This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
The problem is you have been discussing it today so you cannot say you were unaware, or that you could complete it online as confirmed by several posters and the way to obtain your census number
You are being deliberately obtuse and risk the fine
In fairness to Justin - and it’s not as though he and I are bosom friends - he’s not saying he won’t complete it, just that he will only complete it on paper and he doesn’t see why he should have to chase them for it.
Which isn’t radically different from my own situation on Thursday evening, where I said I was willing to fill it in but not ring them up to ask where the form was given I should not have to waste my time for their error.
It's not an error though, is it? The forms aren't being mailed out in England by default. If you want one, you have to request one.
So how come I got one?
The only explanation I can think of, unless you really did ring them up for me, is they somehow realised they hadn’t sent out the original form and it was quicker to prepare and send a full paper copy rather than a net slip.
What error are you complaining about then if you already received the form? That explanation sounds reasonable.
This was never really about blood clots, which is why the temporary ban of Astra-Zeneca was condemned by the World Health Organisation, the European Medicines Agency and anyone familiar with this issue......
The ban is explained by a politically motivated blame game. EU leaders keep discrediting AstraZeneca to deflect attention from their own mistakes and to puncture the notion of a Brexit-related British success story. This short-sighted strategy has backfired quickly. After just two days living under the ban, France and Italy signalled the possibility of a U-turn, as the consequences of their actions became all too clear. Europe is coping with a third wave of Covid; vaccination is the only strategy to get out of the mess. Europe’s leaders have not just harmed this strategy, but inflicted damage to European integration.
The EU has made loads of stupid mistakes, but it feels as if the Brexit media and influencers want to focus on mistakes they have not made to drive further division here.
The blood clot issue originated in Norway which is not in the EU, and it was national regulators, not the EMA, which suspended vaccination. The EMA has always said it should go ahead, and can do so for all age groups.
I think it can be safely said the EU are doing this all on their own and do not need any help from the UK
How on earth can it be the EU on their own if its Norway????? Do facts really not matter anymore?
Norway is a side issue.
It is the idiotic way the EU are behaving that is the issue
But please, all I am asking is for people to remember which actions the EU have taken and which they havent.
The blood clots issue started in Norway, not even an EU member, and then other govts worldwide, some in the EU, some not decided to suspend AZ, other govts worldwide, some in the EU, not in the EU decided (rightly) to continue. The EU's body, the EMA said to continue.
How on earth is that all the EUs fault?
Is anyone explicitly blaming the EU for that? It's not untrue to say EU countries/EU leaders have suspended or tried to discredit the vaccine.
Yes that is the whole thrust of the spectator article, that the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots and different approaches to regulating medicine, but about Brexit politics.
The EU medical authorities have been firm. Local country medical authorities have done suspensions.
Leaders of EU countries are guilty of politics on the AZ suspension question, and several have remarked that they needed to move together. Italy and France, for example.
Which suggests that at least political leaders are interfering with medical regulators, and EU central politicking is a possibility.
There are bits of Brexit politicking around.
UVDL and others are teeing it up to blame "UK Brexit obsession" and "AZ not meeting contracts" and "UK vaccine nationalism" to save themselves,
Yes there are bits of Brexit politicking around, I dont disagree. Bits, its far from the overwhelming reason, and to say the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots is as absurd as the decision to stop using the vaccine because of the concerns over blood clots.
If its about bloodclots how come pfizer wasn't also put on hold as it has had similar incidence?
Is that true? The PEI seems to have seen a few cases of something very rare with AZ, but not with Pfizer, as I understood it.
Certainly the case in the UK and as far as I know we aren't that genetically different from europeans so no reason I can see why they shouldn't be similar numbers in europe.
I did go looking for a comparison of vaccines in europe but could not find one.
Disappointing lack of outdated dodgy sentiment for me to get my teeth stuck into on this thread. On topic, an elected Head of State would imo need to be a non-divisive national treasure. Attenborough is the obvious choice but he's too old, so I'd probably vote for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Who I wouldn't want to see get it is Lord Coe.
Attenborough is on the board of the optimum population trust which advocates severe population reduction.....not sure that makes him non divisive
This was never really about blood clots, which is why the temporary ban of Astra-Zeneca was condemned by the World Health Organisation, the European Medicines Agency and anyone familiar with this issue......
The ban is explained by a politically motivated blame game. EU leaders keep discrediting AstraZeneca to deflect attention from their own mistakes and to puncture the notion of a Brexit-related British success story. This short-sighted strategy has backfired quickly. After just two days living under the ban, France and Italy signalled the possibility of a U-turn, as the consequences of their actions became all too clear. Europe is coping with a third wave of Covid; vaccination is the only strategy to get out of the mess. Europe’s leaders have not just harmed this strategy, but inflicted damage to European integration.
The EU has made loads of stupid mistakes, but it feels as if the Brexit media and influencers want to focus on mistakes they have not made to drive further division here.
The blood clot issue originated in Norway which is not in the EU, and it was national regulators, not the EMA, which suspended vaccination. The EMA has always said it should go ahead, and can do so for all age groups.
I think it can be safely said the EU are doing this all on their own and do not need any help from the UK
How on earth can it be the EU on their own if its Norway????? Do facts really not matter anymore?
Norway is a side issue.
It is the idiotic way the EU are behaving that is the issue
But please, all I am asking is for people to remember which actions the EU have taken and which they havent.
The blood clots issue started in Norway, not even an EU member, and then other govts worldwide, some in the EU, some not decided to suspend AZ, other govts worldwide, some in the EU, not in the EU decided (rightly) to continue. The EU's body, the EMA said to continue.
How on earth is that all the EUs fault?
Is anyone explicitly blaming the EU for that? It's not untrue to say EU countries/EU leaders have suspended or tried to discredit the vaccine.
Yes that is the whole thrust of the spectator article, that the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots and different approaches to regulating medicine, but about Brexit politics.
The EU medical authorities have been firm. Local country medical authorities have done suspensions.
Leaders of EU countries are guilty of politics on the AZ suspension question, and several have remarked that they needed to move together. Italy and France, for example.
Which suggests that at least political leaders are interfering with medical regulators, and EU central politicking is a possibility.
There are bits of Brexit politicking around.
UVDL and others are teeing it up to blame "UK Brexit obsession" and "AZ not meeting contracts" and "UK vaccine nationalism" to save themselves,
Yes there are bits of Brexit politicking around, I dont disagree. Bits, its far from the overwhelming reason, and to say the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots is as absurd as the decision to stop using the vaccine because of the concerns over blood clots.
If its about bloodclots how come pfizer wasn't also put on hold as it has had similar incidence?
