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  • philiphphiliph Posts: 4,704

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
  • TGOHF666TGOHF666 Posts: 2,052

    TGOHF666 said:

    Andy_JS said:

    HYUFD said:
    getting it wrong again? How surprising.
    More to the point, Keir Starmer has been getting it wrong.

    If the opposition doesn't talk about how badly the government has screwed this up and the press are on the government's side as well, the government can get away with the kind of catastrophic incompetence we saw right through March.
    We haven’t hear much since R Reeves released her dodgy dossier of PPE Del Boys half of whom hadn’t even phoned up the government.

    As usual the opposition will come from the right of the Con party.
    I thought the government was coming from the right of the Con party.
    Have you missed Hancock up on the podium day after day promising eternal communism ?

    What will end the lockdown is the new cases and deaths - once these drop to small numbers - or are limited to pensioners, the public will head out.
  • felixfelix Posts: 15,122
    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Yup they're not paranoid they know the Tories are out to get them! :smiley:
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911
    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
  • TGOHF666TGOHF666 Posts: 2,052

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Perhaps Labour voters are more susceptible because they tend to ignore the lockdown advice and don't wash their hands ?

  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951
    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Good morning, Twitter.....
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Bollocks. Tory austerity as you put it has fuck all to do with it. You just want someone to blame.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    Hard to see that it won’t drain the battery, given the way it works, despite what was promised yesterday. I guess I will find out when I get my letter.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951
    edited May 2020

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Nature just levelling up on those Remainers v Leavers death stats we used to hear so much about?

    Good morning, snowflakes...
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Bollocks. Tory austerity as you put it has fuck all to do with it. You just want someone to blame.
    Plus ignoring the greatest contribution of all - age - makes the comment absolutely preposterous.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    ydoethur said:

    Nigelb said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    A London bus weighs less than 200 MPs....
    Well, possibly, now Pickles and Prescott have been kicked upstairs.
    I’d have thought the opposite, regardless of where they are sitting on the bus.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    edited May 2020
    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
  • blairfblairf Posts: 98
    The morbidly obese must wfh for a year. Just seen that floated as official return to work guidance. To anyone working in HR, I'm sorry for what you about to have to go through ;-)
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287
    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
  • SouthamObserverSouthamObserver Posts: 38,874
    US government projections of 3,000 virus deaths a day in June as it spreads into rural areas. If that is right, the long tail will ensure the Trump administration’s response to covid-19 and the inadequacies of the US healthcare system will be front and centre well into autumn.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951
    MaxPB said:

    Mortimer said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    glw said:

    Although vast number Facebook every detail of "details about their social circles."

    app right now.
    joining in the plundering.
    and therefore the individual cannot be identified in person I do not see the problem. I will use the app. That is a given AFAIC.
    Especially since you can later uninstall the app and you can always disable bluetooth whenever you please. The government can already triangulate your position. Sharing contacts for a few weeks using a voluntary app that you can disable at any time doesn't seem like a major invasion to me.
    Small beer compared with pubs being closed for months.



    I like a good pub.

    But I am baffled by the moaning about them being closed.

    They're a means to an end, surely? I can buy in better booze than most pubs, and cook as well as all but the top gastros.

    You don't go to the pub for the booze or the food.
    But - you can do pub quizzes on line now too.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911
    TGOHF666 said:

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Perhaps Labour voters are more susceptible because they tend to ignore the lockdown advice and don't wash their hands ?

    Tories have lots of practice washing their hands of things...
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 12,880

    https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson_MP/status/1257264763530285056?s=20

    Was there much regret shown by Burns' fellow Tories or did they think he was a shit too?

    Look at his fucking face. He's actually tory at a genetic level.
  • OnlyLivingBoyOnlyLivingBoy Posts: 14,911

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Nature just levelling up on those Remainers v Leavers death stats we used to hear so much about?

    Good morning, snowflakes...
    If you put it like that. Cummings has no use for elderly leavers in Labour seats now anyway, they have fulfilled their purpose.
    Christ, you people still boring on about snowflakes? You're reminding me why I ignore this site for months on end.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Of course not.

    Cheeky sod :-D .
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    On the Isle of Wight? Give over.....

  • TGOHF666TGOHF666 Posts: 2,052
    blairf said:

    The morbidly obese must wfh for a year. Just seen that floated as official return to work guidance. To anyone working in HR, I'm sorry for what you about to have to go through ;-)

    A good incentive to ditch the pies and get excersizing.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951

    philiph said:

    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    I assume IoW will be a comfortable Con hold once Cummings and pals get hold of the data for voter targeting on social media. I'm not touching this app with a barge pole as long as Cummings is in the govt.
    This is the key idea of the ap plan. It is to make labour voters more susceptible to corona virus as they will refuse Cummings protection and cull them via infection before the next election.
    Labour voters are already more susceptible to Corona virus, because they tend to work in exposed areas like public transport and health and frequently come from BAME populations and live in areas with higher population density, worse underlying health conditions and poor public services after a decade of Tory austerity. If that's all a joke to you then you Tories are even sicker than I thought.
    Nature just levelling up on those Remainers v Leavers death stats we used to hear so much about?

    Good morning, snowflakes...
    If you put it like that. Cummings has no use for elderly leavers in Labour seats now anyway, they have fulfilled their purpose.
    Christ, you people still boring on about snowflakes? You're reminding me why I ignore this site for months on end.
    You've been missed.
  • AlastairMeeksAlastairMeeks Posts: 30,340
    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    glw said:

    Although vast numbers of us seem prepared to tell Facebook every detail of "details about their social circles."

    There are almost certainly thousands of people complaining on Facebook about the contact tracing app right now.
    Assumed the man furiously ....
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006
    Everyone take a Step Back from the pointless sniping. There are some known issues with this virus. It attacks fat people. It attacks people with weak immune systems. It hits men harder than women, and BAME harder than white.

