Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
Typical of the Govt's and/or the NHS's incompetence is the way in which they start a massive radio advertising campaign for the 'flu vaccine at precisely the time when it has proved virtually impossible to obtain a jab from one's local pharmacy. Although I understand that an emergency, no doubt very expensive supply of 2 million doses have recently been sourced in the U.S. Don't these idiots know how much they will need from year to year to the nearest million, perhaps over rather than under ordering?
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
I read that 80% of all recent cases in Wales were from this strain imported from Spain. If that isn't enough to convince you why foreign trips were a bad idea, I don't know what is.
The crucial weekend polls are starting to come in and so far little to indicate a late recovery by The Orange One.
Movements on Betfair have been glacial slow of late but Biden now in to 1.48 so perhaps the billy bunters are thinking time is about up for his opponent.
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
What risk in the airport. What risk in the place? etc etc
Staying at home, working from home, venturing out to shop with mask etc. would have been lower risk for everyone.
Is this a massive problem 33.7m mail ballots outstanding?
Total Early Votes: 90,012,433
In-Person Votes: 32,663,560 •
Mail Ballots Returned: 57,348,873 •
Mail Ballots Outstanding: 33,680,976
33 million voters thinking "Yeah, Trump is an asshat. But can I really vote for Biden...?"
California sent a mail-in ballot to everyone in the state, which accounts for 12 million of that number.
Which could skew the numbers, if the most populous state (and a Democrat stronghold) is pushing Biden's vote share abnormally high. All 12m could be posted for Biden - but it would have zero EC difference over 2016. Just means Biden s doing less well elsewhere.
Just shooting the breeze though. I still can't see how Biden fails. But then, this is 2020. To think, just a year ago 20-20 was the touchstone for perfect vision....
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
I read that 80% of all recent cases in Wales were from this strain imported from Spain. If that isn't enough to convince you why foreign trips were a bad idea, I don't know what is.
Not just Wales, the research found it was responsible for very large numbers of new cases all across Europe. This one outbreak at a Spain farm is estimated to be responsible for 80% of new cases in Spain, 60% in Ireland and up to 40% in Switzerland and France.
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
What risk in the airport. What risk in the place? etc etc
Staying at home, working from home, venturing out to shop with mask etc. would have been lower risk for everyone.
Also allowing people to travel widely, impossible to track and trace. Ask somebody who they encountered during 2 weeks on holidays, well 1000s at the airport, 100s at different bars, restaurants, the beach, etc. And who those people were, no idea.
Very different from I spent 2 weeks working from home, I went for one meal with these 2 friends, I did 2 gym classes (where everybody is signed in), and I had a pint with a mate.
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
I read that 80% of all recent cases in Wales were from this strain imported from Spain. If that isn't enough to convince you why foreign trips were a bad idea, I don't know what is.
In isolation that is meaningless. The strain had to come from somewhere. 68% of the Titanic's passengers died. If that isn't enough to convince you why taking a berth on the ship was a bad idea, I don't know what is.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
What's scary about where we are now is where the trajectory is heading. A firebreak sets the trajectory back. After a while, it returns and you need another firebreak.
That's why I've been arguing for some time that we should have two-week lockdowns every two months, preplanned so people can organise their lives and businesses around them. Even if you really suffer in lockdowns, they won't feel so awful if you know their duration and regularity. It'd be far better then our current approach of telling people it'll probably be all right, then doing a panicky lockdown for a bit, then relaxing for a bit, etc.
Nick, can I ask if you've ever run a business?
It doesn't work with such regularity as the public sector. Lots of fortuitous purchases in retail, leisure etc. In some sectors it isn't possible to keep running up and down for long periods. EG Pubs, restaurants. And that is before the problem of public reluctance to shop/spend/eat out is taken into account.
I am aghast at the notion of a national lockdown. It simply wont be well observed. How fair is it for the good folk of Dorset to be locked down because Manchester has a problem?
Unfortunately our quest is for the least grim of the grim options available. The Covid delta between Dorset and Manchester is a matter of a few short weeks. If we wait for Dorset to become Manchester before acting it just means that the action needed ends up being tougher and longer.
What makes you think Dorset levels are going to get to Manchester levels? Given its a largely rural county this seems very unlikely to me.
Depends of the number of Londoners who come along to contaminate it, I suppose. Do you count Bournemouth as rural?
Here's a question Peston and co might like to ask today:
Can you tell me how many in the 0-19 age group have died in English hospitals during the last month ?
The answer is zero.
And a total of one during the last four months.
If they ask it, they'll deserve a contemptuous response. By now, any journalist should understand that you can be a vector of a deadly disease even if you don't die from it yourself.
So the young are to have their future destroyed to keep sick oldies alive a few more months and so that obese slobs can have their risks reduced slightly.
Lockdown the young now because we allowed holidays to Spain in July.