Is that true? The PEI seems to have seen a few cases of something very rare with AZ, but not with Pfizer, as I understood it.
The incidence rate in the UK is the same for both.
Going back to a previously discussed topic, could it also be that Pfizer is being kept in Germany for old people whereas AZ (when they're allowed to use it, and where people will actually take it) has been used for younger folk including teachers and nurses, groups including unusually large percentages of young and middle-aged women?
IIRC the rare complication, CVST, that worried the German scientists is seen disproportionately frequently in women who are pregnant or using the contraceptive pill (@MaxPB may be able to confirm if he's on as well, as I think he's written about this.) QED.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
The problem is you have been discussing it today so you cannot say you were unaware, or that you could complete it online as confirmed by several posters and the way to obtain your census number
You are being deliberately obtuse and risk the fine
In fairness to Justin - and it’s not as though he and I are bosom friends - he’s not saying he won’t complete it, just that he will only complete it on paper and he doesn’t see why he should have to chase them for it.
Which isn’t radically different from my own situation on Thursday evening, where I said I was willing to fill it in but not ring them up to ask where the form was given I should not have to waste my time for their error.
It's not an error though, is it? The forms aren't being mailed out in England by default. If you want one, you have to request one.
So how come I got one?
The only explanation I can think of, unless you really did ring them up for me, is they somehow realised they hadn’t sent out the original form and it was quicker to prepare and send a full paper copy rather than a net slip.
What error are you complaining about then if you already received the form? That explanation sounds reasonable.
I’m not, although I did give them a volley in the feedback. I am saying that if it hadn’t arrived, while i’ve no objection to filling in the census (for all I wonder about its real utility) I wouldn’t have wasted my time chasing them up.
And I do, again, agree with Justin that it should have been much more readily available on paper. Perhaps an early deadline of last Sunday for online, followed by the mailing out of paper copies to any remaining addresses.
Bottom line is, the government demands this information, so they should be willing to be flexible about how people return it.
Edit - and in any case, as I’ve said, Justin will get his paper copy when a collector comes round in a week or so.
Disappointing lack of outdated dodgy sentiment for me to get my teeth stuck into on this thread. On topic, an elected Head of State would imo need to be a non-divisive national treasure. Attenborough is the obvious choice but he's too old, so I'd probably vote for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Who I wouldn't want to see get it is Lord Coe.
Attenborough is on the board of the optimum population trust which advocates severe population reduction.....not sure that makes him non divisive
Yes, but population reduction in a nice way.
I think they wanted 30 million world wide.....hard to see how that could be done in a nice way
This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
The problem is you have been discussing it today so you cannot say you were unaware, or that you could complete it online as confirmed by several posters and the way to obtain your census number
You are being deliberately obtuse and risk the fine
In fairness to Justin - and it’s not as though he and I are bosom friends - he’s not saying he won’t complete it, just that he will only complete it on paper and he doesn’t see why he should have to chase them for it.
Which isn’t radically different from my own situation on Thursday evening, where I said I was willing to fill it in but not ring them up to ask where the form was given I should not have to waste my time for their error.
It's not an error though, is it? The forms aren't being mailed out in England by default. If you want one, you have to request one.
So how come I got one?
The only explanation I can think of, unless you really did ring them up for me, is they somehow realised they hadn’t sent out the original form and it was quicker to prepare and send a full paper copy rather than a net slip.
What error are you complaining about then if you already received the form? That explanation sounds reasonable.
I’m not, although I did give them a volley in the feedback. I am saying that if it hadn’t arrived, while i’ve no objection to filling in the census (for all I wonder about its real utility) I wouldn’t have wasted my time chasing them up.
And I do, again, agree with Justin that it should have been much more readily available on paper. Perhaps an early deadline of last Sunday for online, followed by the mailing out of paper copies to any remaining addresses.
Bottom line is, the government demands this information, so they should be willing to be flexible about how people return it.
They are very flexible, giving you either option. You just have to spend less than a minute online to request a paper copy if you want one.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
The problem is you have been discussing it today so you cannot say you were unaware, or that you could complete it online as confirmed by several posters and the way to obtain your census number
You are being deliberately obtuse and risk the fine
In fairness to Justin - and it’s not as though he and I are bosom friends - he’s not saying he won’t complete it, just that he will only complete it on paper and he doesn’t see why he should have to chase them for it.
Which isn’t radically different from my own situation on Thursday evening, where I said I was willing to fill it in but not ring them up to ask where the form was given I should not have to waste my time for their error.
It's not an error though, is it? The forms aren't being mailed out in England by default. If you want one, you have to request one.
So how come I got one?
The only explanation I can think of, unless you really did ring them up for me, is they somehow realised they hadn’t sent out the original form and it was quicker to prepare and send a full paper copy rather than a net slip.
What error are you complaining about then if you already received the form? That explanation sounds reasonable.
I’m not, although I did give them a volley in the feedback. I am saying that if it hadn’t arrived, while i’ve no objection to filling in the census (for all I wonder about its real utility) I wouldn’t have wasted my time chasing them up.
And I do, again, agree with Justin that it should have been much more readily available on paper. Perhaps an early deadline of last Sunday for online, followed by the mailing out of paper copies to any remaining addresses.
Bottom line is, the government demands this information, so they should be willing to be flexible about how people return it.
They are very flexible, giving you either option. You just have to spend less than a minute online to request a paper copy if you want one.
Unhappily not quite straightforward for the still significant number of people who don’t have reliable internet.
This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
The problem is you have been discussing it today so you cannot say you were unaware, or that you could complete it online as confirmed by several posters and the way to obtain your census number
You are being deliberately obtuse and risk the fine
In fairness to Justin - and it’s not as though he and I are bosom friends - he’s not saying he won’t complete it, just that he will only complete it on paper and he doesn’t see why he should have to chase them for it.
Which isn’t radically different from my own situation on Thursday evening, where I said I was willing to fill it in but not ring them up to ask where the form was given I should not have to waste my time for their error.
It's not an error though, is it? The forms aren't being mailed out in England by default. If you want one, you have to request one.
So how come I got one?
The only explanation I can think of, unless you really did ring them up for me, is they somehow realised they hadn’t sent out the original form and it was quicker to prepare and send a full paper copy rather than a net slip.
What error are you complaining about then if you already received the form? That explanation sounds reasonable.
I’m not, although I did give them a volley in the feedback. I am saying that if it hadn’t arrived, while i’ve no objection to filling in the census (for all I wonder about its real utility) I wouldn’t have wasted my time chasing them up.
And I do, again, agree with Justin that it should have been much more readily available on paper. Perhaps an early deadline of last Sunday for online, followed by the mailing out of paper copies to any remaining addresses.
