I notice we're not talking about Taiwan or New Zealand's approaches, how strange
Actually a lot of us have said how atrocious we find Saint Jacinda's approach is repeatedly.
Jacinda has done a lot better than Boris, this is indisputable.
It is very disputable.
If everyone can be boosted by the end of the year that would be incredible.
Please explain how Boris has done better than Jacinda. I will wait
Higher vaccination rates, sooner.
Lockdown restrictions lifted, sooner.
Much better. Not a long wait for you.
How many people have died in NZ compared to the UK.
The vaccination programme seems to have been pretty ineffective all told, we're about to go back into more restrictions and possibly another lockdown.
I would bet money that NZ will be back to normal ultimately before us.
How much restrictions have there been in NZ?
"Deaths" are not the only thing that matter, especially when you can't live your life due to restrictions.
Apart from foreign travel, fewer and shorter than here. I don't think that we could have copied their success because of geography, but they have certainly done well.
That was true pre-vaccines certainly, and yet entirely geography related.
But she's clung onto lockdowns this year which is beyond ridiculous.
They are still not allowed to have parkrun, no matter how low-risk an activity that is.
Does anyone remember "back to normal by the summer" and "two jabs to freedom". I do
We were, Horse. Until this happened, which was always a possibility.
That was not what the big brains trust was saying at the time and you know it, friend
Well, it’s what I heard them saying. Depending on who you meant by ‘the big brains trust.’
And we have effectively operated without restrictions in England at least since June.
There was always a chance of another variant - the hope was if it did occur it would be milder. This one is milder but not it appears by as much as is needed.
So - more jabbing and we should be OK again. The issue is reaching those who weren’t jabbed properly first time.
To which vaxports have always been the answer.
(With no weak self-adminstered LFT alternative either.)
@Farooq your problem is you seem to be, like Rochdale, incapable of seeing past "cases = BAD".
For me, as many cases as happen naturally occur is a GOOD thing. Especially if those who are bothered about the virus are protected by wearing a quality FFP2 etc mask while those who aren't, are not wearing one.
That segments the risk so that the right people are getting immunity more, which raises the herd immunity levels for the benefit of everyone including those having to wear a mask because they're afraid.
I don't accept the premise that preventing "cases" is a good thing. It may have been early on in the pandemic pre vaccines but it isn't anymore. I don't want cases reduced by NPIs, so them being reduced by NPIs isn't a benefit.
The BMJ article says how states (and nations) with mask mandates have had lower case rates. That is an argument AGAINST mask mandates for me. Those states have failed to get immunity.
No, you're just attacking straw men now. The only point I'm trying to make is that masks work. This is in response to your repeated false assertions that they do not. At no point have I said masks should be mandated, I'm just trying to bring some truth in to usurp your lies.
You seem on the verge in the above post of saying that NPIs do, in fact, work. Alongside a separate argument which is saying that, to paraphrase, "they are bad BECAUSE they work".
Well, it's progress, I guess. I hope you'll stop with your anti-science premises now. I won't even attempt to tackle your argument that it's good to let this spread, not now at least.
No shit Sherlock that masks work. That's why I advocated for them last year.
I dispute that mask mandates work post vaccines because inhibiting those who are not bothered about catching Covid and putting them on the same footing as those who are bothered is a terrible idea.
The only way out of this is immunity. The best way to get immunity is vaccines, we've done that.
The second best way to get immunity is for those who don't care if they get infected, to naturally get infected before those who do care if they do.
Inhibiting the spread of the virus post vaccines is stupid. The sane solution is those who are bothered wear masks to protect themselves and nobody else does.
So you've gone on journey from being right about the facts of masks to being wrong about them. What do you want, part credit? Most people prefer to go the other way but horses for courses I guess.
If you were confident in your justification that masks shouldn't be mandated, why go around spreading misinformation about mask efficacy? Why lie?
I never said masks have no efficacy.
I said mask mandates are bad.
There's a difference. I've said that many times now. How many different ways do I need to say it?
'Sadly there is a bullshit idea that has been spread that "your mask protects others"'
'If mask mandates had efficacy, we should surely have studies demonstrating that by now. Where are they?'
You, just in the last few days. I remember older stuff too, but I'm not doing your homework for you a third time. You've been trying to get people to think masks don't work for several weeks. It would be better if you used honest means to push your agenda. Philip, you've lied repeatedly.
