There’s no need to ask for forgiveness; the government aren’t demanding people take elderly relatives to Cheltenham, and we are free to self isolate as we wish.
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
So do we think Sunday's football match in Glasgow will
1) Take place?
2) Take place behind closed doors?
I'm sure they'll be fine to postpone it, it's not much of a derby considering Sevco were only formed in 2012.
There's stories that the reason the Scottish Government's advice on restricting events to under 500 people from Monday is to allow the match to go ahead.
The UK's position is not dissimilar to Singapore's - they decided school closures would be counter productive too.
Singapore currently has 91 active cases and is well on the way to eliminating the virus (for now). No attempt to build herd immunity, just wipe it out. That seems the exact opposite of what we are doing.
Singapore also has done extensive screening of travellers on entry
The "extensive screening" I got a few weeks ago was
"Have you been to China in the last 14 days?"
"No"
"Welcome to Singapore"
And yet, despite being very close to China, it’s “worked” so far.
And yet, you know better than the PM of Singapore.....
No, I noted the press release you mentioned. However, the incidence and rate of growth in Singapore has and is very low.
Stop trolling, start thinking for a change.
Cases per million population: Singapore: 32 UK: 8.7
Given the wildly different approaches to testing by different countries, I'm not sure that the cases per capita metric is much use. Deaths per capita is likely to be a better measure since deaths tend not to go unnoticed!
The UK's position is not dissimilar to Singapore's - they decided school closures would be counter productive too.
Singapore currently has 91 active cases and is well on the way to eliminating the virus (for now). No attempt to build herd immunity, just wipe it out. That seems the exact opposite of what we are doing.
Singapore also has done extensive screening of travellers on entry
The "extensive screening" I got a few weeks ago was
"Have you been to China in the last 14 days?"
"No"
"Welcome to Singapore"
And yet, despite being very close to China, it’s “worked” so far.
And yet, you know better than the PM of Singapore.....
No, I noted the press release you mentioned. However, the incidence and rate of growth in Singapore has and is very low.
Stop trolling, start thinking for a change.
Cases per million population: Singapore: 32 UK: 8.7
Are you doing some kind of debating thing or can you genuinely not see the problem with that comparison?
60% of the population is about 40m. 1% of that is 400,000.
Yep, it's going to be brutal - though I guess (hope) that will be spread out over a number of years. It appears that the time to stop this was two months ago - but is it worth shutting the country off from the outside world just in case it is really bad?
See S Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand. No need to “shut off the outside world”.
Edit: Apparently. I can only react to the information I have. I appreciate there there is no “right answer” but I am annoyed that many on here think that “the science” is incontestable.
I am not sure anyone is saying it is incontestable. Alternative approaches may turn out to be better. Indeed it is very likely no country at all has found an optimum strategy.
The important point is that given its so complex, and that we have one group of very experienced, qualified, senior epidemiologists, scientists, doctors, psychologists, economists, civil servants all working together with the full resources of HMG behind them, why should the country accept someone elses alternative strategy ahead of theirs?
No-one has even attempted to answer that question I have posed daily.
I think this is the wrong question.
I’m sure the best and brightest are working around the clock to devise the best strategies.
The problem is that said strategies:
(a) Entail c 400,00 deaths in the next 12-18 months of the old and vulnerable, and perhaps 4m hospitalisations.
(b) Rest on assumptions that may be belied by the profile of the epidemic in response to stricter policies implemented by countries in the Far East.
Indeed, as @edmundintokyo has pointed out, those “stricter policies” are not even particularly costly.
It is less than two weeks since the PM was encouraging us to keep handshaking, yet as we PBers (and certainly @Eadric) have known for 8 weeks now, the lethal potential of this plague was already obvious.
Some sneering types on here accuse me of ignoring “the science” but I also haven’t seen a slam dunk reason one here why a different approach is not appropriate.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
I'd go with Taiwan, where the deputy president is an epidemiologist.
I would trust his judgment, but he will be relying on the advice presented to him by Taiwanese modellers/epidemiologists. I don't think the quality of that modelling will be as high as in the US/UK/Germany.
There’s no need to ask for forgiveness; the government aren’t demanding people take elderly relatives to Cheltenham, and we are free to self isolate as we wish.
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
Agree. The government does not have the power to compel or forbid common sense and individual judgement in day to day living. Thankfully we don't live in North Korea, or Iran.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
Once you get your head round the fact that the government's policy is to play the long game with this, then you can understand the logic.
This plan has been around for a decade or more, they have dusted if off and tweaked it. But it is a long-term plan for the country. Is the plan out of date and faulty? Who knows. I think it is but my view means little.
However, let's be clear what the plan means.
We are trading 100,000 to 500,000 deaths in the next few months for the benefit that we can emerge from this pandemic over the next-five years unshackled from some sort of permanent lockdown.
Some of the consequences of our plan: long-term we hopefully just get on with our lives as before. That's great.
Some bad ones: lots of people are going to die. But more than that, lots more people as a proportion of those who get sick, are going to die.
We have an old population, we have an obese population, we have a multimorbid population and we have a healthcare system that is always under strain at the best of times.
So where China might have produced a 1% CFR. My very strong feeling is that we will be somewhere above that. Potentially up to 5%.
So that's the trade-off guys. Short term extreme pain versus long-term gain.
It will be grim and the government will be the most unpopular one in history I think. But we might come out of it, fit and ready to grow.
The UK's position is not dissimilar to Singapore's - they decided school closures would be counter productive too.
Singapore currently has 91 active cases and is well on the way to eliminating the virus (for now). No attempt to build herd immunity, just wipe it out. That seems the exact opposite of what we are doing.
Singapore also has done extensive screening of travellers on entry
The "extensive screening" I got a few weeks ago was
"Have you been to China in the last 14 days?"
"No"
"Welcome to Singapore"
And yet, despite being very close to China, it’s “worked” so far.
And yet, you know better than the PM of Singapore.....
No, I noted the press release you mentioned. However, the incidence and rate of growth in Singapore has and is very low.
Stop trolling, start thinking for a change.
Cases per million population: Singapore: 32 UK: 8.7
How do they catch asymptomatic cases if the testing isn't random (which is virtually impossible)? Indeed how are individuals selected for testing, and how does that vary across countries?
There’s no need to ask for forgiveness; the government aren’t demanding people take elderly relatives to Cheltenham, and we are free to self isolate as we wish.