Bottom line is, the government demands this information, so they should be willing to be flexible about how people return it.
They are very flexible, giving you either option. You just have to spend less than a minute online to request a paper copy if you want one.
Unhappily not quite straightforward for the still significant number of people who don’t have reliable internet.
There's also a phone number, and for those without either I'm sure information is available at different civic locations like post offices etc.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
You do realise we're a country of 60 odd million, it takes some time to vaccinate all those people and the immunity to kick in.
And it isn't untold millions, we know the figure.
So stop moaning like a whore and get vaccinated ASAP, otherwise you have no right to complain about lockdowns.
Disappointing lack of outdated dodgy sentiment for me to get my teeth stuck into on this thread. On topic, an elected Head of State would imo need to be a non-divisive national treasure. Attenborough is the obvious choice but he's too old, so I'd probably vote for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Who I wouldn't want to see get it is Lord Coe.
Attenborough is on the board of the optimum population trust which advocates severe population reduction.....not sure that makes him non divisive
Yes, but population reduction in a nice way.
I think they wanted 30 million world wide.....hard to see how that could be done in a nice way
Hmm, perhaps not then. But I did say he was too old anyway and I'll be voting for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Neither of those have put a foot wrong as far as I'm aware.
"contrarian said: I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats."
Funny thing is, in your head I reckon you're hearing people clapping manically at your amazingly clever and insightful commentary.
Remember, conspiracy theories take hold because they feed both your paranoia and your vanity. "I'm so clever I can see through the tissue of lies that you poor fools have fallen for".
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Cases plateauing slightly? Still jolly good in the context of still rising testing and collapsing deaths/admissions
I think case numbers are picking up a lot of lateral tests from children without any symptoms.
I'm hearing about a lot of children who have been sent home due to another child failing a test.
That must be the case - the case rate per 100k seems to have been essentially flat for the past two weeks, so I don't really understand how the seven day average for total cases has been trending moderately downwards for as long as it has TBH.
The seven day average for new hospital admissions now appears to be dropping marginally more slowly than it has done, whereas deaths are still dropping at the same rate, i.e. like a stone. This is wholly consistent with the very old and shielders now having been protected for some time, and the younger pensioners for a while, but nobody under 50 (unlikely to die, but still vulnerable to being hospitalised in some numbers) have had any protection apart from those who are clinically vulnerable or work in health and social care.
The current seven-day rolling average for deaths is now 640. If deaths continue to decline by a steady one-third a week (actually slightly less than the current rate,) then they'll be averaging in single figures per day by the end of April.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Surviving is a pretty low bar.
Do you think Derek Draper has survived Covid-19 to lead a decent life?
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Surviving is a pretty low bar.
Do you think Derek Draper has survived Covid-19 to lead a decent life?
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Surviving is a pretty low bar.
Do you think Derek Draper has survived Covid-19 to lead a decent life?
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
This for Survation 10-17 March 2016: ie the same point in the Holyrood campaign.
SNP - 54%/42% Labour - 20%/18% Cons - 16%/18% Lib Dems - 7%/6% Green - -/10%
Have you done your census yet.
Still time
I await the hard form!
The one with the £1,000 fine
I don't think so. How can they prove I even received their brief Census leaflet? More likely someone will come with a form eventually - at which point I will complete it.
Someone will come round, ring your doorbell and ask why you haven’t completed it. They should bring forms with them.
So basically he wants to waste taxpayers money rather than using it on helping to poor
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Bloody government, taking measures to avoid a holocaust in the country that's been entrusted to their care...
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Bloody government, taking measures to avoid a holocaust in the country that's been entrusted to their care...
Which is not to say all their actions have been right either, the tories have made a bloody mess of things at times and done some correct things as well.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
Here's what happened.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
Here's what happened.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
Here's what happened.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
Here's what happened.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
I think that hate crime polling would benefit from asking whether the respondents agree with the idea of hate crimes in the first place.
I've often said if someone assaults me because they want to steal my phone or they assault me because they don't like Pakis/Muslims it is going to hurt me equally.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
I am relaxed about it too. I don't care if it is this family or another (any Stuarts or Plantagenets still out there who could have a go?) as long as we are not a republic. My affection is for the office not the holder.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
Here's what happened.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
I think that hate crime polling would benefit from asking whether the respondents agree with the idea of hate crimes in the first place.
I've often said if someone assaults me because they want to steal my phone or they assault me because they don't like Pakis/Muslims it is going to hurt me equally.
Well the hate crime laws would have worked in my favour I guess only assault I have ever had was when a girl I lived with pushed a sword into me in a night club, in her defence she didn't mean to.
One thing which i think has failed to be fully appreciated by the EU and certain EU commentators is quite how important the marketing in the EU as the "Oxford/British" vaccine has been to the rollout success. They can talk about contracts, supply, vaccine availability - and of course this is important - but what is also very important is the willingness of the population to take the vaccine.
You can read a lot of complaints/whinges (take your pick) on social media about how AstraZeneca is NOT totally British (funded partly by US, an Anglo-Swedish company, multi national development team etc) but this is missing the point (and also probably missing why the press have been so vocal in calling out the EU/EU countries for its stance on the vaccine). It is not that the UK is trying to take "credit" for the vaccine, but that the linking to Oxford/AZ has been hugely important in gaining public acceptance. And there is strong resistance to any undermining of this.
I remember when the initial results were announced back in October last year, and i don't think it is exaggerating too much to say that the AZ results could potentially have been a crushing blow to its status (especially coming on the back of the Pfizer/Moderna results). The fact it hasn't is obviously due to its price/ease of distribution in part - but i don't think enough credit also has been given to the UK public willingness to back it to the hilt. Of course this is hugely import to the UK - whether it is truly "British" or not - the fact is that it is THE major vaccine that we are using. And if there were widespread doubts about it we really wouldn't be doing as well as we are.
I simply don't think the EU have done enough so far to encourage confidence in the vaccines (from countries far less predisposed to trust them) and that is a major part of their problem.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
This was never really about blood clots, which is why the temporary ban of Astra-Zeneca was condemned by the World Health Organisation, the European Medicines Agency and anyone familiar with this issue......
The ban is explained by a politically motivated blame game. EU leaders keep discrediting AstraZeneca to deflect attention from their own mistakes and to puncture the notion of a Brexit-related British success story. This short-sighted strategy has backfired quickly. After just two days living under the ban, France and Italy signalled the possibility of a U-turn, as the consequences of their actions became all too clear. Europe is coping with a third wave of Covid; vaccination is the only strategy to get out of the mess. Europe’s leaders have not just harmed this strategy, but inflicted damage to European integration.