Mask mandates. Mask mandates not masks. 🤦♂️
"If mask mandates had efficacy"
They don't. Mask mandates don't work because they suppress the virus for everyone but the virus is still endemic. It doesn't ensure those capable of defeating the virus get immunity. It doesn't suppress the virus away from those vulnerable, since the virus remains endemic.
Mandates don't work. Name any state or nation with mask mandates that has better immunity now than we do?
Mask mandates do work. It's right there in one of the studies I sent you earlier that you claim to have read. Jesus fucking Christ, how is it possible you cram so much stupid into just one head? You're like a fucking goldfish.
Define "work".
Working is getting out of restrictions and our normal life with high immunity so the virus isn't causing problems. How do mask mandates achieve that end?
They are counterproductive as they prevent the right people from getting infected, postponing the infection until down the road. They don't prevent infections, they just delay them for everyone which is not working.
But if you don't have mask mandates then you can have more infections amongst the low-risk, but if you are high-risk you can be better protected than everyone else.
Work in that they reduce transmission of the virus. And, in the right circumstances, they can keep the R below 1. That's it. It's a perfectly simple fact.
Once again I'm trying not to involve myself in the argument you're making beyond that which is "is that even desirable?" You make your case well but I'll note that there are arguments against what you're saying too. But I'm not going to enter into those right now, especially not with you because you have a tendency to resort easily to fallacies and even lies. And partially because I would be exploring an issue where I haven't decided where I stand. And you are a very poor person to do that with, for the reasons stated above: I don't trust you not to lie.
The one thing that concerns me most about what you're saying is I think high incidence leads to higher chances of mutations.I haven't read into it or thought much about it, but it "feels" like it's a gamble. But again, I'm not pushing a point of view there. I need to know more facts.
Then you have a completely different and in my view faintly ridiculous definition of working.
Using your logic, lockdowns work, so we should be under lockdown still.
Why is suppressing cases the aim? Suppressing cases should only ever be a means to an end.
My definition for working would be getting to the other side and out of restrictions with as few restrictions, hospitalisations and deaths as possible.
If you end up with more restrictions which suppresses cases in the short term, but overall leads to more hospitalisations and deaths, then you have failed all three of my tests but passed yours.
Do you really think fewer cases in the short term, but more restrictions, more deaths and more hospitalisations over the long term is "working"?
Yes, lockdowns DO work. That is not the same as advocating their use. Masks work. The whole point of them is to prevent transmission of infections. If you prefer everyone to become infected, don't use masks. What you do with the facts is up to you.
Working should be more than just preventing infections in the short term.
If you stop someone from getting infected today but they get infected next Thursday instead, then what purpose has that served?
You're missing the fact that life goes on for longer than today. Mask mandates don't work because they just kick the can with no solution.
You keep asking me to get into the other argument with you, Philip, and I keep telling you no. No means no.
That's fine, then don't complain when others say mask mandates don't work. Because they don't.
Preventing 'cases' is not the goal. It should never be the goal. Preventing 'cases' is never any more than a means to an end.
If you want to claim mask mandates work then they need to do more than just postpone infections from today to tomorrow.
And we're back to the start again. You're impervious to reason, and concretely anti-science on this. I'm done trying to dig you out. You have the science, you can wallow in your own stupidity.
I'm pro-science.
I have different goals than you. You've set a goal of preventing 'cases' today which the science shows doesn't even prevent future cases.
I have set a goal of reducing restrictions, hospitalisations and deaths as much as possible.
Preventing 'cases' today doesn't achieve that goal if that results in more hospitalisations and deaths tomorrow.
I wrote this the other day but Farooq would do well to look at daily case rates before and after the Nov lockdown. All that happened was cases were displaced in time. No sombrero was squished, the spike just got pushed to the right.
As you are calling for the wives and daughters of others to die to preserve the "liberty" of yourself and your own wife and daughter, I will take your perspectives on virtue under advisement.
I haven't called for anyone to die.
But do you have any evidence that mask mandates prevent deaths over the course of the pandemic, post-vaccines?
Give over. Your attitude consistently is "people die, so what?" You assume *others* will die.
Why do you assume he assumes that? Unless he has wholly irrational delusions of preferential immunity, he must be saying: these are risks we should all, including me and mine, be living with.