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
Agreed, the government also doesnt ban elderly relatives from smoking, drinking and eating badly. Everyone realises its a risk, most abstain and a few decide Cheltenham or smoking is worth it to them. Listening to the press conference it was clear that this is the biggest health concern in a generation and we should all take care, especially the elderly.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
They are free to publish their data and their reasoning.
I suspect that Rory's experience in wartime Iraq may not be hugely relevant,
So do we think Sunday's football match in Glasgow will
1) Take place?
2) Take place behind closed doors?
I'm sure they'll be fine to postpone it, it's not much of a derby considering Sevco were only formed in 2012.
There's stories that the reason the Scottish Government's advice on restricting events to under 500 people from Monday is to allow the match to go ahead.
Playing it behind closed doors seems stupid. They'll all turn up anyway.
Via La Repubblica - i) the Italians (in Lombardy) are confident they are not testing asymptomatic cases so the death rate is indeed inflated; ii) there is a suggestion that growth in the number of cases in Lombardy is now linear rather than exponential, meaning they are off the extreme section of the Gaussian curve.
The latter is promising and suggests that we might expect to see constant growth there for another week or so before it starts to decline (gradually first and then quite quickly with some luck). Now, the number of cases / impact on ICU will still be grim of course over the next period but it is at least better news.
It's been pretty clear that infections in Lombardy have been very widespread for some time - epidemiologists in Germany have made that assumption for a while. Which is why the predictions here seem to be that Lombardy is probably already at or near the peak, that the peak here in Germany will perhaps be before June. And that there might just about be enough respirators and intensive care places to cope.
At the moment, people are more worried about not having enough medical staff - hence the reluctance to close schools in NRW too many doctors and nurses have children to take care of. And there's a push to change the guidelines on quarantining medical staff who have been exposed to known infections - and change it to allowing people to carry on working but testing them every day. At the moment if one member of staff tests positive, you're likely supposed to quarantine the entire shift for 14 days, it's not going to be practical.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
Sky Bet say current Mayoral bets will stand for the rescheduled elections if they are rescheduled rather than void. Just something to be aware of if you're arbitraging with Betfair (I'm not in this market) or some such as I reckon the Betfair market will void. Khan should win whenever they take place.
There’s no need to ask for forgiveness; the government aren’t demanding people take elderly relatives to Cheltenham, and we are free to self isolate as we wish.
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
Agreed, the government also doesnt ban elderly relatives from smoking, drinking and eating badly. Everyone realises its a risk, most abstain and a few decide Cheltenham or smoking is worth it to them. Listening to the press conference it was clear that this is the biggest health concern in a generation and we should all take care, especially the elderly.
The biggest take I have from this is that more people than I thought are beholden to the big state to tell them what to do. Nigel Farage included surprisingly
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
If Jeremy Hunt has an issue with the government’s handling of the virus, he has plenty of ways in which he can communicate with the decision-markers directly without going on TV.
What with this and the news of President Bolsonaro having Covid-19, it looks as though the virus is circulating in the heart of the Trump administration:
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
What actions are the UK taking to flatten then peak?
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
Sky Bet say current Mayoral bets will stand for the rescheduled elections if they are rescheduled rather than void. Just something to be aware of if you're arbitraging with Betfair (I'm not in this market) or some such as I reckon the Betfair market will void. Khan should win whenever they take place.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
If Jeremy Hunt has an issue with the government’s handling of the virus, he has plenty of ways in which he can communicate with the decision-markers directly without going on TV.
Maybe he did, and found the response unsatisfactory.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
I'd go with Taiwan, where the deputy president is an epidemiologist.
I would trust his judgment, but he will be relying on the advice presented to him by Taiwanese modellers/epidemiologists. I don't think the quality of that modelling will be as high as in the US/UK/Germany.
On the contrary, they have been continuously planning for an outbreak of this kind since SARS in 2005, as their response this time bears out. It's not just the quality of the scientists (and it is increasingly foolish to underestimate the improvement in the life sciences in the Asian economies), but the amount of time and effort which has gone in to it.
This is probably unfair, but we appear to have dusted off a plan from 2011.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
I didn't used to think they were, either. But then again: - Stewart has a recent history of bizarre announcements, and the way he left the Tory party must some doubts over his judgment. He's also struggling to make much if any impact in the mayoral race, so this could have been his last big roll of the dice. - Hunt may well still be smarting from losing the leadership race to Johnson, is positioning to replace him in the event the current strategy doesn't work at minimal risk, and/or thinks he has a duty to make sure an opposing view is heard in public.
The question I keep coming back to is why none of the actual rent-a-gob politicians are making much noise over this? Or even just the reasonably sensible people on Opposition benches.
It's hard to believe the likes of Abbott, Davey, Blackford, Milliband, Khan, Lucas, etc (to pick some names at semi-random) have all simultaneously decided that the government should just be given a free ride. In particular, neither of the two trailing in the Labour leadership seem to have made any attempts at political capital over this.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs.
We are making one judgement others are making another.
When all is said and done, we will find out who got it right.
We are the control arm in the biggest trial the world has ever seen.
Do pollsters ever ask questions about public health?
How are we to know how many cases there are? Without testing everyone what about running a poll and comparing how many people have a cough compared to how many would normally be expected to have one? But do we have a figure for that?
Since people are advised to stay at home in they have symptoms how are we supposed to have any idea what the actual number of cases is?
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
Sky Bet say current Mayoral bets will stand for the rescheduled elections if they are rescheduled rather than void. Just something to be aware of if you're arbitraging with Betfair (I'm not in this market) or some such as I reckon the Betfair market will void. Khan should win whenever they take place.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
If Jeremy Hunt has an issue with the government’s handling of the virus, he has plenty of ways in which he can communicate with the decision-markers directly without going on TV.
At times like these, discussion ought to be public, not behind closed doors.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
And as an AGW denier.
He’s a ridiculous fraud. It was not surprising to hear he is president of his local toy soldiers society.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
His experience will be directly relevant if the Iraqi army invades the UK and blows the fuck out of our water and power infrastructure.
60% of the population is about 40m. 1% of that is 400,000.
Yep, it's going to be brutal - though I guess (hope) that will be spread out over a number of years. It appears that the time to stop this was two months ago - but is it worth shutting the country off from the outside world just in case it is really bad?
See S Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand. No need to “shut off the outside world”.
Edit: Apparently. I can only react to the information I have. I appreciate there there is no “right answer” but I am annoyed that many on here think that “the science” is incontestable.