The EU has made loads of stupid mistakes, but it feels as if the Brexit media and influencers want to focus on mistakes they have not made to drive further division here.
The blood clot issue originated in Norway which is not in the EU, and it was national regulators, not the EMA, which suspended vaccination. The EMA has always said it should go ahead, and can do so for all age groups.
I think it can be safely said the EU are doing this all on their own and do not need any help from the UK
How on earth can it be the EU on their own if its Norway????? Do facts really not matter anymore?
Norway is a side issue.
It is the idiotic way the EU are behaving that is the issue
But please, all I am asking is for people to remember which actions the EU have taken and which they havent.
The blood clots issue started in Norway, not even an EU member, and then other govts worldwide, some in the EU, some not decided to suspend AZ, other govts worldwide, some in the EU, not in the EU decided (rightly) to continue. The EU's body, the EMA said to continue.
How on earth is that all the EUs fault?
Is anyone explicitly blaming the EU for that? It's not untrue to say EU countries/EU leaders have suspended or tried to discredit the vaccine.
Yes that is the whole thrust of the spectator article, that the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots and different approaches to regulating medicine, but about Brexit politics.
The EU medical authorities have been firm. Local country medical authorities have done suspensions.
Leaders of EU countries are guilty of politics on the AZ suspension question, and several have remarked that they needed to move together. Italy and France, for example.
Which suggests that at least political leaders are interfering with medical regulators, and EU central politicking is a possibility.
There are bits of Brexit politicking around.
UVDL and others are teeing it up to blame "UK Brexit obsession" and "AZ not meeting contracts" and "UK vaccine nationalism" to save themselves,
Yes there are bits of Brexit politicking around, I dont disagree. Bits, its far from the overwhelming reason, and to say the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots is as absurd as the decision to stop using the vaccine because of the concerns over blood clots.
If its about bloodclots how come pfizer wasn't also put on hold as it has had similar incidence?
(1) It isn't about "blood clots" in general, it was blood clots in the brain - i.e. cerebral venous sinus thrombosis. (2) They have apparently now discovered a causal link.
Now, (a) it's incredibly rare (far less likely to cause clotting than the pill), and (b) the benefits outweigh the risks by at least two orders of magnitude and maybe more.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
Out of interest, when would you date the start of the Royal Family's rule as Head of State?
Surely Alfred the Great would be considered the first true monarch.
Thats a misconception he was actually called alfred the grate because he had a high pitched nasal whiny voice just sucessive generations have misinterpreted grate for great....nods.
Interesting, looks like the Cfr is stabilising at 0.15 for the over 85s. Will that improve after the second dose or is a vaccine protection of about 85% for that age group as good as its going to get? If so, once lockdown ends we could still see some quite high death tolls from Covid, even with high levels of vaccination for the country as a whole.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Lockdown has a survival rate way over 99%, so by your lights, we're all unaffected by it. So quit complaining about something that doesn't affect you.
In contrarian's world, grounding the 737-MAX was insupportable; the survival rate per flight was way over 99%. Skydivers should never bother with a reserve parachute; the main parachute opens more than 99% of the time.
Something that kills 1% of all those it touches is harmless. The 4%-5% sent to hospital are unaffected. The 10% suffering symptoms for over 3 months are unaffected.
Meanwhile, taking a vaccine offered by the state is just wrong; don't let them know where you live! (Why not? If they don't kill you, they're harmless, right?)
All in order to support the latest refrain of I DON'T LIKE THIS, IT SHOULD GO AWAY RIGHT NOW, I DON'T CARE, IT'S NOT REAL OR IT'S NOT NECESSARY, MAKE IT GO AWAY.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
The government isn‘t listening to its scientists. That’s why there were so many delays in the January lockdown.
And ‘peddling conspiracy theories’ is not at all the same thing as ‘fighting for our liberties.’ Indeed, if everyone adopted Contrarian’s stance on vaccines we would in all likelihood have to be locked up for years.
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
Out of interest, when would you date the start of the Royal Family's rule as Head of State?
Surely Alfred the Great would be considered the first true monarch.
Thats a misconception he was actually called alfred the grate because he had a high pitched nasal whiny voice just sucessive generations have misinterpreted grate for great....nods.
Interesting, looks like the Cfr is stabilising at 0.15 for the over 80s. Will that improve after the second dose or is a vaccine protection of about 85% for that age group as good as its going to get? If so, once lockdown ends we could still see some quite high death tolls from Covid, even with high levels of vaccination for the country as a whole.
Yes, from the analysis I've been doing on this for the whole pandemic the over 80s mortality rate is about 40% with no vaccine and then drops to just around 10% about 3 weeks after the first dose for vaccinated people and remains at 40% for unvaccinated (which is why the overall rate is still higher than the baseline 10%). With the second dose it will bring that 10% CFR down to around 3% and those will primarily be in the unvaccinated cohort.
This was never really about blood clots, which is why the temporary ban of Astra-Zeneca was condemned by the World Health Organisation, the European Medicines Agency and anyone familiar with this issue......
The ban is explained by a politically motivated blame game. EU leaders keep discrediting AstraZeneca to deflect attention from their own mistakes and to puncture the notion of a Brexit-related British success story. This short-sighted strategy has backfired quickly. After just two days living under the ban, France and Italy signalled the possibility of a U-turn, as the consequences of their actions became all too clear. Europe is coping with a third wave of Covid; vaccination is the only strategy to get out of the mess. Europe’s leaders have not just harmed this strategy, but inflicted damage to European integration.
The EU has made loads of stupid mistakes, but it feels as if the Brexit media and influencers want to focus on mistakes they have not made to drive further division here.
The blood clot issue originated in Norway which is not in the EU, and it was national regulators, not the EMA, which suspended vaccination. The EMA has always said it should go ahead, and can do so for all age groups.
I think it can be safely said the EU are doing this all on their own and do not need any help from the UK
How on earth can it be the EU on their own if its Norway????? Do facts really not matter anymore?
Norway is a side issue.
It is the idiotic way the EU are behaving that is the issue
But please, all I am asking is for people to remember which actions the EU have taken and which they havent.
The blood clots issue started in Norway, not even an EU member, and then other govts worldwide, some in the EU, some not decided to suspend AZ, other govts worldwide, some in the EU, not in the EU decided (rightly) to continue. The EU's body, the EMA said to continue.
How on earth is that all the EUs fault?
Is anyone explicitly blaming the EU for that? It's not untrue to say EU countries/EU leaders have suspended or tried to discredit the vaccine.
Yes that is the whole thrust of the spectator article, that the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots and different approaches to regulating medicine, but about Brexit politics.