Because nobody goes out saying "let people die of Covid so I can do what I like in liberty" assuming it will be they and their own doing the dying.
What makes you say that? It's just wrong. I support the motorway speed limit being 70 vs 20 despite the additional risk of fatal crashes, on a convenience vs risk basis, in the knowledge that the enhanced risk applies to me every bit as much as it applies to everyone else. Presumably, so do you.
Fatal motorway crashes aren't contagious.
An almost unbelievably stupid point. So fking what? The argument is about tolerating risk in exchange for liberty. As with contagious diseases, so with speed limits: being liberal about it increases the risk both of doing harm, and of having harm done to you. What point are you actually trying to make?
Oh, the humanity, Govt. forcing you to wear a seatbelt whenever you drive!
Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?
I know you are a train person, but the law on seatbelts does not vary with the speed limit. Trust me on this.
If masks are so oppressive, you should also boycott seatbelts, surely?
You are confusing me with someone else. Got masks? Outstanding. Now all we need is a deck of cards.
What's the specific wording? All over 18s "offered" a booster by end of December or "given"? The former would take us to the middle of January for all ~22m that need to be done, which is actually a reasonably achievable target.
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Perhaps if the Government hadn't installed complacency and been utterly useless yet again over the summer we wouldn't be in this mess
Your partisanship is showing.
You call it partisanship, I call it the truth.
I have warned about this for months. Complacency setting in again.
No politician would over rule the JVCI, not Boris, not Starmer.
Starmer is irrelevant in this case. I am saying what I warned about
You would overule the JCVI on vaccines, it like telling the public to take horse dewormer....no responsible politician would do it.
This is the problem with having advisers that make the decisions. The MHRA ruled it safe for kids and said boosters are necessary for all adults yet the government handed the responsibility to another body that dithered and delayed for political reasons.
I could not understand their assumption regarding the proportion of each age cohort that would actually contract the virus in their vaccine side effect calculations.
The simplest and most accurate assumption for who was going to get it was not 1%, 5% or 20%, it was just 100%. Everyone.
Why nobody challenged their nonsense at the time I have no idea. If I'd been given a 'question from the public' it would have been the first one I asked.
At the time, Israel had double jabbed about 60% of the total population, and cases had diminished to basically zero.
Prior to Delta and Omicron, it looked like if you double jabbed 80% of adults, then there weren't enough infectious people for Covid to survive. It looked like - in developed countries - Covid had gone the way of Polio and Measles.
Of course, two things changed that. First, there were the variants, which were much, much more infectious. Second, there was evidence that vaccine immunity waned rather quicker than we'd have liked.
Staff believe it is likely that ITV journalists have many hours more footage of Ms Stratton’s floundering dry runs as Boris Johnson’s press secretary, recorded in late 2020.
It is thought the footage could contain more embarrassing disclosures about the heart of Mr Johnson’s administration, after a leaked clip last week confirmed for the first time that a “Christmas party” had taken place on December 18 last year while London was in partial lockdown.
Junior No10 staff are said to be suffering from mental health crises over the looming threat of more leaks that implicate officials.
Ms Stratton is understood to have taken part in several sessions to prepare her for “White House-style” televised briefings, with Government special advisers posing as journalists.
The plan for on-screen press conferences was eventually abandoned, after Mr Johnson was advised that she had not performed well in the practice sessions.
Well that much is obvious. Few could repeat Johnsons lies and keep a straight face.
I reckon Peter Cook could have done it.
I know Peter Cook is known for playing a Prime Minister in the film version of Whoops Apocalypse! (wholly inferior to the original TV series IMHO), but he did a far better job in the sadly now rather unknown The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer. Well worth seeking out.
I remember when the Sweden model was the one to follow, nobody spouting that nonsense anymore
Tegnell was correct about the pandemic going on for many years......everybody thought he had called even that wrong because of rapid vaccine development, but looks like he will be correct in the end. This will still very much be a thing after 3 years, is not longer.
If the leave it to the Swedes themselves to decide was the right one, not so sure about that.
I notice we're not talking about Taiwan or New Zealand's approaches, how strange
Actually a lot of us have said how atrocious we find Saint Jacinda's approach is repeatedly.
Jacinda has done a lot better than Boris, this is indisputable.
It is very disputable.
If everyone can be boosted by the end of the year that would be incredible.