Presumably the young weren't among those taking advantage of being allowed to take holidays to Spain in July so are absolved of all responsibility.
I don't condemn people for holidaying in Spain, or Greece. Both countries have had a really torrid time in recent years. I was astonished to learn just how important British tourism is to each of their economies (the absence of foreign holidays has been a big factor in the UK trade surplus).
I dunno. To take a foreign holiday in the middle of a global pandemic is pretty dumb.
It did wonders for my mental health. And I had a great time, at negligible risk to my health.
What about the health of others?
All good.
The beauty of COVID is that you could have had it, completely asymptomatically, passed in on to tons of people. etc etc.
You have no way of knowing, short of an antibody test.
But why the theory that there is increased risk in going to the nasty dirty abroad? Except for countries with demonstrably higher rates of infection than here, who is to say that if I had stayed at home the virus might have mutated in my next door neighbour who would then have popped round and infected me, so I was actually dodging a bullet on my own behalf and those whom I might otherwise have infected by going off on holiday?
I read that 80% of all recent cases in Wales were from this strain imported from Spain. If that isn't enough to convince you why foreign trips were a bad idea, I don't know what is.
In isolation that is meaningless. The strain had to come from somewhere. 68% of the Titanic's passengers died. If that isn't enough to convince you why taking a berth on the ship was a bad idea, I don't know what is.
It had to come from somewhere? No it didn't if people weren't travelling!
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
What's scary about where we are now is where the trajectory is heading. A firebreak sets the trajectory back. After a while, it returns and you need another firebreak.
That's why I've been arguing for some time that we should have two-week lockdowns every two months, preplanned so people can organise their lives and businesses around them. Even if you really suffer in lockdowns, they won't feel so awful if you know their duration and regularity. It'd be far better then our current approach of telling people it'll probably be all right, then doing a panicky lockdown for a bit, then relaxing for a bit, etc.
Nick, can I ask if you've ever run a business?
It doesn't work with such regularity as the public sector. Lots of fortuitous purchases in retail, leisure etc. In some sectors it isn't possible to keep running up and down for long periods. EG Pubs, restaurants. And that is before the problem of public reluctance to shop/spend/eat out is taken into account.
I am aghast at the notion of a national lockdown. It simply wont be well observed. How fair is it for the good folk of Dorset to be locked down because Manchester has a problem?
Unfortunately our quest is for the least grim of the grim options available. The Covid delta between Dorset and Manchester is a matter of a few short weeks. If we wait for Dorset to become Manchester before acting it just means that the action needed ends up being tougher and longer.
What makes you think Dorset levels are going to get to Manchester levels? Given its a largely rural county this seems very unlikely to me.
Depends of the number of Londoners who come along to contaminate it, I suppose. Do you count Bournemouth as rural?
No, thats why I said 'largely' rather than 'entirely'....
We are in a much better position than elsewhere. If Peston is right and we get put into Tier 4, I'll be fuming.
Utterly predictable we would end up in national lockdown. Boris has wasted weeks dithering and kidding himself all would be fine.
Not sure Drakeford is wise either to promise what will happen post- firebreak.
At some point politicians need to understand - the virus sets the timetable, not them.
Yep Drakeford is trying to get political "credit" for acting early. But come next week Wales is going to be on a par, at best, with middle of the road English regions. So quite why they will be in a position to say a decisive "no" to a longer lockdown, as England enters one, isn't clear.
Sturgeon also seems to be claiming that she might not need to follow England because "the signs are that transmission in Scotland is coming down". Well exactly the same is true in England on their published data. R number falling. Almost below 1 in the North West - the area with the harshest restrictions. Quite why we are publishing data in England when the scientists seems to dismiss everything it is saying in favour of their own models, who knows?
Drakeford deserves a bit of credit for recognising the obvious a few weeks earlier than Boris (or Sturgeon...)
I suspect the firebreak will have a big impact and will reduce infections substantially. Time will tell.
Unless Drakeford has data to back him up we haven't seen, it's foolish to promise what he will do after the firebreak.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
If we can get cases down to the point where track, trace, isolate can cope, then we can control the epidemic and we won't need more lockdowns.
In addition - more time gives us chance to improve TTI system, gets us closer to a vaccine and better treatments, AND prevents the inevitable Christmas increase in contacts from being quite so devastating.
So the system magically fixes itself? If it was possible to do it then it would have happened by now.
The system has a capacity it can handle and a capacity it cannot.
If there was 1 covid case in the UK, I suspect even Dido Harding could manage to trace all of those contacts in 24 hours and get enough of them to isolate to keep R under 1.
Presumably the continuing efforts to improve capacity are having some positive effect.
So capacity is continually growing, unfortunately it is lagging the virus. Circuit break for 3 weeks could plausibly reduce cases by 40-50%.
That *might* be enough to get things back under control.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
At least there's a travel ban, although it should also apply to visitors.
