being sent home and locked away again.
Set against that, we can learn to live without mass international travel for a while.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries. The same is true regarding the way we identified and reported on the so-called UK strain.
Personally, I think "Excess Deaths per 100k population" is not the right measure. I would go with "Excess deaths as a percentage". So if a country would normally expect to see 100 people die, and actually sees 120, then that's 20%.
If you do "per 100k", then countries with young populations (like India) will appear to have done very well, when their actual number of deaths could be twice the normal level.
(For the record, we're doing "ok" on both excess deaths measure. We haven't done as well as Germany, but we're in line with most of Europe, and we'd expect to pull ahead post vaccinations.)
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
The way you need to think about CV19 is "how many days head start does this vaccine give my body's immune system?" and "how much viral load did I get?"
The best vaccines relative to the weakest variant may give your body's immune system a 5 or 6 day headstart. The infection is recognised very early and those T-Cells and antibodies get to work 5 or 6 days earlier than they might otherwise. With AZ, it's probably 4 days. With AZ and a new variant, it might be more like two days, or even one and a half.
(If you've had a coronavirus variant of the common cold, as many of us have, that might give you a half day advantage too.)
No mutation is going to cut your body's response time back to baseline. The question is "how much of that headstart is lost?"
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Ahem
*Deaths for any reason within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
"For any reason" is probably the most honest part.
We could, I suppose have determined instead "Deaths specifically attributable to Covid within 28 days of a positive test". The figures might look better on that metric.
What percentage of the people who died within 28 days of having Covid would have died during that period if they hadn't caught the virus? Very few I would imagine.
You can work this out (Sort of)
Median time to death is 13 days[1]. The peak of cases on 9th Jan saw a 7 day moving average of 59660 cases. The 7 day moving average peak of deaths on Jan 23rd was 1248 deaths, Jan 22nd (13 days after the 9th) was 1241 - they're not so far apart of course. It represents a 2% mortality rate. Maybe loads of people really are asymptomatic - so say 100,000 caught the virus that day.
There were 530,841 deaths in the UK in 2019 (Non pandemic year). Which means you can expect 1454 people to die each day.
Our population is 68,102,885 which means in a random sample of 59660 people, the expected deaths in 1 year is 465. In one day that would be just over 1 death. If you want to include the asymptomatic guess (100k), maybe you can stretch to 2 deaths 'with Covid' per day. Tilt it by age etc - perhaps you'll reach 5 deaths or so on an unlucky day for your 100,000 people.
It's a tremendously low figure, the number dieing AFTER 28 days because of Covid will swamp it - see the various graphs in [1].
Can you use a random sampling in that way? You are more likely to be tested for covid if you enter hospital for whatever reason, and you are more likely to be in hospital if you are older.
England and Wales stats from 2011 (Census year) Age 85 and over Pop 1,254,688 Deaths 180,103 Total pop 56,075,912 484,367
Multiple for 85+ = 34.3
1.27 deaths = 44 deaths amongst the 59660 testing positive. That's REALLY tilting things though - if you do it for 65+ then you get 13 times as likely to die which would be 16 deaths on that day with covid. Deaths outside the 28 days because of covid will still be higher.
Politico.com - GOP castigates ‘terrible job’ by Trump legal team Still, Trump's attorney told reporters that he didn’t expect any changes to the legal team or its structure of arguments.
House Democrats started former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial with a well-executed video and direct speakers. Trump’s defense opened with a rambling bit by lead lawyer Bruce Castor that conceded the House presentation was “well done” and their arguments would be answered later.
The contrast was not lost on the jury.
“The House managers were focused. They were organized. They relied upon both precedent, the Constitution and legal scholars. They made a compelling argument. President Trump’s team were disorganized. They did everything they could but to talk about the question at hand,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.). “And when they talked about it, they kind of glided over, almost as if they were embarrassed of their arguments.”
Cassidy even voted with 55 other senators that the trial should go forward and was not unconstitutional, changing his position from last month. “If I’m an impartial juror and one side is doing a great job and the other job is doing a terrible job on the issue at hand? As an impartial juror, I’m going to vote for the side that did the good job.”
Cassidy’s shift was the most electric moment of the day and highlighted what could only be seen as an incoherent defense by Castor. . . .
