Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
Total rubbish. Just conspiracy theory nonsense.
Scientists and health officials love it when people die in large numbers, it gives them a real kick.
I do get the basic point of power (albeit in this case merely advisory power) being corrupting, but let's get real here - so many people, at so many levels, would need to be complete sociopaths for contrarian to be right about their motivations to damage the country so much for no reason other than power. That's just not plausible.
Being overly cautious or gung ho, if that is the worry, is much more likely to be motivated by fear than malice.
Arguing against that approach as disproportionate is far more effective than suggesting Chris Whitty is a literal meglomaniac. And focusing on the latter undermines people arguing about the former.
Even by his slightly disappointing standards @contrarian is being utterly absurd. This has nothing to do with power or megalomania.
What is a concern is that there is an inevitable and understandable reluctance to take responsibility for uncertainty. That is why it is ultimately a politician's job to balance the risks, to look at the bigger picture and to offset the consequences of not removing restrictions against doing so. Scientists and experts advise but this is a political call.
Personally, in recognition of that, I am willing to cut them a bit of slack, especially if they are brave enough not to try and hide behind the "following the science" mantra.
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
Power is one of a number of human desires. No one in history has given up everything they held dear in the pursuit of power. Not one of the above you quote. It's nothing to do with morality - it's psychology. Some people desire power. Very few, in fact none, desire power to the exclusion of all other basic needs such as human contact.
Speaking as a scientist, it's a pretty odd career choice for someone who is power-hungry. I'm really not feeling the power
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
I’m pretty sure the cabinet, led by the Chancellor who is trying to prepare a budget with a £30bn a month deficit, want the country back to something approaching normal as soon as possible.
Really? they are all in it up to their necks. They are the facilitators of this giant car wreck. When allegations of abuse swept the catholic church, many of the innocent found it as difficult to accept the truth as the guilty. In some ways more so.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I think your general point goes in the right direction, but a hospitalisation per case rate of 0.01% is just wishful thinking. Half of hospitalisations are among under 70s, most of whom haven't been vaccinated yet, and two Pfizer doses reduce serious cases by 92% not 99.99% according to that recent Israel study.
I think the criterium should be expected hospitalizations, based on daily case rate (as that provides the least laggy data) and recent hospitalizations per case. That way, more cases are tolerated as the hospitalizations per case rate comes down.
Interesting you used "under 70s" as the watershed.
Because two can play at that game.
Only 11% of hospitalisations are under 40.
Under 70s aren't vaccinated yet though.
It's going to be months yet before all over 40s are.
Indeed. I picked out that line because that's roughly where we are with vaccinations at the moment.
When we do get to reducing hospitalisations per case to 10% of what it's been, we can tolerate ten times as many cases. I don't see how that's controversial.
I've been suffering from a mild depression for the first time in my life in recent weeks.
How do I know it's a depression?
Well, I don't know. I'm not an expert. But my symptoms match what I understand are common ones online.
I'm tired in the morning. I'm tired during the day. I'm tired in the evening. I don't sleep well at night.
I am listless during the day. I stare and drift. I can't focus. I struggle to read books or even newspaper articles - they are too big and long and take too much effort - I go off Netflix and Amazon series almost immediately. I don't want to leave the house. I feel better when I leave the house. I don't want to talk to people outside the house. I feel better if I do see a smile outside the house.
I'm aggressive and frustrated. I want to start fights. On social media and even with my wife. I immediately regret it when I do and feel victimised when they strike back, as they do. A lingering comment can stay with me for weeks. Which puts me off talking to people at all.
The only way I get work done is through immense self-discipline and short bursts of productivity at times when I have no choice, and I absolutely must. I just about do it. I put on a "game face" on for meetings - but I've even dodged a few of those. My tolerance for work colleagues I don't quite click with or who annoy me is virtually zero. And I don't care.
So this lockdown is really really shit. Everyone I've spoken to feels the same. I don't know how many feel how I feel, but I suspect it's undercounted.
It would make all the difference to see close friends and family, and go into work once a week in London (couldn't give tuppence for all the rest really) and get away on holiday with my family, where we can play and eat and have fun. Because that's living. And this is no life.
I'm pushing the boundaries of these rules as far as I can (and some) and feel I have no alternative if I am to maintain some basic level of sanity. Sorry.
Sorry to hear that.
Like all the others I will only suggest things that I have found helpful, and for me the top two have been regular (ish) phone contact with a couple of friends just to blow off steam, a few new projects and routine, and sometimes just blind "keeping on keeping on".
Are there any new things you can pick up that are short enough that you see results not too far away? I've just picked up some pots of bulbs for the house, as these will last about a month and I'm getting up the energy for a battle to rebuild a veg bed that has just crawled out from under the snow as it's time to plant onions and garlic.
My most quixotic thing has been working through some of the "skills tests" from masterchef. I am now an expert in kidneys on toast.
Mr Noor faces 10 days in COVID-19 quarantine in a hotel room near London's Heathrow Airport after falling foul of new border controls because of a flight delay.
'I don't have a book. I don't have a Koran. I don't have nothing here,' Noor said by phone after his arrival on Monday, a day later than planned, landed him with a £1,750-pound bill.
In another hotel nearby, 61-year-old Sole, who declined to give her surname, said she realised too late that the new rules would kick in before she returned from visiting friends in Chile.
It is absolutely clear there are a proportion of people who just feel that international travel is a human right and there should be no restrictions on them. Not even faking the "it was for essential business" in the case of Sole.
In news that is totally unsurprising to me I see the famed "deplatforming" of Germaine Greet cited in the supporting docs for government culture war paper never actually happened
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
We aren't in the phase where we have disconnected the cases from the hospitalisations and deaths.
That needs more jabs.
As to the actual numbers of cases - not got specimen date data yet. 4pm and all that.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
I'm not remotely worried about this, because the number of deaths is way, way, way more important to people than either cases or hospitalisations. Once that number falls back into double digits and stays there, no-one is going to care less whether we have a hundred cases a day, or a million. The clamour to end restrictions at that point will be impossible to ignore, and no SAGE member is going to have the necessary clout and skill to persuade either ministers or the public otherwise.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
Some areas but I'd be careful to see if it's more than just statistical noise at this stage. Especially since Scotland has had a high positivity rate for weeks, they seem like an odd exception already.
With three weeks to go until schools reopen, probably six weeks to go until other things open (and schools reclose) and about 9 weeks to go until we have both schools and other things open simultaneously I see little reason for us to be anywhere close to 5k daily cases by then.
In news that is totally unsurprising to me I see the famed "deplatforming" of Germaine Greet cited in the supporting docs for government culture war paper never actually happened
Is there a confusion about different incidents? There was an attempt to deplatform her at Cardiff University in 2015 but the event ultimately went ahead with additional security, and then a few years later a motion was passed at Bristol University to exclude "trans-exclusionary radical feminists" including Greer from being able to speak on campus.
A very English story. While the world is wrestling with the Covid pandemic Dominic Raab has mobilised to foreign office to deal with the hugely important question of what has happened to Princess Latifa?
'Is there more that the British government could be doing?' Asks the BBC
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
Total rubbish. Just conspiracy theory nonsense.
Scientists and health officials love it when people die in large numbers, it gives them a real kick.
I do get the basic point of power (albeit in this case merely advisory power) being corrupting, but let's get real here - so many people, at so many levels, would need to be complete sociopaths for contrarian to be right about their motivations to damage the country so much for no reason other than power. That's just not plausible.
Being overly cautious or gung ho, if that is the worry, is much more likely to be motivated by fear than malice.
Arguing against that approach as disproportionate is far more effective than suggesting Chris Whitty is a literal meglomaniac. And focusing on the latter undermines people arguing about the former.