Absolutely. Arrivals need to be put in hotels for 2 weeks (or very least tested on arrival, hotel, tested 5 days later). Its not rocket science. I don't give a f##k if it sounds harsh or unfair.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
What's scary about where we are now is where the trajectory is heading. A firebreak sets the trajectory back. After a while, it returns and you need another firebreak.
That's why I've been arguing for some time that we should have two-week lockdowns every two months, preplanned so people can organise their lives and businesses around them. Even if you really suffer in lockdowns, they won't feel so awful if you know their duration and regularity. It'd be far better then our current approach of telling people it'll probably be all right, then doing a panicky lockdown for a bit, then relaxing for a bit, etc.
Nick, can I ask if you've ever run a business?
It doesn't work with such regularity as the public sector. Lots of fortuitous purchases in retail, leisure etc. In some sectors it isn't possible to keep running up and down for long periods. EG Pubs, restaurants. And that is before the problem of public reluctance to shop/spend/eat out is taken into account.
I am aghast at the notion of a national lockdown. It simply wont be well observed. How fair is it for the good folk of Dorset to be locked down because Manchester has a problem?
Unfortunately our quest is for the least grim of the grim options available. The Covid delta between Dorset and Manchester is a matter of a few short weeks. If we wait for Dorset to become Manchester before acting it just means that the action needed ends up being tougher and longer.
What makes you think Dorset levels are going to get to Manchester levels? Given its a largely rural county this seems very unlikely to me.
Depends of the number of Londoners who come along to contaminate it, I suppose. Do you count Bournemouth as rural?
No, thats why I said 'largely' rather than 'entirely'....
We are in a much better position than elsewhere. If Peston is right and we get put into Tier 4, I'll be fuming.
Is this a massive problem 33.7m mail ballots outstanding?
Total Early Votes: 90,012,433
In-Person Votes: 32,663,560 •
Mail Ballots Returned: 57,348,873 •
Mail Ballots Outstanding: 33,680,976
Nine states and DC automatically send out postal votes to all registered voters including some big ones. They are California, New Jersey, Vermont, Nevada, Colorado, Washington, Utah, Hawaii, and Oregon. So I'd assume all non-voters in these states would be in "mail ballots outstanding". It therefore doesn't strike me as a surprising figure (and of course some will still get there in time or be dropped off in person on the day).
At least there's a travel ban, although it should also apply to visitors.
Absolutely. Arrivals need to be put in hotels for 2 weeks (or very least tested on arrival, hotel, tested 5 days later). Its not rocket science. I don't give a f##k if it sounds harsh or unfair.
And thumping great fines for those who breach the regs.
Guernsey is up to 10 cases - all linked, all in quarantine, all - except the initial case, identified through Test Track & Trace.
At least there's a travel ban, although it should also apply to visitors.
Absolutely. Arrivals need to be put in hotels for 2 weeks (or very least tested on arrival, hotel, tested 5 days later). Its not rocket science. I don't give a f##k if it sounds harsh or unfair.
And thumping great fines for those who breach the regs.
Guernsey is up to 10 cases - all linked, all in quarantine, all - except the initial case, identified through Test Track & Trace.
Absolutely. Again, I don't give a shit you thought it didn't apply to you or that "it just got out of hand"....Under these circumstances, I have no issue with tagging people to make monitor them during their stay in the hotel, however much people scream it makes them look and feel like a criminal.
It's all about being first, they don't give a hoot about the damage it does.
That is their job. The focus should be on who told him. If they had an inquiry to nail that creep Williamson they should immediately have one into this.
Is this a massive problem 33.7m mail ballots outstanding?
Total Early Votes: 90,012,433
In-Person Votes: 32,663,560 •
Mail Ballots Returned: 57,348,873 •
Mail Ballots Outstanding: 33,680,976
33 million voters thinking "Yeah, Trump is an asshat. But can I really vote for Biden...?"
California sent a mail-in ballot to everyone in the state, which accounts for 12 million of that number.
Which could skew the numbers, if the most populous state (and a Democrat stronghold) is pushing Biden's vote share abnormally high. All 12m could be posted for Biden - but it would have zero EC difference over 2016. Just means Biden s doing less well elsewhere.
Just shooting the breeze though. I still can't see how Biden fails. But then, this is 2020. To think, just a year ago 20-20 was the touchstone for perfect vision....
At least there's a travel ban, although it should also apply to visitors.
Absolutely. Arrivals need to be put in hotels for 2 weeks (or very least tested on arrival, hotel, tested 5 days later). Its not rocket science. I don't give a f##k if it sounds harsh or unfair.
Just about what the Thai Govt did, and they've got land borders. Very few cases now.My son really needs to go to Singapore now, and is having to negotiate with Americans who don't appear to fully understand!