Politico.com - Trump was quite displeased with his impeachment defense team The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
The UK has now vaccinated more people than the whole of the EU put together.
The EU are going to totally lose their shit.
When a country is hit by a pandemic the objective of the government has to be to minimise deaths and minimise the economic impact.
If, when the dust settles, the UK has done as poorly as it is currently doing on both metrics, the fact that it rolled out the vaccines a few weeks earlier than the rest of Europe won't be much consolation.
I take my hat off to those that worked on our vaccination efforts, it has, so far, been a great success. At the end of the day though it is a means to an end not an end in itself.
On excess deaths the UK is firmly mid-table and the infections aren't comparable given the scale of testing here.
The government is taking criticism on international comparisons because it is being transparent over deaths, we're basically the only country in the world that is reporting more covid deaths than excess deaths, for example. We also have an incredible level of data transparency in cases because of the weekly ONS report that no other country has so far replicated.
Once this is all done and the real statistics all come out the UK response will look very much like every other disorganised Western European country, not better or worse just more honest about the situation.
You are just making assumptions that suit your agenda. I do not believe that there is anything uniquely transparent or honest about the UKs covid reporting statistics.
Politico.com - Trump was quite displeased with his impeachment defense team The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
Some of which I commented on when I was watching the speech live.
The weirdest bit was when he cited the failure of the coup and the successful transfer of power to the new president as evidence that the system was working and no impeachment was necessary.
Trump won’t have enjoyed watching his lawyer concede on his behalf.
And from a criminal point of view, since when was an incompetent attempt at a crime ever a defence?
Politico.com - Trump was quite displeased with his impeachment defense team The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
Some of which I commented on when I was watching the speech live.
The weirdest bit was when he cited the failure of the coup and the successful transfer of power to the new president as evidence that the system was working and no impeachment was necessary.
Trump won’t have enjoyed watching his lawyer concede on his behalf.
And from a criminal point of view, since when was an incompetent attempt at a crime ever a defence?
It must be hugely reassuring for Sindy supporters to know that one of the major figures designing their post-independence economic future has been "working on a possible new banking and financial system for Scotland" - ie a whole new form of capitalism - "for two or three months".
It makes the grave gamble of Brexit look like buying one single Premium Bond.
What's even more funny about it is he then, in answer to someone quizzing him on his proposal, goes onto say that it would need to be "worked out by someone more knowledgeable than I".
Err, yep.
I love the idea that 4% interest on a £100,000 mortgage for 20 years means that you need to repay £104,000
Errr . . . why not just ban all interest as usury while you're at it?
Or have an independent Scotland adopt Sharia Law. Bingo! No interest....
Ha. Funnily enough, banks in Islamic countries still find many ways to take money from you. They just don’t use the word “interest”.
”Who champions the little guy now that Trump is gone?
Sir Andrew Cook, chairman of leading British manufacturer William Cook Group, bemoans the fact that the parties of the left no longer stand up for the little guy”
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
As usual we're being penalised for being more honest and reliable in reporting the data than a lot of other countries. The same is true regarding the way we identified and reported on the so-called UK strain.
Not the perfidious foreigners at it again
Do you think the statistics are faked or something?
The way this is being handled has the smell of propaganda and news management, not scientific honesty. Once again the UK is functioning in a separate information space, where objectivity is being thrown away and scientific data is leaked and then quoted to support policy and not policies used to follow the science. The implicit nationalist agenda: "we are right, you are wrong" is simplistic nonsense for a Sun or Express headline. The truth is that concerns about the efficacy of AZ were not hostile foreign propaganda to do down old Blighty, they were actually well founded and important. The 65% efficacy in younger subjects is not the 90% in all subjects that we thought we had 2 weeks ago. Meanwhile, Gove and Johnson have a track record of misleading propaganda themselves. Their statements have not been accurate and under the circumstances this is now downright sinister.
It’s worse than that. It’s not simple interest he’s suggesting but a flat charge. (Ie a £100k 20 year mortgage at 4% would result in £104k being repaid).
The result is that you would have lots of 364 day mortgages and people would have the hassle and cost of remortgaging their house every year. And application fees would be huge.