I am not sure anyone is saying it is incontestable. Alternative approaches may turn out to be better. Indeed it is very likely no country at all has found an optimum strategy.
The important point is that given its so complex, and that we have one group of very experienced, qualified, senior epidemiologists, scientists, doctors, psychologists, economists, civil servants all working together with the full resources of HMG behind them, why should the country accept someone elses alternative strategy ahead of theirs?
No-one has even attempted to answer that question I have posed daily.
I think this is the wrong question.
I’m sure the best and brightest are working around the clock to devise the best strategies.
The problem is that said strategies:
(a) Entail c 400,00 deaths in the next 12-18 months of the old and vulnerable, and perhaps 4m hospitalisations.
(b) Rest on assumptions that may be belied by the profile of the epidemic in response to stricter policies implemented by countries in the Far East.
Indeed, as @edmundintokyo has pointed out, those “stricter policies” are not even particularly costly.
It is less than two weeks since the PM was encouraging us to keep handshaking, yet as we PBers (and certainly @Eadric) have known for 8 weeks now, the lethal potential of this plague was already obvious.
Some sneering types on here accuse me of ignoring “the science” but I also haven’t seen a slam dunk reason one here why a different approach is not appropriate.
Anyway, enough. I’m supposed to be WFH.
Thanks for the response. I think your figures are an overestimate, possibly close to a ceiling on the worst case scenario rather than an expected number.
But it comes back to my point, the govt team are very much aware of the points you raised and still think their plan is best suited to the UK as of today. In coming days many of the measures people are calling for will be introduced. Why is anyone better placed than them? I guess they could become overly emotionally attached to their original plan when new evidence comes along but really it comes down to CMO, CSO, experts working together > edmundintokyo, eadric, Farage, Stewart. There is nothing relevant the latter group know or have considered that the former group dont know or havent considered. The same is not true the other way around.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I wonder if it's not a deliberate strategy (or at least not wargamed as such even if Hunt isn't in on the strategy). In a perfect world where you are trying to build up herd immunity without overwhelming the NHS you would want to gradually reduce the transmission rate so that it hits 1 and then stays there at about the point that the NHS hits saturation. With the massive advantage we have of being behind other countries we are going to get people already working from home, practising social distancing etc. even without the government telling them to. That reduces the transmission rate. As more people become aware they will do likewise - which again will slowly reduce the transmission rate again. The best way of doing this is to say 'we will need to do this at some point but not yet' and have others going 'well lets do it now anyway' - you get to effectively introduce it gradually.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I got the impression he was talking for others, not himself, allowing those whose voices are currently unheard to be heard. There are ones who don’t care about sticking their head up, like Ashton, but channelling those who don’t want to rock the boat, as of yet.
There’s no need to ask for forgiveness; the government aren’t demanding people take elderly relatives to Cheltenham, and we are free to self isolate as we wish.
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
Agreed, the government also doesnt ban elderly relatives from smoking, drinking and eating badly. Everyone realises its a risk, most abstain and a few decide Cheltenham or smoking is worth it to them. Listening to the press conference it was clear that this is the biggest health concern in a generation and we should all take care, especially the elderly.
The biggest take I have from this is that more people than I thought are beholden to the big state to tell them what to do. Nigel Farage included surprisingly
Farage just playing to the populist something must be done meme, as he did with the EU.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
What actions are the UK taking to flatten then peak?
Where do you think we are on the curve?
The actions you should take depend on where you think you are on the curve.
I think we are (roughly speaking) at a comparable stage as Germany, perhaps a little behind them.
So I would expect (roughly speaking) us to be doing the same as Germany, perhaps a little behind them.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available? And could different countries (and people) not validly prefer and choose different approaches despite using similar scientific principles and modelling techniques? I would think they could and this is probably what to an extent is happening.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
On the topic of Cyclefree's interesting article, two points: Firstly, people look at who is proposing something before deciding if they agree because all actions by the powerful are part of a package. If a Marxist wants to increase public debt it may be part of a wider plan to put capitalism under pressure; if a Tory does so it is likely to have a different motive; and motives matter.
Secondly, though not as bad as Trump this government has been careless in its rhetoric about courts and accountability. However at no point has it acted, SFAICS, to prevent any court from doing its task of requiring government to obey its own laws, nor has it been reported as breaching any orders of the courts.
Governments are, through parliamentary elections, sackable by us. They remain fully accountable, via a small army of very bright lawyers and the courts, for adhering to their own laws.
A free press helps. The Guardian et al is unlikely to miss much in their scrutiny. The article makes the sobering point that millions of people, including some who are not unintelligent, voted for an anti Semitic party. But most declined to do so, (including many working class people in the north of England) and most people voted for clearly anti racist parties. As a result some of the highest offices in the land are held by members of ethnic minorities, and Jewish people are not fleeing the UK to Israel for refuge.
PS And even Labour looks like appointing a leader who seems to be a democratic centre left candidate and impossible to think of as being a racist - so there is light at the end of this tunnel too.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
And as an AGW denier.
He’s a ridiculous fraud. It was not surprising to hear he is president of his local toy soldiers society.
LOL. When you have lost the argument you launch the ad hominem attacks. It really does show how utterly devoid of reasonable arguments you are.
I will take all of that as a compliment and a sign you know you have lost the argument.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I wonder if it's not a deliberate strategy (or at least not wargamed as such even if Hunt isn't in on the strategy). In a perfect world where you are trying to build up herd immunity without overwhelming the NHS you would want to gradually reduce the transmission rate so that it hits 1 and then stays there at about the point that the NHS hits saturation. With the massive advantage we have of being behind other countries we are going to get people already working from home, practising social distancing etc. even without the government telling them to. That reduces the transmission rate. As more people become aware they will do likewise - which again will slowly reduce the transmission rate again. The best way of doing this is to say 'we will need to do this at some point but not yet' and have others going 'well lets do it now anyway' - you get to effectively introduce it gradually.
I agree, it is possible Hunt is playing a role agreed with the govt in this to get us to a halfway point and also make the introduction of restrictions smoother when it does happen by raising support for them now.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
The UK's position is not dissimilar to Singapore's - they decided school closures would be counter productive too.
Singapore currently has 91 active cases and is well on the way to eliminating the virus (for now). No attempt to build herd immunity, just wipe it out. That seems the exact opposite of what we are doing.