Very windy place. Pack carefully and counter-intuitively You'll need what you think you won't and not need what you think you will.
I've been several times. There's a little bay in the south which is entirely sheltered from the winds, and gets the best and warmest sun. That's where you need to be.
Sky reporting from Liverpool just now showing a queue for a Halloween fancy dress shop.
The reporter commented that on speaking to those in the queue they want to get their fancy dress for their parties tonight and have no intention of following the rules
No matter what Boris does or anyone else fighting this pandemic until a strictly policed stay at home curfew is introduced this pandemic will continue unchecked
So rather than lockdown the shops, have a strictly policed curfew? For someone who needed regular inhalations of smelling salts just 'cos of the great Drakeford repression of toaster sales, you have a strangely inconsistent position on authoritarian measures.
In the areas that need it...
So allow shops to stay open but use (scarce) police resources to keep people off the streets so those shops don't make sales anyway?
I'm sure Boris wouldn't mind floating a shoot-to-kill policy to enforce a curfew for mawkishly sentimental Scousers and 'a society that has become hooked on grief and likes to wallow in a sense of vicarious victimhood’.
Not sure you understand the curfew
It is designed to stop people socialising in the evening but allowing normal social distancing shopping
France has introduced one between 9.00pm and 6.00am
Will this be an enforced curfew or one of them cuddly, voluntary ones?
Sky reporting from Liverpool just now showing a queue for a Halloween fancy dress shop.
The reporter commented that on speaking to those in the queue they want to get their fancy dress for their parties tonight and have no intention of following the rules
No matter what Boris does or anyone else fighting this pandemic until a strictly policed stay at home curfew is introduced this pandemic will continue unchecked
So rather than lockdown the shops, have a strictly policed curfew? For someone who needed regular inhalations of smelling salts just 'cos of the great Drakeford repression of toaster sales, you have a strangely inconsistent position on authoritarian measures.
In the areas that need it...
So allow shops to stay open but use (scarce) police resources to keep people off the streets so those shops don't make sales anyway?
I'm sure Boris wouldn't mind floating a shoot-to-kill policy to enforce a curfew for mawkishly sentimental Scousers and 'a society that has become hooked on grief and likes to wallow in a sense of vicarious victimhood’.
He won’t want shoot to kill for lockdown breakers. For reasons that continue to defy understanding, he values Cummings.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
What's scary about where we are now is where the trajectory is heading. A firebreak sets the trajectory back. After a while, it returns and you need another firebreak.
That's why I've been arguing for some time that we should have two-week lockdowns every two months, preplanned so people can organise their lives and businesses around them. Even if you really suffer in lockdowns, they won't feel so awful if you know their duration and regularity. It'd be far better then our current approach of telling people it'll probably be all right, then doing a panicky lockdown for a bit, then relaxing for a bit, etc.
Nick, can I ask if you've ever run a business?
It doesn't work with such regularity as the public sector. Lots of fortuitous purchases in retail, leisure etc. In some sectors it isn't possible to keep running up and down for long periods. EG Pubs, restaurants. And that is before the problem of public reluctance to shop/spend/eat out is taken into account.
I am aghast at the notion of a national lockdown. It simply wont be well observed. How fair is it for the good folk of Dorset to be locked down because Manchester has a problem?
It is easy to spot the Tories, all you get is "F you I am all right Jack", full of the milk of human kindness.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
He's pretty much persona-non-grata quite widely. Therefore it's an interesting question, and quite risky for whoever is.
Why's he 'Prof'? Surely no Uni has given him an honorary professorship?
Its taking the piss, because so many times he has rocked up and asked this long winded question as if he is an international expert on the subject only for people who know what they are talking about to point out he is talking utter shit / misunderstood the facts e.g. his stuff on chemical engineering.
Remember when I said that there were in effect 5 tiers of Shagger's 3 tier plan? That as well the missing "Low" tier we would have to have an "Extremely High" tier because Whitty said 3 wouldn't be enough? I remember some (like Philip) doggedly insisting that wasn't true.
And yet here we are with Tier 4. Don't forget folks. It is NOT a national lockdown. Merely a new very high regional tier shutting pubs and shops and banning travel being applied to all regions at once.
Is this a massive problem 33.7m mail ballots outstanding?
Total Early Votes: 90,012,433
In-Person Votes: 32,663,560 •
Mail Ballots Returned: 57,348,873 •
Mail Ballots Outstanding: 33,680,976
Nine states and DC automatically send out postal votes to all registered voters including some big ones. They are California, New Jersey, Vermont, Nevada, Colorado, Washington, Utah, Hawaii, and Oregon. So I'd assume all non-voters in these states would be in "mail ballots outstanding". It therefore doesn't strike me as a surprising figure (and of course some will still get there in time or be dropped off in person on the day).
He's pretty much persona-non-grata quite widely. Therefore it's an interesting question, and quite risky for whoever is.