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
But this bastard virus spreads so fast, in its new incarnation, and can also reinfect people with prior history of infection, I therefore fear you are being a bit blase.
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
The more effective the vaccines are, the better the case for pulling up the drawbridge. Any resultant harm will pale into insignificance compared with that of endless lockdown, or a constant cycle of regular lockdowns.
Besides anything else, the Government's two stated priorities have been 1. to stop the NHS keeling over and 2. to get children back into school. Imported SuperCovid could imperil the healthcare system and result in children being sent home and locked away again.
Set against that, we can learn to live without mass international travel for a while.
If the vaccines are very effective, travel for the vaccinated is fine.
There's always a risk that they will bring something unpleasant in, maybe something not related to this virus at all, as there's a risk that travellers will be rapists or murderers, but life is about risk I'm afraid.
They could call it "homo-milk". As in milk from homo sapiens.
But milk comes from female animals, in nature, so maybe "milk" is sexist, or transphobic?
How about front-chest-human-bottom-juice?
You really feel quite threatened by Trans discussions, don't you?
No, you mustn't do that. Trans people (prejudice against whom I find even more inexplicable than prejudice against gays) and people being wankers ostensibly in support of trans people are entirely different issues.
I don't see much trans prejudice what I do see and trans friends agree with me on this is a vociferous few arguing for things that are clearly dubious.
Trans women( male to female shouldnt compete in sport). Create a third or fourth category for them
Trans women pre op shouldnt be in women only spaces like open dressing rooms and womens prison. Toilets which are cubicles fine, changing rooms which are cubicles fine but most women don't reallly want a todger waving around in front of them while they are getting changed.
I don't know anyone trans that disagrees with either its an extreme position an they understand why
It’s fundamentally about conflicting rights and the need to find a balance
Smoking is a good parallel. How do you reconcile the freedom that people have to smoke wherever they want with the freedom of other customers (in a restaurant) to enjoy a smoke free room? We tried smoking sections which helped, but ultimately banned it because of the appreciation that staff didn’t have a choice & were being unfairly exposed to the risk of secondary smoke.
The conflict here is between trans people (who have the right to live in their gender/sex) and women who may feel threatened in certain circumstances but the presence of pre-op trans people (ie an exposed todger in the changing room). Unisex facilities strike me as a logical way forward.
It’s worse than that. It’s not simple interest he’s suggesting but a flat charge. (Ie a £100k 20 year mortgage at 4% would result in £104k being repaid).
The result is that you would have lots of 364 day mortgages and people would have the hassle and cost of remortgaging their house every year. And application fees would be huge.
I suppose the other alternative is that rather than interest being annualised it would just be presented as the final repayment figure (which is already quoted as an estimate or at least, it was on my mortgage).
But that figure might be somewhat off-putting, especially given the likely deficit and consequent annual interest rates of an independent Scotland.
It’s worse than that. It’s not simple interest he’s suggesting but a flat charge. (Ie a £100k 20 year mortgage at 4% would result in £104k being repaid).
The result is that you would have lots of 364 day mortgages and people would have the hassle and cost of remortgaging their house every year. And application fees would be huge.
Every new Scottish currency discussion gets more barmy than the previous one.
Assuming they want to get from the pound to the Euro at some point, the only thing that would work is to persuade the EU to allow a transition straight from the pound to the Euro or a pegged equivalent - without the massively painful intermediate step, of a temporary floating Scottish currency being smashed to bits by the international markets.
My wife was on a work call with someone who has just returned to work after 3 weeks ill with Covid and is still feeling rough.
Age - around 20.
I'm not sure how surprising this is. I reckon the most ill I've felt was when I was 21. Whatever I picked up knocked me out for three weeks. Annoyingly it was in the run up to my finals at university.
Glandular fever? A traditional disease of the undergraduate. Totally pole-axed me when I was about 20. And came back for more
I had glandular fever when I was seven - the earliest case the throat specialist had ever seen. What I most remember is that I enjoyed the three weeks off school I got as a result.
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
But this bastard virus spreads so fast, in its new incarnation, and can also reinfect people with prior history of infection, I therefore fear you are being a bit blase.
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
The more effective the vaccines are, the better the case for pulling up the drawbridge. Any resultant harm will pale into insignificance compared with that of endless lockdown, or a constant cycle of regular lockdowns.
