I note we moved onto the 3rd - 5th group to be vaccinated while only at about 50% of the top 2 groups (which are now at about 75%).
I assume this was to maintain momentum. Once you have done the easy ones in the top groups the vaccinations in that group will slow down as you get to the harder ones to do, yet you have the capacity to vaccine many more people so why not open up the next group to keep the numbers up.
We are now at 44% of the top 5 groups and could reach 50% in 2 to 3 days.
I am particularly interested in knowing when they are going to hit the next group as I am in that one. I certainly wasn't expecting a jab for a long time. is this wishful thinking on my part?
I think it is probably as a the rate of vaccination drops for each group - you will have a long tail.
There is no point in holding back capacity, so long as you can book in all the members of the existing priority groups that have been green lit.
A new mass vaccination centre aimed at expanding the roll-out of the Covid-19 jab has opened in Northamptonshire. The NHS said the hub, based at Moulton Park in Northampton, could enable thousands of people to vaccinated each week. The centre will operate seven days a week from 08:00 to 20:00 GMT. Chief executive of Northamptonshire Clinical Commissioning Group, Toby Sanders, said it would create "significant extra capacity".
One thing I do respect about HYUFD is that he voted Remain and has never recanted from conceding that Brexit is economically damaging (albeit necessary, having voted for it).
That’s actually a lot more honest than many posters who scoffed unto the end that any economic harm was just “Project Fear”.
Virtually everything that was warned about Brexit that was dismissed as "project fear" has largely come to pass. The only real Project Fear was that used by Leave fascists who wanted the gullible to believe that they were about to be overrun by Romanians
I’d give it about 8/10.
Slower growth? Check. Fall in pound? Check. Increased inflation? Only a little only (so far) Increased indy sentiment? Check. Succour to populists and alt-rightest? Check. Trade restrictions? Check. Loss of rights? Check. Damage to relations with key allies? Check. Loss of U.K. influence? Check. Fall in house prices? Not really.
I'd give it the following Fall in pound? Check. (But I'd argue in the circumstances this is a good thing) Increased indy sentiment? Check. Trade restrictions? Check. (Negligible, just paperwork not tariffs etc) Loss of rights? Check. (Those that were acknowkledged during the referendum)
Slower growth? ❌ - Objectively the UK had faster, not slower, growth than the Eurozone in the past decade "despite Brexit"
Increased inflation? ❌ - Objectively the UK has below-target inflation.
Succour to populists and alt-rightest? ❌ - Objectively opinion polls are showing reduced tolerance of alt-rightists and populists and greater acceptance of immigrants and immigration.
Loss of U.K. influence? ❌ - I can't see any objective way to measure this but UK has been capable of reaching agreements with those they want to do so, on a similar basis as we could before.
Damage to relations with key allies? ❌ - Allies have accepted Brexit and moved on. They view it as Britain being Britain and not objectively damaged.
Fall in house prices? Not really. - Which is a shame but nevermind.
A fall in the pound makes British people poorer and so cannot be considered, in itself, to be a good thing. It may be a necessary thing, given other factors (eg if you hinder your exporters and damage your productive capacity, you will need a weaker currency to restore your competitiveness). With a floating exchange rate the currency will find its level. If that level is significantly lower than before, that is telling you something, and it isn't good.
A fall in the pound doesn't make the British people poorer. Inflation makes the British people poorer, but inflation is below target.
Setting aside Brexit and looking at the economic fundamentals we have below target inflation, a current account deficit, a balance of payments deficit and low savings ratio. If you don't have savings, you have a balance of payments deficit etc then your currency falling is what should happen - not a bad thing.
The pound has fallen consistently not just in recent years but for the whole of the last century. The last century has been a story of the pound falling. It is falling because we don't save enough, we import too much and export too little. Save more, import less, export more and the pound will stabilise instead of continuing its century-long period of decline.
But for so long as we have insufficient savings ratio, a balance of payments deficit and the rest of the fundamentals then falling sterling is a good thing not a bad thing. It is a natural stabiliser and when you remove natural stabilisers the pressures on the system go somewhere else they don't go away. Fix savings, fix balance of payments, fix everything else and the pound will stop falling.
We don't have inflation now because GBP is stable now. Following its devaluation in 2016 CPI inflation went from 0% to 3%, and inflation for heavily imported items went up even more (food inflation from - 3% to 4%). As you say, the fall in the currency is a natural stabiliser. What is it stabilising? What happened in 2016 that made FX market participants think we would be finding it harder to make our living in the world, so that we needed to make our workers cheaper to compensate? We all know the answer.
Target inflation is 2% +/- 1%. 3% is closer to target than 0% so that's a good thing not a bad thing.
Cherrypicking random items that went up more is meaningless, someone else could cherrypick others that went up less, the simple fact of the matter is that despite the fall in sterling inflation has remained within or below target for almost all of recent years.
Again the savings ratio isn't high enough, that is why pound falls. If you want the pound to stop falling then save more. As for making our living in the world it goes back to what was said a couple of pages ago: in the last decade, despite whatever happened in 2016 onwards, the UK grew faster than the Eurozone over the decade. Not slower, faster. Yes with the pound falling across the decade - to which I say: so what?
Which would you rather have given we have too low savings and high balance of payments deficit: falling currency and faster growth across the decade (sterling), or rising currency and slower growth across the decade (Eurozone)?
I don't think you really understand any of this, and it's not helped by your scattergun approach of throwing in various non sequiturs and trying to change the topic of conversation (sadly a frequent experience when trying to engage you in debate). We have a weaker currency because Brexit has harmed our ability to make a living in the world and the exchange rate has weakened to restore our competitiveness by making our workers cheaper. Inflation went up because of higher import prices, and real wages fell. The exchange rate is an equilibrating force in a floating currency world. We couldn't have a stronger currency and weaker growth or vice versa, it's not something we get to choose: we have the exchange rate that equilibrates supply and demand for sterling in FX markets and our growth rate reflects real factors such as productivity, population growth and labour market participation, and in the short run any temporary effect from fiscal or monetary policy.
It isn't whether we "could" have a stronger currency and weaker growth, or vice-versa. That is what we "do" have in the real world.
Over the past decade 2010-2019 "despite Brexit" the UK had a weaker currency and stronger growth than the Eurozone. The Eurozone had a stronger currency and weaker growth.
You seem to perceive the value of a currency as some sort of sign of national virility to take pride in - that a "stronger" currency is in itself a good thing. It is not. Why did the EU have a stronger currency, despite having weaker growth?
The savings rate in Europe - and Germany especially - is more than it is in the UK. That is the fundamental behind most of our currency change over the course of the decade, not Brexit.
You claim the "topic of conversation" is being changed but the fact is macroeconomics is complicated and it seems you don't understand it if you don't understand why the savings ratio, the balance of payments, the currency and many other factors are all interconnected. Currency is not and never has been a symbol of strength or virility alone.