If you have wiped it out then would you not need to prevent travel in and out of the country for the forseeable future to keep it out? A small city state like Singapore might be able to try to screen everyone arriving in the country but it's unlikely to be practical in most countries.
On the topic of Cyclefree's interesting article, two points: Firstly, people look at who is proposing something before deciding if they agree because all actions by the powerful are part of a package. If a Marxist wants to increase public debt it may be part of a wider plan to put capitalism under pressure; if a Tory does so it is likely to have a different motive; and motives matter.
Secondly, though not as bad as Trump this government has been careless in its rhetoric about courts and accountability. However at no point has it acted, SFAICS, to prevent any court from doing its task of requiring government to obey its own laws, nor has it been reported as breaching any orders of the courts.
Governments are, through parliamentary elections, sackable by us. They remain fully accountable, via a small army of very bright lawyers and the courts, for adhering to their own laws.
A free press helps. The Guardian et al is unlikely to miss much in their scrutiny. The article makes the sobering point that millions of people, including some who are not unintelligent, voted for an anti Semitic party. But most declined to do so, (including many working class people in the north of England) and most people voted for clearly anti racist parties. As a result some of the highest offices in the land are held by members of ethnic minorities, and Jewish people are not fleeing the UK to Israel for refuge.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
I'd go with Taiwan, where the deputy president is an epidemiologist.
I would trust his judgment, but he will be relying on the advice presented to him by Taiwanese modellers/epidemiologists. I don't think the quality of that modelling will be as high as in the US/UK/Germany.
On the contrary, they have been continuously planning for an outbreak of this kind since SARS in 2005, as their response this time bears out. It's not just the quality of the scientists (and it is increasingly foolish to underestimate the improvement in the life sciences in the Asian economies), but the amount of time and effort which has gone in to it.
This is probably unfair, but we appear to have dusted off a plan from 2011.
It is grossly unfair. I rather doubt there is a "grand plan".
There is plan that is continuously evolving as new data come in.
I am not underestimating the improvement in sciences in Asia. I am a regular visitor to China and S. Korea, and advise two other Asian countries on certain aspects of their science policy.
On the topic of Cyclefree's interesting article, two points: Firstly, people look at who is proposing something before deciding if they agree because all actions by the powerful are part of a package. If a Marxist wants to increase public debt it may be part of a wider plan to put capitalism under pressure; if a Tory does so it is likely to have a different motive; and motives matter.
Secondly, though not as bad as Trump this government has been careless in its rhetoric about courts and accountability. However at no point has it acted, SFAICS, to prevent any court from doing its task of requiring government to obey its own laws, nor has it been reported as breaching any orders of the courts.
Governments are, through parliamentary elections, sackable by us. They remain fully accountable, via a small army of very bright lawyers and the courts, for adhering to their own laws.
A free press helps. The Guardian et al is unlikely to miss much in their scrutiny. The article makes the sobering point that millions of people, including some who are not unintelligent, voted for an anti Semitic party. But most declined to do so, (including many working class people in the north of England) and most people voted for clearly anti racist parties. As a result some of the highest offices in the land are held by members of ethnic minorities, and Jewish people are not fleeing the UK to Israel for refuge.
Agreed. Also look at how the BNP was comprehensively rejected at the ballot box. I believe that the British people are pretty good at spotting extrmists and unpleasant 'isms' - and vote accordingly.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
I am not sneering at the scientists. I am sneering at ignorant trolls like you.
Also do please point me to any post ever where I have dismissed the OBR or even criticised them.
Ever.
It is sad you have decided that as you have no logical arguments to make you have to resort to smears and lies. It does seem to be your go to position when you have run out of other excuses.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
The OBR are economists. Economics is not a science... (hides behind sofa)
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
I'd go with Taiwan, where the deputy president is an epidemiologist.
I would trust his judgment, but he will be relying on the advice presented to him by Taiwanese modellers/epidemiologists. I don't think the quality of that modelling will be as high as in the US/UK/Germany.
On the contrary, they have been continuously planning for an outbreak of this kind since SARS in 2005, as their response this time bears out. It's not just the quality of the scientists (and it is increasingly foolish to underestimate the improvement in the life sciences in the Asian economies), but the amount of time and effort which has gone in to it.
This is probably unfair, but we appear to have dusted off a plan from 2011.
It is grossly unfair. I rather doubt there is a "grand plan".
There is plan that is continuously evolving as new data come in.
I am not underestimating the improvement in sciences in Asia. I am a regular visitor to China and S. Korea, and advise two other Asian countries on certain aspects of their science policy.
There is a curious symmetry about the assumptions of the 2011 plan and what is being done, unfair or not.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Our friend is totally wrong if he thinks it's just simply about mininising deaths. It is a fine balance between health and costs over the long-term.
But there are feedback loops whereby we are likely to get a CFR higher than China has seen. Something akin to Italy.
We will smooth the curve as best as possible but as soon as this goes pop we will look like Italy. As you know, the plan is to look like Italy for at least 3-months, i.e let this virus do its thing.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
I am not sneering at the scientists. I am sneering at ignorant trolls like you.
Also do please point me to any post ever where I have dismissed the OBR or even criticised them.
Ever.
It is sad you have decided that as you have no logical arguments to make you have to resort to smears and lies. It does seem to be your go to position when you have run out of other excuses.
I am not accusing you of sneering at scientists. I am accusing you of sneering at me, and others, who merely raise the question of whether the government’s policy is the right one.
If you are happy to back the OBR, fine. You’ll note their recent forecast about the considerable dent to this country’s growth prospects caused by Brexit.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
Parties notice what people do more than what people say. As a result of what people do no major party at the moment will go into an election promising to raise taxes on people in exchange for higher expenditure on NHS or social care. Voters choose, and voters take the consequence.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
Yes clearly there is way more volatility in this choice, also so many unknowns.
Does it need to be made explicit, Im not sure. Its very complex so few people will understand it. It will add to anxiety and division. Anxiety reduces our immune response and makes us less likely to work as a team. Im not really sure what the benefits of it being explicit are?
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
The OBR are economists. Economics is not a science... (hides behind sofa)
Lol.
Economics is a social science. Economics and epidemiology are more closely related than certain lead-sniffers which to admit.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
The OBR are economists. Economics is not a science... (hides behind sofa)
Economists use decimal points to show the world they have a sense of humour.....
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
And as an AGW denier.
He’s a ridiculous fraud. It was not surprising to hear he is president of his local toy soldiers society.