Besides anything else, the Government's two stated priorities have been 1. to stop the NHS keeling over and 2. to get children back into school. Imported SuperCovid could imperil the healthcare system and result in children being sent home and locked away again.
Set against that, we can learn to live without mass international travel for a while.
If the vaccines are very effective, travel for the vaccinated is fine.
There's always a risk that they will bring something unpleasant in, maybe something not related to this virus at all, as there's a risk that travellers will be rapists or murderers, but life is about risk I'm afraid.
If vaccination totally protects the recipient from contracting the virus - or, failing that, if it is 100% effective against onward transmission - then that would be correct, of course. But it would appear that no vaccine confers this kind of invulnerability to Covid.
We therefore need to address the balance of risk and reward in this case. My contention is simply that the risk - that we end up with a tsunami of corpses and being stuck back in lockdown for four to six months whilst a novel disease variant is suppressed and vaccinated against - is so massive that it's not worth taking it for the sake of something as comparatively trivial and inessential as a holiday, or anything close.
We'd be vastly better off recapitalising the airlines and mothballing the travel agents and tour operators - even at the cost of tens of thousands of jobs - than we would be back in lockdown. Lockdown is a catastrophe. Almost any price is worth paying to avoid it.
It is probably clear - notwithstanding my views on certain personal morality issues - from my earlier comments over the years that I position myself pretty firmly on the Left. However, tonight whilst watching the Newsnight report re- child poverty, I felt a bit irritated by the focus on 'relative poverty.' Throughout that piece I kept reminding myself that few of these 'poor' households were likely to find themselves without a mobile phone , a colour television - or probably a microwave.Quite a few are likely to own cars. Very few indeed will not have a washing machine, fridge or vacuum cleaner. It occurred to me that most will enjoy living standards which in 'absolute' terms are as comfortable as those lived by fairly Middle Class households back in the mid-1960s. I don't doubt that 'relative poverty' exists on a significant scale - but very few face the burden of 'absolute poverty' as experienced by many even in the 1960s - never mind the 1930s or 1920s. Some reference to this would have been useful in terms of balance and perspective.
My wife was on a work call with someone who has just returned to work after 3 weeks ill with Covid and is still feeling rough.
Age - around 20.
I'm not sure how surprising this is. I reckon the most ill I've felt was when I was 21. Whatever I picked up knocked me out for three weeks. Annoyingly it was in the run up to my finals at university.
Glandular fever? A traditional disease of the undergraduate. Totally pole-axed me when I was about 20. And came back for more
I had glandular fever when I was seven - the earliest case the throat specialist had ever seen. What I most remember is that I enjoyed the three weeks off school I got as a result.
You shouldn’t have snogged the babysitter then...
Is that what used to happen at your place when somebody got sick?
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
Because it’s easy to identify if someone is dead or not.
The penalty against which Sumption is railing is Draconian. On the one hand, you can kind of understand where it has come from, because the Government doesn't trust people not to lie to get around hotel quarantine and it's right to do so. On the other hand, it wouldn't be necessary if they simply did what Sturgeon has decided to do and lock up all inbound travellers.
Yet again, dithering and ineffectual half-measures have their consequences.
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
Because it’s easy to identify if someone is dead or not.
You clearly haven’t watched a House of Lords debate.
The dose reduced the symptomatic infection risk by 65 per cent in younger adults, and 64 per cent in over-80s.
Glorious news.
It's not glorious. I wish it were. It's good, with caveats.
What does it do against the new variants?
It's not that much of a caveat if it is the case that if the SA variant for example were to take hold it will not be for many months at least, possibly time to stock up on the other orders we have which may be more effective against it and allow time for development of specific strains to target it, and thus means that the tens of millions of vaccinations we have done will protect against the predominant strains for the short and medium term.
But this bastard virus spreads so fast, in its new incarnation, and can also reinfect people with prior history of infection, I therefore fear you are being a bit blase.
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
The more effective the vaccines are, the better the case for pulling up the drawbridge. Any resultant harm will pale into insignificance compared with that of endless lockdown, or a constant cycle of regular lockdowns.