We were smart in backing off what we feared would become - and indeed what proved to be - a very poorly planned and executed EU way out of the crisis. Their ventilator bollocks gave fair warning. Sure, we have made our own domestic Horlicks of a bunch of issues, but on the strategic planning of vaccine, we have proved so much more nimble than the EU.
Yes, indeed.
I wonder, though, whether that would still have been true if the government had left the procurement to the normal NHS process, rather than asking an unpaid venture capitalist to head up the vaccine taskforce and get the thing done despite the technical and financial risks? I rather suspect not, but it's impossible to know for sure.
Sub-contracted health structures have not exactly covered themselves in glory throughout the Covid crisis, however ; and without the NHS's still national, monolithic and centralised basis, which has been a running sore for the Tories for decades, the vaccine rollout may have been roughly the speed of Germany's - or probably, much slower, going on other sub-contracted plans during the pandemic.
I doubt that very much. Israel doesn't have a monolithic health service, and the USA - with the diametric opposite of a centralised health service - is also doing quite well, despite lumbering itself with Donald Trump. So, although of course one should give full credit to the NHS staff and others who have been organising the roll-out very effectively, there's really no evidence that the monolithic nature of the beast has been an important factor. The important factor is supply.
Michael Vaughan is transitioning into Geoffrey Boycott. I've been listening to R5 commentary since I got up. Almost every other thing he's said has been whinging about England not starting will their full strength side in India. Even just now, after Joe Root has explained why they have to have rotation at the moment to keep the players sane with breaks from their bubble, he just can't stop complaining and repeating himself. If he commentates until the same age as Boycs did we've another 34 years of his Yorkshire tinged whinge to come.
He's just declared that England can't beat India but might be able to "ask them a few questions".
I note we moved onto the 3rd - 5th group to be vaccinated while only at about 50% of the top 2 groups (which are now at about 75%).
I assume this was to maintain momentum. Once you have done the easy ones in the top groups the vaccinations in that group will slow down as you get to the harder ones to do, yet you have the capacity to vaccine many more people so why not open up the next group to keep the numbers up.
We are now at 44% of the top 5 groups and could reach 50% in 2 to 3 days.
I am particularly interested in knowing when they are going to hit the next group as I am in that one. I certainly wasn't expecting a jab for a long time. is this wishful thinking on my part?
At the present rate of vaccination, ~500,000 a day, it is expected that all 9 priority groups will be jabbed by March 17. Of course they may do even better - or worse
Puerto Rico seems likely, some GOP senators like Rubio support it. Making DC a state feels like a piss-take though and will probably lead to teh GOP trying to make places like Guam and the US Virgin Islands into states.
A new mass vaccination centre aimed at expanding the roll-out of the Covid-19 jab has opened in Northamptonshire. The NHS said the hub, based at Moulton Park in Northampton, could enable thousands of people to vaccinated each week. The centre will operate seven days a week from 08:00 to 20:00 GMT. Chief executive of Northamptonshire Clinical Commissioning Group, Toby Sanders, said it would create "significant extra capacity".
Thousands per week? I’d hope for tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands.
The 15 minute watch period that Pfizer requires adds complexity and limitations which will disappear as other vaccines become more available. .
The whole process for my wife and I took 35 minutes from parking to leaving the car park, and that included 15 minutes socially distanced seating
The other factor that we found interesting was the doctors explanation of the storage, and the process of the injection of the Pfizer vaccine, including that the phial had not to be shaken or disturbed in any way in the process of injection
We were smart in backing off what we feared would become - and indeed what proved to be - a very poorly planned and executed EU way out of the crisis. Their ventilator bollocks gave fair warning. Sure, we have made our own domestic Horlicks of a bunch of issues, but on the strategic planning of vaccine, we have proved so much more nimble than the EU.
Yes, indeed.
I wonder, though, whether that would still have been true if the government had left the procurement to the normal NHS process, rather than asking an unpaid venture capitalist to head up the vaccine taskforce and get the thing done despite the technical and financial risks? I rather suspect not, but it's impossible to know for sure.
Sub-contracted health structures have not exactly covered themselves in glory throughout the Covid crisis, however ; and without the NHS's still national, monolithic and centralised basis, which has been a running sore for the Tories for decades, the vaccine rollout may have been roughly the speed of Germany's - or probably, much slower, going on other sub-contracted plans during the pandemic.
I doubt that very much. Israel doesn't have a monolithic health service, and the USA - with the diametric opposite of a centralised health service - is also doing quite well, despite lumbering itself with Donald Trump. So, although of course one should give full credit to the NHS staff and others who have been organising the roll-out very effectively, there's really no evidence that the monolithic nature of the beast has been an important factor. The important factor is supply.
I think it has been a combination of a national level purchase and distribution network, allied to a wide variety of distribution methods, some very local oriented - hospitals, GPSs, pharmacies, large custom centres, small custom centres, mobile units.....
EDIT : and a deliberate over capacity in the distribution system.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
Piers Morgan is also wrong to say we have the highest death rate in the world. Of non micro-countries, Belgium, Slovenia and Czechia are all higher, in terms of deaths per M.
Still not great, however.
We will be in front of Czechia by the end of today. Belgium and Slovenia are some way off but we're closer to our current peak than they are so might be able to overtake them.
I must say I find the eagerness of some people to discuss how the UK might fall a few places further down the deaths league than country X (especially EU country X) rather distasteful. The fact is that tens of thousands of people in the UK have died unnecessarily, and the reason they have died is the incompetence of our government.
Is it as distasteful as the eagerness to say we've the highest death rate in the world when it isn't true? Or are you happier about that?
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
The Leaver view is that the EU was - is - on a path towards political union of such scope and completeness that our membership would in due course become incompatible with the very existence of the UK as a nation state. It was therefore essential to bail out now while we still can. Leave it much longer and we'd have been trapped in a train hurtling down a one way track to just one destination. A United States Of Europe.
A new mass vaccination centre aimed at expanding the roll-out of the Covid-19 jab has opened in Northamptonshire. The NHS said the hub, based at Moulton Park in Northampton, could enable thousands of people to vaccinated each week. The centre will operate seven days a week from 08:00 to 20:00 GMT. Chief executive of Northamptonshire Clinical Commissioning Group, Toby Sanders, said it would create "significant extra capacity".
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
The Leaver view is that the EU was - is - on a path towards political union of such scope and completeness that our membership would in due course become incompatible with the very existence of the UK as a nation state. It was therefore essential to bail out now while we still can. Leave it much longer and we'd have been trapped in a train hurtling down a one way track to just one destination. A United States Of Europe.
Exciting stuff.
Of course it is.
You can't long-term have federal powers without federal accountability and federal decision making.
That you do is not a good thing, it is a bad one. Mr Nabavi seems to be waving around an absence of accountability as a "strength" rather than a weakness.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
Yep. The reasonable worst-case-scenario - reasonable - is that the virus keeps out-maneuvering us with new mutations and we remain in some awful form of lockdown, light or hard, with virtually no travel, for years, maybe many years. A lost decade, as you say.