Even by his slightly disappointing standards @contrarian is being utterly absurd. This has nothing to do with power or megalomania.
What is a concern is that there is an inevitable and understandable reluctance to take responsibility for uncertainty. That is why it is ultimately a politician's job to balance the risks, to look at the bigger picture and to offset the consequences of not removing restrictions against doing so. Scientists and experts advise but this is a political call.
Personally, in recognition of that, I am willing to cut them a bit of slack, especially if they are brave enough not to try and hide behind the "following the science" mantra.
That's where the argument should be focused, on the balance of risks. Some scientists and officials will be have very harsh views on that, others won't, and it will be a political call, a very important one.
That some people, including doctors, have been murderers doesn't mean it likely that most are, nor does that some people really enjoy power trips (usually with less cost to themselves) mean it likely that so many people are collaborating to indulge a current one.
All it does it make it easier for the side pushing the harsher calls, as it associated criticism of that approach with conspiracies.
I think its good some people push against lockdown, we need to challenge decisions and test them with our decision makers, but that kind of conspiracy focus just undermines good arguments.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
Last summer the day with fewest cases was 12th July: 370. There were 94,700 tests on that day. So the positivity rate was 0.39%
I think it's very unlikely that they were all false positives, given that the local lockdown in Leicester happened at the end of June - there was clearly still some community transmission of Covid in the UK, as well as cases imported from abroad that were then tested positive here.
The false positive rate is very unlikely to be above 0.1%
And, we won't be using 1,000 cases as a threshold anyway.
Firstly the UK doesn't have highest deaths per million.
True Gibralter does
UK is highest deaths per Million of any Nation with a Population over 12m though
I would wait until seeing actual excess death figures before repeating that if I were you.
In the UK it seems we included everyone who tested for Covid as a Covid test (even if killed by a bus) while elsewhere I've seen plenty of cases where Covid is the cause of death but wasn't even vaguely mentioned as the published reason.
It's a preposterous and absurd lie.
The UK is counting deaths, other countries aren't. The UK is the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths, most other nations have dramatically more excess deaths than Covid deaths.
Russia has more excess deaths per million recorded by the end of November than the UK has recorded to mid January. Russia is not having a good winter either.
On the subject of perposterous and absurd lies (or more charitably just making shit up): The UK is not "the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths". You only have to go as far as France to find another example, and there are several others.
If you hit the "show all" tab then more countries appear including France which as you say has more Covid than excess deaths as does Switzerland. Its pretty rare though
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
Good to be reminded that there’s more to football than millionaires breaking lockdown and has-beens spouting inanities for money on the telly. Perhaps Lou can get a spot in Marcus’s first cabinet..
Good lockdown game, which current and ex football folk would you want in a government (and which definitely not anywhere near government!).
Well, I say good, options are a bit sparse atm.
I'd like Keegan in there. The confidence to work without a contract yet not ego driven - "I'm just a bit short at this level" - and a great communicator. Honest too. An honest bloke.
Who wouldn't I want? Harry Redknapp. I don't trust that man.
Always liked Pat Nevin as a thoughtful observer, and I guess Sir Alex would have to be there as someone who didn't let being massively successful and stinking rich get in the way of remaining a life long Labour man. As Dixiedean pointed out earlier the Nevilles show encouraging signs of having a conscience.
Kenny Dalglish was one of my faves back in the day, but he seems utterly enigmatic on matters political/social. Probably a good thing.
I think the whole Hillsborough tragedy burned him (and shortly after Heysel as well, which haunted Joe Fagan).
Dalglish realised he had to be apolitical to help the families get support and justice.
Plus being a Rangers fan who ended playing for and managing Celtic probably helped him develop nuance/be enigmatic on things.
Mr Noor faces 10 days in COVID-19 quarantine in a hotel room near London's Heathrow Airport after falling foul of new border controls because of a flight delay.
'I don't have a book. I don't have a Koran. I don't have nothing here,' Noor said by phone after his arrival on Monday, a day later than planned, landed him with a £1,750-pound bill.
In another hotel nearby, 61-year-old Sole, who declined to give her surname, said she realised too late that the new rules would kick in before she returned from visiting friends in Chile.
It is absolutely clear there are a proportion of people who just feel that international travel is a human right and there should be no restrictions on them. Not even faking the "it was for essential business" in the case of Sole.
It's fine that people will moan about measures, but less fine where it is implied that it upsets some people means that the measures themselves are inherently unreasonable. This is all a massive imposition in an extreme situation, of course people are going to face an awful lot of unfortunate situations.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
Some areas but I'd be careful to see if it's more than just statistical noise at this stage. Especially since Scotland has had a high positivity rate for weeks, they seem like an odd exception already.
With three weeks to go until schools reopen, probably six weeks to go until other things open (and schools reclose) and about 9 weeks to go until we have both schools and other things open simultaneously I see little reason for us to be anywhere close to 5k daily cases by then.
There is a chance that it's a cold weather effect – all the areas cited have had very cold weather for prolonged periods. But, no idea if that is right, or whether PB is on to something, or whether it's just the usual hysteria. We'll see.
Of course the next thing is to stop testing. Why bother? If you test and are negative, then fine. If you test and are positive but asymptomatic then so what?
If you need to, you will end up in hospital with or without a test.
Boris will lift restrictions too early, deaths may not go up much but hospitalizations will - and if we are unlucky we will get some new strains that might even be resistant to vaccines.
The approach Marquee Mark set out sounds spot on, but I dont share his belief that the Conservative party is on the same page.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
There is something going on with ZOE for sure, but its had a blip before in January, then the fall resumed. It may be similar. It may also not get reflected in the cases data.
I think the true test is going to be hospitalisations. When that gets low, combined with hopefully far fewer in hospital with covid, then relaxation should happen. I don't think it will be wise to tie it directly to cases.
Good to be reminded that there’s more to football than millionaires breaking lockdown and has-beens spouting inanities for money on the telly. Perhaps Lou can get a spot in Marcus’s first cabinet..
Good lockdown game, which current and ex football folk would you want in a government (and which definitely not anywhere near government!).
Well, I say good, options are a bit sparse atm.
I'd like Keegan in there. The confidence to work without a contract yet not ego driven - "I'm just a bit short at this level" - and a great communicator. Honest too. An honest bloke.
Who wouldn't I want? Harry Redknapp. I don't trust that man.
Always liked Pat Nevin as a thoughtful observer, and I guess Sir Alex would have to be there as someone who didn't let being massively successful and stinking rich get in the way of remaining a life long Labour man. As Dixiedean pointed out earlier the Nevilles show encouraging signs of having a conscience.
Kenny Dalglish was one of my faves back in the day, but he seems utterly enigmatic on matters political/social. Probably a good thing.
I think the whole Hillsborough tragedy burned him (and shortly after Heysel as well, which haunted Joe Fagan).
Dalglish realised he had to be apolitical to help the families get support and justice.
Plus being a Rangers fan who ended playing for and managing Celtic probably helped him develop nuance/be enigmatic on things.
The Lou Macari story is just inspirational. Thanks to @Theuniondivvie for sharing it.
Of course the next thing is to stop testing. Why bother? If you test and are negative, then fine. If you test and are positive but asymptomatic then so what?
If you need to, you will end up in hospital with or without a test.
And, obvs, that is all that matters.
OK you might need an early warning system.
It would be absurd to stop testing until everyone is vaccinated. Which won't happen until September probably. If you're positive it might not affect you but it might affect others who aren't vaccinated yet so why not self isolate? But there'd be no reason for widespread restrictions, just isolate those who are positive.