The EU medical authorities have been firm. Local country medical authorities have done suspensions.
Leaders of EU countries are guilty of politics on the AZ suspension question, and several have remarked that they needed to move together. Italy and France, for example.
Which suggests that at least political leaders are interfering with medical regulators, and EU central politicking is a possibility.
There are bits of Brexit politicking around.
UVDL and others are teeing it up to blame "UK Brexit obsession" and "AZ not meeting contracts" and "UK vaccine nationalism" to save themselves,
Yes there are bits of Brexit politicking around, I dont disagree. Bits, its far from the overwhelming reason, and to say the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots is as absurd as the decision to stop using the vaccine because of the concerns over blood clots.
If its about bloodclots how come pfizer wasn't also put on hold as it has had similar incidence?
Is that true? The PEI seems to have seen a few cases of something very rare with AZ, but not with Pfizer, as I understood it.
The incidence rate in the UK is the same for both.
I don't think it's apples-to-apples: for the UK it was a comparison of all clotting events, and Pfizer had slightly more than AZ. (And both were less common than the contraceptive pill.)
What a shame that the idiocy of TSE's anti-monarchist dribbling in the comments has now translated into a fatuous and pointless thread header.
We were far better discussing biscuits.
I'm relaxed about it!
The Royal Family have been Head of State for 1,000 years and will still be so in 1,000 years time.
Out of interest, when would you date the start of the Royal Family's rule as Head of State?
Surely Alfred the Great would be considered the first true monarch.
Glorious Revolution. That was the point when you can arguably pinpoint the split between political power and symbolic leadership of the country that culminated in the respective roles of Parliament and Monarchy today.
People argue that we aren't a true democracy because of the Monarchy. I would reject that fundamentally. I don't think the modern role of monarch is such that it requires a democratic process (as represented as appointment via elections) to validate it. That is not the same as saying that it doesn't need to retain popular support. It is essential to the role that the Monarchy retains widespread public support. But this doesn't need elections.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
The government isn‘t listening to its scientists. That’s why there were so many delays in the January lockdown.
And ‘peddling conspiracy theories’ is not at all the same thing as ‘fighting for our liberties.’ Indeed, if everyone adopted Contrarian’s stance on vaccines we would in all likelihood have to be locked up for years.
Yeah - the contrarian/Toby Young/Mike Yeadon voices act to toxify a position that needs to be held by some. I'm very much against the "lock down forever in case of one extra death" stance, and I cringe when the contrarians and Piers Corbyns get coverage.
Interesting, looks like the Cfr is stabilising at 0.15 for the over 80s. Will that improve after the second dose or is a vaccine protection of about 85% for that age group as good as its going to get? If so, once lockdown ends we could still see some quite high death tolls from Covid, even with high levels of vaccination for the country as a whole.
Yes, from the analysis I've been doing on this for the whole pandemic the over 80s mortality rate is about 40% with no vaccine and then drops to just around 10% about 3 weeks after the first dose for vaccinated people and remains at 40% for unvaccinated (which is why the overall rate is still higher than the baseline 10%). With the second dose it will bring that 10% CFR down to around 3% and those will primarily be in the unvaccinated cohort.
Have you done any modelling on how many Covid-19 deaths we will see in the winter?
I'm working on the premise we have a successful booster jab uptake as well.
This was never really about blood clots, which is why the temporary ban of Astra-Zeneca was condemned by the World Health Organisation, the European Medicines Agency and anyone familiar with this issue......
The ban is explained by a politically motivated blame game. EU leaders keep discrediting AstraZeneca to deflect attention from their own mistakes and to puncture the notion of a Brexit-related British success story. This short-sighted strategy has backfired quickly. After just two days living under the ban, France and Italy signalled the possibility of a U-turn, as the consequences of their actions became all too clear. Europe is coping with a third wave of Covid; vaccination is the only strategy to get out of the mess. Europe’s leaders have not just harmed this strategy, but inflicted damage to European integration.
The EU has made loads of stupid mistakes, but it feels as if the Brexit media and influencers want to focus on mistakes they have not made to drive further division here.
The blood clot issue originated in Norway which is not in the EU, and it was national regulators, not the EMA, which suspended vaccination. The EMA has always said it should go ahead, and can do so for all age groups.
I think it can be safely said the EU are doing this all on their own and do not need any help from the UK
How on earth can it be the EU on their own if its Norway????? Do facts really not matter anymore?
Norway is a side issue.
It is the idiotic way the EU are behaving that is the issue
But please, all I am asking is for people to remember which actions the EU have taken and which they havent.
The blood clots issue started in Norway, not even an EU member, and then other govts worldwide, some in the EU, some not decided to suspend AZ, other govts worldwide, some in the EU, not in the EU decided (rightly) to continue. The EU's body, the EMA said to continue.
How on earth is that all the EUs fault?
Is anyone explicitly blaming the EU for that? It's not untrue to say EU countries/EU leaders have suspended or tried to discredit the vaccine.
Yes that is the whole thrust of the spectator article, that the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots and different approaches to regulating medicine, but about Brexit politics.
The EU medical authorities have been firm. Local country medical authorities have done suspensions.
Leaders of EU countries are guilty of politics on the AZ suspension question, and several have remarked that they needed to move together. Italy and France, for example.
Which suggests that at least political leaders are interfering with medical regulators, and EU central politicking is a possibility.
There are bits of Brexit politicking around.
UVDL and others are teeing it up to blame "UK Brexit obsession" and "AZ not meeting contracts" and "UK vaccine nationalism" to save themselves,
Yes there are bits of Brexit politicking around, I dont disagree. Bits, its far from the overwhelming reason, and to say the AZ suspensions were not about blood clots is as absurd as the decision to stop using the vaccine because of the concerns over blood clots.
If its about bloodclots how come pfizer wasn't also put on hold as it has had similar incidence?
Is that true? The PEI seems to have seen a few cases of something very rare with AZ, but not with Pfizer, as I understood it.
The incidence rate in the UK is the same for both.
Going back to a previously discussed topic, could it also be that Pfizer is being kept in Germany for old people whereas AZ (when they're allowed to use it, and where people will actually take it) has been used for younger folk including teachers and nurses, groups including unusually large percentages of young and middle-aged women?
IIRC the rare complication, CVST, that worried the German scientists is seen disproportionately frequently in women who are pregnant or using the contraceptive pill (@MaxPB may be able to confirm if he's on as well, as I think he's written about this.) QED.
I suspect this is the key point: it's probably a really small increase in risk for a very small portion of the population.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
The government isn‘t listening to its scientists. That’s why there were so many delays in the January lockdown.