The extreme worst case scenario is that it mutates into Avian flu and kills 60% of all humans, which would be a real bummer, tbh
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
Viruses mutate. It is what they do. This is not news. There are likely mutations in every corner of the globe but only those countries with sequencing can detect them. The second wave of the 1918-20 pandemic was likely caused by one. But in California, as with SA and the UK, deaths are reaching a plateu and cases are falling (or at least levelling off) - indeed in Kent, our varient's ground zero, deaths clearly falling.
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
The government needs act in regards care homes and NHS front line. We can't have people who work in those settings turn a jab down.
It will need a change in the law.
Being compelled to take a vaccine can be a part of the job if it is a part of their terms and conditions of employment, but it is not for existing staff - and companies struggle to easily unilaterally change their terms and conditions of employment for people who've been working there for years and are on a contract that doesn't include that in their terms.
We were smart in backing off what we feared would become - and indeed what proved to be - a very poorly planned and executed EU way out of the crisis. Their ventilator bollocks gave fair warning. Sure, we have made our own domestic Horlicks of a bunch of issues, but on the strategic planning of vaccine, we have proved so much more nimble than the EU.
Yes, indeed.
I wonder, though, whether that would still have been true if the government had left the procurement to the normal NHS process, rather than asking an unpaid venture capitalist to head up the vaccine taskforce and get the thing done despite the technical and financial risks? I rather suspect not, but it's impossible to know for sure.
Sub-contracted health structures have not exactly covered themselves in glory throughout the Covid crisis, however ; and without the NHS's still national, monolithic and centralised basis, which has been a running sore for the Tories for decades, the vaccine rollout may have been roughly the speed of Germany's - or probably, much slower, going on other sub-contracted plans during the pandemic.
I doubt that very much. Israel doesn't have a monolithic health service, and the USA - with the diametric opposite of a centralised health service - is also doing quite well, despite lumbering itself with Donald Trump. So, although of course one should give full credit to the NHS staff and others who have been organising the roll-out very effectively, there's really no evidence that the monolithic nature of the beast has been an important factor. The important factor is supply.
The issue of supply is because of Britain's vastly outsize contribution to pharmaceutics and biotechnology for the size of its economy and population ; and the two biggest single reasons for that, are the vast expenditure on drugs developed in the war effort, and then the way in which the national government was then the sole national buyer for these drugs from the late 1940s and early 1950s onward , ahead of many other governments without yet national systems at the time. The NHS's heavily centralised structure certainly has its flaws, but one of the things my doctor father was always most emphatic about was that without it happening at the time it did, in the way it did, we wouldn't have our pharmaceutical and biotech lead.
The government needs act in regards care homes and NHS front line. We can't have people who work in those settings turn a jab down.
It will need a change in the law.
Being compelled to take a vaccine can be a part of the job if it is a part of their terms and conditions of employment, but it is not for existing staff - and companies struggle to easily unilaterally change their terms and conditions of employment for people who've been working there for years and are on a contract that doesn't include that in their terms.
Having a jab doesn't stop you passing the virus on. Being asymptomatic helps not to pass the virus on.
People are now happy to elide this for the moment but if you are talking legislation (O Mr Libertarian, btw)) then the nitty gritty will be reached pretty soon.
Which is that vaccine or no vaccine you don't want people coughing and sneezing in care homes. How to legislate that.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
Viruses mutate. It is what they do. This is not news. There are likely mutations in every corner of the globe but only those countries with sequencing can detect them. The second wave of the 1918-20 pandemic was likely caused by one. But in California, as with SA and the UK, deaths are reaching a plateu and cases are falling (or at least levelling off) - indeed in Kent, our varient's ground zero, deaths clearly falling.
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
But it isn't hyperbole. It's a serious possibility that new variants will emerge which will resist the vaccine. So then we tweak the vaccine, which takes a few months, then it happens again, and so on. Like a dog chasing its tail
Spotlighting this real possibility is not hyperbole, or doom-porn, or whatever*
Note that I also report all the good news: like my friend in PG4 being vaxxed Wedenesday
*OK the phrase "The Satan Bug" is doom porn but it was one of my favourite movies as a kid
Here's a weird thought. In a couple of months Kurt Cobain will have been dead for longer than he actually lived. But we won't be able to say that about Bertrand Russell until almost half a century has passed from now.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
The government needs act in regards care homes and NHS front line. We can't have people who work in those settings turn a jab down.
It will need a change in the law.
Being compelled to take a vaccine can be a part of the job if it is a part of their terms and conditions of employment, but it is not for existing staff - and companies struggle to easily unilaterally change their terms and conditions of employment for people who've been working there for years and are on a contract that doesn't include that in their terms.
Having a jab doesn't stop you passing the virus on. Being asymptomatic helps not to pass the virus on.
People are now happy to elide this for the moment but if you are talking legislation (O Mr Libertarian, btw)) then the nitty gritty will be reached pretty soon.
Which is that vaccine or no vaccine you don't want people coughing and sneezing in care homes. How to legislate that.
You're wrong, having a jab does reduce the risks of you passing on the virus - that is precisely why care staff are being vaccinated. Did you think they were being vaccinated to save their own lives rather than the lives of those they work with?
I'm not advocating legislation, I'm saying if you want what Mr Urquhart wants, then it will take legislation.
Asymptomatic spread happens with this virus without coughing and sneezing, we have known that for at least six months now.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
If one subscribes to the Gaia Hypothesis, whittling down the nasty little microbes ruining it for everything else with a mutating, ineradicable virus would be the way to go. Sod the Wuhan eggheads, Mother Earth is awake and she’s furious.
And the Council isn't elected at a European election on a European manifesto commitment.
The European Parliament is but its not a real Parliament in the way we understand it. The question to ask is if the European Parliament wants to pass (or repeal) a law against the wishes of the Commission and the Council then can it do so? To which the answer is no.
Could a European "Benn Act" opposed by the Commission President pass because Parliament wants it passing? No, it can not. It can in the UK - unlikely most of the time, but it can and has in our recent past.
I'm fascinated by this argument, variants of which one sees often from Brexiteers. Effectively you are criticising the EU on the grounds that it isn't a fully federal state with its own fully-empowered parliament. Well, quite. It isn't, it isn't intended to be, and certainly isn't going to be in any foreseeable future. That's what those on the Remain side were pointing out for years.
But it has the powers of a federal state, but not the accountability of a federal state. That is the worst of both worlds.
If you want a federal state, then the EU should have the powers and it should have a fully-empowered Parliament. That is an acceptable federal solution.
If you don't want a federal state, then the EU should not have the powers.
There is no democratic justification whatsoever for it to have the powers of a federal state, but without a fully-empowered Parliament.
It doesn't have the powers of a federal state. It has powers within the tightly-defined parameters of the EU treaties, and of course any member can leave at two years' notice.
It's really not like any other institution anywhere.