Two variants have merged into heavily mutated coronavirus
The UK and California variants of coronavirus appear to have combined into a heavily mutated hybrid, sparking concern that we may be entering a new phase of the covid-19 pandemic
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
Hands up anyone who genuinely thinks that if hospitalisations and deaths have fallen to a very low level by mid-April, 50%-60%+ are vaccinated, and vaccinations are showing excellent effectiveness in prevent serious illness, and we're rapidly approaching the local elections... that Boris won't look at reducing restrictions a long way?
"No, no, we don't want a big surge in popularity right now, chaps! We all get a buzz out of keeping everyone miserable and being unable to do anything ourselves, right? Rishi - you love running a massive ongoing deficit, don't you? I know this is exactly what I had in mind when I took on this job, what a stroke of luck coming up with a pandemic like this to give us all the excuse to do what we'd all wanted to do all along, eh? I'll just bimble off and have a chat with Merkel, Macron, Biden, Trudeau and the others to luxuriate in how well our cunning plans are working out for us - socially distanced over Zoom, of course! God forbid we should have any international travel and luxurious hotels; I don't know about you, but I always hated that!"
"Documentary Film Can't Get You Out of My Head Love, power, money, ghosts of empire, conspiracies, artificial intelligence – and You. An emotional history of the modern world by Adam Curtis."
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
Last summer the day with fewest cases was 12th July: 370. There were 94,700 tests on that day. So the positivity rate was 0.39%
I think it's very unlikely that they were all false positives, given that the local lockdown in Leicester happened at the end of June - there was clearly still some community transmission of Covid in the UK, as well as cases imported from abroad that were then tested positive here.
The false positive rate is very unlikely to be above 0.1%
And, we won't be using 1,000 cases as a threshold anyway.
Firstly the UK doesn't have highest deaths per million.
True Gibralter does
UK is highest deaths per Million of any Nation with a Population over 12m though
I would wait until seeing actual excess death figures before repeating that if I were you.
In the UK it seems we included everyone who tested for Covid as a Covid test (even if killed by a bus) while elsewhere I've seen plenty of cases where Covid is the cause of death but wasn't even vaguely mentioned as the published reason.
It's a preposterous and absurd lie.
The UK is counting deaths, other countries aren't. The UK is the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths, most other nations have dramatically more excess deaths than Covid deaths.
Russia has more excess deaths per million recorded by the end of November than the UK has recorded to mid January. Russia is not having a good winter either.
On the subject of perposterous and absurd lies (or more charitably just making shit up): The UK is not "the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths". You only have to go as far as France to find another example, and there are several others.
If you hit the "show all" tab then more countries appear including France which as you say has more Covid than excess deaths as does Switzerland. Its pretty rare though
Looking at when excess deaths dives under Covid deaths, I suspect the point is that we haven't had many deaths from flu this winter and that's feeding through to the total excess.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
Last summer the day with fewest cases was 12th July: 370. There were 94,700 tests on that day. So the positivity rate was 0.39%
I think it's very unlikely that they were all false positives, given that the local lockdown in Leicester happened at the end of June - there was clearly still some community transmission of Covid in the UK, as well as cases imported from abroad that were then tested positive here.
The false positive rate is very unlikely to be above 0.1%
And, we won't be using 1,000 cases as a threshold anyway.
Firstly the UK doesn't have highest deaths per million.
True Gibralter does
UK is highest deaths per Million of any Nation with a Population over 12m though
I would wait until seeing actual excess death figures before repeating that if I were you.
In the UK it seems we included everyone who tested for Covid as a Covid test (even if killed by a bus) while elsewhere I've seen plenty of cases where Covid is the cause of death but wasn't even vaguely mentioned as the published reason.
It's a preposterous and absurd lie.
The UK is counting deaths, other countries aren't. The UK is the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths, most other nations have dramatically more excess deaths than Covid deaths.
Russia has more excess deaths per million recorded by the end of November than the UK has recorded to mid January. Russia is not having a good winter either.
On the subject of perposterous and absurd lies (or more charitably just making shit up): The UK is not "the only nation to have more Covid deaths than excess deaths". You only have to go as far as France to find another example, and there are several others.
If you hit the "show all" tab then more countries appear including France which as you say has more Covid than excess deaths as does Switzerland. Its pretty rare though
Looking at when excess deaths dives under Covid deaths, I suspect the point is that we haven't had many deaths from flu this winter and that's feeding through to the total excess.
I think that is almost certainly true although flu gets the blame for a lot of deaths that would have happened anyway.
As does Covid of course. A good friend of mine's father in law died this week. He had been ill for some time with cancer and did not have long. When in hospital for some treatment he caught Covid with no particularly obvious symptoms. He was allowed home and slipped away within a few days. He will be a "Covid" death in the statistics but, really he was already on his way out and there is no evidence that he departed any quicker for it.
In news that is totally unsurprising to me I see the famed "deplatforming" of Germaine Greet cited in the supporting docs for government culture war paper never actually happened
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
+1 - it's solving a problem that really doesn't exist but has been invented to justify the everyone is against you culture war that the Tories seem to desperately need.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
Of course the next thing is to stop testing. Why bother? If you test and are negative, then fine. If you test and are positive but asymptomatic then so what?
If you need to, you will end up in hospital with or without a test.
And, obvs, that is all that matters.
OK you might need an early warning system.
It would be absurd to stop testing until everyone is vaccinated. Which won't happen until September probably. If you're positive it might not affect you but it might affect others who aren't vaccinated yet so why not self isolate? But there'd be no reason for widespread restrictions, just isolate those who are positive.
Yes when people are vaccinated we should stop. I can't btw see anyone self-isolating (= 10 days off work) if they feel fine, they know that the vaccine effort is underway, and that by self-isolating they would be losing income.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
+1 - it's solving a problem that really doesn't exist but has been invented to justify the everyone is against you culture war that the Tories seem to desperately need.
When similar measures were brought in, in NI, including a sweep of the electoral rolls for voting dead people - 100K+ voters suffered an existence failure IIRC.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It was Dave (pbuh) who didn't want us to have those chocolate oranges.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
There is something going on with ZOE for sure, but its had a blip before in January, then the fall resumed. It may be similar. It may also not get reflected in the cases data.
I think the true test is going to be hospitalisations. When that gets low, combined with hopefully far fewer in hospital with covid, then relaxation should happen. I don't think it will be wise to tie it directlydirectly to cases.
Agreed that it's ultimately down to hospitalisations. Cases have about a week or two less lag though, so allow to make quicker decisions and hence relax measures sooner. Multiply them with the observed hospitalisations per case to factor in the vaccine effect and predict what hospitalisations will be.
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
As per, you go way, way too far with your hyperbole, which makes people ignore you when you have a grit of a point.
What is happening (and what you might have mistaken for megalomania) is lots of attention-grabbing, doom-mongering hysteria from the Mad Scientists.
Remember that these people were complete nonentities prior to Covid, and would have lived out their whole lives as such. But, then, suddenly, they find they can get on telly at the drop of a hat.
The Boffin' Boffin and the John "Doom" Edmunds are now household names. Their self-promotion strategy is working big time.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
As is practically obligatory, I will point out that it's almost impossible to know if there's anything wrong with the current system, given that it's based entirely on trust.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Never been to a race so can't say but at a stadium for football or concerts or theatres etc you've got hundreds thronging the bars, especially for eg football where everyone does it at the same time (before kick off and at half time) plus turnstiles for entrances etc - at the beach its far more steady without turnstiles and with ice cream vendors typically spaced out outside with outside queues.
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
We have a breakdown in lorry numbers by week showing they dipped originally then got back to normal.
What we lack is a breakdown in empty lorries by week. Did they have a similar or inverse effect? Because that makes all the difference.