    It surely has to be a given that people in the front line are the most exposed. As well as NHS staff that means people driving buses, delivering stuff, working in supermarkets and factories. Austerity hasn't put them there as there have always been people doing these kinds of jobs.

    Impact of austerity on public services? Bad. Impact of austerity specifically on services used by these groups? They don't have their own NHS or own school system or police or own access to stuff like UC. Austerity shagged everyone, and whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity. Which itself was a failure as during austerity the Tories managed to both decimate public service provision and nearly double the national debt.

    The really impressive bit is that they then found a way to not only sweep under the carpet the economic mismanagement, they persuaded the people their incompetence had hit the hardest to vote for them. I'm not a Tory, but you have to admire the craft when its politics done well...
  • MysticroseMysticrose Posts: 4,688

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
  • FF43FF43 Posts: 15,542
    Sandpit said:

    Bad App News: It appears that little testing has been done on it in advance of the IoW trial, not yet a stable version for QA. Carefully worded responses around use of data.

    Good App News: It appears that government are in favour of nudging people to use it, rather than attempting to make it in any way compulsory.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/04/revealed-governments-coronavirus-tracing-app-failed-key-tests/

    Hmm. The "good" app news is probably bad if we want this app to work as intended. And the "bad" app news is indeed bad.

  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    Morning all,

    Coronavirus: France's first known case 'was in December'

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52526554
  • TGOHF666TGOHF666 Posts: 2,052

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    edited May 2020

    MaxPB said:

    Mortimer said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    glw said:

    Although vast number Facebook every detail of "details about their social circles."

    app right now.
    joining in the plundering.
    and therefore the individual cannot be identified in person I do not see the problem. I will use the app. That is a given AFAIC.
    Especially since you can later uninstall the app and you can always disable bluetooth whenever you please. The government can already triangulate your position. Sharing contacts for a few weeks using a voluntary app that you can disable at any time doesn't seem like a major invasion to me.
    Small beer compared with pubs being closed for months.

    I like a good pub.

    But I am baffled by the moaning about them being closed.

    They're a means to an end, surely? I can buy in better booze than most pubs, and cook as well as all but the top gastros.

    You don't go to the pub for the booze or the food.
    But - you can do pub quizzes on line now too.
    Had a pub quiz via Zoom for the gym last Saturday.

    Scored 2/20 on pop music lyrics and 8/8 on politics.

    The most difficult politics question was "Which country first gave women the right to vote in 1893?". The next most difficult was "Who was PM in 1973 when the UK joined the EEC?".

    If I get the opportunity, I will start with "who is your MP?. The pop music will be about un-PC pop, starting with "When I kissed the teacher". Very tempted by the Labour Chancellors of the Exchequer since the war question.
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287
    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287

    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    Everyone take a Step Back from the pointless sniping. There are some known issues with this virus. It attacks fat people. It attacks people with weak immune systems. It hits men harder than women, and BAME harder than white.

    It surely has to be a given that people in the front line are the most exposed. As well as NHS staff that means people driving buses, delivering stuff, working in supermarkets and factories. Austerity hasn't put them there as there have always been people doing these kinds of jobs.

    Impact of austerity on public services? Bad. Impact of austerity specifically on services used by these groups? They don't have their own NHS or own school system or police or own access to stuff like UC. Austerity shagged everyone, and whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity. Which itself was a failure as during austerity the Tories managed to both decimate public service provision and nearly double the national debt.

    The really impressive bit is that they then found a way to not only sweep under the carpet the economic mismanagement, they persuaded the people their incompetence had hit the hardest to vote for them. I'm not a Tory, but you have to admire the craft when its politics done well...

    You're doubly wrong Rochdale. The fact we are printing now does not make austerity before pointless, quite the opposite. We're better positioned to withstand an economic crisis now because the deficit is smaller now than it was last time. Printing money during catastrophes while inflation is low and deflation is a risk is reasonable. Printing money all the time is not.

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
    Data is singular for the same reason that book is singular.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006
    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Hear hear. A rule that adds no clarity does not need following, especially if that 'rule' is the only objection to the usage. Fewer and less are not interchangeable in every context, but they often are.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951
    edited May 2020

    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia

    Is it right to objectify MPs?
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392

    Everyone take a Step Back from the pointless sniping. There are some known issues with this virus. It attacks fat people. It attacks people with weak immune systems. It hits men harder than women, and BAME harder than white.

    It surely has to be a given that people in the front line are the most exposed. As well as NHS staff that means people driving buses, delivering stuff, working in supermarkets and factories. Austerity hasn't put them there as there have always been people doing these kinds of jobs.

    Impact of austerity on public services? Bad. Impact of austerity specifically on services used by these groups? They don't have their own NHS or own school system or police or own access to stuff like UC. Austerity shagged everyone, and whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity. Which itself was a failure as during austerity the Tories managed to both decimate public service provision and nearly double the national debt.

    The really impressive bit is that they then found a way to not only sweep under the carpet the economic mismanagement, they persuaded the people their incompetence had hit the hardest to vote for them. I'm not a Tory, but you have to admire the craft when its politics done well...

    You're doubly wrong Rochdale. The fact we are printing now does not make austerity before pointless, quite the opposite. We're better positioned to withstand an economic crisis now because the deficit is smaller now than it was last time. Printing money during catastrophes while inflation is low and deflation is a risk is reasonable. Printing money all the time is not.

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.
    People will continue to disagree about austerity, and that's fine, but actions taken now in this highly irregular emergency do not stand as proof of its wrongness.
  • MattWMattW Posts: 18,080
    The case from December in France does interest me.

    I had much more interaction with London based family (one stoodent working in London, and a daily tube traveller working for the Mayor in the centre) in Nov / Dec than usual - probably 10-14 day all staying up here, and was badly knocked out by *something* for 6 weeks from mid-December - despite the usual flu jab.

    No way of knowing, unfortunately.