Besides anything else, the Government's two stated priorities have been 1. to stop the NHS keeling over and 2. to get children back into school. Imported SuperCovid could imperil the healthcare system and result in children being sent home and locked away again.
Set against that, we can learn to live without mass international travel for a while.
If the vaccines are very effective, travel for the vaccinated is fine.
There's always a risk that they will bring something unpleasant in, maybe something not related to this virus at all, as there's a risk that travellers will be rapists or murderers, but life is about risk I'm afraid.
If vaccination totally protects the recipient from contracting the virus - or, failing that, if it is 100% effective against onward transmission - then that would be correct, of course. But it would appear that no vaccine confers this kind of invulnerability to Covid.
We therefore need to address the balance of risk and reward in this case. My contention is simply that the risk - that we end up with a tsunami of corpses and being stuck back in lockdown for four to six months whilst a novel disease variant is suppressed and vaccinated against - is so massive that it's not worth taking it for the sake of something as comparatively trivial and inessential as a holiday, or anything close.
We'd be vastly better off recapitalising the airlines and mothballing the travel agents and tour operators - even at the cost of tens of thousands of jobs - than we would be back in lockdown. Lockdown is a catastrophe. Almost any price is worth paying to avoid it.
I agree lockdown is a catastrophe, but the solution to that is an effective tracing programme.
Holidays aren't trivial - for millions of people they are the high point of the year. They help the economy, boost mental health, increase cultural awareness as well as being very good fun.
Also there are the political implications. 2.8 million have already booked summer holidays - millions more no doubt in a month or two. And there are those whose jobs are at risk. That's a huge constituency to annoy needlessly.
You'll never eliminate the risk of new variants entirely, any more than you'll eliminate overseas travel. So I think it's time to take the risk for the vaccinated. Maybe test them when they get back - a good way to keep testing capacity going.
Politico.com - Trump was quite displeased with his impeachment defense team The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
Some of which I commented on when I was watching the speech live.
The weirdest bit was when he cited the failure of the coup and the successful transfer of power to the new president as evidence that the system was working and no impeachment was necessary.
Trump won’t have enjoyed watching his lawyer concede on his behalf.
And from a criminal point of view, since when was an incompetent attempt at a crime ever a defence?
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Genuine question, is there a reason excess death stats are particularly reliable?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
Because it’s easy to identify if someone is dead or not.
It must be hugely reassuring for Sindy supporters to know that one of the major figures designing their post-independence economic future has been "working on a possible new banking and financial system for Scotland" - ie a whole new form of capitalism - "for two or three months".
It makes the grave gamble of Brexit look like buying one single Premium Bond.
What's even more funny about it is he then, in answer to someone quizzing him on his proposal, goes onto say that it would need to be "worked out by someone more knowledgeable than I".
Err, yep.
I love the idea that 4% interest on a £100,000 mortgage for 20 years means that you need to repay £104,000
Errr . . . why not just ban all interest as usury while you're at it?
Or have an independent Scotland adopt Sharia Law. Bingo! No interest....
Ha. Funnily enough, banks in Islamic countries still find many ways to take money from you. They just don’t use the word “interest”.
It’s worse than that. It’s not simple interest he’s suggesting but a flat charge. (Ie a £100k 20 year mortgage at 4% would result in £104k being repaid).
The result is that you would have lots of 364 day mortgages and people would have the hassle and cost of remortgaging their house every year. And application fees would be huge.
I suppose the other alternative is that rather than interest being annualised it would just be presented as the final repayment figure (which is already quoted as an estimate or at least, it was on my mortgage).
But that figure might be somewhat off-putting, especially given the likely deficit and consequent annual interest rates of an independent Scotland.
Yes although contractually that could be nasty if it became the repayment figure not an annual charge
Politico.com - Trump was quite displeased with his impeachment defense team The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
Some of which I commented on when I was watching the speech live.
The weirdest bit was when he cited the failure of the coup and the successful transfer of power to the new president as evidence that the system was working and no impeachment was necessary.
Trump won’t have enjoyed watching his lawyer concede on his behalf.
And from a criminal point of view, since when was an incompetent attempt at a crime ever a defence?