Why are you not surprised to hear he does miniature wargames? What do you think that means? He dresses up in combats and LARPs? Or he has an interest in history and this is merely one way of expressing it?
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
Yes clearly there is way more volatility in this choice, also so many unknowns.
Does it need to be made explicit, Im not sure. Its very complex so few people will understand it. It will add to anxiety and division. Anxiety reduces our immune response and makes us less likely to work as a team. Im not really sure what the benefits of it being explicit are?
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
Yes clearly there is way more volatility in this choice, also so many unknowns.
Does it need to be made explicit, Im not sure. Its very complex so few people will understand it. It will add to anxiety and division. Anxiety reduces our immune response and makes us less likely to work as a team. Im not really sure what the benefits of it being explicit are?
The benefits are to see if society agrees with it? Before we make a catastrophic mistake.
But it's out of our hands now.
The decision is DONE.
Put a ring around everyone who is old and seal them in a cocoon.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
The OBR are economists. Economics is not a science... (hides behind sofa)
Lol.
Economics is a social science. Economics and epidemiology are more closely related than certain lead-sniffers which to admit.
Economics is at least at the sane end of the social science spectrum.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
It is also not, in the end, a matter of number of deaths. As we see studies showing the long term health effects of surviving after this virus, the NHS will be put under more pressure as more and more are living with those effects.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
The point is that Cummings and Johnson have direct access to the experts and their modelling. Hunt and Stewart do not.
You have a touching faith in the omniscience of our rulers.
Once again, it has nothing to do with our rulers. It has everything to do with the experts who are advising them.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
But as a Brexiter, you don’t believe in expertise.
And as an AGW denier.
He’s a ridiculous fraud. It was not surprising to hear he is president of his local toy soldiers society.
Why are you not surprised to hear he does miniature wargames? What do you think that means? He dresses up in combats and LARPs? Or he has an interest in history and this is merely one way of expressing it?
Confused.
If one was to write a novel about a ranting Brexiter ideologue, one would put him in Lincolnshire, and have him very keen on toy soldiers.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
A nice day out for the "they are Brexiteers so they must be thick" attack line.
FWIW Having reflected on it overnight I think the government's strategy is the right one long term HOWEVER once our infections/deaths go past several countries the pressure on the government will be to reverse ferret and I'm not sure Boris Johnson has the ability to stay unpopular in his locker.
So we'll get the worst of all worlds on our pandemic response.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
I knew it before I looked it up
Jeremy Hunt, PPE, Oxford, Rory Stewart, PPE, Oxford.
They are not even scientists -- let alone experts in epidemiology, or even medicine.
Dominic Cummings, History, Oxford. Boris Johnson, Classics, Oxford.
The system has always been scientists advise, politicians decide.
But on the figures, the UK would have to have v. good reasons to follow de facto US policy and ignore rest of Europe plus E Asia.
It's almost as if Brexit has left a group of people unhinged and desperate to become the 51st. state.
You are sounding like Piers Morgan.
If you want some reassurance, our policy is most like Germany's.
And of the countries in the world with access to top scientific advice, I'd go: 1. The US, 2 The UK, 3 Germany.
The US is different because the politicians won't listen to the scientists,
I'd go with Taiwan, where the deputy president is an epidemiologist.
I would trust his judgment, but he will be relying on the advice presented to him by Taiwanese modellers/epidemiologists. I don't think the quality of that modelling will be as high as in the US/UK/Germany.
On the contrary, they have been continuously planning for an outbreak of this kind since SARS in 2005, as their response this time bears out. It's not just the quality of the scientists (and it is increasingly foolish to underestimate the improvement in the life sciences in the Asian economies), but the amount of time and effort which has gone in to it.
This is probably unfair, but we appear to have dusted off a plan from 2011.
It is grossly unfair. I rather doubt there is a "grand plan".
There is plan that is continuously evolving as new data come in.
I am not underestimating the improvement in sciences in Asia. I am a regular visitor to China and S. Korea, and advise two other Asian countries on certain aspects of their science policy.
There is a curious symmetry about the assumptions of the 2011 plan and what is being done, unfair or not.
I haven't looked at the 2011 plan, but it is not surprising to me that there has been some contingency planning done.
The choices of action in response to a major pandemic are limited. So, some points of contact will be the same. But, with the scientific expertise we have in this country, we will not just be blindly dusting off a decades-old plan.
The modelling will be being performed continuously as new data come in. By multiple groups with multiple codes and multiple assumptions.
I doubt if there is "a plan", as opposed to a continuously evolving best course of action suggested by the modelling and the data, set by the aim of reducing the total number of deaths this year.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available? And could different countries (and people) not validly prefer and choose different approaches despite using similar scientific principles and modelling techniques? I would think they could and this is probably what to an extent is happening.
It`s not the only metric. Economic disruption and curtailments of our freedom are in the mix too.
At the end of all this, there is a clear metric -- total number of deaths due to COVID-19 per head of population over the course of the pandemic.
Our Government Scientists are acting to reduce that metric.
Many of the parameters of the epidemic are known to sufficient certainty. The uncertainty can be modelled in the inference from the data.
The only major unknown is when a vaccine will be routinely available to all. No-one has suggested a timescale less than a year for that -- and two years seems likely to me.
Also, I am not actually sure that the Government is behaving very differently to Germany or France or Spain. We are just behind them.
But IS that the clear and single metric? For example, more deaths but a smaller hit to the economy - is that not potentially a valid choice if available?...
How many governments are going to be up front about that kind of choice ? And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
Every year the Chancellor says how much money we will spend on the NHS and care. There will be a relationship between that spending and the number of deaths we can prevent. That trade off has been made by society since it started, its rarely explicitly discussed in those terms but has always been made.
It is a far sharper choice this time, though. And deserves to be made explicit.
It is also not, in the end, a matter of number of deaths. As we see studies showing the long term health effects of surviving after this virus, the NHS will be put under more pressure as more and more are living with those effects.
Should we go full Italy, then that might not be a problem...
But agreed, that is an aspect of the disease little discussed so far (though at this stage, the data are limited, and many of the reports come form China where lung disease is of a different order than here).
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
I am not sneering at the scientists. I am sneering at ignorant trolls like you.
Also do please point me to any post ever where I have dismissed the OBR or even criticised them.
Ever.
It is sad you have decided that as you have no logical arguments to make you have to resort to smears and lies. It does seem to be your go to position when you have run out of other excuses.