Interesting to note that 30% of lorries are empty normally anyway. Our trade deficit in action. The Irish no longer using us as a landbridge should probably also be taken into account.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
+1 - it's solving a problem that really doesn't exist but has been invented to justify the everyone is against you culture war that the Tories seem to desperately need.
When similar measures were brought in, in NI, including a sweep of the electoral rolls for voting dead people - 100K+ voters suffered an existence failure IIRC.
Did they actually check if those people had voted after dying though? As that is a quality of data issue and nothing more than that.
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
I am not denying there is clearly an impact, but it isn't gone to hell in a handcart stuff.
I think we will see businesses further adapt, but there will be a cost involved. I fully expect for example rather than small businesses setup a subsidiary in EU, there will be a somebody start offering the service as an intermediary so Mr Cheshire Cheese doesn't send hampers, he sends blocks of Cheddar and they do the packing there. Obviously that's jobs in somewhere like Calais rather than here and either smaller margins / extra cost to consumer.
The big thing we are going to see an end to is this process of importing then immediately exporting it. I know for instance the likes of M&S did that for the Irish market a lot. Stuff in and split up and then back out the same day often on the same lorries. Again, I presume that will be extra warehousing / processing.
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
This morning they are trying to link lockdown to getting cases under 1k per day. With the amount of testing we're doing that feels like a statistical impossibility when taking into account asymptomatic and very mild cases among the vaccinated population.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Well money hasn't been a problem to date. And you answer the question yourself re fatties. And they brought down the official "safe" drinking limit recently.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
Now that 40% drop is possibly too high as the article says things are improving but I do think it's a 30% drop.
Roll of and roll on trade is a really, really tiny part of UK-EU good trade. The vast majority is done by shipping container. It would be worth looking into whether volumes by container have gone up or down too.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
Alas we see this in nearly all walks of life - rules that address the bad behaviour of a very small percentage of the population imposing a 'tax' of some sort - additional bureaucracy, less autonomy, less freedom - on the entire population. I.e. rules designed for the bad, rather than for the vast majority. In supposedly rooting out corruption and inefficiencies, it imposes costs that far overshadow the supposed savings.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
+1 - it's solving a problem that really doesn't exist but has been invented to justify the everyone is against you culture war that the Tories seem to desperately need.
Alternatively it may have been brought in for the entire country to avoid requiring it in certain areas only, which would probably have led to accusations of discrimination against those places.
Boris will lift restrictions too early, deaths may not go up much but hospitalizations will - and if we are unlucky we will get some new strains that might even be resistant to vaccines.
The approach Marquee Mark set out sounds spot on, but I dont share his belief that the Conservative party is on the same page.
That's the form horse. They have twice reopened too early. But I think they'll get this one about right. The pressure to not make that mistake again, and overcompensate by unlocking too late, will be neutralized by the pressure from Tory backbenchers and some of the tabloids to unlock too early - putting them in broadly the correct place.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Well money hasn't been a problem to date. And you answer the question yourself re fatties. And they brought down the official "safe" drinking limit recently.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Is not out of the question.
Yup, they have this all powerful policy now and it's up to the politicians to put it back in its box and live with NHS bods mouthing off to the media that not allowing them lockdowns in the future to fight non-COVID based public health emergencies will result in more deaths.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
Not depressing. If it nips in the bud any future Trumpian-style bollocks that "the vote can't be trusted, we were cheated", it will be a step well worth taking.
Region of Residence 1st dose 2nd dose Cumulative Total Doses to Date Total 312,669 3,128 315,797 East Of England 35,009 360 35,369 London 44,584 394 44,978 Midlands 62,001 253 62,254 North East And Yorkshire 52,919 947 53,866 North West 37,577 254 37,831 South East 48,689 666 49,355 South West 30,402 245 30,647
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
I am not denying there is clearly an impact, but it isn't gone to hell in a handcart stuff.
I think we will see businesses further adapt, but there will be a cost involved. I fully expect for example rather than small businesses setup a subsidiary in EU, there will be a somebody start offering the service as an intermediary so Mr Cheshire Cheese doesn't send hampers, he sends blocks of Cheddar and they do the packing there. Obviously that's jobs in somewhere like Calais rather than here and either smaller margins / extra cost to consumer.
The big thing we are going to see an end to is this process of importing then immediately exporting it. I know for instance the likes of M&S did that for the Irish market a lot. Stuff in and split up and then back out the same day often on the same lorries. Again, I presume that will be extra warehousing / processing.
It is also a fact that GDP in Spain, for example, fell a further 9.00% in Q4, adding to other falls during the year. Comparing exports in January 2020 with January 2021 is a pretty silly exercise given these falls. Demand in many EU countries, and indeed here, for many things has fallen off a cliff. In many cases the shops where they might be sold are not even open.
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
This morning they are trying to link lockdown to getting cases under 1k per day. With the amount of testing we're doing that feels like a statistical impossibility when taking into account asymptomatic and very mild cases among the vaccinated population.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
And all I would say is that this is not a "shifting of the goalposts" any more than any and everything has been since March. It was "protect the NHS" then it was "save lives" then it was something else.
They have been shifting the goalposts since Day 1 and they continue to do that. It really is no surprise that the CMO, CSO et al are finding things about which to be concerned before they agree to lift lockdown.
As I have said often, @contrarian and I disagree on much but not on the general thrust and danger, from the very beginning of having Government by Chief Medical Officer.
And while everyone (most people) were saying "they're just following the science" what an idiot even to mention it, it has been quite obvious that the danger is why would they stop?
Not because they want to take over the world and go and live in a volcano with a Siamese cat, but because they realise this is an opportunity to rebalance the UK's health and health system.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Official Covid advice for your day at the beach "Wee in the sea". Redtops would have a field day if that came out.
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
I am not denying there is clearly an impact, but it isn't gone to hell in a handcart stuff.
I think we will see businesses further adapt, but there will be a cost involved. I fully expect for example rather than small businesses setup a subsidiary in EU, there will be a somebody start offering the service as an intermediary so Mr Cheshire Cheese doesn't send hampers, he sends blocks of Cheddar and they do the packing there. Obviously that's jobs in somewhere like Calais rather than here and either smaller margins / extra cost to consumer.
The big thing we are going to see an end to is this process of importing then immediately exporting it. I know for instance the likes of M&S did that for the Irish market a lot. Stuff in and split up and then back out the same day often on the same lorries. Again, I presume that will be extra warehousing / processing.
It is also a fact that GDP in Spain, for example, fell a further 9.00% in Q4, adding to other falls during the year. Comparing exports in January 2020 with January 2021 is a pretty silly exercise given these falls. Demand in many EU countries, and indeed here, for many things has fallen off a cliff. In many cases the shops where they might be sold are not even open.
That's a very good point. Shops and of course just as importantly restaurants.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Well money hasn't been a problem to date. And you answer the question yourself re fatties. And they brought down the official "safe" drinking limit recently.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Is not out of the question.
Sure, that makes some sense as a position. I'm not concerned about it, because it's a terrible argument to put to the cabinet without a whole lot more leverage than they actually have. The response is obvious: we can't give you the money unless we open up society, so you'll have to pick your poison.
Oh and by the way we're going to ignore you either way because it's become politically unviable to keep society locked up any longer.
PS I do find it amusing that you chose to tag (rather than just reference) Dura_Ace in a post that has literally nothing to do with him.
Voter ID was trialled where I live in 2017. On the local forums it was only Labour campaigners that complained. Not so much from a civil liberties point of view but more from a 'it's too much hassle for ordinary people' angle.
Voter fraud is without doubt an issue in parts of London. I see this policy as strengthening democracy rather than weakening it, and bringing us in line with most of the Western world.
Depressing news in some ways. In most places theres no problem with the current system, which is based on trusting people to be honest.