Comments
https://eu.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2021/02/08/bruce-springsteen-super-bowl-ad-jeep-michigan-upper-peninsula/4435192001/
@OllyT have a look at the facts. Look at the difference between officially recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths per country.
Officially the UK has nearly 3x the Russian Covid deaths - reality is that Russia has double our excess deaths. That's a six-fold difference between recorded Covid deaths and excess deaths.
Or look at America - their excess deaths is nearly a quarter more than their recorded deaths.
The UK is almost completely unique in recording more Covid deaths than excess deaths.
Who will hold it when the music stops?
Someone should, but doubtless won't.
*Ironically it's probably going to cost several multiples of the original savings.
Turns out to be long term cheaper to spend extra on cladding that doesn't burn easily. Who could have ever imagined?
If that chart is right then it partly explains why Belgium's Covid death rate has been so bad.
Only on PB.
Indeed, although not as bad we have had very bad years very recently.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/articles/highestnumberofexcesswinterdeathssince19992000/2015-11-25
What's most interesting about UK excess deaths is that they have now fallen behind COVID deaths on the death certificate, that speaks to what many of us were saying in the first wave that COVID has definitely killed off people with low life expectancies of under a year, I wonder whether that will be true in the second wave as well. I don't think so because the cohort is on average a bit younger.
In the UK (and Australia and elsewhere) we have seen very few influenza cases compared to normal years precisely because the social distancing to prevent Covid spread also prevents influenza spread. Many US states trying to depoliticise Covid deaths have seen not that many official Covid deaths but lots of influenza or pneumonia deaths - more than normal, where we're seeing less than normal.
You can bump Covid deaths into being pneumonia deaths to hide the fact people have died from Covid if that's all you're measuring - but unless you're going to stop reporting who is alive and who is dead, or you're going to pretend the dead are still alive - then excess deaths have to be much more accurate.
The (small) clinical trial started last summer.
https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04416399
It is most melancholy.
I am reminded of that column in Rome, which was first erected in the 2nd century AD, or whenever, and at the base is sculpted with ease and grace and style, recording Roman victories. Towards the top, the sculpting becomes embarrassingly clumsy, in the 4th-5th century, as the Romans literally forgot how to carve stone, and the civilisation that enabled high artistry was extinguished.
We may be near that point in the West. I hope I am wrong.
https://twitter.com/Samfr/status/1359273958428848134?s=20
Ah, except, of course, this is absent the SA bug.
But still: good
Glorious news.
What does it do against the new variants?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56005488
Something to be glad of after a dismal year.
"She has been very lucky," David Tavella, spokesman for the Sainte Catherine Labouré retirement home, said.
She's 117, she's already been pretty darn lucky I'd say.
The Greeks and Romans - civilisations we much admire - were quite acceptant of adult-child sex. Which we now find abhorrent. I think we have got it right and they got it wrong, but mine is still a passing opinion, or at most a temporarily settled perspective.
Wait til robot sex arrives - quite soon.
Of course, you could do it now, if just takes a bit more effort.
Pleasant dreams.
Indeed. We need to see the research but The Sun has a great record of nailing these sorts of exclusives. Every so often it ventures outside its comic-populist comfort zone and pins down a proper story. ...
Median time to death is 13 days[1]. The peak of cases on 9th Jan saw a 7 day moving average of 59660 cases. The 7 day moving average peak of deaths on Jan 23rd was 1248 deaths, Jan 22nd (13 days after the 9th) was 1241 - they're not so far apart of course. It represents a 2% mortality rate. Maybe loads of people really are asymptomatic - so say 100,000 caught the virus that day.
There were 530,841 deaths in the UK in 2019 (Non pandemic year). Which means you can expect 1454 people to die each day.
Our population is 68,102,885 which means in a random sample of 59660 people, the expected deaths in 1 year is 465. In one day that would be just over 1 death. If you want to include the asymptomatic guess (100k), maybe you can stretch to 2 deaths 'with Covid' per day. Tilt it by age etc - perhaps you'll reach 5 deaths or so on an unlucky day for your 100,000 people.
It's a tremendously low figure, the number dieing AFTER 28 days because of Covid will swamp it - see the various graphs in [1].