I am not accusing you of sneering at scientists. I am accusing you of sneering at me, and others, who merely raise the question of whether the government’s policy is the right one.
If you are happy to back the OBR, fine. You’ll note their recent forecast about the considerable dent to this country’s growth prospects caused by Brexit.
I have noted those risks since long before we ever looked like leaving. I am not one of those who pretended there would be no cost. I just believed it would be worth it in the end.
You on the other hand are clearly siding with the ill informed, anti-science lobby against those in the very best position to make these decisions. You are no better than the anti-vaxers and just as dangerous.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
A nice day out for the "they are Brexiteers so they must be thick" attack line.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
These two are not rent-a-gob politicians
Might they, perhaps quite justifiably some might say (including myself), have a prejudice against the PM though?
Hunt in particular has been defending and supporting the government line for the last few weeks, something changed yesterday.
I think the strategy might have pivoted from the South Korean model to the original plan of accepting the poison for the long-term gain.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs. .
Yes.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
I am not sneering at the scientists. I am sneering at ignorant trolls like you.
Also do please point me to any post ever where I have dismissed the OBR or even criticised them.
Ever.
It is sad you have decided that as you have no logical arguments to make you have to resort to smears and lies. It does seem to be your go to position when you have run out of other excuses.
I am not accusing you of sneering at scientists. I am accusing you of sneering at me, and others, who merely raise the question of whether the government’s policy is the right one.
If you are happy to back the OBR, fine. You’ll note their recent forecast about the considerable dent to this country’s growth prospects caused by Brexit.
I have noted those risks since long before we ever looked like leaving. I am not one of those who pretended there would be no cost. I just believed it would be worth it in the end.
You on the other hand are clearly siding with the ill informed, anti-science lobby against those in the very best position to make these decisions. You are no better than the anti-vaxers and just as dangerous.
Anti-vaxxers are those who perpetuate a conspiracy-laden myth to the detriment of the country’s well being.
Which I’d have rather thought applies more to you than me.
I'm fairly certain when Rory Stewart was Governor of an Iraqi province he had to deal with an outbreak of some infectious disease, so he's not some idiot on this topic.
As for Jeremy Hunt who knows, he might still have contacts at the NHS/PHE who are concerned about the government's strategy and have asked him to speak out.
Of course the mortality for ebola is such that herd immunity is not an option and eradication is essential. He may be misapplying the lessons he learned in this previous incident but he is no fool, nor is he ignorant.
Once you get your head round the fact that the government's policy is to play the long game with this, then you can understand the logic.
This plan has been around for a decade or more, they have dusted if off and tweaked it. But it is a long-term plan for the country. Is the plan out of date and faulty? Who knows. I think it is but my view means little.
However, let's be clear what the plan means.
We are trading 100,000 to 500,000 deaths in the next few months for the benefit that we can emerge from this pandemic over the next-five years unshackled from some sort of permanent lockdown.
Some of the consequences of our plan: long-term we hopefully just get on with our lives as before. That's great.
Some bad ones: lots of people are going to die. But more than that, lots more people as a proportion of those who get sick, are going to die.
We have an old population, we have an obese population, we have a multimorbid population and we have a healthcare system that is always under strain at the best of times.
So where China might have produced a 1% CFR. My very strong feeling is that we will be somewhere above that. Potentially up to 5%.
So that's the trade-off guys. Short term extreme pain versus long-term gain.
It will be grim and the government will be the most unpopular one in history I think. But we might come out of it, fit and ready to grow.
1% of 80% of our population is 540k. 5% would be 2.7m. I very much hope that you are wrong.
My concerns are: (1) the assumption that any attempt to eradicate the virus is doomed to fail and simply postpones misery. (2) the Iceberg assumption on which the current model is built. (3) the possibility of effective anti-virals being found or a vaccine being developed with the result pain deferred is pain saved. (4) The risk that mutation of the virus means that our very hard won herd immunity has limited effectiveness.
None of these means that the government is wrong. I have absolute respect for their dedication and focus on this. But it is frankly foolish not to worry when the price we are being asked to pay is so high.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
If Jeremy Hunt has an issue with the government’s handling of the virus, he has plenty of ways in which he can communicate with the decision-markers directly without going on TV.
At times like these, discussion ought to be public, not behind closed doors.
I’ve no problem with him publishing his evidence and discussing it. But he doesn’t have any.
I hope his personal action plan has been to stop sleeping in a different home every night - and acting as the worst possible super-spreader.
Meanwhile, cheap jokes aside, Jeremy Hunt has (politely) criticised the government. He seems to have changed his mind in the past 4 days as his tweets were more moderate then.
I have no confidence in the UK or US governments. The prognosis seems to be
1 trebles all round for funeral directors 2 quite a few parliamentary byelections.
Jeremy Hunt doesn’t strike me as a rabble rousing populist. Neither does Rory Stewart.
The fact that both are on the record as demurring against government policy is very disquieting.
If Jeremy Hunt has an issue with the government’s handling of the virus, he has plenty of ways in which he can communicate with the decision-markers directly without going on TV.
At times like these, discussion ought to be public, not behind closed doors.
I’ve no problem with him publishing his evidence and discussing it. But he doesn’t have any.
The Chinese are now bobbling along at roughly 20 new cases a day. They have 13.5k active cases with a very high percentage of critical so there are more deaths to come. But their total infections (recorded) are 81K, less than 0.1% of their population. Does that not make you pause? Our assumption is that somewhere between 60 and 80% will get this. They are less than 0.1%. How is that possible?
I'm not due to meet anyone vulnerable in the near future, and work is now gonna be quiet for 6 weeks. So now would be a great time for me to help with the herd immunity by catching the bloody thing.
Scenario: you work, you've recently been in hospital with a respiratory problem, including time in ICU . You've got a young school aged child. You are not fully recovered from what put you in hospital and have reduced lung function.
What advice has the government given or actions it has taken that are actionable/useful for you?
None, Take your child out of school and nail up your front door.
Which is effectively what we are doing. But that opens us up to prosecution for taking our child out of school.
You would hope that is the least of their concerns at present.
So do we think Sunday's football match in Glasgow will
1) Take place?
2) Take place behind closed doors?
I'm sure they'll be fine to postpone it, it's not much of a derby considering Sevco were only formed in 2012.
There's stories that the reason the Scottish Government's advice on restricting events to under 500 people from Monday is to allow the match to go ahead.