Not depressing. If it nips in the bud any future Trumpian-style bollocks that "the vote can't be trusted, we were cheated", it will be a step well worth taking.
I agree - and also postal voting needs looking at in my opinion. Should be the exception rather than the rule.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Official Covid advice for your day at the beach "Wee in the sea". Redtops would have a field day if that came out.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Well money hasn't been a problem to date. And you answer the question yourself re fatties. And they brought down the official "safe" drinking limit recently.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Is not out of the question.
Yup, they have this all powerful policy now and it's up to the politicians to put it back in its box and live with NHS bods mouthing off to the media that not allowing them lockdowns in the future to fight non-COVID based public health emergencies will result in more deaths.
Apart from Steve and his merry men - who is actually agitating for this?
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
This morning they are trying to link lockdown to getting cases under 1k per day. With the amount of testing we're doing that feels like a statistical impossibility when taking into account asymptomatic and very mild cases among the vaccinated population.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
I'm still struggling to understand why you think this is impossible given that cases have been falling by 25% to 30% per week.
If 30% falls continue then we should see sub 5k daily cases within a fortnight.
Even if falls drop to 20% per week we'd see below 5k by the time schools reopen surely?
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Official Covid advice for your day at the beach "Wee in the sea". Redtops would have a field day if that came out.
Hands up anyone who genuinely thinks that if hospitalisations and deaths have fallen to a very low level by mid-April, 50%-60%+ are vaccinated, and vaccinations are showing excellent effectiveness in prevent serious illness, and we're rapidly approaching the local elections... that Boris won't look at reducing restrictions a long way?
"No, no, we don't want a big surge in popularity right now, chaps! We all get a buzz out of keeping everyone miserable and being unable to do anything ourselves, right? Rishi - you love running a massive ongoing deficit, don't you? I know this is exactly what I had in mind when I took on this job, what a stroke of luck coming up with a pandemic like this to give us all the excuse to do what we'd all wanted to do all along, eh? I'll just bimble off and have a chat with Merkel, Macron, Biden, Trudeau and the others to luxuriate in how well our cunning plans are working out for us - socially distanced over Zoom, of course! God forbid we should have any international travel and luxurious hotels; I don't know about you, but I always hated that!"
Patently correct. Perhaps one effect of Lockdown is people succumbing to paranoia about Lockdown?
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
Yep, 'true-but-irrelevant' positives could be an issue with the mainstream testing (or at least, comparing numbers now to numbers last summer for example). Shouldn't be for the ONS surveillance studies though.
'Irrelevant' of course depending on the context - they're relevant to telling whether someone is infected, but not - hopefully, any more - so relevant as a leading indicator of hospitalisations and deaths and the need to lock down.
Yeah and this is why it's so alarming to have scientists and other public health people try to link lockdown easing to case numbers. It feels completely dishonest and I don't blame the Chancellor for blowing up at them recently if this is the reason.
Surely the ONS study will suffer from it too unless they're asking people to list any symptoms they have when filling in the survey. If they are then it actually could be a treasure trove of data for the whole world.
Finally you realise. Finally.
There are people out there, powerful people, who will link the easing of lockdown to anything whatever that keeps us in lockdown.
Why would they do that?
Ooh me sir me sir.
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
The medical profession has been trying to control us for decades. All those surveys on what you should or shouldn't eat/do etc. which were patently ignored by ordinary people,.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
It's a testament to your commitment to your username that, on the first day in ages when you long-expressed views sort of make sense at last, that you have upped the ante to this level in a desperate bid to ensure that nobody can possibly agree with you on it.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
$$$
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Well, more charitably I would say that fewer clinically obese patients suffering from heart conditions means more NHS funds available to treat other conditions (in simple terms, so ignoring the short term vs long term cost benefit analysis).
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
Well money hasn't been a problem to date. And you answer the question yourself re fatties. And they brought down the official "safe" drinking limit recently.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Is not out of the question.
Sure, that makes some sense as a position. I'm not concerned about it, because it's a terrible argument to put to the cabinet without a whole lot more leverage than they actually have. The response is obvious: we can't give you the money unless we open up society, so you'll have to pick your poison.
Oh and by the way we're going to ignore you either way because it's become politically unviable to keep society locked up any longer.
PS I do find it amusing that you chose to tag (rather than just reference) Dura_Ace in a post that has literally nothing to do with him.
Yebbut is it? Look at the polls, as are frequently quoted on here. Public hugely in favour of lockdown. So take away their furlough - can you see BoJo doing that? Not a chance.
And as for your PS I don't see a difference in tagging or referring. What is the difference/amusing bit? Does he get a credit?
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Official Covid advice for your day at the beach "Wee in the sea". Redtops would have a field day if that came out.
What about #2's ?
In the loo. Still. Presumably.
Well, a lot of sewage finds its way into the sea eventually, so...
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
Some areas but I'd be careful to see if it's more than just statistical noise at this stage. Especially since Scotland has had a high positivity rate for weeks, they seem like an odd exception already.
With three weeks to go until schools reopen, probably six weeks to go until other things open (and schools reclose) and about 9 weeks to go until we have both schools and other things open simultaneously I see little reason for us to be anywhere close to 5k daily cases by then.
The difference in positivity is due to lateral flow tests being included in the test numbers for England. PCR test positivity is in the same ballpark, currently around 6%.
I don't know whether Scotland as well as Wales and NI aren't doing lateral flow tests in numbers, or just not doing statistics on them. Probably the former, as the lateral flow tests were a Cummings initiative, right?
England's cases are still falling at a sustained 25..30% rate per week, and could undertake Scotland within a week.
By my estimate if case falls were to be 20% per week (which is less than we've got currently) then we'd be under 1k cases within 11 weeks. Which takes us to the end of April vaccination target date.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Silly journalists with telescopic lenses didn't help.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
One thing I do wonder though, the prof says well going to the horse racing is different because you have pinch points of people going to get a drink or travel....but don't people going to the beach do similar things? They queue in shops for a ice cream, for a beer, for food, and most people travel there and they all have to go pee at some point during the day.
Official Covid advice for your day at the beach "Wee in the sea". Redtops would have a field day if that came out.
Note Mike writes, in the second paragraph, that the great vaccine effect makes things "much harder" for Johnson.
The fact that this doesn`t read "much easier" (as it should) is testament to that the default position of "lockdown over liberties" and testament to the government`s default aim of "must avoid criticism" over growing some balls and taking us out of this nightmare as quickly as possible within NHS capacity.
We shouldn`t be constrained for a day longer than is necessary and that is legal.
Just catching up on threads. Firstly, excellent piece by Mike – there have been some brilliant leaders by the Smithsons (Jr and Sr) in recent days. Also enjoyed the linked column by Dr John Lees in the Mail.
I couldn't agree more with @Stocky here – the government needs to grow a pair. The first and most important step is drumming into the Mad Scientists that it is HOSPITALISATIONS that should be the key metric not CASES (h/t @theProle FPT).
Do we even need to know the number of daily positive cases anymore? Isn`t this just stoking up fear?
No. Watching the daily positive cases coming down is one of the only things that gives me optimism and hope.
Deaths and hospitalisations are what actually matter.
Well not quite. Until a vast majority of our population is vaccinated higher cases still leads to higher hospitalisations and higher deaths. They are all linked.
The less (fewer) cases, the less chance I have of catching COVID.
But the issue is that the scientists are moving the goalposts. Rishi was right, we were sold this lockdown as a way to protect the NHS from collapse. Now we're being told it's a way to get cases down. How long until that becomes getting cases to zero before we're allowed out of it?
No. The line must be kept at ensuring the NHS doesn't collapse, we're on the way to achieving that in a lasting way by ensuring all people at risk of ending up on hospital from this will be immunised by the end of April (in reality probably the end of March) and all adults by August (more likely June). The idea that once this is achieved we should stay in lockdown because cases are high is simply unacceptable and the scientists are moving the goalposts. We can't have rule by SAGE, no one voted for them.