Please explain how Boris has done better than Jacinda. I will wait
Higher vaccination rates, sooner.
Lockdown restrictions lifted, sooner.
Much better. Not a long wait for you.
How many people have died in NZ compared to the UK.
The vaccination programme seems to have been pretty ineffective all told, we're about to go back into more restrictions and possibly another lockdown.
I would bet money that NZ will be back to normal ultimately before us.
How much restrictions have there been in NZ?
"Deaths" are not the only thing that matter, especially when you can't live your life due to restrictions.
That is even sillier than your earlier post
Deaths are pretty important if you die of Covid, and as such " you can't live your life", restrictions or no restrictions.
How important are "deaths" if you die from something other than Covid?
What about if your last year of life is under restrictions so you lose your last year of life and lose any opportunity to see your family and loved ones before your death?
There are people who haven't been able to see their loved ones since before the pandemic began due to restrictions. Many of those will have died from natural causes and never see their loved ones ever again as a result.
I've got no problem with tonight's announcement from the PM.
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
I notice we're not talking about Taiwan or New Zealand's approaches, how strange
Actually a lot of us have said how atrocious we find Saint Jacinda's approach is repeatedly.
Jacinda has done a lot better than Boris, this is indisputable.
It is very disputable.
If everyone can be boosted by the end of the year that would be incredible.
Please explain how Boris has done better than Jacinda. I will wait
Higher vaccination rates, sooner.
Lockdown restrictions lifted, sooner.
Much better. Not a long wait for you.
How many people have died in NZ compared to the UK.
The vaccination programme seems to have been pretty ineffective all told, we're about to go back into more restrictions and possibly another lockdown.
I would bet money that NZ will be back to normal ultimately before us.
How much restrictions have there been in NZ?
"Deaths" are not the only thing that matter, especially when you can't live your life due to restrictions.
Loving the scare quotes around the word deaths there...
Because the "deaths" figures doesn't count all deaths, does it. If someone dies from natural causes while under lockdown and lost their chance to see their family for a final time then is their death in your "deaths" tally or not?
Perhaps if the Government hadn't installed complacency and been utterly useless yet again over the summer we wouldn't be in this mess
Your partisanship is showing.
You call it partisanship, I call it the truth.
I have warned about this for months. Complacency setting in again.
No politician would over rule the JVCI, not Boris, not Starmer.
Starmer is irrelevant in this case. I am saying what I warned about
You would overule the JCVI on vaccines, it like telling the public to take horse dewormer....no responsible politician would do it.
This is the problem with having advisers that make the decisions. The MHRA ruled it safe for kids and said boosters are necessary for all adults yet the government handed the responsibility to another body that dithered and delayed for political reasons.
I could not understand their assumption regarding the proportion of each age cohort that would actually contract the virus in their vaccine side effect calculations.
The simplest and most accurate assumption for who was going to get it was not 1%, 5% or 20%, it was just 100%. Everyone.
Why nobody challenged their nonsense at the time I have no idea. If I'd been given a 'question from the public' it would have been the first one I asked.
At the time, Israel had double jabbed about 60% of the total population, and cases had diminished to basically zero.
Prior to Delta and Omicron, it looked like if you double jabbed 80% of adults, then there weren't enough infectious people for Covid to survive. It looked like - in developed countries - Covid had gone the way of Polio and Measles.
Of course, two things changed that. First, there were the variants, which were much, much more infectious. Second, there was evidence that vaccine immunity waned rather quicker than we'd have liked.
Delta changed the game, Chris Whitty said it in the summer, everyone is going to get COVID and displacing infections with lockdowns or NPIs has little to no value. As France are now seeing with a surge in hospitalisations (now 14k in hospital and going up by 3-4k per week, before Omicron).
What's the specific wording? All over 18s "offered" a booster by end of December or "given"? The former would take us to the middle of January for all ~22m that need to be done, which is actually a reasonably achievable target.
Since anyone over 3 months past their 2nd jab can book the booster from tomorrow they will have met an 'offered' target, by tomorrow.
I am operating under the assumption that the Government doesn't believe the vaccination goal is attainable. This dramatic pledge is just to help get as many people as possible boosted as soon as possible.
The issue is though that when it doesn’t happen it becomes yet another government failure at a time when they’re already under pressure.