And ‘peddling conspiracy theories’ is not at all the same thing as ‘fighting for our liberties.’ Indeed, if everyone adopted Contrarian’s stance on vaccines we would in all likelihood have to be locked up for years.
Yeah - the contrarian/Toby Young/Mike Yeadon voices act to toxify a position that needs to be held by some. I'm very much against the "lock down forever in case of one extra death" stance, and I cringe when the contrarians and Piers Corbyns get coverage.
Precisely the point people are being loons and it hides the sane voices that are questioning lockdown.
Disappointing lack of outdated dodgy sentiment for me to get my teeth stuck into on this thread. On topic, an elected Head of State would imo need to be a non-divisive national treasure. Attenborough is the obvious choice but he's too old, so I'd probably vote for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Who I wouldn't want to see get it is Lord Coe.
I think a better question would be "which of these people could do the job the Queen does now."
"Who do you like" is for evaluation of an image/symbol, which is a small part of the role.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
Surviving is a pretty low bar.
Do you think Derek Draper has survived Covid-19 to lead a decent life?
Interesting, looks like the Cfr is stabilising at 0.15 for the over 80s. Will that improve after the second dose or is a vaccine protection of about 85% for that age group as good as its going to get? If so, once lockdown ends we could still see some quite high death tolls from Covid, even with high levels of vaccination for the country as a whole.
Yes, from the analysis I've been doing on this for the whole pandemic the over 80s mortality rate is about 40% with no vaccine and then drops to just around 10% about 3 weeks after the first dose for vaccinated people and remains at 40% for unvaccinated (which is why the overall rate is still higher than the baseline 10%). With the second dose it will bring that 10% CFR down to around 3% and those will primarily be in the unvaccinated cohort.
When the second dose is given, it looks like the overall fatality rate should be reduced by about a factor of fifteen or so, which is indeed comparable with influenza. That would point to somewhere like a bad influenza season at worst - which isn't to trivialize it at all, especially not for the families of those who die, but on the national picture, they don't shut down things for that, so the chances of doing so for covid when it's at that level would be negligible.
And the impact on R might mean that herd immunity would help protect the more vulnerable age groups beyond the level that we see with a bad influenza season, anyway, so the death toll could be significantly less.
Disappointing lack of outdated dodgy sentiment for me to get my teeth stuck into on this thread. On topic, an elected Head of State would imo need to be a non-divisive national treasure. Attenborough is the obvious choice but he's too old, so I'd probably vote for Olivia Coleman or Monty Don. Who I wouldn't want to see get it is Lord Coe.
I think a better question would be "which of these people could do the job the Queen does now."
"Who do you like" is for evaluation of an image/symbol, which is a small part of the role.
There was a time if electing a head of state we might have got jade goody.....I think I vote for monarchy
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
Interesting, looks like the Cfr is stabilising at 0.15 for the over 80s. Will that improve after the second dose or is a vaccine protection of about 85% for that age group as good as its going to get? If so, once lockdown ends we could still see some quite high death tolls from Covid, even with high levels of vaccination for the country as a whole.
Yes, from the analysis I've been doing on this for the whole pandemic the over 80s mortality rate is about 40% with no vaccine and then drops to just around 10% about 3 weeks after the first dose for vaccinated people and remains at 40% for unvaccinated (which is why the overall rate is still higher than the baseline 10%). With the second dose it will bring that 10% CFR down to around 3% and those will primarily be in the unvaccinated cohort.
Sounds good.
Do you think we will need to vaccinate children to try and achieve herd immunity like we do with flu or not?
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
Do you think "lockdown forever" is a particularly winning manifesto platform?
The scientists are - I believe - over cautious. And I suspect the UK's experience in the late Autumn and over Christmas has made the government desperate to avoid a third lockdown. (Which means they're letting lockdown two go on for longer than it might.)
I would be loosening restrictions a bit quicker. (And, indeed, California is loosening them rather more quickly than the UK at the moment - indoor dining has reopened, albeit at low capacity, and I look forward to going to an LAFC game next month.)
But the slowness of the UK isn't because of "lockdown forever", it's because they fucked up over Christmas.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
Well...... I'm not quite sure what to say about this thread header.
In more serious news I've just had a listen to the interview with Mary Ramsay on Marr. I'm confused. She didn't rule out people being able to go on holiday to Europe in the summer though there may be one or two differences to normal. But then at the end she talked about maintaining social distancing for several years?????????? Apparently we've all got used to these lower level restrictions? Which are what? Not being able to visit friends or family indoors? I for one certainly haven't got used to it.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
Oh, right, the one with the confidence interval of -76.8 to 54.8 and a short dosing interval. I don't give too much weight to that. I guess we'll find out in due course.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
The government isn‘t listening to its scientists. That’s why there were so many delays in the January lockdown.
And ‘peddling conspiracy theories’ is not at all the same thing as ‘fighting for our liberties.’ Indeed, if everyone adopted Contrarian’s stance on vaccines we would in all likelihood have to be locked up for years.
Yeah - the contrarian/Toby Young/Mike Yeadon voices act to toxify a position that needs to be held by some. I'm very much against the "lock down forever in case of one extra death" stance, and I cringe when the contrarians and Piers Corbyns get coverage.
I may be too trusting but it seems to me there is a strong economic driver acting against lock down forever. Seems to me it's partly that economic driver that's giving rise to caution in opening up, as well. Can't afford not to open up, can't afford to get it wrong & need to reverse.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
Well, we can be sure that the South African strain is in the UK (and indeed everywhere else). If the AZ vaccine is completely ineffective against it, then we'll be all getting another set of jabs in the Autumn.
Well...... I'm not quite sure what to say about this thread header.
In more serious news I've just had a listen to the interview with Mary Ramsay on Marr. I'm confused. She didn't rule out people being able to go on holiday to Europe in the summer though there may be one or two differences to normal. But then at the end she talked about maintaining social distancing for several years?????????? Apparently we've all got used to these lower level restrictions? Which are what? Not being able to visit friends or family indoors? I for one certainly haven't got used to it.
She also seemed to be arguing that the economy was doing just fine with social distancing. Which is, er, a controversial position.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
Oh, right, the one with the confidence interval of -76.8 to 54.8 and a short dosing interval. I don't give too much weight to that. I guess we'll find out in due course.
--AS
Given it takes some time for AZ effectiveness to build, and the shortness of trial, that's another issue.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You really are a [moderated].
You moan like a whore about lockdown but get upset about the quickest route to permanently leave lockdown.
Are you Laurence Fox?
Untold millions have been vaccinated.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
Untold millions? The stats are actually quite precise. Unfortunately, you seem to be under the impression that you can just stop when the job is incomplete and call it good enough.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
What is 'the job?' what is the task? its gone from three weeks to protect the NHS to vaccinating an entire population from a disease 99% plus would survive anyway.