  • No_Offence_AlanNo_Offence_Alan Posts: 3,701

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
    I think it is "fewer" when dealing with whole numbers, e.g. numbers of people, but "less" with a continuous scale e.g. money. Percentages of whole numbers are a grey area.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

  • TGOHF666TGOHF666 Posts: 2,052

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    . Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how -
    So we could have gone in to this crisis borrowing at Brownian levels and had the same response ?

    Italy says hello.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 49,951

    Morning all,

    Coronavirus: France's first known case 'was in December'

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52526554

    The problem with that story is that we will now have several million who will say "I bloody KNEW I had that Coronavirus in December. So I must be immune to it now, eh? P-A-R-T-Y!!!"

    In the way that the same people will say "I had bloody terrible flu for a couple of days last week..."
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,261


    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.

    Broadly agree and language does change (e.g. I don't like "bored of" rather than "bored with" but I have to accept that the language has moved on) but not disrupting communication by still-controversial usage is a good idea. Using less for fewer still distracts lot of people (including me) from whatever you're saying (including me) in a way that data as singular doesn't, perhaps because it's a word that most people use less (not us on PB, obvs).
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 7,243

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
    Data is singular for the same reason that book is singular.
    I used to really not care either way with data, but since I became a data geek (thanks @Mysticrose, but I may as well admit it) data are, in my mind, a big (in my line of work) group of things and I do now find it jarring to read or hear "data is". Not jarring enough to 'correct' people though :wink: In normal English language for most people I think "data is" is acceptable enough - 'data' (the word, so I'll use 'is') is a synonym for 'information' for most people.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    MattW said:

    The case from December in France does interest me.

    I had much more interaction with London based family (one stoodent working in London, and a daily tube traveller working for the Mayor in the centre) in Nov / Dec than usual - probably 10-14 day all staying up here, and was badly knocked out by *something* for 6 weeks from mid-December - despite the usual flu jab.

    No way of knowing, unfortunately.

    One day there will be a reliable anti-body test.
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287

    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia

    Is it right to objectify MPs?

    I think thats down to individual conscience.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    edited May 2020

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
  • coachcoach Posts: 250
    The strangest thing I read and hear is people who think "austerity" will end once lockdown does.

    What world do these deluded people live in?
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392
    Ah arguments about austerity, takes me back to arriving on PB in 2010, this virus really has set us back years.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006
    TGOHF666 said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    . Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how -
    So we could have gone in to this crisis borrowing at Brownian levels and had the same response ?

    Italy says hello.
    I know that some of your are struggling with this simple premise. Two issues - how much money you spend and what you spend it on.

    Spend money on a big pissup? Money is gone. Spend it investing into a Brewery - many pissups. Tories made a lot of noise about "we've spent more money on the NHS". True! But not on the things the NHS needed like Doctors and facilities and PPE. No, instead you spent it creating CCGs because what we really need the not enough doctors to be doing is managing a vast array of contracts all of which need expensive legal oversight and compliance checks.

    Same with the police. How do you spend more on law and order whilst egregiously cutting police numbers? May insisted she was right and the police were wrong when she took their budget for coppers and spent in on lawyers pissups. Turns out the police were right which is how we ended up with surging crime levels and a lack of police.

    This is how we managed not to get the deficit under much control (see other EU countries) and still see the same decimation in services.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 25,042
    Selebian said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
    Data is singular for the same reason that book is singular.
    I used to really not care either way with data, but since I became a data geek (thanks @Mysticrose, but I may as well admit it) data are, in my mind, a big (in my line of work) group of things and I do now find it jarring to read or hear "data is". Not jarring enough to 'correct' people though :wink: In normal English language for most people I think "data is" is acceptable enough - 'data' (the word, so I'll use 'is') is a synonym for 'information' for most people.
    If data = *a* big group of things, then 'is' is correct, as you're referring to a singular thing, a group. If it's several things, that's different.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,749
    coach said:

    The strangest thing I read and hear is people who think "austerity" will end once lockdown does.

    What world do these deluded people live in?

    I think in the very short term the government will be hosing money everywhere trying to keep the economy afloat and the rise in unemployment to a minimum. And then the bills will start to come in. After that we face another decade of tight public spending, tougher than the one we have just been through with higher taxes.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    edited May 2020
    Selebian said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
    Data is singular for the same reason that book is singular.
    I used to really not care either way with data, but since I became a data geek (thanks @Mysticrose, but I may as well admit it) data are, in my mind, a big (in my line of work) group of things and I do now find it jarring to read or hear "data is". Not jarring enough to 'correct' people though :wink: In normal English language for most people I think "data is" is acceptable enough - 'data' (the word, so I'll use 'is') is a synonym for 'information' for most people.
    Data is a collection of information yes.

    A sentence is a collection of paragraph.
    A paragraph is a collection of sentences.
    A chapter is a collection of paragraphs.
    A book is a collection of chapters . . . and ultimately a collection of words.
    A library is a collection of books . . . and ultimately a collection of words.

    Is a book singular or plural? Is a library plural or singular. It is a collection, but it is in a whole singular. The words are plural, but the book is singular. Similarly for data - the information may be plural but the collection is singular.
  • JonathanJonathan Posts: 20,901
    edited May 2020
    It’s all very cute discussing the past, quaint even. The economic challenges we face make 2008 look like a picnic.

    I trust this government will receive the same support it gave the Brown government when it battled that crisis.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,749
    He's lost a bit of weight with his travails.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
    I think it is "fewer" when dealing with whole numbers, e.g. numbers of people, but "less" with a continuous scale e.g. money. Percentages of whole numbers are a grey area.
    Fewer pennies and less money - grey areas abound.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
    Overall debt is much lower then than the UK would have been where it not for the deficit reduction program.

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
    Overall debt is much lower then than the UK would have been where it not for the deficit reduction program.

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.
    It's clear you live down South rather than up North than.