Nobody remembers that Market Garden achieved 90% of its objectives, as that clown Montgomery optimistically described it in his report. They just remember it failed to capture Arnhem and diverted Allied efforts from Antwerp.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
Thoughts on the broadcast. Boris Johnson is a one man nudge unit. Heave unit rather. He wants to scare people into social distancing without actually locking them down because that gets him into trouble with his party. It also means people who lose business or their jobs won't be compensated.
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
I've got no problem with tonight's announcement from the PM.
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
The booster programme has been absolutely pitiful, compared to how good the initial vaccines were.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
The Saffers are a few weeks further down the line and appear to have no need of a lockdown. 21 deaths reported today.
I notice we're not talking about Taiwan or New Zealand's approaches, how strange
Actually a lot of us have said how atrocious we find Saint Jacinda's approach is repeatedly.
Jacinda has done a lot better than Boris, this is indisputable.
It is very disputable.
If everyone can be boosted by the end of the year that would be incredible.
Please explain how Boris has done better than Jacinda. I will wait
Higher vaccination rates, sooner.
Lockdown restrictions lifted, sooner.
Much better. Not a long wait for you.
How many people have died in NZ compared to the UK.
The vaccination programme seems to have been pretty ineffective all told, we're about to go back into more restrictions and possibly another lockdown.
I would bet money that NZ will be back to normal ultimately before us.
How much restrictions have there been in NZ?
"Deaths" are not the only thing that matter, especially when you can't live your life due to restrictions.
Loving the scare quotes around the word deaths there...
Because the "deaths" figures doesn't count all deaths, does it. If someone dies from natural causes while under lockdown and lost their chance to see their family for a final time then is their death in your "deaths" tally or not?
I'd like to see your lecture on the theology of Easter.
I've got no problem with tonight's announcement from the PM.
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
The ramp up on the past 2 weeks have been very poor. Its seems the government were told well it will take until the 13th to really up to speed and they have gone hmm ok, np.
The current vaccines minister is Mrs Invisible. Zahawi gave me a lot more confidence.
Yet another F1 analogy…. The rules say the ref has overriding authority on the use of the whistle to stop the game for injuries… in this case, the referee uses the whistle but decides that “use of” also entitles him to move the ball 95 metres up the pitch and send off the goalkeeper so that the team the sponsors want to win have an open goal… and then he “uses” the whistle to restart the game…
Why was he not wearing a wedding ring? Has Carrie dumped him already?
I don't wear mine. Never got on with having it on my finger.
I used to wear it and then started playing with it during the workday, then it fell on the floor and I couldn't find it for hours. After that I leave it at home in the drawer and only wear it to weddings and on our anniversary. I honestly think it would be a week in the spare bedroom if I lost it.
I managed to lose my original wedding ring at a friend's wedding. I was rather drunk...
I now wear my Great-grandfathers and never take it off.
How many nights in the spare bedroom did you get for that? Just wondering, of course!
One of the finest features of Mrs Foxy is her appalling memory. I am often in the doghouse, but always released quite quickly as she forgets what I have done. One of the secrets of a long marriage is forgetting past misdemeanours.
I've got no problem with tonight's announcement from the PM.
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
The booster programme has been absolutely pitiful, compared to how good the initial vaccines were.
Complacency. We had all summer
The rate is basically the same. That's hardly pitiful.
I can report that Lustau Fino del Puerte is technically very good, but nowhere near as good as it is in situ in Jerez at the bodega, or propping up a bar watching flamenco.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
I didn't say the vaccine programme was a failure, I said it has been ineffective.
"World beating" it is clearly not, I notice Tories have stopped calling it that, why?
It was very quick to get up and running, and did very well until second jabs started but unfortunately did not scale up proportionally from there. That saved somewhere in the region of 100,000 lives, so I would never call that first phase a failure. The real problem has been a complacency set in around that time, that the job was on its way to being done, that two jabs would be enough, that children probably wouldn't need vaccinating.
Right from the very start of this at the back of my mind I've thought we might need to crash vaccinate the population very rapidly in response to a new more dangerous variant. I just didn't expect that to happen this year or the next, and yet here we are in the last weeks of 2021 and that's what we are now trying to do.
If I was PM I would give someone the job of figuring out what it will take to go from identifying a new variant of concern to vaccinating the whole population with an updated vaccine in a matter of a few months. Because if we end up facing something more virulent as well as more transmissible we will need the capability.