Thought they had cancelled all Scottish football for 3 weeks
Scenario: you work, you've recently been in hospital with a respiratory problem, including time in ICU . You've got a young school aged child. You are not fully recovered from what put you in hospital and have reduced lung function.
What advice has the government given or actions it has taken that are actionable/useful for you?
None, Take your child out of school and nail up your front door.
Which is effectively what we are doing. But that opens us up to prosecution for taking our child out of school.
I know someone who among other things deals with processing pupil absencse for Glasgow City Council, a system where parents notify online that their kids are going to be off for appointments, illness etc; numbers have been increasing exponentially with corona virus given as a reason. There'll surely come a point when government has to recognise & regularise this.
"This not just a lesson for Labour. It is a lesson for voters too. Over 10 million of them rationalised away any queasiness they may have felt and voted for a party which shares the unenviable claim of being, like the neo-Nazi BNP, investigated by the EHRC for anti-semitism and institutional racism. This was not a deal-breaker."
I normally read your articles with interest whether I agree with them or not, but I'm sorry, this was simply a disgusting thing to write.
I have a number of friends who equate "Tory" with "racist", and I regularly speak out firmly against them on that, and sometimes get treated as a closet-Tory as a result (despite being very left myself). I have similarly spoken out against anti-religious bigotry from people on the left on this site, and met an analogous response. Both of these things infuriate me, but what I have seen from the left does not even begin to compare with the racism that is widespread on the right.
Labour has serious problems with anti-Semitism to deal with, but to suggest for one second that people who oppose racism should feel queasy about voting Labour, but not any other major UK party, is beyond delusional.
Comments
I didn’t get that sense of encouragement to do what the tweeter describes from yesterday’s press conference at all.
1) Take place?
2) Take place behind closed doors?
I'm sure they'll be fine to postpone it, it's not much of a derby considering Sevco were only formed in 2012.
There's stories that the reason the Scottish Government's advice on restricting events to under 500 people from Monday is to allow the match to go ahead.
I’m sure the best and brightest are working around the clock to devise the best strategies.
The problem is that said strategies:
(a)
Entail c 400,00 deaths in the next 12-18 months of the old and vulnerable, and perhaps 4m hospitalisations.
(b)
Rest on assumptions that may be belied by the profile of the epidemic in response to stricter policies implemented by countries in the Far East.
Indeed, as @edmundintokyo has pointed out, those “stricter policies” are not even particularly costly.
It is less than two weeks since the PM was encouraging us to keep handshaking, yet as we PBers (and certainly @Eadric) have known for 8 weeks now, the lethal potential of this plague was already obvious.
Some sneering types on here accuse me of ignoring “the science” but I also haven’t seen a slam dunk reason one here why a different approach is not appropriate.
Anyway, enough. I’m supposed to be WFH.
This plan has been around for a decade or more, they have dusted if off and tweaked it. But it is a long-term plan for the country. Is the plan out of date and faulty? Who knows. I think it is but my view means little.
However, let's be clear what the plan means.
We are trading 100,000 to 500,000 deaths in the next few months for the benefit that we can emerge from this pandemic over the next-five years unshackled from some sort of permanent lockdown.
Some of the consequences of our plan: long-term we hopefully just get on with our lives as before. That's great.
Some bad ones: lots of people are going to die. But more than that, lots more people as a proportion of those who get sick, are going to die.
We have an old population, we have an obese population, we have a multimorbid population and we have a healthcare system that is always under strain at the best of times.
So where China might have produced a 1% CFR. My very strong feeling is that we will be somewhere above that. Potentially up to 5%.
So that's the trade-off guys. Short term extreme pain versus long-term gain.
It will be grim and the government will be the most unpopular one in history I think. But we might come out of it, fit and ready to grow.
I suspect that Rory's experience in wartime Iraq may not be hugely relevant,
At the moment, people are more worried about not having enough medical staff - hence the reluctance to close schools in NRW too many doctors and nurses have children to take care of. And there's a push to change the guidelines on quarantining medical staff who have been exposed to known infections - and change it to allowing people to carry on working but testing them every day. At the moment if one member of staff tests positive, you're likely supposed to quarantine the entire shift for 14 days, it's not going to be practical.
The bottom line is do I trust the guy with decades of experience and expertise in epidemiology or do I trust the bloke with a PPE.
You trust the politician if you like. I am sticking with the Epidemiologist.
Sky Bet say current Mayoral bets will stand for the rescheduled elections if they are rescheduled rather than void.
Just something to be aware of if you're arbitraging with Betfair (I'm not in this market) or some such as I reckon the Betfair market will void.
Khan should win whenever they take place.
https://twitter.com/guardiannews/status/1238403686205923329
It's not just the quality of the scientists (and it is increasingly foolish to underestimate the improvement in the life sciences in the Asian economies), but the amount of time and effort which has gone in to it.
This is probably unfair, but we appear to have dusted off a plan from 2011.
- Stewart has a recent history of bizarre announcements, and the way he left the Tory party must some doubts over his judgment. He's also struggling to make much if any impact in the mayoral race, so this could have been his last big roll of the dice.
- Hunt may well still be smarting from losing the leadership race to Johnson, is positioning to replace him in the event the current strategy doesn't work at minimal risk, and/or thinks he has a duty to make sure an opposing view is heard in public.
The question I keep coming back to is why none of the actual rent-a-gob politicians are making much noise over this? Or even just the reasonably sensible people on Opposition benches.
It's hard to believe the likes of Abbott, Davey, Blackford, Milliband, Khan, Lucas, etc (to pick some names at semi-random) have all simultaneously decided that the government should just be given a free ride. In particular, neither of the two trailing in the Labour leadership seem to have made any attempts at political capital over this.
If we think the discussion is brutal here, imagine being in that decision-making room.
The idea that this is science or epidemiology is nonsense. It is about a judgement of TRADE OFFs.
We are making one judgement others are making another.
When all is said and done, we will find out who got it right.
We are the control arm in the biggest trial the world has ever seen.
How are we to know how many cases there are? Without testing everyone what about running a poll and comparing how many people have a cough compared to how many would normally be expected to have one? But do we have a figure for that?
Since people are advised to stay at home in they have symptoms how are we supposed to have any idea what the actual number of cases is?
It was not surprising to hear he is president of his local toy soldiers society.