    When Osbourne changed local Government grants so that Councils kept their council tax money rather than paying it to central Government and receiving grants back he cut the income of councils up North by 10-20% at a stroke.

    A lot of Northern Councils including (as the obvious example as it was hit worst) Northampton County Council were left with enough money for Essential Services and absolutely nothing else.

    This did work to the Tories advantage as most people have short memories so the Tories won the councils last year and now have to fix the mess.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,749
    blairf said:

    Nigelb said:

    Yokes said:

    From the previous threads headline article.

    1. The idea that if somehow Sars CoV 2 was a weapon it was a terrible failure. This is just plain wrong and has next to no merit. It'd have been rather good. I did go through the concept a week or two back on here of sub threshold strategies and weapons that are designed to cripple and damage but not invite (due to the nature of the damage or the uncertainty of the source) a proportionate response. Its a well known concept and is something that plague warriors have understood for decades.

    2. We do not know either way how the virus got into the human population, we just don't, we have conjecture we have what sounds right and logical but we do not have certainty.

    3. The China issue is less about whether they couldn't mop up properly in their BSL 4 labs but how much they told the world, how much they withheld, how much they may have actually fed positively false information, why they appear to be behind public disinformation efforts and how much they've lost the head when someone suggests their handling of it needs looking into.

    4. Trump may be a first rate clown that automatically reduces the credibility of anything just by opening his mouth but do not assume everyone around him including the US & Western Intelligence agencies are all clowns as well.

    Perhaps not. But as this article points out, the odds are considerably in favour of a natural transmission route:

    https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-scientists-think-the-novel-coronavirus-developed-naturally-not-in-a-chinese-lab/
    There’s a simpler, if less flashy, explanation for the emergence of a new SARS. A study, published in 2018, of four rural villages in Yunnan province located near caves containing bats known to carry coronaviruses found that 2.7 percent of those surveyed had antibodies for close relatives of SARS. Thousands, if not millions, of people are exposed to wild coronaviruses every year. Most of them aren’t dangerous, but “if you roll the dice enough times,” Goldstein said, you’ll see a bad one....
    https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1755436514000504

    Nine challenges in modelling the emergence of novel pathogens

    Epidemics, Volume 10, March 2015, Pages 35-39

    Whole thing is worth a read but think you'd be interested in their "Challenge 7".

    7. Expand models for emerging infections to account for host immunity

    Most models of emerging infections assume a completely susceptible host population, but this is not valid if parts of the population have been exposed to low doses of the pathogen or to less virulent ancestors or related pathogens. Those in frequent contact with animals may have been exposed to zoonotic pathogens such as SARS-CoV or influenza, and more elderly sub-populations might have historic exposures.

    These partially immune groups can cause profound dynamic effects. Having a population fraction immune, or partially immune, can facilitate disease persistence by reducing the chance of extinction in the post-epidemic trough (Pulliam et al., 2012). If those most at risk of exposure to a zoonotic pathogen are those with the highest levels of immunity (because of multiple previous exposures), they could form an effective barrier preventing an infection from spreading to the rest of the population; such a pattern is seen for influenza antibodies in numerous studies of swine industry workers (Myers et al., 2006). Data from this scenario might also lead to underestimation of the reproduction number of the pathogen if it spreads into a population that is truly naive. Models could help distinguish between pathogens that fail to spread because their transmissibility is low in all humans, versus those that fail because of low transmissibility in the human population in contact with the reservoir. We need to understand when these effects matter, and how to identify them.


    agree very worthwhile read. Point 4 jumped out at me as something that hadn't really struck me before and would explain the 'natural' dying down of this diseases. Buried in it is a truly critical observation. The most connected people (potential super spreaders) get the disease early, recover and become immune, so get taken out the spreader pool and so there influence peaks early then decays. If say 5% are hyper connected they get it early, do the damage, but then stop do the damage. In the jargon, these time bound non-stationarities are critical.

    Fascinating.
    That's one of those amazing ideas that is really obvious when someone cleverer points it out. Thanks.
  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    DavidL said:

    He's lost a bit of weight with his travails.
    He looks more like his brother Jo in that photo than I've noticed before.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    edited May 2020

    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia

    And prescriptive grammarians are full of shit.

    Grammar is a study of how a language is used, not a list of rules that needs to be followed.

    As the very article you are quoting states fewer vs less was a 'rule' made up in the late 1700s on the whim of one guy.

    There is no textual evidence that supports the draconian application of fewer vs less that prescriptivist claim.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006
    kle4 said:

    Ah arguments about austerity, takes me back to arriving on PB in 2010, this virus really has set us back years.

    Politically its irrelevant - as I said in my first post on the subject the political genius of the Tories was to get the people smashed by austerity to vote for the party who did it. Redcar was literally shut by the Tories, people then voted Tory and are apparently now celebrating that they the local taxpayer now own the derilict steelworks and get to pay to demolish it and eventually replace it with a high tech park with half the jobs. But the migrants are to blame not the Tories...

    So there are no elections to win no points to score as there is no game for years. This is more about the basics of "adding" where people seem to think that repeating political slogans is a good replacement for basic understanding of maths and how things work. Hence the brief debate I had last night with Philip where I said no deal means Tesco and Jaguar are fucked, he said no it doesn't, I pointed out that Dover said we're fucked, he said no they didn't and I then provided the quote from the boss of the port quoted from last year's Tory conference saying we're fucked.

    In the past ignoring how things work was just slogans - "get brexit done" and "fuck business". But now its people lives. And whilst I have no problem with sharp political operators doing things that are unpopular but work (Thatcher) I do have a problem with gobshite no nothing chancers who get it wrong, claim they are right and then believe their own hype (this government).
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,092
    Selebian said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    Yep. There are conventions and I don't want to push this point too hard but a good friend, bestselling author, once said to me that English serves the writer not the other way around. If you become a slave to it then you are just that. Pedants are a pain in the ass.