Why's he 'Prof'? Surely no Uni has given him an honorary professorship?
Its taking the piss, because so many times he has rocked up and asked this long winded question as if he is an international expert on the subject only for people who know what they are talking about to point out he is talking utter shit / misunderstood the facts e.g. his stuff on chemical engineering.
Very windy place. Pack carefully and counter-intuitively You'll need what you think you won't and not need what you think you will.
I've been several times. There's a little bay in the south which is entirely sheltered from the winds, and gets the best and warmest sun. That's where you need to be.
First holiday with the person who became my 2nd wife. We won a karaoke contest as a duet doing I Got You Babe. Still have the 1st prize tee shirts.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
And Christmas is cancelled
The whole point of this is to get the virus sufficiently suppressed to allow a couple of weeks of easing around Christmas. However I suspect the lockdown will then be swiftly reimposed in January. We are staring at this until spring 2021. Right through the fucking winter.
Utterly predictable we would end up in national lockdown. Boris has wasted weeks dithering and kidding himself all would be fine.
Not sure Drakeford is wise either to promise what will happen post- firebreak.
At some point politicians need to understand - the virus sets the timetable, not them.
Yep Drakeford is trying to get political "credit" for acting early. But come next week Wales is going to be on a par, at best, with middle of the road English regions. So quite why they will be in a position to say a decisive "no" to a longer lockdown, as England enters one, isn't clear.
Sturgeon also seems to be claiming that she might not need to follow England because "the signs are that transmission in Scotland is coming down". Well exactly the same is true in England on their published data. R number falling. Almost below 1 in the North West - the area with the harshest restrictions. Quite why we are publishing data in England when the scientists seems to dismiss everything it is saying in favour of their own models, who knows?
Drakeford deserves a bit of credit for recognising the obvious a few weeks earlier than Boris (or Sturgeon...)
I suspect the firebreak will have a big impact and will reduce infections substantially. Time will tell.
Unless Drakeford has data to back him up we haven't seen, it's foolish to promise what he will do after the firebreak.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
If we can get cases down to the point where track, trace, isolate can cope, then we can control the epidemic and we won't need more lockdowns.
In addition - more time gives us chance to improve TTI system, gets us closer to a vaccine and better treatments, AND prevents the inevitable Christmas increase in contacts from being quite so devastating.
So the system magically fixes itself? If it was possible to do it then it would have happened by now.
The system has a capacity it can handle and a capacity it cannot.
If there was 1 covid case in the UK, I suspect even Dido Harding could manage to trace all of those contacts in 24 hours and get enough of them to isolate to keep R under 1.
Presumably the continuing efforts to improve capacity are having some positive effect.
So capacity is continually growing, unfortunately it is lagging the virus. Circuit break for 3 weeks could plausibly reduce cases by 40-50%.
That *might* be enough to get things back under control.
What a load of rubbish. It's the same system that had plenty of capacity in August and we ended up in this situation.
Testing capacity isn't a problem, it's keeping the people who have the virus separate from those who don't. You like many others have completely misunderstood what the problem actually is. More of the same testing capacity won't change anything and we're going to be back where we are today within a couple of weeks at best, or more realistically nothing is actually going to change.
He's pretty much persona-non-grata quite widely. Therefore it's an interesting question, and quite risky for whoever is.
Why's he 'Prof'? Surely no Uni has given him an honorary professorship?
Its taking the piss, because so many times he has rocked up and asked this long winded question as if he is an international expert on the subject only for people who know what they are talking about to point out he is talking utter shit / misunderstood the facts e.g. his stuff on chemical engineering.
Utterly predictable we would end up in national lockdown. Boris has wasted weeks dithering and kidding himself all would be fine.
Not sure Drakeford is wise either to promise what will happen post- firebreak.
At some point politicians need to understand - the virus sets the timetable, not them.
Yep Drakeford is trying to get political "credit" for acting early. But come next week Wales is going to be on a par, at best, with middle of the road English regions. So quite why they will be in a position to say a decisive "no" to a longer lockdown, as England enters one, isn't clear.
Sturgeon also seems to be claiming that she might not need to follow England because "the signs are that transmission in Scotland is coming down". Well exactly the same is true in England on their published data. R number falling. Almost below 1 in the North West - the area with the harshest restrictions. Quite why we are publishing data in England when the scientists seems to dismiss everything it is saying in favour of their own models, who knows?
Drakeford deserves a bit of credit for recognising the obvious a few weeks earlier than Boris (or Sturgeon...)
I suspect the firebreak will have a big impact and will reduce infections substantially. Time will tell.
Unless Drakeford has data to back him up we haven't seen, it's foolish to promise what he will do after the firebreak.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
If we can get cases down to the point where track, trace, isolate can cope, then we can control the epidemic and we won't need more lockdowns.