We won't have rule by SAGE any more than we had rule by Cummings. The PM/ministers will listen to advisers, but they make the call and they are held to account for it.
The scientists (in the virology/public health/epidemiology areas) will advise on what's best for their area of expertise. The virologists and epidemiologists might well push for crushing cases to reduce chances of further damaging mutations (although, realistically, they are more likely to come from countries with few vaccinations and largely beyond our control other than border closing). The public health scientists should take a wider view on e.g. mental health, getting other health services back to full capacity. There should also be economists advising, who will likely push to open as much as possible as soon as possible.
Having said that, I agree that getting everyone* vaccinated (plus two-three weeks) should be a pretty clear end point. After that, things are as good as they're going to get, unless the NHS is on point of collapse there's no holding on a bit longer for things to get better, as they won't (they should be pretty good by then). The only justification for going longer would be a new vaccine-dodging strain that puts a lot of people in hospital or kills them (i.e. the already used vaccines don't prevent even severe illness) and a new vaccine for that very close. In that scenario, restrictions would still be to prevent NHS collapse, but we should not get into that situation.
* or indeed just the vulnerable for at least most restrictions
As we are constantly being told, the public is hugely in favour of continued lockdown. So why on earth wouldn't Boris continue to say "we are following the science" and maintain the lockdown until we have a "robust and effective strategy to identify new variants"?
= continued popularity = continued governing = trebles all round.
Current polling maybe. Try polling on a scenario in which we're in July, deaths are in double figures or lower. People hate lockdown, but at present they think it's justified. They won't think that when it isn't.
Also, I was unfair on the epidemiologists/virologists above. They didn't call for a lockdown very early in the pandemic, which is what you would do if only bothered about cases and damn everything else - didn't SAGE recommend it about two weeks or so before it actually happened? There's not a lot of evidence that even SAGE are lockdown-happy.
We shall see.
But it is entirely possible that Chris Whitty, Chris Hopson et al will agitate against opening up "just in case". And they will do so standing alongside the Prime Minister broadcasting live to the country at 5pm in front of the Union Jack.
Plenty of people will imo take what they say as "the science" and to be followed.
Yup, and there's always going to be a "just in case" reason for these types, it could be mutations, it could be the unvaccinated BAME people being put at risk, it could be too many cases or the NHS not being able to cope with new non-COVID issues. It's like you said, they've been handed this all powerful policy tool to conquer death and for public health types that's their primary concern.
Isn't it just about impossible to get positive tests at less than 1000 a day? My understanding (and I can't remember where from) is that false positivity rate is around 0.5%. If Covid doesn't exist, but we are doing 300,000 tests a day, we'll still be getting 1,500 positives a day. And of those 1,500, you will always get a handful then dying in the next 28 days. Therefore, deaths will never be zero. If anyone can disabuse me of this I'd be very grateful - otherwise I can't see a route out of lockdown ever.
That false positive rate is not 0.5%.
The ONS estimate puts the absolute upper bound of false positives to be 0.08%
That is assuming every single positive from its test sample of ~200k were positive.
Literally zero acutal positive cases, every single one a false positive.
For 800,000 daily tests then 0.08% still equals 640 potentially doesn't it?
Correct but 0.08% is not the actual false positive rate. It is the absolute ceiling on false positives.
Tbh, it's not false positives that are the problem. It's asymptomatic and mild cases among people who have been vaccinated. There is almost guaranteed to be more tha 1k per day in that category with the amount of testing we're doing. That's why it feels like a really dishonest moving of the goal posts.
It's a problem to have 10k per day getting infected when 1k of those end up in hospital, it's not a problem to have 10x as many per day getting infected when only 10 of them end up in hospital. The people who are proposing moving to cases know this as well but they really do seem fixated on keeping people locked up forever. It's up to the politicians to be brave and open up against that advice because lockdown forever isn't a solution to any problem.
I don't see why it's inevitable to be 1k?
Last May to August we got numbers down to the hundreds per day. With vaccines suppressing R, plus natural immunity, I'd expect us to be back to that level relatively soon even without dragging out restrictions absurdly.
You defending the 1K cases bar for serious unwinding of lockdown?
Best of luck with that, my old china.
No I'm not. The opposite, I'm saying I expect us to reach 1000 before too long even with unlocking occuring.
I don't see how that's possible, even among the vaccinated there is ~85% immunity from symptoms. So for the 15m who are immunised we could expect 15% to develop mild symptoms and ~30-40% to be infected.
I'd actually suggest that with the amount of testing going on we're going to struggle to get below 5-7k cases per day for the rest of the year because of mild and asymptomatic spread among the immunised.
Isn't it currently at ~10k and coming down by 30% per week (and accelerating).
At that rate it will be below 5k within a fortnight surely? I see absolutely no reason for it to still be above 5k by the eight of March. I'd be surprised if it's above 2k by the end of March.
I don't see how it will be above 1k by end of April unless the fall is completely arrested.
According to PB today, cases are now rising again. Very depressing news (not that I think it should be the key metric – it shouldn't – but people are obsessed with case numbers over hospitalisations).
Some areas but I'd be careful to see if it's more than just statistical noise at this stage. Especially since Scotland has had a high positivity rate for weeks, they seem like an odd exception already.
With three weeks to go until schools reopen, probably six weeks to go until other things open (and schools reclose) and about 9 weeks to go until we have both schools and other things open simultaneously I see little reason for us to be anywhere close to 5k daily cases by then.
The difference in positivity is due to lateral flow tests being included in the test numbers for England. PCR test positivity is in the same ballpark, currently around 6%.
I don't know whether Scotland as well as Wales and NI aren't doing lateral flow tests in numbers, or just not doing statistics on them. Probably the former, as the lateral flow tests were a Cummings initiative, right?
England's cases are still falling at a sustained 25..30% rate per week, and could undertake Scotland within a week.
Indeed that's my point. Some people seem convinced case falls are suddenly going to halt here but I see no logic behind that. At least until 8 March the falls should continue surely?
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
It states in the article that this is continuing to falling back down now towards levels one would previous expect.
So as I said it's a 30% drop - but it's a great example of how you can use a story to hide reality by focussing all the figures on one side of the equation when the other side is more important.
We have a breakdown in lorry numbers by week showing they dipped originally then got back to normal.
What we lack is a breakdown in empty lorries by week. Did they have a similar or inverse effect? Because that makes all the difference.
Interesting to note that 30% of lorries are empty normally anyway. Our trade deficit in action. The Irish no longer using us as a landbridge should probably also be taken into account.
That's in the report which is how I was able to get to that 40% (probably 30% figure).
Number of lorries dropped to 85% from before (Covid related).
Empty lorries leaving Dover was 30% (from 100% lorries) now 50% (of 85 lorries).
So 70 lorries were full previously and now it's somewhere between 42 and 50 roughly.
And as MaxPB points out a lot of these lorries are transporting priority (so fresh) goods so it's not surprising there is less going out as we definitely aren't exporting as much seafish and other food products.
Good to be reminded that there’s more to football than millionaires breaking lockdown and has-beens spouting inanities for money on the telly. Perhaps Lou can get a spot in Marcus’s first cabinet..
Good lockdown game, which current and ex football folk would you want in a government (and which definitely not anywhere near government!).
Well, I say good, options are a bit sparse atm.
I'd like Keegan in there. The confidence to work without a contract yet not ego driven - "I'm just a bit short at this level" - and a great communicator. Honest too. An honest bloke.
Who wouldn't I want? Harry Redknapp. I don't trust that man.