    And data is always singular unless you want to sound like a complete geek.
    Data is singular for the same reason that book is singular.
    I used to really not care either way with data, but since I became a data geek (thanks @Mysticrose, but I may as well admit it) data are, in my mind, a big (in my line of work) group of things and I do now find it jarring to read or hear "data is". Not jarring enough to 'correct' people though :wink: In normal English language for most people I think "data is" is acceptable enough - 'data' (the word, so I'll use 'is') is a synonym for 'information' for most people.
    The word "data" is generally treated as plural in scientific settings and as singular in more general or casual contexts.

    I think the use of a plural form is a marker of the status the speaker is asserting. Saying "the data show such and such" tells the listener that the speaker is (a) careful with words and (b) likely to be better acquainted with the properties and characteristics of the data than if he or she had said "the data shows such and such".

  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287
    Alistair said:

    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia

    And prescriptive grammarians are full of shit.

    Grammar is a study of how a language is used, not a list of rules that needs to be followed.

    As the very article you are quoting states fewer vs less was a 'rule' made up in the late 1700s on the whim of one guy.

    There is no textual evidence that supports the draconian application of fewer vs less that prescriptivist claim.
    To me its a question of what it sounds like. You hear people say things like "Me and my Dad" and it sounds like nails on a blackboard.
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,341

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
    I think it is "fewer" when dealing with whole numbers, e.g. numbers of people, but "less" with a continuous scale e.g. money. Percentages of whole numbers are a grey area.
    Fewer pennies and less money - grey areas abound.
    Would it be 'fewer' or 'less' grey areas? We need fewer or less grey areas of that sort if we are to resolve this problem.

  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 23,926
    Same under McDonnell wasn't it?
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    edited May 2020
    eek said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
    Overall debt is much lower then than the UK would have been where it not for the deficit reduction program.

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.
    It's clear you live down South rather than up North than.

    When Osbourne changed local Government grants so that Councils kept their council tax money rather than paying it to central Government and receiving grants back he cut the income of councils up North by 10-20% at a stroke.

    A lot of Northern Councils including (as the obvious example as it was hit worst) Northampton County Council were left with enough money for Essential Services and absolutely nothing else.

    This did work to the Tories advantage as most people have short memories so the Tories won the councils last year and now have to fix the mess.
    You're wrong I'm up north.

    If the Councils had the money for essential services and nothing else then doesn't that agree with my point? Essential services would be front line services surely so if they're getting paid for while jollies to the Caribbean for Councillors are not then that is progress.

    Northamptonshire County Council still has enough money to spend 33% more paying its Chief Executive than the UK pays its Prime Minister. So there hasn't been enough austerity yet for them to run out of money. https://www.northamptonshire.gov.uk/councilservices/council-and-democracy/transparency/open-data-our-publications/Pages/salary-information.aspx
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001
    edited May 2020

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.

    Right. Go ask a Doctor. Or a Police Officer. A Teacher. A Council leader (a Tory one if you like).

    They all had more money on paper with cabinet ministers boasting about increases with LESS MONEY in reality. We even had the spectacle of David Cameron writing to his Tory Council Leader complaining about cuts to front line services when the councils are definitely getting more money, only for the council leader to patiently tell him the reality.

    Here's the story https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/nov/11/cameron-hypocrisy-cuts-letter-oxfordshire-council:

    "A leaked letter shows Cameron chastised Ian Hudspeth, leader of Oxfordshire county council, for considering cuts to elderly day centres, libraries and museums. The prime minister said the proposals for possible cuts were disappointing and suggested the Conservative-run council should look at back-office savings and shared services between the emergency services instead."

    "Hudspeth’s reply described how the council had already cut back-office functions and looked at shared services as far back as 2006, reduced staff numbers by thousands, and disposed of property. He also noted new functions that have transferred to the council, including public health and social care, while central government funding has dropped.

    “Excluding schools, our total government grants have fallen from £194m in 2009/10 to £122m a year in 2015/16, and are projected to keep falling at a similar rate. I cannot accept your description of a drop in funding of £72m or 37% as a ‘slight fall’,” he said."

    "A spokesman for Cameron said: “There is still significant scope for sensible savings across local government to be made by back-office consolidation, disposing of surplus property and joining up our local public services; we will be discussing with Oxfordshire how this can be taken forward to help protect frontline services.”

    There's plenty of money says Tory government. No there isn't says Tory council leader. There's plenty of money says Tory government. Rinse and repeat...
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797
    edited May 2020

    eek said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
    Overall debt is much lower then than the UK would have been where it not for the deficit reduction program.

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.
    It's clear you live down South rather than up North than.

    When Osbourne changed local Government grants so that Councils kept their council tax money rather than paying it to central Government and receiving grants back he cut the income of councils up North by 10-20% at a stroke.

    A lot of Northern Councils including (as the obvious example as it was hit worst) Northampton County Council were left with enough money for Essential Services and absolutely nothing else.

    This did work to the Tories advantage as most people have short memories so the Tories won the councils last year and now have to fix the mess.
    You're wrong I'm up north.

    If the Councils had the money for essential services and nothing else then doesn't that agree with my point? Essential services would be front line services surely so if they're getting paid for while jollies to the Caribbean for Councillors are not then that is progress.

    Northampton County Council still has enough money to spend 33% more paying its Chief Executive than the UK pays its Prime Minister. So there hasn't been enough austerity yet for them to run out of money. https://www.northamptonshire.gov.uk/councilservices/council-and-democracy/transparency/open-data-our-publications/Pages/salary-information.aspx
    Sorry by none essentials I was thinking of things like education services, libraries swimming pools, arts, museums and other things to support the well being of the community as a whole rather than having enough money to wipe bums.

    Adult Social care really shouldn't be a local authority task, it impacts the NHS in so many ways it needs to be handled as part of a overall health plan - as can see by the needless deaths in Care Homes by the inappropriate placement of patients recovering from Covid19.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038

    Same under McDonnell wasn't it?
    This news was far more of a sign of Labour getting back into business.