In addition - more time gives us chance to improve TTI system, gets us closer to a vaccine and better treatments, AND prevents the inevitable Christmas increase in contacts from being quite so devastating.
Getting track and trace to work is the new unicorn poo. Two week break to "sort it", is horseshit. The reality is it isn't possible to do this manually. The way the disease is, by the time you have a test, its been 4-5 days of infecting other people, then a day to get the results, then at least another day to start to try and work out who you spent any time with over the past week, and you won't know the people you sat next to on the Tube, its easy to forget your neighbour popped round for a quick chat, who that person who was in the gym getting changed next to you.
And nobody is suggesting we do much more than change from a central system to a local run by local authorities involving door knocking, which maybe be better at actually contacting some people, but is even slower to go on foot door to door. And evidence so far, the likes of PHE were the worst at trying to organize testing.
A working test, track and trace system capable of reacting to this required 5 years of development in South Korea, one if not the most technologically advanced nations on earth.
I don't understand this veering between hubris and defeatism.
A 3 week break could reduce cases by ~40%. At the same time, testing capacity should increase.
If we look at the past 3 weeks, testing capacity increased by ~40%. We need lots of excess capacity to run tests as fast as possible, the fact that most tests aren't turned around in 24 hours is critical.
Hiring some more people in local public health should also help. We should also put in place better incentives to isolate.
Will that be enough - I don't know. But it plausibly could be. We should definitely try!
South Korea may have needed 5 years of development for its system, but we should be able to make much faster progress if we make it our #1 priority and invest accordingly.
Remember when I said that there were in effect 5 tiers of Shagger's 3 tier plan? That as well the missing "Low" tier we would have to have an "Extremely High" tier because Whitty said 3 wouldn't be enough? I remember some (like Philip) doggedly insisting that wasn't true.
And yet here we are with Tier 4. Don't forget folks. It is NOT a national lockdown. Merely a new very high regional tier shutting pubs and shops and banning travel being applied to all regions at once.
Oh how they scoffed when Sturgeon announced a Tier 4.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
And Christmas is cancelled
The whole point of this is to get the virus sufficiently suppressed to allow a couple of weeks of easing around Christmas. However I suspect the lockdown will then be swiftly reimposed in January. We are staring at this until spring 2021. Right through the fucking winter.
Is it OK to drink gin at 4.16pm?
I expect that doing anything remotely amusing or enjoyable will shortly be illegal.
Come off it. This ISN'T a national lockdown - such a thing would be a disaster. No, it is simply an extension of the regional tier strategy. With a new tier added on top that we definitely didn't need. Applied in every region of the nation. With a travel ban to keep our country moving.
Utterly predictable we would end up in national lockdown. Boris has wasted weeks dithering and kidding himself all would be fine.
Not sure Drakeford is wise either to promise what will happen post- firebreak.
At some point politicians need to understand - the virus sets the timetable, not them.
Yep Drakeford is trying to get political "credit" for acting early. But come next week Wales is going to be on a par, at best, with middle of the road English regions. So quite why they will be in a position to say a decisive "no" to a longer lockdown, as England enters one, isn't clear.
Sturgeon also seems to be claiming that she might not need to follow England because "the signs are that transmission in Scotland is coming down". Well exactly the same is true in England on their published data. R number falling. Almost below 1 in the North West - the area with the harshest restrictions. Quite why we are publishing data in England when the scientists seems to dismiss everything it is saying in favour of their own models, who knows?
Drakeford deserves a bit of credit for recognising the obvious a few weeks earlier than Boris (or Sturgeon...)
I suspect the firebreak will have a big impact and will reduce infections substantially. Time will tell.
Unless Drakeford has data to back him up we haven't seen, it's foolish to promise what he will do after the firebreak.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
If we can get cases down to the point where track, trace, isolate can cope, then we can control the epidemic and we won't need more lockdowns.
In addition - more time gives us chance to improve TTI system, gets us closer to a vaccine and better treatments, AND prevents the inevitable Christmas increase in contacts from being quite so devastating.
Getting track and trace to work is the new unicorn poo. Two week break to "sort it", is horseshit. The reality is it isn't possible to do this manually. The way the disease is, by the time you have a test, its been 4-5 days of infecting other people, then a day to get the results, then at least another day to start to try and work out who you spent any time with over the past week, and you won't know the people you sat next to on the Tube, its easy to forget your neighbour popped round for a quick chat, who that person who was in the gym getting changed next to you.
And nobody is suggesting we do much more than change from a central system to a local run by local authorities involving door knocking, which maybe be better at actually contacting some people, but is even slower to go on foot door to door. And evidence so far, the likes of PHE were the worst at trying to organize testing.
A working test, track and trace system capable of reacting to this required 5 years of development in South Korea, one if not the most technologically advanced nations on earth.
I don't understand this veering between hubris and defeatism.