[1] https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/928729/S0803_CO-CIN_-_Time_from_symptom_onset_until_death.pdf
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-56005138
Yet, you could be right. We may have bought enough time to drive down UK cases, keep out new variants, and thus secure a Covid-free UK. Or at least something like it: akin to Thailand, say (but with their allied economic pain of strict border quarantine)
It is not a glorious outcome: it will hurt. But is it good, compared to the possible alternatives? Definitely, YES
And on that positive note, night night, PB
I honestly don't see how the two are even comparable, but whatever.
Besides anything else, the Government's two stated priorities have been 1. to stop the NHS keeling over and 2. to get children back into school. Imported SuperCovid could imperil the healthcare system and result in children being sent home and locked away again.
Set against that, we can learn to live without mass international travel for a while.
Or avoid the Alps, especially ski resorts?
If you do "per 100k", then countries with young populations (like India) will appear to have done very well, when their actual number of deaths could be twice the normal level.
(For the record, we're doing "ok" on both excess deaths measure. We haven't done as well as Germany, but we're in line with most of Europe, and we'd expect to pull ahead post vaccinations.)
The best vaccines relative to the weakest variant may give your body's immune system a 5 or 6 day headstart. The infection is recognised very early and those T-Cells and antibodies get to work 5 or 6 days earlier than they might otherwise. With AZ, it's probably 4 days. With AZ and a new variant, it might be more like two days, or even one and a half.
(If you've had a coronavirus variant of the common cold, as many of us have, that might give you a half day advantage too.)
No mutation is going to cut your body's response time back to baseline. The question is "how much of that headstart is lost?"
Age 85 and over Pop 1,254,688 Deaths 180,103
Total pop 56,075,912 484,367
Multiple for 85+ = 34.3
1.27 deaths = 44 deaths amongst the 59660 testing positive. That's REALLY tilting things though - if you do it for 65+ then you get 13 times as likely to die which would be 16 deaths on that day with covid.
Deaths outside the 28 days because of covid will still be higher.
Scientists from the University of Copenhagen have developed an AI tool that can predict who’ll die from COVID-19 with up to 90% accuracy.
The researchers fed the system health data from almost 4,000 COVID-19 patients in Denmark to train it to find patterns in their medical histories.
It also predicted whether someone who’s admitted to hospital with COVID-19 will need a respirator with 80% accuracy.
https://thenextweb.com/neural/2021/02/09/new-ai-tool-predicts-wholl-die-from-covid-19-with-90-accuracy/
I can have a fairly good guess for 90% of cases without super computer AI.....they are old / fat / have diabetes...
I am not sure this AI, more regression of the factors that humans have already done so using traditional statistical techniques.
Still, Trump's attorney told reporters that he didn’t expect any changes to the legal team or its structure of arguments.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/09/gop-trump-legal-team-impeachment-468130
House Democrats started former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial with a well-executed video and direct speakers. Trump’s defense opened with a rambling bit by lead lawyer Bruce Castor that conceded the House presentation was “well done” and their arguments would be answered later.
The contrast was not lost on the jury.
“The House managers were focused. They were organized. They relied upon both precedent, the Constitution and legal scholars. They made a compelling argument. President Trump’s team were disorganized. They did everything they could but to talk about the question at hand,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.). “And when they talked about it, they kind of glided over, almost as if they were embarrassed of their arguments.”
Cassidy even voted with 55 other senators that the trial should go forward and was not unconstitutional, changing his position from last month. “If I’m an impartial juror and one side is doing a great job and the other job is doing a terrible job on the issue at hand? As an impartial juror, I’m going to vote for the side that did the good job.”
Cassidy’s shift was the most electric moment of the day and highlighted what could only be seen as an incoherent defense by Castor. . . .
The former president was frustrated with the meandering arguments. Some close to his defense team quit watching.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/09/trump-impeachment-team-468112
For former President Donald Trump, the opening day of his second impeachment trial did not go as planned or to his liking.
Cocooned at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Trump watched as his defense attorneys responded to an emotional presentation by House impeachment managers with a series of dry, technical and at times meandering arguments about due process and the constitutionality of the proceedings. As they droned on, he grew increasingly frustrated with the sharp contrast between their muted response and the prosecution’s opening salvo, according to two people familiar with his thinking.