No - and none of your blether alters the fact that it has monumentally screwed up wrt vaccinations - I too voted remain but this is a matter upon which deflection is wholly inappropriate. It has been found wanting.
The government needs act in regards care homes and NHS front line. We can't have people who work in those settings turn a jab down.
It will need a change in the law.
Being compelled to take a vaccine can be a part of the job if it is a part of their terms and conditions of employment, but it is not for existing staff - and companies struggle to easily unilaterally change their terms and conditions of employment for people who've been working there for years and are on a contract that doesn't include that in their terms.
Having a jab doesn't stop you passing the virus on. Being asymptomatic helps not to pass the virus on.
People are now happy to elide this for the moment but if you are talking legislation (O Mr Libertarian, btw)) then the nitty gritty will be reached pretty soon.
Which is that vaccine or no vaccine you don't want people coughing and sneezing in care homes. How to legislate that.
You're wrong, having a jab does reduce the risks of you passing on the virus - that is precisely why care staff are being vaccinated. Did you think they were being vaccinated to save their own lives rather than the lives of those they work with?
I'm not advocating legislation, I'm saying if you want what Mr Urquhart wants, then it will take legislation.
Asymptomatic spread happens with this virus without coughing and sneezing, we have known that for at least six months now.
Not a big reader? I said having a jab makes you asymptomatic and hence reduces the risk of you passing the virus on. Care home staff are having the jab both to protect themselves and for this reason.
Asymptomatic spread does happen but is reduced compared with symptomatic spread.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
You're wrong. I said I expected the EU would move if we held firm. I have said that consistently since Theresa May was PM and I was right. So I am claiming kudos.
Kinabalu thought there'd be a deal because the UK would move. I thought there'd be a deal because the EU would move. The EU moved. I was right.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
Viruses mutate. It is what they do. This is not news. There are likely mutations in every corner of the globe but only those countries with sequencing can detect them. The second wave of the 1918-20 pandemic was likely caused by one. But in California, as with SA and the UK, deaths are reaching a plateu and cases are falling (or at least levelling off) - indeed in Kent, our varient's ground zero, deaths clearly falling.
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
But it isn't hyperbole. It's a serious possibility that new variants will emerge which will resist the vaccine. So then we tweak the vaccine, which takes a few months, then it happens again, and so on. Like a dog chasing its tail
Spotlighting this real possibility is not hyperbole, or doom-porn, or whatever*
Note that I also report all the good news: like my friend in PG4 being vaxxed Wedenesday
*OK the phrase "The Satan Bug" is doom porn but it was one of my favourite movies as a kid
The pandemic worst case is:
(a) Truly horrific (b) Truly unlikely (c) Truly worth planning for (d) All of the above
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
The Leaver view is that the EU was - is - on a path towards political union of such scope and completeness that our membership would in due course become incompatible with the very existence of the UK as a nation state. It was therefore essential to bail out now while we still can. Leave it much longer and we'd have been trapped in a train hurtling down a one way track to just one destination. A United States Of Europe.
Exciting stuff.
Of course it is.
You can't long-term have federal powers without federal accountability and federal decision making.
That you do is not a good thing, it is a bad one. Mr Nabavi seems to be waving around an absence of accountability as a "strength" rather than a weakness.
Well if we're now sovereign whereas before we were ruled by Brussels I look forward to general elections where Conservative voters are truly worried by what Labour might do if they get in. Because this has not been the case for a while.
Who gives a crap? Midterm polls are meaningless at best of times, in the middle a pandemic they are beyond meaningless. Why anyone pays the slightest attention is beyond me.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
If one subscribes to the Gaia Hypothesis, whittling down the nasty little microbes ruining it for everything else with a mutating, ineradicable virus would be the way to go. Sod the Wuhan eggheads, Mother Earth is awake and she’s furious.
The same thought has occurred to me. The Revenge of the Pangolins.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
The Leaver view is that the EU was - is - on a path towards political union of such scope and completeness that our membership would in due course become incompatible with the very existence of the UK as a nation state. It was therefore essential to bail out now while we still can. Leave it much longer and we'd have been trapped in a train hurtling down a one way track to just one destination. A United States Of Europe.
Exciting stuff.
Of course it is.
You can't long-term have federal powers without federal accountability and federal decision making.
That you do is not a good thing, it is a bad one. Mr Nabavi seems to be waving around an absence of accountability as a "strength" rather than a weakness.
Well if we're now sovereign whereas before we were ruled by Brussels I look forward to general elections where Conservative voters are truly worried by what Labour might do if they get in. Because this has not been the case for a while. Certainly in 17 and 19 it wasn't.
That would have been the case if Corbyn was still Labour leader post Brexit, less so now Starmer is Labour leader
Mr. Divvie, it is ironic to hear Brown come out with that, given the divisions have been increased (cemented?) by the devolution Labour thought would give them a fiefdom forever, and the system they contrived is now making it easier for the SNP to retain their dominance of Holyrood.
If the Sunday Times is right from Yesterday - the pro independence parties are going to have 2/3 of the seats come May. In the same way that HYUFD states that the Tories 80 seat majority is enough to stop a referendum, the 40 seat majority independence will have (216 if you expended to to Parliament's 650 seats) is enough to say that Scotland wants one.
It would not matter if the SNP won every seat at Holyrood Westminster is sovereign and we have a UK Tory majority government and when Boris righly refuses a legal indyref2 any referendum Sturgeon attempts to hold will not only be illegal but will be boycotted by Unionists. Madrid showed in Catalonia illegal referendums can be ignored as will this one. Plus the latest polling has the SNP on about 51% and 46% on the constituency and list votes, which is below where it was in the autumn and the poll yesterday had 35% for the status quo and 18% for devomax and 47% for independence, so more back devomax than independence
Small drift from CON to SLAB could still produce some gains for the SNP, but Prof Curtice found tribal differences were still more important than all-out Unionism in 2016
"It seems that for most pro-union voters the differences of stance and style between the pro-union parties still mattered more to them than those parties' common opposition to independence."
Also AFAIK no pollster is yet prompting for ISP or another pro-indy list only party
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
Viruses mutate. It is what they do. This is not news. There are likely mutations in every corner of the globe but only those countries with sequencing can detect them. The second wave of the 1918-20 pandemic was likely caused by one. But in California, as with SA and the UK, deaths are reaching a plateu and cases are falling (or at least levelling off) - indeed in Kent, our varient's ground zero, deaths clearly falling.
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
But it isn't hyperbole. It's a serious possibility that new variants will emerge which will resist the vaccine. So then we tweak the vaccine, which takes a few months, then it happens again, and so on. Like a dog chasing its tail
Spotlighting this real possibility is not hyperbole, or doom-porn, or whatever*
Note that I also report all the good news: like my friend in PG4 being vaxxed Wedenesday
*OK the phrase "The Satan Bug" is doom porn but it was one of my favourite movies as a kid
The pandemic worst case is:
(a) Truly horrific (b) Truly unlikely (c) Truly worth planning for (d) All of the above
The right answer: (d) All of the above.