A 3 week break could reduce cases by ~40%. At the same time, testing capacity should increase.
If we look at the past 3 weeks, testing capacity increased by ~40%. We need lots of excess capacity to run tests as fast as possible, the fact that most tests aren't turned around in 24 hours is critical.
Hiring some more people in local public health should also help. We should also put in place better incentives to isolate.
Will that be enough - I don't know. But it plausibly could be. We should definitely try!
South Korea may have needed 5 years of development for its system, but we should be able to make much faster progress if we make it our #1 priority and invest accordingly.
Never any hubris here. I am just a realist. There are no easy quick fix solutions. But there are some big steps we could take, but instead politicians try and sell us the easy answers and tell us that we can have our normal lives back in a few weeks.
The reality is we need big travel restrictions, we need very strict quarantine / isolation, we need to keep places like pubs closed, and we needed to do that for a year.
Utterly predictable we would end up in national lockdown. Boris has wasted weeks dithering and kidding himself all would be fine.
Not sure Drakeford is wise either to promise what will happen post- firebreak.
At some point politicians need to understand - the virus sets the timetable, not them.
Yep Drakeford is trying to get political "credit" for acting early. But come next week Wales is going to be on a par, at best, with middle of the road English regions. So quite why they will be in a position to say a decisive "no" to a longer lockdown, as England enters one, isn't clear.
Sturgeon also seems to be claiming that she might not need to follow England because "the signs are that transmission in Scotland is coming down". Well exactly the same is true in England on their published data. R number falling. Almost below 1 in the North West - the area with the harshest restrictions. Quite why we are publishing data in England when the scientists seems to dismiss everything it is saying in favour of their own models, who knows?
Drakeford deserves a bit of credit for recognising the obvious a few weeks earlier than Boris (or Sturgeon...)
I suspect the firebreak will have a big impact and will reduce infections substantially. Time will tell.
Unless Drakeford has data to back him up we haven't seen, it's foolish to promise what he will do after the firebreak.
And then what? We stay in those measures forever because as soon as they are relaxed we're back to where we are now in a few short weeks.
If we can get cases down to the point where track, trace, isolate can cope, then we can control the epidemic and we won't need more lockdowns.
In addition - more time gives us chance to improve TTI system, gets us closer to a vaccine and better treatments, AND prevents the inevitable Christmas increase in contacts from being quite so devastating.
Getting track and trace to work is the new unicorn poo. Two week break to "sort it", is horseshit. The reality is it isn't possible to do this manually. The way the disease is, by the time you have a test, its been 4-5 days of infecting other people, then a day to get the results, then at least another day to start to try and work out who you spent any time with over the past week, and you won't know the people you sat next to on the Tube, its easy to forget your neighbour popped round for a quick chat, who that person who was in the gym getting changed next to you.
And nobody is suggesting we do much more than change from a central system to a local run by local authorities involving door knocking, which maybe be better at actually contacting some people, but is even slower to go on foot door to door. And evidence so far, the likes of PHE were the worst at trying to organize testing.
A working test, track and trace system capable of reacting to this required 5 years of development in South Korea, one if not the most technologically advanced nations on earth.
I don't understand this veering between hubris and defeatism.
A 3 week break could reduce cases by ~40%. At the same time, testing capacity should increase.
If we look at the past 3 weeks, testing capacity increased by ~40%. We need lots of excess capacity to run tests as fast as possible, the fact that most tests aren't turned around in 24 hours is critical.
Hiring some more people in local public health should also help. We should also put in place better incentives to isolate.
Will that be enough - I don't know. But it plausibly could be. We should definitely try!
South Korea may have needed 5 years of development for its system, but we should be able to make much faster progress if we make it our #1 priority and invest accordingly.
As I just said, more of the same capacity is going to make no difference. Even if we found all 560,000 people who have the virus right now, we live in a country where 440,000 of them won't isolate after being told they are positive, some for valid reasons such as not being able to get supermarket delivery slots, fear of being fired, not being able to afford two weeks off or for illegitimate reasons such as "I feel fine".
The testing system has a lot of flaws, capacity isn't one of them, in fact we have got probably the best testing capacity out of all European countries, more of it will solve nothing.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
And Christmas is cancelled
The whole point of this is to get the virus sufficiently suppressed to allow a couple of weeks of easing around Christmas. However I suspect the lockdown will then be swiftly reimposed in January. We are staring at this until spring 2021. Right through the fucking winter.
Is it OK to drink gin at 4.16pm?
Yes. Gin is fine at all minutes that are a multiple of 1. Tonic shouldn't be used between the hours of 1am-5am though.
He's pretty much persona-non-grata quite widely. Therefore it's an interesting question, and quite risky for whoever is.
Why's he 'Prof'? Surely no Uni has given him an honorary professorship?