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
To ensure there isn't yet another wave? That really should be obvious.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
To be clear - preventing another wave of mass hospitalisations and deaths.
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
Except, there are plenty of scientists who want us to lockdown almost forever, just in case some variant sneaks through. Cf the woman today who said social distancing and masks should be maintained for YEARS - until the whole world is vaccinated.
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
Do you think "lockdown forever" is a particularly winning manifesto platform?
The scientists are - I believe - over cautious. And I suspect the UK's experience in the late Autumn and over Christmas has made the government desperate to avoid a third lockdown. (Which means they're letting lockdown two go on for longer than it might.)
I would be loosening restrictions a bit quicker. (And, indeed, California is loosening them rather more quickly than the UK at the moment - indoor dining has reopened, albeit at low capacity, and I look forward to going to an LAFC game next month.)
But the slowness of the UK isn't because of "lockdown forever", it's because they fucked up over Christmas.
I agree with that. But I also think that there is a lot to be said for certainty, and our plan is as close as you can get to certain to go ahead.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I’m not sure you can say that - AIUI the evidence we have is that the vaccines (at least the AZ vaccine) is 90% ineffective against the SA variant.
I’m surprised more isn’t being made of this inconvenient fact by the media.
Go on pbers- tell me I’m panicking over nothing...?!!
Ineffective against spread, but not against serious illness/hospitalisations/deaths.
Also i read somewhere that there had been some recent revisions of the original numbers?
The NEJM only dealt with mild/moderate disease. It was quite a young population so insufficient serious cases in either test or placebo arms therefore unable to comment on severe disease.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats.
And there's not much really.
You have been vaccinated against a disease with a survival rate of 99 per cent plus. Many get away with mild or zero symptoms. Big deal.
Against that, you still can't go for a drink with friends, go to a political meeting, attend a protest, have a party, exercise at a gym, have a night out at a theatre, restaurant, nightclub or concert hall. Many are not even allowed to work.
Even if these 'treats' (otherwise known as human rights) return, in the longer term, foreign travel looks like a distant pipedream. Summer abroad is getting cancelled because mutant strains innit.
Package holidays to Spain will soon be looked on as the halcyon days. If you aren't under house arrest in the summer the government are going to make jolly sure you are under country arrest.
And the bill for all this is coming soon, its coming right around the corner at you, and it will make you and vast numbers much poorer.
And yet you think you are well off. Goodness.
You've started shifting the goalposts a bit, haven't you? Almost as if you can sense that you'll look a little bit stupid when in defiance of your dire predictions of permanent lockdown Kim Jong-Boris opens up the country for the summer and everyone's having fun. Except for you.
All I'd say about that is not to count chickens. Even if we assume that the end state of this is that we are basically let out of prison except for foreign travel (which I could happily live with,) and that the Government and the sensible advisers tell the lunatic "social distancing and masks until the Plague has been driven from every last village in Afghanistan" brigade to take a running jump, then I still wouldn't place too much faith in the provisional unlocking timetable.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I hear your point about not counting chickens, but unless something drastic changes we really are closing in on the end of this thing as a serious disruption of normal life. Here's Israel's R from a few days ago after doing about 2.5 times as many doses per 100 as we have now - it's dropping like a rock:
I’m not sure you can say that - AIUI the evidence we have is that the vaccines (at least the AZ vaccine) is 90% ineffective against the SA variant.
I’m surprised more isn’t being made of this inconvenient fact by the media.
Go on pbers- tell me I’m panicking over nothing...?!!
Ineffective against spread, but not against serious illness/hospitalisations/deaths.
Also i read somewhere that there had been some recent revisions of the original numbers?
The NEJM only dealt with mild/moderate disease. It was quite a young population so insufficient serious cases in either test or placebo arms therefore unable to comment on severe disease.
There were 23 mild to moderate events in the placebo group, and 15 in the vaccine group. Given the median age of 30, and that everyone was healthy, unsurprisingly, we don't have any real data on prevention of serious illness.
My gut - and I'm not a doctor or a scientist - is that effectiveness builds as you scale the severity wall.
Comments
Boris and his team watching the trend in deaths and hospitalisations very closely, the trend in which continues to be encouraging.
I did go looking for a comparison of vaccines in europe but could not find one.
I'm hearing about a lot of children who have been sent home due to another child failing a test.
IIRC the rare complication, CVST, that worried the German scientists is seen disproportionately frequently in women who are pregnant or using the contraceptive pill (@MaxPB may be able to confirm if he's on as well, as I think he's written about this.) QED.
We are still in lockdown. The first real tangible dose of freedom for adults is mid May. At the earliest.
What's the difference between that and the tractor stats, really?
thousands of tractors built.
Millions still hungry.
Yeah but building tractors is great.
And mid-May? Isn't outdoor hospitality opening in a couple of weeks?
And I do, again, agree with Justin that it should have been much more readily available on paper. Perhaps an early deadline of last Sunday for online, followed by the mailing out of paper copies to any remaining addresses.
Bottom line is, the government demands this information, so they should be willing to be flexible about how people return it.
Edit - and in any case, as I’ve said, Justin will get his paper copy when a collector comes round in a week or so.
Also they campaigned against the UK taking in syrian refugees
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/charity-which-campaigned-to-ban-syrian-refugees-from-britain/
still non divisive?
from case data
from hospitalisations
And it isn't untold millions, we know the figure.
So stop moaning like a whore and get vaccinated ASAP, otherwise you have no right to complain about lockdowns.
I'm trying to think how much difference there is between the vaccine number rampers and those party members you see clapping manically in communist states as the Dear Leader announces the latest tractor stats."
Funny thing is, in your head I reckon you're hearing people clapping manically at your amazingly clever and insightful commentary.
Remember, conspiracy theories take hold because they feed both your paranoia and your vanity. "I'm so clever I can see through the tissue of lies that you poor fools have fallen for".
Oh and by the way travel abroad will still be out. And you will still need to social distance. And we reserve the right to bring in new restrictions in the autumn if we feel like it. And you will probably be much poorer.
You have gained little. You have given away much. Some of it isn't coming back anytime soon.
The seven day average for new hospital admissions now appears to be dropping marginally more slowly than it has done, whereas deaths are still dropping at the same rate, i.e. like a stone. This is wholly consistent with the very old and shielders now having been protected for some time, and the younger pensioners for a while, but nobody under 50 (unlikely to die, but still vulnerable to being hospitalised in some numbers) have had any protection apart from those who are clinically vulnerable or work in health and social care.