If your worst case is a completely airborne pathogen that requires no host to survive, but is 100% infectious and 100% fatal in 10 seconds (the Satan Bug)...
And the Council isn't elected at a European election on a European manifesto commitment.
The European Parliament is but its not a real Parliament in the way we understand it. The question to ask is if the European Parliament wants to pass (or repeal) a law against the wishes of the Commission and the Council then can it do so? To which the answer is no.
Could a European "Benn Act" opposed by the Commission President pass because Parliament wants it passing? No, it can not. It can in the UK - unlikely most of the time, but it can and has in our recent past.
I'm fascinated by this argument, variants of which one sees often from Brexiteers. Effectively you are criticising the EU on the grounds that it isn't a fully federal state with its own fully-empowered parliament. Well, quite. It isn't, it isn't intended to be, and certainly isn't going to be in any foreseeable future. That's what those on the Remain side were pointing out for years.
Which is precisely why it is a lumbering, technocratic, anti-democratic hybrid. Neither fish nor fowl. It is quite good at keeping the peace between squabbling nations, but the vaccine programme shows many of its graver flaws.
The Commission chose a bad moment to screw the pooch.
The vaccine programme should never have been done at EU level, and didn't have to be. They got a bit over-communitaire there, but it was a voluntary sovereign decision by the 27 nations. A very bad one, but we in the UK are not in a good position to criticise other countries for bad decisions.
Bollox. The UK is constantly criticised for bad decisions and when they get something right they deserve fulsome praise and they have every right to criticise others in those circumstances.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
The Leaver view is that the EU was - is - on a path towards political union of such scope and completeness that our membership would in due course become incompatible with the very existence of the UK as a nation state. It was therefore essential to bail out now while we still can. Leave it much longer and we'd have been trapped in a train hurtling down a one way track to just one destination. A United States Of Europe.
Exciting stuff.
Of course it is.
You can't long-term have federal powers without federal accountability and federal decision making.
That you do is not a good thing, it is a bad one. Mr Nabavi seems to be waving around an absence of accountability as a "strength" rather than a weakness.
Well if we're now sovereign whereas before we were ruled by Brussels I look forward to general elections where Conservative voters are truly worried by what Labour might do if they get in. Because this has not been the case for a while.
It happened as recently as 2019. I was terrified by the concept of Prime Minister Corbyn.
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
Viruses mutate. It is what they do. This is not news. There are likely mutations in every corner of the globe but only those countries with sequencing can detect them. The second wave of the 1918-20 pandemic was likely caused by one. But in California, as with SA and the UK, deaths are reaching a plateu and cases are falling (or at least levelling off) - indeed in Kent, our varient's ground zero, deaths clearly falling.
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
But it isn't hyperbole. It's a serious possibility that new variants will emerge which will resist the vaccine. So then we tweak the vaccine, which takes a few months, then it happens again, and so on. Like a dog chasing its tail
Spotlighting this real possibility is not hyperbole, or doom-porn, or whatever*
Note that I also report all the good news: like my friend in PG4 being vaxxed Wedenesday
*OK the phrase "The Satan Bug" is doom porn but it was one of my favourite movies as a kid
The pandemic worst case is:
(a) Truly horrific (b) Truly unlikely (c) Truly worth planning for (d) All of the above
The right answer: (d) All of the above.
If your worst case is a completely airborne pathogen that requires no host to survive, but is 100% infectious and 100% fatal in 10 seconds (the Satan Bug)...
(c) isn't really worth any effort
That's not a Satan bug. The infected won't get long to spread it in those 10 seconds.
What makes this virus so pernicious is that asymptomatic spread happens without symptoms and days before infection occurs.
A true Satan bug would be an airborne pathogen (as Covid seems to be) that requires no host to survive, but is 100% infections, asymptomatic spread for a fortnight before onset of symptoms, then sudden 100% fatality.
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
If one subscribes to the Gaia Hypothesis, whittling down the nasty little microbes ruining it for everything else with a mutating, ineradicable virus would be the way to go. Sod the Wuhan eggheads, Mother Earth is awake and she’s furious.
I kind of do if one discards the bulk of its woo baggage (i.e. most of it). It follows that an argument I sort of had with @Leon the other day (global warming vs covid) turns out to be a non-argument: they are both symptoms of the same thing. And it gets worse: there is a lot more where those two things came from. There's a misguided belief that zero emissions = sunlit uplands forever. We are only not noticing habitat loss, soil depletion, plastic pollution and a hundred other things because we can only concentrate on one thing at a time.
And the Council isn't elected at a European election on a European manifesto commitment.
The European Parliament is but its not a real Parliament in the way we understand it. The question to ask is if the European Parliament wants to pass (or repeal) a law against the wishes of the Commission and the Council then can it do so? To which the answer is no.
Could a European "Benn Act" opposed by the Commission President pass because Parliament wants it passing? No, it can not. It can in the UK - unlikely most of the time, but it can and has in our recent past.
I'm fascinated by this argument, variants of which one sees often from Brexiteers. Effectively you are criticising the EU on the grounds that it isn't a fully federal state with its own fully-empowered parliament. Well, quite. It isn't, it isn't intended to be, and certainly isn't going to be in any foreseeable future. That's what those on the Remain side were pointing out for years.
Which is precisely why it is a lumbering, technocratic, anti-democratic hybrid. Neither fish nor fowl. It is quite good at keeping the peace between squabbling nations, but the vaccine programme shows many of its graver flaws.
The Commission chose a bad moment to screw the pooch.
The vaccine programme should never have been done at EU level, and didn't have to be. They got a bit over-communitaire there, but it was a voluntary sovereign decision by the 27 nations. A very bad one, but we in the UK are not in a good position to criticise other countries for bad decisions.
Bollox. The UK is constantly criticised for bad decisions and when they get something right they deserve fulsome praise and they have every right to criticise others in those circumstances.
I agree. If you go on the principle of no entity that makes bad decisions can receive any praise even when they get it right then I think that wipes out ever being able to praise the majority of Western democracies.
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
And the Council isn't elected at a European election on a European manifesto commitment.
The European Parliament is but its not a real Parliament in the way we understand it. The question to ask is if the European Parliament wants to pass (or repeal) a law against the wishes of the Commission and the Council then can it do so? To which the answer is no.
Could a European "Benn Act" opposed by the Commission President pass because Parliament wants it passing? No, it can not. It can in the UK - unlikely most of the time, but it can and has in our recent past.
I'm fascinated by this argument, variants of which one sees often from Brexiteers. Effectively you are criticising the EU on the grounds that it isn't a fully federal state with its own fully-empowered parliament. Well, quite. It isn't, it isn't intended to be, and certainly isn't going to be in any foreseeable future. That's what those on the Remain side were pointing out for years.