But it comes back to my point, the govt team are very much aware of the points you raised and still think their plan is best suited to the UK as of today. In coming days many of the measures people are calling for will be introduced. Why is anyone better placed than them? I guess they could become overly emotionally attached to their original plan when new evidence comes along but really it comes down to CMO, CSO, experts working together > edmundintokyo, eadric, Farage, Stewart. There is nothing relevant the latter group know or have considered that the former group dont know or havent considered. The same is not true the other way around.
The actions you should take depend on where you think you are on the curve.
I think we are (roughly speaking) at a comparable stage as Germany, perhaps a little behind them.
So I would expect (roughly speaking) us to be doing the same as Germany, perhaps a little behind them.
I mean, at this stage I am “happy” to follow government advice and indeed policy.
But it is senseless to insist sneeringly that the scientists have this all sewn up, as @Richard_Tyndall, @YBarddCwsc, and others do.
Weirdly they mostly appear to be Brexiters, who dismiss the OBR, for example, as mere crystal ball gazers.
Secondly, though not as bad as Trump this government has been careless in its rhetoric about courts and accountability. However at no point has it acted, SFAICS, to prevent any court from doing its task of requiring government to obey its own laws, nor has it been reported as breaching any orders of the courts.
Governments are, through parliamentary elections, sackable by us. They remain fully accountable, via a small army of very bright lawyers and the courts, for adhering to their own laws.
A free press helps. The Guardian et al is unlikely to miss much in their scrutiny.
The article makes the sobering point that millions of people, including some who are not unintelligent, voted for an anti Semitic party. But most declined to do so, (including many working class people in the north of England) and most people voted for clearly anti racist parties. As a result some of the highest offices in the land are held by members of ethnic minorities, and Jewish people are not fleeing the UK to Israel for refuge.
PS And even Labour looks like appointing a leader who seems to be a democratic centre left candidate and impossible to think of as being a racist - so there is light at the end of this tunnel too.
I will take all of that as a compliment and a sign you know you have lost the argument.
Did you see him telling the supporters to put their fucking hands away?
What a shame for all his remarkable work that this year will be the year of the pandemic and not the year Liverpool won the league.
Oh well. He will fight through it and be strong again.
And would it be a valid choice if you were to make it covertly while insisting you're doing otherwise ?
If you have wiped it out then would you not need to prevent travel in and out of the country for the forseeable future to keep it out? A small city state like Singapore might be able to try to screen everyone arriving in the country but it's unlikely to be practical in most countries.
There is plan that is continuously evolving as new data come in.
I am not underestimating the improvement in sciences in Asia. I am a regular visitor to China and S. Korea, and advise two other Asian countries on certain aspects of their science policy.
Also do please point me to any post ever where I have dismissed the OBR or even criticised them.
Ever.
It is sad you have decided that as you have no logical arguments to make you have to resort to smears and lies. It does seem to be your go to position when you have run out of other excuses.
https://www.ecb.co.uk/england/men/news/1645171/ecb-statement-test-series-in-sri-lanka-postponed
But there are feedback loops whereby we are likely to get a CFR higher than China has seen. Something akin to Italy.
We will smooth the curve as best as possible but as soon as this goes pop we will look like Italy. As you know, the plan is to look like Italy for at least 3-months, i.e let this virus do its thing.
And deserves to be made explicit.
I am accusing you of sneering at me, and others, who merely raise the question of whether the government’s policy is the right one.
If you are happy to back the OBR, fine. You’ll note their recent forecast about the considerable dent to this country’s growth prospects caused by Brexit.
Does it need to be made explicit, Im not sure. Its very complex so few people will understand it. It will add to anxiety and division. Anxiety reduces our immune response and makes us less likely to work as a team. Im not really sure what the benefits of it being explicit are?
Economics is a social science.
Economics and epidemiology are more closely related than certain lead-sniffers which to admit.
Confused.
But it's out of our hands now.
The decision is DONE.
Put a ring around everyone who is old and seal them in a cocoon.
Everyone else, good luck!
It's been a while.
So we'll get the worst of all worlds on our pandemic response.
The choices of action in response to a major pandemic are limited. So, some points of contact will be the same. But, with the scientific expertise we have in this country, we will not just be blindly dusting off a decades-old plan.
The modelling will be being performed continuously as new data come in. By multiple groups with multiple codes and multiple assumptions.
I doubt if there is "a plan", as opposed to a continuously evolving best course of action suggested by the modelling and the data, set by the aim of reducing the total number of deaths this year.
The big question is what happens to Liverpool and the rest of promotion and relegation and european qualification
This thread is seeking scientific expertise
I mean I didn't want The Hundred to happen but not like this.
1 9 Covid Corona
2 Liverpool
But agreed, that is an aspect of the disease little discussed so far (though at this stage, the data are limited, and many of the reports come form China where lung disease is of a different order than here).
You on the other hand are clearly siding with the ill informed, anti-science lobby against those in the very best position to make these decisions. You are no better than the anti-vaxers and just as dangerous.
Which I’d have rather thought applies more to you than me.
Of course the mortality for ebola is such that herd immunity is not an option and eradication is essential. He may be misapplying the lessons he learned in this previous incident but he is no fool, nor is he ignorant.
My concerns are:
(1) the assumption that any attempt to eradicate the virus is doomed to fail and simply postpones misery.
(2) the Iceberg assumption on which the current model is built.
(3) the possibility of effective anti-virals being found or a vaccine being developed with the result pain deferred is pain saved.
(4) The risk that mutation of the virus means that our very hard won herd immunity has limited effectiveness.
None of these means that the government is wrong. I have absolute respect for their dedication and focus on this. But it is frankly foolish not to worry when the price we are being asked to pay is so high.
"This not just a lesson for Labour. It is a lesson for voters too. Over 10 million of them rationalised away any queasiness they may have felt and voted for a party which shares the unenviable claim of being, like the neo-Nazi BNP, investigated by the EHRC for anti-semitism and institutional racism. This was not a deal-breaker."
I normally read your articles with interest whether I agree with them or not, but I'm sorry, this was simply a disgusting thing to write.
I have a number of friends who equate "Tory" with "racist", and I regularly speak out firmly against them on that, and sometimes get treated as a closet-Tory as a result (despite being very left myself). I have similarly spoken out against anti-religious bigotry from people on the left on this site, and met an analogous response. Both of these things infuriate me, but what I have seen from the left does not even begin to compare with the racism that is widespread on the right.
Labour has serious problems with anti-Semitism to deal with, but to suggest for one second that people who oppose racism should feel queasy about voting Labour, but not any other major UK party, is beyond delusional.