    Labour Party: Jennie Formby to stand down as general secretary
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-52528829
  • contrariancontrarian Posts: 5,818
    edited May 2020
    Today we learn that 60% of workers are effectively employed by the state, a situation that would have made an old Warsaw pact state blush.

    What's this teenager government plan to get the private sector moving again?

    Saddle them with a whole load of new nanny state restrictions on social distancing for a year, apparently.

    Do they honestly, honestly think, or does anybody on here, that thousands of (Particularly small) businesses will bother to re-open under those circumstances even if it were (marginally) profitable? For many thousands it simply won't be. They will be gone.

    And who can blame them, the way this government has arbitrarily and instantly betrayed them to placate a bunch of idiot journalists obsessed with face masks and R numbers, and now seeks to lecture them, the wealth creators, on 'the new normal'. You will need to do this if you want to re-open your business. Tell you what sunshine, how about I just don;t effing bother. YOU employ the six workers I took on to build a business.

    Sunak said today that the end of furlough will not be a cliff edge. That's right mate. its more like the edge of an abyss.

  • LostPasswordLostPassword Posts: 14,772
    algarkirk said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
    I think it is "fewer" when dealing with whole numbers, e.g. numbers of people, but "less" with a continuous scale e.g. money. Percentages of whole numbers are a grey area.
    Fewer pennies and less money - grey areas abound.
    Would it be 'fewer' or 'less' grey areas? We need fewer or less grey areas of that sort if we are to resolve this problem.

    Fewer grey areas and less area of grey...
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826

    kle4 said:

    Ah arguments about austerity, takes me back to arriving on PB in 2010, this virus really has set us back years.

    Politically its irrelevant - as I said in my first post on the subject the political genius of the Tories was to get the people smashed by austerity to vote for the party who did it. Redcar was literally shut by the Tories, people then voted Tory and are apparently now celebrating that they the local taxpayer now own the derilict steelworks and get to pay to demolish it and eventually replace it with a high tech park with half the jobs. But the migrants are to blame not the Tories...

    So there are no elections to win no points to score as there is no game for years. This is more about the basics of "adding" where people seem to think that repeating political slogans is a good replacement for basic understanding of maths and how things work. Hence the brief debate I had last night with Philip where I said no deal means Tesco and Jaguar are fucked, he said no it doesn't, I pointed out that Dover said we're fucked, he said no they didn't and I then provided the quote from the boss of the port quoted from last year's Tory conference saying we're fucked.

    In the past ignoring how things work was just slogans - "get brexit done" and "fuck business". But now its people lives. And whilst I have no problem with sharp political operators doing things that are unpopular but work (Thatcher) I do have a problem with gobshite no nothing chancers who get it wrong, claim they are right and then believe their own hype (this government).
    You were wrong then and you're wrong now. The quote you gave wasn't that Dover was "fucked" it was that there might be less trade going through Dover. That's not the same thing and it doesn't make Tesco and Jaguar fucked.
  • JonathanJonathan Posts: 20,901

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
    Austerity certainly had an impact in setting the scene for this crisis. To deny it is silly.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    Jonathan said:

    It’s all very cute discussing the past, quaint even. The economic challenges we face make 2008 look like a picnic.

    I trust this government will receive the same support it gave the Brown government when it battled that crisis.

    I notice Starmer was treading carefully a fine line of supporting the government on virus actions and pointing out some criticisms.

    Going to be tricky for him in next few months.
  • glwglw Posts: 9,535
    MattW said:

    glw said:

    Although vast numbers of us seem prepared to tell Facebook every detail of "details about their social circles."

    There are almost certainly thousands of people complaining on Facebook about the contact tracing app right now.
    Assumed the man furiously ....
    Funnily enough this morning whilst I was listening to the radio they were talking about the app trial on the Isle of Wight, and people complaining about it on Facebook was mentioned.

    There is simply a segment of the internet population that will see anything the government does as having a nefarious intention.
  • squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,287
    algarkirk said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    What is usual logic?
    I think it is "fewer" when dealing with whole numbers, e.g. numbers of people, but "less" with a continuous scale e.g. money. Percentages of whole numbers are a grey area.
    Fewer pennies and less money - grey areas abound.
    Would it be 'fewer' or 'less' grey areas? We need fewer or less grey areas of that sort if we are to resolve this problem.

    Fewer as it is plural. "Less off a grey area" s correct as i read it
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,341

    Alistair said:

    IanB2 said:

    IanB2 said:

    kamski said:


    BigRich said:

    Why I think that Swedens no-Lock-down' approach will probably have less overall deaths.

    Im going to try to make this sort ish, There are lots of caviats, and so on im going to skip over in the quest for brevaty but will reply if people are intested.

    Two roads to heard immunity.


    Swedish is split at the movement the virus is retreating in Stockholm and the surrounding county, but growing in most of the rest of the nation. theses two combine to give a overall R of below but very close to 1. The althoratys in Sweden think that 25% of the city has had the virus.

    In NYC a recent anti virus study suggested that 24.7% of NYC have also been infected,

    On the day that the anti virus test was done in NYC 0.11% of the population had died. by contrast in Stockholm it was 0.06% roughly half.

    Looking at the death fingers from any contrary, but Ill use the UK, 157 people under 20 have died but over 10,000 of the over 80 cohort. How many people die is as strongly related to who (by age) gets the virus as any mesher. if you could work out how to get to 'heard immunity' levels by only young and healthy people getting the virus you could get though this with only a limited number of deaths.

    There is no magic bullet that will do that for you, but by doing things like keeping bars open, where lots of young people go. and recommending old and sick people stay at home as much as possible, you can shift the dynamic sufficiently to make a big difference. if you confine everybody equally then it will spread equally in all demographics, there for lots of old people will get it and die.