Which is precisely why it is a lumbering, technocratic, anti-democratic hybrid. Neither fish nor fowl. It is quite good at keeping the peace between squabbling nations, but the vaccine programme shows many of its graver flaws.
The Commission chose a bad moment to screw the pooch.
The vaccine programme should never have been done at EU level, and didn't have to be. They got a bit over-communitaire there, but it was a voluntary sovereign decision by the 27 nations. A very bad one, but we in the UK are not in a good position to criticise other countries for bad decisions.
Bollox. The UK is constantly criticised for bad decisions and when they get something right they deserve fulsome praise and they have every right to criticise others in those circumstances.
Too early to say if they have got something right.
I think that is the response we have had for the last 11 months re monumental fuck ups
Talking of border guards, this potential stand-off between Johnson and Sturgeon worries me. I don't think any of us wants to see Johnson sending in the police to arrest key SNP leaders, Catalonia-style.
Which police would he send in?
If his only recourse was to UK-wide, centrally commanded military forces, that really would be the end of the union.
Spain and China both responded to secessionist movements by arresting the key leaders, Catalonia remains part of Spain without its nationalist government having been given even one legal independence referendum, Hong Kong remains part of China and China has removed anti Beijing, pro democracy leaders from the Hong Kong Assembly.
A crackdown may not be advisable but Boris is not going to grant a legal indyref2 knowing he would be more likely to lose it than say Sunak or Starmer would and if he lost it he would have to resign as PM. So why risk it?
Not because it's a manifesto commitment then.
I'm also very taken with the idea that our present PM would resign because of a matter of principle. Always the chance of a leopard chasing it's spots, I suppose, but it doesn't seem likely.
Boris would be toppled by his MPs if he granted a legal indyref2 and lost the Union, he knows he could not stay in office as Cameron knew the same had he lost in 2014.
He can stay in office however ignoring Sturgeon, most Tory MPs could not care about her whinging or that of the SNP
Re your last sentence is arrogant and it is time for the party to give consideration to a genuine issue
If I was Boris I would allow a free vote on section 30 and would expect the HOC to reject it leaving the SNP to decide how to resolve the issue
Which means Boris would then still reject it after the Commons vote and there would still be the same confrontation with Sturgeon and the SNP
No the HOC would reject it
The SNP would then face big problems in obtaining international recognition of UDI
I don't disagree and Sturgeon has said she will not do a UDI although the hardcore Salmondites are demanding she should.
However a confrontation is inevitable if the SNP win a majority in May at Holyrood on an indyref2 platform.
And won't we here love that!
Not really. I suggest all sensible Scots for a Unionist party to avoid such a scenario.
Who gives a crap? Midterm polls are meaningless at best of times, in the middle a pandemic they are beyond meaningless. Why anyone pays the slightest attention is beyond me.
A few weeks ago we were assured that the Tories would get a Brexit bounce inn the polls. After that failed to materialise a vaccine bounce was predicted. So this poll is interesting in that it seems to show no sign of any bouncing.
It's weird how the UK's experience of WW2 is held up as an eternal worst case scenario, so even something which has absolutely nothing in common with it could not possibly be allowed to be as disruptive.
Fair enough with Sturgeon on this one. If vaccine rollout is completed, the pandemic is eliminated in the UK, with quarantine hotels for those coming overseas etc then why wait for the WHO to declare the pandemic over globally?
Mr. Pioneers, the jester's ego is the size of Jupiter's magnetic field, whereas his self-awareness is a half-grain of sand.
Expecting Boris Johnson to have sound judgement is akin to expecting a baboon to recite Chaucer. It may be theoretically possible, but it is certainly not commonplace.
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
Covid literally kills almost twice as many men as women. But it is being "used by the patriarchy to exploit women"
What has happened to our charities? Entirely captured by lunatics
Worlds richest 10 men have seen their wealth grow by 400bn in just 12 months. Enough to pay for the whole population of the world to be vaccinated apparently
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
Yep. The reasonable worst-case-scenario - reasonable - is that the virus keeps out-maneuvering us with new mutations and we remain in some awful form of lockdown, light or hard, with virtually no travel, for years, maybe many years. A lost decade, as you say.
The extreme worst case scenario is that it mutates into Avian flu and kills 60% of all humans, which would be a real bummer, tbh
It is looking as if it's not just individual cases that grow exponentially, it's also variant viruses.
ETA
"Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles found that although the strain had been barely detectable in early October, it accounted for 24% of roughly 4,500 viral samples gathered throughout California in the last weeks of 2020.
In a separate analysis of 332 virus samples culled mostly from Northern California during late November and December, 25% were of the same type.
“There was a homegrown variant under our noses,” said Dr. Charles Chiu, a laboratory medicine specialist at University of California, San Francisco who examined the samples from the northern part of the state with collaborators from the California Department of Public Health. Were they not on the hunt for the U.K. strain and other viral variants, he said, “we could have missed this at every level.”
Jesus. It really could be The Satan Bug.
And 2020/21 really could turn out to be just the warmup to the Lost Decade. Not catastrophising for the sake of it, and not joking.
If one subscribes to the Gaia Hypothesis, whittling down the nasty little microbes ruining it for everything else with a mutating, ineradicable virus would be the way to go. Sod the Wuhan eggheads, Mother Earth is awake and she’s furious.
I kind of do if one discards the bulk of its woo baggage (i.e. most of it). It follows that an argument I sort of had with @Leon the other day (global warming vs covid) turns out to be a non-argument: they are both symptoms of the same thing. And it gets worse: there is a lot more where those two things came from. There's a misguided belief that zero emissions = sunlit uplands forever. We are only not noticing habitat loss, soil depletion, plastic pollution and a hundred other things because we can only concentrate on one thing at a time.
I don't remember that argument, because I largely agree with you. Pandemics generally occur after a period of "globalisation" - increased trade, international travel, foreigners mingling
The Black Death came after a surge in trade across Eurasia, Spanish flu came after the Great War with its huge shift of populations. Coronavirus has emerged after the biggest globalisation of all, which has also caused enormous environmental damage, much of which we have barely begun to address, like plastics. as you say. And insect die-off
If covid persists for years globalisation WILL be thrown into reverse. International travel, for a start, will go back to being expensive and laborious: it will greatly reduce. Cleaning the air. So the Gaia hypothesis works, here
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
Covid literally kills almost twice as many men as women. But it is being "used by the patriarchy to exploit women"
What has happened to our charities? Entirely captured by lunatics
Worlds richest 10 men have seen their wealth grow by 400bn in just 12 months. Enough to pay for the whole population of the world to be vaccinated apparently
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
Thank you, Ishmael. Yes, that was peak me, I suspect. Probably on my way down now, starting with a Trump conviction which I backed at 4 and is now approaching 7. I've had a good roll on the political forecasting/betting front since I joined PB three years ago. In fact I'm inclined to think it's to some extent because I came here, since there is a correlation. The last big event before I discovered PB - the GE of 2017 - I got entirely wrong and dropped a packet. But since then, gosh, close to spooky!