"President Trump was not happy with the performance of his legal team in action,” said one of the people familiar with his thinking.
It didn’t help that his lead attorney, former Pennsylvania prosecutor Bruce Castor, name-checked Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who just days ago slammed his state party for their “weird worship” of Trump. Castor also referred to Trump as the “former president,” conceding that he had in fact lost the 2020 election when he was removed by “smart” voters last November. . . .
At one point during Castor’s remarks, the right-wing network Newsmax––which Trump had been watching throughout the day, according to a person familiar with his viewing habits––cut away to a segment featuring the ex-president’s former impeachment attorney Alan Dershowitz.
“I have no idea what he is doing,” Dershowitz said of Castor, shaking his head dismissively. “The American people are entitled to an argument… but this, just, after all kinds of very strong presentations on the part of the House managers… it does not appear to me to be effective advocacy.”
The weirdest bit was when he cited the failure of the coup and the successful transfer of power to the new president as evidence that the system was working and no impeachment was necessary.
Trump won’t have enjoyed watching his lawyer concede on his behalf.
And from a criminal point of view, since when was an incompetent attempt at a crime ever a defence?
https://twitter.com/MikaelThalen/status/1359209202292428800
The implicit nationalist agenda: "we are right, you are wrong" is simplistic nonsense for a Sun or Express headline. The truth is that concerns about the efficacy of AZ were not hostile foreign propaganda to do down old Blighty, they were actually well founded and important. The 65% efficacy in younger subjects is not the 90% in all subjects that we thought we had 2 weeks ago.
Meanwhile, Gove and Johnson have a track record of misleading propaganda themselves. Their statements have not been accurate and under the circumstances this is now downright sinister.
The result is that you would have lots of 364 day mortgages and people would have the hassle and cost of remortgaging their house every year. And application fees would be huge.
There's always a risk that they will bring something unpleasant in, maybe something not related to this virus at all, as there's a risk that travellers will be rapists or murderers, but life is about risk I'm afraid.
"Mr Hancock’s connection with reality, which has been getting looser for some time, has finally snapped."
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/02/09/does-mr-hancock-really-think-non-disclosed-portugal-visit-worse/
Smoking is a good parallel. How do you reconcile the freedom that people have to smoke wherever they want with the freedom of other customers (in a restaurant) to enjoy a smoke free room? We tried smoking sections which helped, but ultimately banned it because of the appreciation that staff didn’t have a choice & were being unfairly exposed to the risk of secondary smoke.
The conflict here is between trans people (who have the right to live in their gender/sex) and women who may feel threatened in certain circumstances but the presence of pre-op trans people (ie an exposed todger in the changing room). Unisex facilities strike me as a logical way forward.
But that figure might be somewhat off-putting, especially given the likely deficit and consequent annual interest rates of an independent Scotland.
Assuming they want to get from the pound to the Euro at some point, the only thing that would work is to persuade the EU to allow a transition straight from the pound to the Euro or a pegged equivalent - without the massively painful intermediate step, of a temporary floating Scottish currency being smashed to bits by the international markets.
We therefore need to address the balance of risk and reward in this case. My contention is simply that the risk - that we end up with a tsunami of corpses and being stuck back in lockdown for four to six months whilst a novel disease variant is suppressed and vaccinated against - is so massive that it's not worth taking it for the sake of something as comparatively trivial and inessential as a holiday, or anything close.
We'd be vastly better off recapitalising the airlines and mothballing the travel agents and tour operators - even at the cost of tens of thousands of jobs - than we would be back in lockdown. Lockdown is a catastrophe. Almost any price is worth paying to avoid it.
Explains a lot.
Yet again, dithering and ineffectual half-measures have their consequences.
Holidays aren't trivial - for millions of people they are the high point of the year. They help the economy, boost mental health, increase cultural awareness as well as being very good fun.
Also there are the political implications. 2.8 million have already booked summer holidays - millions more no doubt in a month or two. And there are those whose jobs are at risk.
That's a huge constituency to annoy needlessly.
You'll never eliminate the risk of new variants entirely, any more than you'll eliminate overseas travel. So I think it's time to take the risk for the vaccinated. Maybe test them when they get back - a good way to keep testing capacity going.
Actually have to admire the guy’s composure in the circumstances.