Always liked Pat Nevin as a thoughtful observer, and I guess Sir Alex would have to be there as someone who didn't let being massively successful and stinking rich get in the way of remaining a life long Labour man. As Dixiedean pointed out earlier the Nevilles show encouraging signs of having a conscience.
Kenny Dalglish was one of my faves back in the day, but he seems utterly enigmatic on matters political/social. Probably a good thing.
I think the whole Hillsborough tragedy burned him (and shortly after Heysel as well, which haunted Joe Fagan).
Dalglish realised he had to be apolitical to help the families get support and justice.
Plus being a Rangers fan who ended playing for and managing Celtic probably helped him develop nuance/be enigmatic on things.
Sticking a placeholder figure of 5,000 in for Northern Ireland, we're at 89% of the previous Tuesday's figure in terms of vaccinations. Sunday was 86%; Monday 79%.
There has never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a crowded beach, MPs have heard.
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
Sticking a placeholder figure of 5,000 in for Northern Ireland, we're at 89% of the previous Tuesday's figure in terms of vaccinations. Sunday was 86%; Monday 79%.
Yesterday a large number of second jabs were done which is probably slowing down the number of first jabs.
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
This morning they are trying to link lockdown to getting cases under 1k per day. With the amount of testing we're doing that feels like a statistical impossibility when taking into account asymptomatic and very mild cases among the vaccinated population.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
No doubt there's a debate - which is healthy - but let's see what Johnson lays out as the plan. I'll be surprised if it links the end of Lockdown to cases of under 1k a day. My central expectation is a phased return to normality by mid-summer and I'm not as yet seeing much reason to doubt this.
"Bill Gates has called on the U.S. and other wealthy countries to give up eating beef entirely and switch to synthetic alternatives due to climate change.
'I don’t think the poorest 80 countries will be eating synthetic meat. I do think all rich countries should move to 100% synthetic beef,' Gates the MIT Technology Review in an interview on Monday.
'You can get used to the taste difference, and the claim is they’re going to make it taste even better over time. Eventually, that green premium is modest enough that you can sort of change the people or use regulation to totally shift the demand,' Gates mused."
FFS how many more times. They like the vast unaccountable power Johnson has handed them to control the lives of the people of Britain. They do not want it to end.
So people, scientists, medics, and the like, go to college, medical school, with a view to curing people, and suddenly find that once they have power to make people miserable that's all they want to do? They just enjoy controlling people's lives, nothing else? They don't enjoy all the things that we enjoy? They have no children who want to play with their friends, see their families? They never take holidays or want to again? They don't like doing anything else except exercising power? Is that what you are saying? That power to keep people is the only think that motivates medics and scientists? That they enjoy prolonging misery?
Because that is the logical outcome of what you are suggesting.
FFS Doug Harold Shipman was a doctor. And a well respected one at that. Mengele was a doctor. Being a scientist does not confer any kind of morality whatsoever. Einstein gave the go ahead to hiroshima.
Ditto the other professions. When the final solution was decided at the Wannsee many in the room were qualified lawyers.
In the right circumstances power can and does corrupt anybody.
I wouldn't go that far, I just think the policy tool of lockdown is something the public health people won't want to give up easily which is why they are moving the goal posts from hospitals to cases.
But they're going to announce a roadmap to 'normal by July'. Ok, we can quibble on the margins of that - argue for a few weeks earlier - but what is feeding your fear that SAGE intends to cling to Lockdown in the longer term? I don't see much evidence for this.
This morning they are trying to link lockdown to getting cases under 1k per day. With the amount of testing we're doing that feels like a statistical impossibility when taking into account asymptomatic and very mild cases among the vaccinated population.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
No doubt there's a debate - which is healthy - but let's see what Johnson lays out as the plan. I'll be surprised if it links the end of Lockdown to cases of under 1k a day. My central expectation is a phased return to normality by mid-summer and I'm not as yet seeing much reason to doubt this.
If all 9 priority groups are vaccinated by end April I don't see why we can't have a phased return to normality by start of summer.
Comments
What is a concern is that there is an inevitable and understandable reluctance to take responsibility for uncertainty. That is why it is ultimately a politician's job to balance the risks, to look at the bigger picture and to offset the consequences of not removing restrictions against doing so. Scientists and experts advise but this is a political call.
Personally, in recognition of that, I am willing to cut them a bit of slack, especially if they are brave enough not to try and hide behind the "following the science" mantra.
When we do get to reducing hospitalisations per case to 10% of what it's been, we can tolerate ten times as many cases. I don't see how that's controversial.
Like all the others I will only suggest things that I have found helpful, and for me the top two have been regular (ish) phone contact with a couple of friends just to blow off steam, a few new projects and routine, and sometimes just blind "keeping on keeping on".
Are there any new things you can pick up that are short enough that you see results not too far away? I've just picked up some pots of bulbs for the house, as these will last about a month and I'm getting up the energy for a battle to rebuild a veg bed that has just crawled out from under the snow as it's time to plant onions and garlic.
My most quixotic thing has been working through some of the "skills tests" from masterchef. I am now an expert in kidneys on toast.
ATB
'I don't have a book. I don't have a Koran. I don't have nothing here,' Noor said by phone after his arrival on Monday, a day later than planned, landed him with a £1,750-pound bill.
In another hotel nearby, 61-year-old Sole, who declined to give her surname, said she realised too late that the new rules would kick in before she returned from visiting friends in Chile.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9266677/Self-isolating-guests-boast-leave-rooms-smoke-want.html
It is absolutely clear there are a proportion of people who just feel that international travel is a human right and there should be no restrictions on them. Not even faking the "it was for essential business" in the case of Sole.
That needs more jabs.
As to the actual numbers of cases - not got specimen date data yet. 4pm and all that.
With three weeks to go until schools reopen, probably six weeks to go until other things open (and schools reclose) and about 9 weeks to go until we have both schools and other things open simultaneously I see little reason for us to be anywhere close to 5k daily cases by then.
https://twitter.com/chrismusson/status/1362029563618951171?s=21
https://twitter.com/chrismusson/status/1362029564973772804?s=21
https://twitter.com/chrismusson/status/1362029566206873601?s=21
'Is there more that the British government could be doing?' Asks the BBC
No BBC. I doubt it very much.................
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-56085369
That some people, including doctors, have been murderers doesn't mean it likely that most are, nor does that some people really enjoy power trips (usually with less cost to themselves) mean it likely that so many people are collaborating to indulge a current one.
All it does it make it easier for the side pushing the harsher calls, as it associated criticism of that approach with conspiracies.
I think its good some people push against lockdown, we need to challenge decisions and test them with our decision makers, but that kind of conspiracy focus just undermines good arguments.
If you hit the "show all" tab then more countries appear including France which as you say has more Covid than excess deaths as does Switzerland. Its pretty rare though
Here's a couple off the top of my head.
1. NHS bods dictating policy atm want $$$ for the NHS. Historically no one has given them this (or enough of this). NHS bods dictating policy link ending lockdown to the receipt of $$$ for the NHS. How much $$$? Sky's the limit.
2. Tough lockdown strategy popular in the polls. "Following the science" popular in the polls. Boris continuing lockdown and "following the science" = Boris riding high in the polls.
Dalglish realised he had to be apolitical to help the families get support and justice.
Plus being a Rangers fan who ended playing for and managing Celtic probably helped him develop nuance/be enigmatic on things.
The recall of the Governor undermines the woke-ism that dominates the national Democratic Party"
https://thecritic.co.uk/is-california-recalling-progressivism/
If you need to, you will end up in hospital with or without a test.
And, obvs, that is all that matters.
OK you might need an early warning system.
Boris will lift restrictions too early, deaths may not go up much but hospitalizations will - and if we are unlucky we will get some new strains that might even be resistant to vaccines.