Who gives a crap? Midterm polls are meaningless at best of times, in the middle a pandemic they are beyond meaningless. Why anyone pays the slightest attention is beyond me.
A few weeks ago we were assured that the Tories would get a Brexit bounce inn the polls. After that failed to materialise a vaccine bounce was predicted. So this poll is interesting in that it seems to show no sign of any bouncing.
There is a bounce but I suspect it's more like this
with polls continuing as they are until reality suddenly hits.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
Thank you, Ishmael. Yes, that was peak me, I suspect. Probably on my way down now, starting with a Trump conviction which I backed at 4 and is now approaching 7. I've had a good roll on the political forecasting/betting front since I joined PB three years ago. In fact I'm inclined to think it's to some extent because I came here, since there is a correlation. The last big event before I discovered PB - the GE of 2017 - I got entirely wrong and dropped a packet. But since then, gosh, close to spooky!
Let’s hope no evil Nats reveal his whereabouts, don’t want his security threatened by having to meet actual Scotch people.
When I met Dishi Rishi on the CalMac ferry there was a small protest group on the dock in Rothesay waiting to greet him.
Why is the PM going to Scotland thinking his visit will help save the union? Its the opposite surely...
There's actually nothing for Boris to lose by being shouted at by some spittle flecked Ian Blackford fans. In people broadly OK with Boris it would inspire some sympathy - in those anti-Boris it would be somewhat cleansing. Blair was very good at sweatily putting himself through the anti-Blair wringer, and it never did him any harm.
However, I don't think Boris sees it that way - he seems to have a positive horror of being subjected to abuse. I suppose none of us like it, but politicians should be more inured to it than most.
Can you still receive universal credit while receiving chemotherapy for cancer treatment?
My young friend - who has just received a cancer diagnosis - believes you cannot as you are no longer “looking for work”.
Take advice perhaps from a cancer charity but I strongly suspect that is wrong. Plus of course many of the conditions for universal credit are currently suspended anyway.
Best wishes for your friend, hope they make a full recovery.
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
Thank you, Ishmael. Yes, that was peak me, I suspect. Probably on my way down now, starting with a Trump conviction which I backed at 4 and is now approaching 7. I've had a good roll on the political forecasting/betting front since I joined PB three years ago. In fact I'm inclined to think it's to some extent because I came here, since there is a correlation. The last big event before I discovered PB - the GE of 2017 - I got entirely wrong and dropped a packet. But since then, gosh, close to spooky!
You were right there would be a deal, but your logic why was wrong.
I also said there would be a deal but gave different logic.
We were smart in backing off what we feared would become - and indeed what proved to be - a very poorly planned and executed EU way out of the crisis. Their ventilator bollocks gave fair warning. Sure, we have made our own domestic Horlicks of a bunch of issues, but on the strategic planning of vaccine, we have proved so much more nimble than the EU.
Yes, indeed.
I wonder, though, whether that would still have been true if the government had left the procurement to the normal NHS process, rather than asking an unpaid venture capitalist to head up the vaccine taskforce and get the thing done despite the technical and financial risks? I rather suspect not, but it's impossible to know for sure.
Sub-contracted health structures have not exactly covered themselves in glory throughout the Covid crisis, however ; and without the NHS's still national, monolithic and centralised basis, which has been a running sore for the Tories for decades, the vaccine rollout may have been roughly the speed of Germany's - or probably, much slower, going on other sub-contracted plans during the pandemic.
I doubt that very much. Israel doesn't have a monolithic health service, and the USA - with the diametric opposite of a centralised health service - is also doing quite well, despite lumbering itself with Donald Trump. So, although of course one should give full credit to the NHS staff and others who have been organising the roll-out very effectively, there's really no evidence that the monolithic nature of the beast has been an important factor. The important factor is supply.
Though the monolithic NHS has proved particularly effective at conducting clinical trials during the pandemic - another area in which we have led the world, but which has little to do with government action.
The US, in comparison, has been useless (see hydroxchloroquine and the gazillion trials conducted there to no avail).
Israel has a very interesting health structure; we could do with a closer look at it (preferably not while Boris's administration is doing the looking).
Jesus Christ, Oxfam has released a report on COVID..
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
Macmillan are good at this sort of stuff. When my mum had cancer they made sure she was aware of various extra benefits she could get including living support which paid for cleaners to come and help her keep house. She chose not to claim any money but she did find the support helpful as time went by and things became more of an effort.
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
Thank you, Ishmael. Yes, that was peak me, I suspect. Probably on my way down now, starting with a Trump conviction which I backed at 4 and is now approaching 7. I've had a good roll on the political forecasting/betting front since I joined PB three years ago. In fact I'm inclined to think it's to some extent because I came here, since there is a correlation. The last big event before I discovered PB - the GE of 2017 - I got entirely wrong and dropped a packet. But since then, gosh, close to spooky!
You were right there would be a deal, but your logic why was wrong.
I also said there would be a deal but gave different logic.
Given that it has since emerged that Boris Johnson made substantial concessions and parts of the deal are unworkable, would you claim that your logic was vindicated?
A European demos will evolve over time. It is the history of federations.
The choice is whether you want to be federal (in which case give its Parliament full accountability) or not (in which case Brexit). Mr Nabavi wanting the EU to have federal powers but trumpetting the lack of federal accountability as a strength is just bizarre.
Not at all, the choice was between our semi-detached membership, with lots of opt-outs and enhanced by Cameron's renegotiation and what we've got now, which to put it at its mildest, is not exactly going well.
Our opt-outs were never very meaningful and just left us ever more ostracised as an outside within the tent. Given the UK had could be outvoted by QMV by the Eurozone, being tied to the project but outside the room was the worst sort of "influence".
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Nothing ever goes "exactly" as forecast. Not by anybody. And you have a hole in your forecasting portfolio you are never going to recover from. @Kinabalu forecast a deal in December, and acquired kudos. I forecast no deal (I said 80% chance of no deal, which I think is as close to certainty as any such forcast should be) and looked like an arse. And you made no commitment either way, because your task in life is to postdict what Johnson does and affirm that it is the best thing that could ever have happened in this best possible of worlds. So "As I foretold you" is not a line you can really use.
Thank you, Ishmael. Yes, that was peak me, I suspect. Probably on my way down now, starting with a Trump conviction which I backed at 4 and is now approaching 7. I've had a good roll on the political forecasting/betting front since I joined PB three years ago. In fact I'm inclined to think it's to some extent because I came here, since there is a correlation. The last big event before I discovered PB - the GE of 2017 - I got entirely wrong and dropped a packet. But since then, gosh, close to spooky!
You were right there would be a deal, but your logic why was wrong.
I also said there would be a deal but gave different logic.
Given that it has since emerged that Boris Johnson made substantial concessions and parts of the deal are unworkable, would you claim that your logic was vindicated?
Comments
There is no point in holding back capacity, so long as you can book in all the members of the existing priority groups that have been green lit.