Its taking the piss, because so many times he has rocked up and asked this long winded question as if he is an international expert on the subject only for people who know what they are talking about to point out he is talking utter shit / misunderstood the facts e.g. his stuff on chemical engineering.
His Dad was, of course. Nice chap; spoke concisely as I recall.
Until the 2nd Dec....Boris will spin this action as to save Christmas, and so people will still be planning Christmas getaways, skiing in the spring....they should be telling people, Tier 4 or not, sorry outbound travel for leisure is off the table for 6 months.
And Christmas is cancelled
The whole point of this is to get the virus sufficiently suppressed to allow a couple of weeks of easing around Christmas. However I suspect the lockdown will then be swiftly reimposed in January. We are staring at this until spring 2021. Right through the fucking winter.
Does anyone else think that, sadly, without closing schools and education generally it is not a lock down? The (Peston) provisions are a national extension of Tier 3 with small additions. I wish I thought it could work, but the millions of daily movements and interactions involved in education generally are a critical factor.
All well and good to say that, but what...We have 500k a day testing capacity, thats plenty. "Improve Track and Trace", how?....what other systems can be put in place in a month?
Its dead easy to claim better handling, but much harder to come up with plans that a) can be implemented within a few weeks and b) people, especially the media, will accept e.g sending people to gulags to quarantine (as they would phrase it).
Comments
Movements on Betfair have been glacial slow of late but Biden now in to 1.48 so perhaps the billy bunters are thinking time is about up for his opponent.
Staying at home, working from home, venturing out to shop with mask etc. would have been lower risk for everyone.
Our reward?
Tier 4.
Thank you.
Just shooting the breeze though. I still can't see how Biden fails. But then, this is 2020. To think, just a year ago 20-20 was the touchstone for perfect vision....
Very different from I spent 2 weeks working from home, I went for one meal with these 2 friends, I did 2 gym classes (where everybody is signed in), and I had a pint with a mate.
If there is to be a lockdown, what is the government going to do during it so things are different after it ends?
https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1322562698287210498?s=20
https://twitter.com/Peston/status/1322562697058226176?s=20
We are in a much better position than elsewhere. If Peston is right and we get put into Tier 4, I'll be fuming.
If there was 1 covid case in the UK, I suspect even Dido Harding could manage to trace all of those contacts in 24 hours and get enough of them to isolate to keep R under 1.
Presumably the continuing efforts to improve capacity are having some positive effect.
So capacity is continually growing, unfortunately it is lagging the virus. Circuit break for 3 weeks could plausibly reduce cases by 40-50%.
That *might* be enough to get things back under control.
https://twitter.com/piersmorgan/status/1322567843095994368?s=20
https://twitter.com/aljwhite/status/1322567809923166211?s=20
Biden 50 .. Trump 44 - Final Poll
https://gravismarketing.com/final-national-poll-2020/
Tier 2 is working here.
Guernsey is up to 10 cases - all linked, all in quarantine, all - except the initial case, identified through Test Track & Trace.
And to go for the hat trick - how much understanding of either the disease or the issues it causes do you have?
https://twitter.com/Conservatives/status/1318895415710961665
https://twitter.com/CrimeLdn/status/1322518856909443072?s=20
Why's he 'Prof'? Surely no Uni has given him an honorary professorship?
And yet here we are with Tier 4. Don't forget folks. It is NOT a national lockdown. Merely a new very high regional tier shutting pubs and shops and banning travel being applied to all regions at once.
6,531 lower than an hour ago.
Now only 33,674,445
Reassured that nobody has ever thought him wise.
Is it OK to drink gin at 4.16pm?
Testing capacity isn't a problem, it's keeping the people who have the virus separate from those who don't. You like many others have completely misunderstood what the problem actually is. More of the same testing capacity won't change anything and we're going to be back where we are today within a couple of weeks at best, or more realistically nothing is actually going to change.
A 3 week break could reduce cases by ~40%.
At the same time, testing capacity should increase.
If we look at the past 3 weeks, testing capacity increased by ~40%.
We need lots of excess capacity to run tests as fast as possible, the fact that most tests aren't turned around in 24 hours is critical.
Hiring some more people in local public health should also help. We should also put in place better incentives to isolate.
Will that be enough - I don't know. But it plausibly could be. We should definitely try!
South Korea may have needed 5 years of development for its system, but we should be able to make much faster progress if we make it our #1 priority and invest accordingly.
The reality is we need big travel restrictions, we need very strict quarantine / isolation, we need to keep places like pubs closed, and we needed to do that for a year.
The testing system has a lot of flaws, capacity isn't one of them, in fact we have got probably the best testing capacity out of all European countries, more of it will solve nothing.
https://twitter.com/StigAbell/status/1322571855685963787?s=20
Its dead easy to claim better handling, but much harder to come up with plans that a) can be implemented within a few weeks and b) people, especially the media, will accept e.g sending people to gulags to quarantine (as they would phrase it).