The approach Marquee Mark set out sounds spot on, but I dont share his belief that the Conservative party is on the same page.
I think the true test is going to be hospitalisations. When that gets low, combined with hopefully far fewer in hospital with covid, then relaxation should happen. I don't think it will be wise to tie it directly to cases.
Finally, finally, they have traction. They have leverage. They have power.
"No, no, we don't want a big surge in popularity right now, chaps! We all get a buzz out of keeping everyone miserable and being unable to do anything ourselves, right? Rishi - you love running a massive ongoing deficit, don't you? I know this is exactly what I had in mind when I took on this job, what a stroke of luck coming up with a pandemic like this to give us all the excuse to do what we'd all wanted to do all along, eh? I'll just bimble off and have a chat with Merkel, Macron, Biden, Trudeau and the others to luxuriate in how well our cunning plans are working out for us - socially distanced over Zoom, of course! God forbid we should have any international travel and luxurious hotels; I don't know about you, but I always hated that!"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/p093wp6h/cant-get-you-out-of-my-head
Description:
"Documentary Film
Can't Get You Out of My Head
Love, power, money, ghosts of empire, conspiracies, artificial intelligence – and You. An emotional history of the modern world by Adam Curtis."
Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, told the Science and Technology Committee: "Over the summer we were treated to all this on the television news and pictures of crowded beaches, and there was an outcry about this.
"There were no outbreaks linked to crowded beaches - there's never been a Covid-19 outbreak linked to a beach ever, anywhere in the world, to the best of my knowledge."
He says that mass gatherings - such as a horse racing event - are an exception because they do not involve social distancing and there are "pinch points" like travel and refreshment facilities.
"I think we do have to understand where the risks are so that we can do as much as possible safely," he added.
As does Covid of course. A good friend of mine's father in law died this week. He had been ill for some time with cancer and did not have long. When in hospital for some treatment he caught Covid with no particularly obvious symptoms. He was allowed home and slipped away within a few days. He will be a "Covid" death in the statistics but, really he was already on his way out and there is no evidence that he departed any quicker for it.
Even in normal times pre-pandemic when sitting on a beach I'd sit with my family/friends and not strangers. Its almost as if people prefer some personal space by default.
https://www.bbc.com/news/56086926
Clifnotes, not quite, but not that far off.
Quite why the medical profession should be so invested in making sure that, for example, your meals are bland and unenjoyable, is completely beyond me.
What is happening (and what you might have mistaken for megalomania) is lots of attention-grabbing, doom-mongering hysteria from the Mad Scientists.
Remember that these people were complete nonentities prior to Covid, and would have lived out their whole lives as such. But, then, suddenly, they find they can get on telly at the drop of a hat.
The Boffin' Boffin and the John "Doom" Edmunds are now household names. Their self-promotion strategy is working big time.
https://twitter.com/IFLScience/status/1362031758359805953?s=20
I don't think they want to control our minds. But they sure as hell want more money.
Previously out of 100 lorries 70 had exports and 30% were empty
Now out of 85 lorries only 50% have exports
So it's gone from 70 lorries with exports to 42 lorries.
That's a lot more than not quite normal - it's a 40% drop.
Now that 40% drop is possibly too high as the article says things are improving but I do think it's a 30% drop.
But all that does is raise the question of how they expect to continue receiving more and more money if they won't allow the economy that pays their wages to open up again?
What we lack is a breakdown in empty lorries by week. Did they have a similar or inverse effect? Because that makes all the difference.
Interesting to note that 30% of lorries are empty normally anyway. Our trade deficit in action. The Irish no longer using us as a landbridge should probably also be taken into account.
I think we will see businesses further adapt, but there will be a cost involved. I fully expect for example rather than small businesses setup a subsidiary in EU, there will be a somebody start offering the service as an intermediary so Mr Cheshire Cheese doesn't send hampers, he sends blocks of Cheddar and they do the packing there. Obviously that's jobs in somewhere like Calais rather than here and either smaller margins / extra cost to consumer.
The big thing we are going to see an end to is this process of importing then immediately exporting it. I know for instance the likes of M&S did that for the Irish market a lot. Stuff in and split up and then back out the same day often on the same lorries. Again, I presume that will be extra warehousing / processing.
It's a shifting of the goal posts that I think Rishi was very aware of last week and he's got my full backing to completely blast anyone who is trying to link this to cases rather than ensuring the NHS is kept running properly.
CMO: "The only way we are going to be able to function is if we have an increase in $$$ so that we can handle new variants/new diseases/the backlog in "normal" cases/fatties/adventure sportsmen/mountaineers/rock climbers/steeplechase jockeys/rally drivers/@Dura_Ace /circus highwire performers/etc. Until we get that money, sadly we won't be able to agree to open up society."
Is not out of the question.
Region of Residence 1st dose 2nd dose Cumulative Total Doses to Date
Total 312,669 3,128 315,797
East Of England 35,009 360 35,369
London 44,584 394 44,978
Midlands 62,001 253 62,254
North East And Yorkshire 52,919 947 53,866
North West 37,577 254 37,831
South East 48,689 666 49,355
South West 30,402 245 30,647
England up marginally wk on wk, Scotland and Wales down significantly
They have been shifting the goalposts since Day 1 and they continue to do that. It really is no surprise that the CMO, CSO et al are finding things about which to be concerned before they agree to lift lockdown.
As I have said often, @contrarian and I disagree on much but not on the general thrust and danger, from the very beginning of having Government by Chief Medical Officer.
And while everyone (most people) were saying "they're just following the science" what an idiot even to mention it, it has been quite obvious that the danger is why would they stop?
Not because they want to take over the world and go and live in a volcano with a Siamese cat, but because they realise this is an opportunity to rebalance the UK's health and health system.
500k a day should ideally be the min we do every day.
Oh and by the way we're going to ignore you either way because it's become politically unviable to keep society locked up any longer.
PS I do find it amusing that you chose to tag (rather than just reference) Dura_Ace in a post that has literally nothing to do with him.
Voter fraud is without doubt an issue in parts of London. I see this policy as strengthening democracy rather than weakening it, and bringing us in line with most of the Western world.
If 30% falls continue then we should see sub 5k daily cases within a fortnight.
Even if falls drop to 20% per week we'd see below 5k by the time schools reopen surely?
Why would cases flatline now?
And as for your PS I don't see a difference in tagging or referring. What is the difference/amusing bit? Does he get a credit?
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/testing?areaType=nation&areaName=England
I don't know whether Scotland as well as Wales and NI aren't doing lateral flow tests in numbers, or just not doing statistics on them. Probably the former, as the lateral flow tests were a Cummings initiative, right?
England's cases are still falling at a sustained 25..30% rate per week, and could undertake Scotland within a week.
Number of lorries dropped to 85% from before (Covid related).
Empty lorries leaving Dover was 30% (from 100% lorries) now 50% (of 85 lorries).
So 70 lorries were full previously and now it's somewhere between 42 and 50 roughly.
And as MaxPB points out a lot of these lorries are transporting priority (so fresh) goods so it's not surprising there is less going out as we definitely aren't exporting as much seafish and other food products.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=y5omabmUwmM
Sunday was 86%; Monday 79%.
SHOCKED I TELL YOU
'I don’t think the poorest 80 countries will be eating synthetic meat. I do think all rich countries should move to 100% synthetic beef,' Gates the MIT Technology Review in an interview on Monday.
'You can get used to the taste difference, and the claim is they’re going to make it taste even better over time. Eventually, that green premium is modest enough that you can sort of change the people or use regulation to totally shift the demand,' Gates mused."
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9267327/Bill-Gates-says-100-synthetic-beef-prevent-climate-change.html