Over the past decade 2010-2019 "despite Brexit" the UK had a weaker currency and stronger growth than the Eurozone. The Eurozone had a stronger currency and weaker growth.
You seem to perceive the value of a currency as some sort of sign of national virility to take pride in - that a "stronger" currency is in itself a good thing. It is not. Why did the EU have a stronger currency, despite having weaker growth?
The savings rate in Europe - and Germany especially - is more than it is in the UK. That is the fundamental behind most of our currency change over the course of the decade, not Brexit.
You claim the "topic of conversation" is being changed but the fact is macroeconomics is complicated and it seems you don't understand it if you don't understand why the savings ratio, the balance of payments, the currency and many other factors are all interconnected. Currency is not and never has been a symbol of strength or virility alone.
The other factor that we found interesting was the doctors explanation of the storage, and the process of the injection of the Pfizer vaccine, including that the phial had not to be shaken or disturbed in any way in the process of injection
EDIT : and a deliberate over capacity in the distribution system.
As I've said before, there is a strong chance the jabs will become compulsory, de jure or de facto. HMG is putting money into vaccine passports
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2021/01/24/government-funds-eight-vaccine-passport-schemes-despite-no-plans/
What we've got now is going well IMHO. Its going better than forecast by the likes of you - and exactly as I forecast.
Exciting stuff.
However, better today and no other signs of side effects
You can't long-term have federal powers without federal accountability and federal decision making.
That you do is not a good thing, it is a bad one. Mr Nabavi seems to be waving around an absence of accountability as a "strength" rather than a weakness.
The extreme worst case scenario is that it mutates into Avian flu and kills 60% of all humans, which would be a real bummer, tbh
https://twitter.com/DaveKeating/status/1353589667917144064?s=20
And an alternative to "someone stole our vaccine":
https://twitter.com/ChrisBarnettGMP/status/1353622870447054853?s=20
I'm no denier. This is a bitch of a virus, deadly, I fully support whatever it takes to supress it, and beating it will be a long hard haul yet - but the hyperbole is really really unhelpful.
Being compelled to take a vaccine can be a part of the job if it is a part of their terms and conditions of employment, but it is not for existing staff - and companies struggle to easily unilaterally change their terms and conditions of employment for people who've been working there for years and are on a contract that doesn't include that in their terms.
People are now happy to elide this for the moment but if you are talking legislation (O Mr Libertarian, btw)) then the nitty gritty will be reached pretty soon.
Which is that vaccine or no vaccine you don't want people coughing and sneezing in care homes. How to legislate that.
Spotlighting this real possibility is not hyperbole, or doom-porn, or whatever*
Note that I also report all the good news: like my friend in PG4 being vaxxed Wedenesday
*OK the phrase "The Satan Bug" is doom porn but it was one of my favourite movies as a kid
Speaking to the Chanel Connects podcast, the actress said: "I don't have an absolute ban [on filming nude scenes], but I kind of do with men.
"It's partly vanity and also it's the male gaze," the 35-year-old explained.
https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-55795237
What happens if her opposite in such a scene has a no female director policy?
These NHS people can be replaced easily, right?
I'm not advocating legislation, I'm saying if you want what Mr Urquhart wants, then it will take legislation.
Asymptomatic spread happens with this virus without coughing and sneezing, we have known that for at least six months now.
Asymptomatic spread does happen but is reduced compared with symptomatic spread.
Kinabalu thought there'd be a deal because the UK would move. I thought there'd be a deal because the EU would move. The EU moved. I was right.
(a) Truly horrific
(b) Truly unlikely
(c) Truly worth planning for
(d) All of the above
The right answer: (d) All of the above.
https://twitter.com/jimmfelton/status/1353674231956066305?s=21
"It seems that for most pro-union voters the differences of stance and style between the pro-union parties still mattered more to them than those parties' common opposition to independence."
Also AFAIK no pollster is yet prompting for ISP or another pro-indy list only party
(c) isn't really worth any effort
It is full on all about the evils of Neoliberalism, patriarchy and white supremacy..
It has exploited and exacerbated entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, namely patriarchy and structural racism, ingrained in white supremacy. These systems are the root causes of injustice and poverty. They generate huge profits accumulated in the hands of a White patriarchal elite by exploiting people living in poverty, women and racialized and historically marginalized and oppressed communities around the world.
https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/621149/bp-the-inequality-virus-250121-en.pdf
Your charity donations, when not going on aid workers exploit the poor by paying for sex, is to write this garbage.
What makes this virus so pernicious is that asymptomatic spread happens without symptoms and days before infection occurs.
A true Satan bug would be an airborne pathogen (as Covid seems to be) that requires no host to survive, but is 100% infections, asymptomatic spread for a fortnight before onset of symptoms, then sudden 100% fatality.
What has happened to our charities? Entirely captured by lunatics
I think that is the response we have had for the last 11 months re monumental fuck ups
It's important we maintain some political pressure for the lockdown to be eased, even if Feb 14 is an ambition rather than a target.
Why is the PM going to Scotland thinking his visit will help save the union? Its the opposite surely...
Can you still receive universal credit while receiving chemotherapy for cancer treatment?
My young friend - who has just received a cancer diagnosis - believes you cannot as you are no longer “looking for work”.
Expecting Boris Johnson to have sound judgement is akin to expecting a baboon to recite Chaucer. It may be theoretically possible, but it is certainly not commonplace.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/covid-vaccine-richest-men-poverty-oxfam-b1791281.html
The Black Death came after a surge in trade across Eurasia, Spanish flu came after the Great War with its huge shift of populations. Coronavirus has emerged after the biggest globalisation of all, which has also caused enormous environmental damage, much of which we have barely begun to address, like plastics. as you say. And insect die-off
If covid persists for years globalisation WILL be thrown into reverse. International travel, for a start, will go back to being expensive and laborious: it will greatly reduce. Cleaning the air. So the Gaia hypothesis works, here
with polls continuing as they are until reality suddenly hits.
I might have to take another fortnight off PB, in the vain hope that the screeching hysteria will fade.
It really does completely wreck the enjoyment of the site.
However, I don't think Boris sees it that way - he seems to have a positive horror of being subjected to abuse. I suppose none of us like it, but politicians should be more inured to it than most.
Best wishes for your friend, hope they make a full recovery.
Even if she puzzles her way round that one, she is using her platform to provide an exploitative role model for younger women.
Presumably the money outweighs the ideology and the conscience.
I also said there would be a deal but gave different logic.
You retiring the sockpuppet too?
The US, in comparison, has been useless (see hydroxchloroquine and the gazillion trials conducted there to no avail).
Israel has a very interesting health structure; we could do with a closer look at it (preferably not while Boris's administration is doing the looking).
Macmillan are good at this sort of stuff. When my mum had cancer they made sure she was aware of various extra benefits she could get including living support which paid for cleaners to come and help her keep house. She chose not to claim any money but she did find the support helpful as time went by and things became more of an effort.