    I'm going to predict that Sweden will when this is all over have less deaths and not have trashed its economy. but facts will only be truly comparable in perhaps 12-18 months.

    I'm going with the premise that a vaccine is over 6 months away and that lock-downs can not be sustained that long. and track and trace apps will be a delaying factor not a game changer. Therefor I suspect that heard immunity is going to have to be the thing that ultimately beets the virus, not all will agree and yes New Zealand looks to have done it without but is now stuck unable to open its boarders.

    #grammar police

    FEWER overall deaths....
    Excuse me officer, am I allowed to say something like "less than 200 MPs"?
    Alastair's last lead used fewer (one time) when, under the usual logic, it should have been less - a switch you see a lot less often - and nobody said a word. Clear evidence of FEWER bias among some PB'ers.
    Clarity and not sounding weird are both far more important than rigid grammar. I’m aware data is a plural word. I’ll still treat it as singular. If fewer feels more natural than less, I’ll use it without worrying too much what Fowler might say.
    The example I was thinking of was a percentage. Less than 1% is usually preferred to Fewer than 1%.
    Fewer versus less is the debate revolving around grammatically using the use words "fewer" and "less" correctly. According to prescriptive grammar, "fewer" should be used with nouns for countable objects and concepts. According to this rule, "less" should be used only with a grammatically singular noun. 
    Wikipedia

    And prescriptive grammarians are full of shit.

    Grammar is a study of how a language is used, not a list of rules that needs to be followed.

    As the very article you are quoting states fewer vs less was a 'rule' made up in the late 1700s on the whim of one guy.

    There is no textual evidence that supports the draconian application of fewer vs less that prescriptivist claim.
    To me its a question of what it sounds like. You hear people say things like "Me and my Dad" and it sounds like nails on a blackboard.
    Context matters. OK in the 'Me and my dad' song, less convincing when posh politicians go all demotic. Imagine, say, Lonnie Donegan saying 'My dad and I'.
  • FishingFishing Posts: 4,555
    TGOHF666 said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    . Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how -
    So we could have gone in to this crisis borrowing at Brownian levels and had the same response ?

    Italy says hello.
    Italy doesn't have its own currency, so can't monetise its public debt. Unlike the UK, or Japan, which has run a high deficit for decades.
  • Philip_ThompsonPhilip_Thompson Posts: 65,826
    eek said:

    eek said:

    TGOHF666 said:

    whats more now that we're printing a gazillion pounds to cover the costs of all this it was pointless reducing the national debt via austerity...

    Actually completely the opposite - had the Conservatives not reduced the deficit from the Darling/Brown levels we could not have afforded current government support.

    They will now have to repeat the task.
    Lol - nice deflection. I said DEBT not DEFICIT. You reduce the deficit - the gap between what you spend and what you have coming in - to reduce the amount you're in debt. On that front they failed massively with the national debt doubled in 10 years.

    This is the comedy of austerity. Slash spending to front line services to cause a genuine crisis and manage not to have the cash left over afterwards. I think we know how - that NHS marketised reorganisation where GPs form themselves into businesses to tender for care contracts - how many zillions has that burned? Big cuts to front line provision, a big shortage in medical personnel but party time for lawyers and contract managers who soak up all the cash saved from medics salary and a whole load more. Trebles all round!
    No you don't. You're wrong right from the first paragraph.

    You reduce the deficit in order to bring current expenditure and taxes under control and not increase the debt as much as you would with an out of control deficit. You DO NOT decrease the debt by reducing the deficit except in a comparison with what the debt would have been otherwise.
    Yes thats what I said. If I end the year at -£200bn as opposed to -£400bn I am in £200bn less debt than I would have been. Flattening the curve as seems to be the new lexicon. Keep doing that enough and you start to reduce overall debt levels.

    Here's the problem. You Tories slashed the money from the front line. And gave all the money and even more to the back office and service providers. Thats how you failed to get things under control as spending went up whilst available cash for things went down.
    Overall debt is much lower then than the UK would have been where it not for the deficit reduction program.

    There's no evidence I've seen that the front line was slashed with more money going to the back office. Quite the opposite.
    It's clear you live down South rather than up North than.

    When Osbourne changed local Government grants so that Councils kept their council tax money rather than paying it to central Government and receiving grants back he cut the income of councils up North by 10-20% at a stroke.

    A lot of Northern Councils including (as the obvious example as it was hit worst) Northampton County Council were left with enough money for Essential Services and absolutely nothing else.

    This did work to the Tories advantage as most people have short memories so the Tories won the councils last year and now have to fix the mess.
    You're wrong I'm up north.

    If the Councils had the money for essential services and nothing else then doesn't that agree with my point? Essential services would be front line services surely so if they're getting paid for while jollies to the Caribbean for Councillors are not then that is progress.

    Northampton County Council still has enough money to spend 33% more paying its Chief Executive than the UK pays its Prime Minister. So there hasn't been enough austerity yet for them to run out of money. https://www.northamptonshire.gov.uk/councilservices/council-and-democracy/transparency/open-data-our-publications/Pages/salary-information.aspx
    Sorry by none essentials I was thinking of things like education services, libraries swimming pools, arts, museums and other things to support the well being of the community as a whole rather than having enough money to wipe bums.

    Adult Social care really shouldn't be a local authority task, it impacts the NHS in so many ways it needs to be handled as part of a overall health plan - as can see by the needless deaths in Care Homes by the inappropriate placement of patients recovering from Covid19.
    Adult social care has never been a part of the NHS unfortunately but this government has done more than any before it to try to coordinate care with the NHS including the fact that Matt Hancock's job title now is Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.