The current seven-day rolling average for deaths is now 640. If deaths continue to decline by a steady one-third a week (actually slightly less than the current rate,) then they'll be averaging in single figures per day by the end of April.
And you were saying that the "first real tangible dose of freedom for adults" was going to be mid-May. That's completely wrong, regardless of whether international travel is happening or not.
Do you think Derek Draper has survived Covid-19 to lead a decent life?
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/showbiz-tv/kate-garraway-says-husband-derek-20219789
All indicators heading down, apart from cases, which are falling apart from a rise in the 0-14 cohort
If we can get it down to the incidence of measles, nobody is going to be suggesting continuing with these restrictions, apart from those like Lozza Fox, Contrarian and Topping who want something to whinge about.
But this is simply a bad article, full of unsupportable claims and bias and pointless when nothing will change and there are so many other far more interesting subjects to discuss.
It'll only take SPI-M to churn out one worrying computer projection and we could all be locked up for weeks or months extra. March 29th looks baked in, but I wouldn't get excited about any of the remaining restrictions after that being binned until it actually happens.
I had written two pieces for this weekend, first one was the electoral voting systems one which I wrote on Thursday night the other one was about Scotland, a deep dive into the Holyrood polling, which I wrote on Friday and yesterday.
However two polls appeared in the last 12 hours or so, one at just after midnight, and one at just after 1pm today.
However the data tables haven't been released and I didn't want to write an incomplete piece so I had a look at what YouGov had posted this week and did this piece on it.
It was either that or this
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1372841450585612289
Guy beats up his wife in domestic violence incident......hate crime
Guy beats up his husband in domestic violence incident ..... non hate crime
?
https://twitter.com/segal_eran/status/1372435352389042181
You can read a lot of complaints/whinges (take your pick) on social media about how AstraZeneca is NOT totally British (funded partly by US, an Anglo-Swedish company, multi national development team etc) but this is missing the point (and also probably missing why the press have been so vocal in calling out the EU/EU countries for its stance on the vaccine). It is not that the UK is trying to take "credit" for the vaccine, but that the linking to Oxford/AZ has been hugely important in gaining public acceptance. And there is strong resistance to any undermining of this.
I remember when the initial results were announced back in October last year, and i don't think it is exaggerating too much to say that the AZ results could potentially have been a crushing blow to its status (especially coming on the back of the Pfizer/Moderna results). The fact it hasn't is obviously due to its price/ease of distribution in part - but i don't think enough credit also has been given to the UK public willingness to back it to the hilt. Of course this is hugely import to the UK - whether it is truly "British" or not - the fact is that it is THE major vaccine that we are using. And if there were widespread doubts about it we really wouldn't be doing as well as we are.
I simply don't think the EU have done enough so far to encourage confidence in the vaccines (from countries far less predisposed to trust them) and that is a major part of their problem.
https://twitter.com/ScotTories/status/1373625338706726915
YEARS?
Go jump in a lake.
We need people like contrarian et al, to fight for the restoration of our liberties (and our economies and sex lives), because otherwise the nanny state boffins will lock us up in perpetuity
(2) They have apparently now discovered a causal link.
Now, (a) it's incredibly rare (far less likely to cause clotting than the pill), and (b) the benefits outweigh the risks by at least two orders of magnitude and maybe more.
I hope everyone else who was jabbed yesterday is doing okay!
--AS
In contrarian's world, grounding the 737-MAX was insupportable; the survival rate per flight was way over 99%.
Skydivers should never bother with a reserve parachute; the main parachute opens more than 99% of the time.
Something that kills 1% of all those it touches is harmless. The 4%-5% sent to hospital are unaffected. The 10% suffering symptoms for over 3 months are unaffected.
Meanwhile, taking a vaccine offered by the state is just wrong; don't let them know where you live!
(Why not? If they don't kill you, they're harmless, right?)
All in order to support the latest refrain of I DON'T LIKE THIS, IT SHOULD GO AWAY RIGHT NOW, I DON'T CARE, IT'S NOT REAL OR IT'S NOT NECESSARY, MAKE IT GO AWAY.
In Dore he officially became King of the Anglo Saxon lands.
And ‘peddling conspiracy theories’ is not at all the same thing as ‘fighting for our liberties.’ Indeed, if everyone adopted Contrarian’s stance on vaccines we would in all likelihood have to be locked up for years.
People argue that we aren't a true democracy because of the Monarchy. I would reject that fundamentally. I don't think the modern role of monarch is such that it requires a democratic process (as represented as appointment via elections) to validate it. That is not the same as saying that it doesn't need to retain popular support. It is essential to the role that the Monarchy retains widespread public support. But this doesn't need elections.
I'm very much against the "lock down forever in case of one extra death" stance, and I cringe when the contrarians and Piers Corbyns get coverage.
I'm working on the premise we have a successful booster jab uptake as well.
I'm reminded of this: https://xkcd.com/1252/
"Who do you like" is for evaluation of an image/symbol, which is a small part of the role.
I’m surprised more isn’t being made of this inconvenient fact by the media.
Go on pbers- tell me I’m panicking over nothing...?!!
That would point to somewhere like a bad influenza season at worst - which isn't to trivialize it at all, especially not for the families of those who die, but on the national picture, they don't shut down things for that, so the chances of doing so for covid when it's at that level would be negligible.
And the impact on R might mean that herd immunity would help protect the more vulnerable age groups beyond the level that we see with a bad influenza season, anyway, so the death toll could be significantly less.
--AS
Do you think we will need to vaccinate children to try and achieve herd immunity like we do with flu or not?
The scientists are - I believe - over cautious. And I suspect the UK's experience in the late Autumn and over Christmas has made the government desperate to avoid a third lockdown. (Which means they're letting lockdown two go on for longer than it might.)
I would be loosening restrictions a bit quicker. (And, indeed, California is loosening them rather more quickly than the UK at the moment - indoor dining has reopened, albeit at low capacity, and I look forward to going to an LAFC game next month.)
But the slowness of the UK isn't because of "lockdown forever", it's because they fucked up over Christmas.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2102214
In more serious news I've just had a listen to the interview with Mary Ramsay on Marr. I'm confused. She didn't rule out people being able to go on holiday to Europe in the summer though there may be one or two differences to normal. But then at the end she talked about maintaining social distancing for several years?????????? Apparently we've all got used to these lower level restrictions? Which are what? Not being able to visit friends or family indoors? I for one certainly haven't got used to it.
Also i read somewhere that there had been some recent revisions of the original numbers?
--AS
But that's as bad as it gets.
https://twitter.com/Valdevia_Art/status/1373369896655073283?s=20
My gut - and I'm not a doctor or a scientist - is that effectiveness builds as you scale the severity wall.