    Do you accept that Northamptonshire County Council can find the money to pay its Chief Executive more than the UK Government pays its Prime Minister?
  • dr_spyndr_spyn Posts: 11,279
    Ian Watson also tweeted that Labour had lost 4 General Elections in a row, and by implication Keir Starmer & his new General Sec aren't keen to make it 5. Labour still have to win 113 seats for a majority.
  • RochdalePioneersRochdalePioneers Posts: 27,006

    You were wrong then and you're wrong now. The quote you gave wasn't that Dover was "fucked" it was that there might be less trade going through Dover. That's not the same thing and it doesn't make Tesco and Jaguar fucked.

    We will soon find out. If you think that a significant increase in time taken to get through our border has no significant impact on the supply of everything then you should go into consulting, go tell all those logistics professionals how they're talking out of their arse with all their facts and their experience vs whatever it is you've got.

    And thus is Brexit. We've had enough of experts, fuck business.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001
    Jonathan said:

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
    Austerity certainly had an impact in setting the scene for this crisis. To deny it is silly.
    I do not accept that.

    We are in a much better place today because we took the measures post 2008 than if we had not.

  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001

    Jonathan said:

    It’s all very cute discussing the past, quaint even. The economic challenges we face make 2008 look like a picnic.

    I trust this government will receive the same support it gave the Brown government when it battled that crisis.

    I notice Starmer was treading carefully a fine line of supporting the government on virus actions and pointing out some criticisms.

    Going to be tricky for him in next few months.
    Starmer is in an unenviable position

    Indeed so would most any LOTO at this moment in time
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 50,749

    US government projections of 3,000 virus deaths a day in June as it spreads into rural areas. If that is right, the long tail will ensure the Trump administration’s response to covid-19 and the inadequacies of the US healthcare system will be front and centre well into autumn.

    If the US follows anything like the normal pattern that will prove to be wildly pessimistic. They may well have had peak deaths (daily) already although there will be a very long tail.
  • eekeek Posts: 24,797

    Jonathan said:

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
    Austerity certainly had an impact in setting the scene for this crisis. To deny it is silly.
    I do not accept that.

    We are in a much better place today because we took the measures post 2008 than if we had not.

    Are we?

    Modern Monetary Theory says we could have continued spending without any impact.
  • JonathanJonathan Posts: 20,901

    Jonathan said:

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
    Austerity certainly had an impact in setting the scene for this crisis. To deny it is silly.
    I do not accept that.

    We are in a much better place today because we took the measures post 2008 than if we had not.

    I didn’t have you down as a something for nothing person. You can’t pull billions out of public services and not incur some cost.
  • StockyStocky Posts: 9,653
    edited May 2020
    Jonathan said:

    Secondly "doubling the national debt" was inevitable and why austerity was required. The only way to have not doubled the debt will have been to have far, far, far more austerity leading to a budget surplus quicker - as had to happen in many European nations.

    So it was inevitable and to show why it was inevitable here's an example as to why it wasn't? How can you decimate services and spend more in the process of doing so? You cut the deficit to reduce the rate you are running into debt. The Tories managed to cut the deficit and accelerate the amount we were in debt. Record amounts spent in the NHS but swinging cuts to every front line service - because the money was handed to lawyers and contractors. Thats the comedy of trying to marketise something that shouldn't be.

    Why do we both have a PPE crisis in large parts of the NHS and surpluses in others? Because its not coordinated, its not managed, its a market. Please don't try and tell me that Osbrown was a good Chancellor, its too funny. He understood completely the simple measures you need to manage performance and missed every single one of them.

    The Tories didn't accelerate the amount we were running into debt. The deficit is the amount we are running into debt and the Tories reduced that annually. Again you aren't understanding the concepts.

    If you wish to say that money was mismanaged or spent on the wrong things then that's a different debate and got nothing to do with austerity. I'd agree that a fair amount of government expenditure is inefficient and there could be more austerity if it was more efficiently spent.

    We have a PPE crisis in some parts of the NHS because of logistical issues. PPE that was never required in some places is now required so they needed to get it simultaneously - and PPE demand has increased by over 5000%. That means every single week more PPE is being consumed than would be in an entire year normally. That would be a logistical challenge for anyone.

    In comparison supermarket shelves emptied of some products when demand for them suddenly increased 6-fold. PPE demands have increased overnight more than 50-fold. That's got nothing to do with austerity.
    The "logistical issues" are austerity. Slash spending on front line NHS staff and provision, take all that money and even more and create a vast pointless market that burns public money at market rates and leaves us utterly incapable of coordinating PPE. You keep pointing to the small minority of hospitals who have enough PPE as why there is no issue - no, thats the issue. Had you not austerity slashed the front line and spent the money on an internal market, you would have had an organisation capable of coordinating itself properly.

    Its ALL austerity. You waste money and say "we don't have any". Thats austerity.
    You're talking nonsense. The logistical issues would have happened in any circumstances as hospitals and care homes suddenly needed overnight a year's worth of PPE per week and much PPE that they never normally even require in the first place in any volume. The logistical issues have been resolved, its not "a small minority of hospitals" that have the PPE they require it is almost all hospitals that have what they require now.

    Human error will call logistical issues in any circumstances anyway. A hospital that thought its demand would jump up massively and ordered 30x the PPE that they'd normally require would run out of PPE when it went up 50x instead.
    The discussion on PPE shortages rarely asks the question why governments across the world are in a similar position including Germany.

    It denies reality and a lazy argument is blamimg it on austerity
    Austerity certainly had an impact in setting the scene for this crisis. To deny it is silly.
    "Austerity" has been defined neatly to mean "Conservative`s tighter management of public finances compared to Labour". Under this definition, then Labour are always going to use the word to batter the Tories with. Forever more. Osborne`s fault I guess.

    Why you think that the inevitable profligate spending by Labour over the last few years, had they been in power, would have put us in a better position to fight this virus is puzzling. Especially if McDonnell had been Chancellor. Prudent management over the last few years has sufficiently improved the public finances to enable Sunak the room for manoeuvre that he currently has.
  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001
    edited May 2020
    Sky

    Demand for new cars collapsed by 97% last month

    Also similar figures from across europe
This discussion has been closed.