I reckon give it 30 mins and the Guardian will be running with a leak from SAGE saying provided with new data, we are seeing rapid rates of transmission, poor protected against Omicron from vaccines and thus we have now advised the government a full lockdown is needed immediately.
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
The 1889 “Russian Flu” outbreak (which may or may not have been a coronavirus) carried on intermittently for about 5 years.
On topic and I expect people aren't paying a lot of attention to North Shropshire amongst the worsening Covid situation. As long shot challengers Lib Dems don't want to "manage expectations". They want to give the impression of being in a position to win.
I notice we're not talking about Taiwan or New Zealand's approaches, how strange
Actually a lot of us have said how atrocious we find Saint Jacinda's approach is repeatedly.
Jacinda has done a lot better than Boris, this is indisputable.
It is very disputable.
If everyone can be boosted by the end of the year that would be incredible.
Please explain how Boris has done better than Jacinda. I will wait
Higher vaccination rates, sooner.
Lockdown restrictions lifted, sooner.
Much better. Not a long wait for you.
How many people have died in NZ compared to the UK.
The vaccination programme seems to have been pretty ineffective all told, we're about to go back into more restrictions and possibly another lockdown.
I would bet money that NZ will be back to normal ultimately before us.
How much restrictions have there been in NZ?
"Deaths" are not the only thing that matter, especially when you can't live your life due to restrictions.
Loving the scare quotes around the word deaths there...
Because the "deaths" figures doesn't count all deaths, does it. If someone dies from natural causes while under lockdown and lost their chance to see their family for a final time then is their death in your "deaths" tally or not?
I'd like to see your lecture on the theology of Easter.
You might not be surprised to find out I'm rather cynical about that too.
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
The 1889 “Russian Flu” outbreak (which may or may not have been a coronavirus) carried on intermittently for about 5 years.
On topic and I expect people aren't paying a lot of attention to North Shropshire amongst the worsening Covid situation. As long shot challengers Lib Dems don't want to "manage expectations". They want to give the impression of being in a position to win.
I think Corbyn might too although of course he is not currently classed as a Labour MP
Well Corbyn did join right-wing Tory rebels in voting down May's Deal. No surprise he joins right-wing Tory rebels in voting against Vaxports now too, especially as he helped elect many more of them in December 2019
I've got no problem with tonight's announcement from the PM.
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
The ramp up on the past 2 weeks have been very poor. Its seems the government were told well it will take until the 13th to really up to speed and they have gone hmm ok, np.
The current vaccines minister is Mrs Invisible. Zahawi gave me a lot more confidence.
Zahawi was minister for vaccine press calls. An excellent up front job was done on procurement. Since then it's been usual departments and channels doing usual job - our actual roll out of available stock has been entirely mediocre, and indeed world wide most countries have had no trouble actually jabbing once they get the stock. We're neither crap nor outstanding and we're going the same speed now we were in the spring.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
I didn't say the vaccine programme was a failure, I said it has been ineffective.
"World beating" it is clearly not, I notice Tories have stopped calling it that, why?
It was very quick to get up and running, and did very well until second jabs started but unfortunately did not scale up proportionally from there. That saved somewhere in the region of 100,000 lives, so I would never call that first phase a failure. The real problem has been a complacency set in around that time, that the job was on its way to being done, that two jabs would be enough, that children probably wouldn't need vaccinating.
Right from the very start of this at the back of my mind I've thought we might need to crash vaccinate the population very rapidly in response to a new more dangerous variant. I just didn't expect that to happen this year or the next, and yet here we are in the last weeks of 2021 and that's what we are now trying to do.
If I was PM I would give someone the job of figuring out what it will take to go from identifying a new variant of concern to vaccinating the whole population with an updated vaccine in a matter of a few months. Because if we end up facing something more virulent as well as more transmissible we will need the capability.
I completely agree with this. First phase, very good as I said so at the time and am happy to say so again. But the reality is that all told, this vaccine programme has ended up being pretty middling and not "world beating". As you say, that is complacency.
I remember when we were going to destroy Europe on this, so far ahead they said. And yet we've ended up in the same position. Seems all so petty now arguing about EU policy or not when it seems to have made little difference in the end
I can report that Lustau Fino del Puerte is technically very good, but nowhere near as good as it is in situ in Jerez at the bodega, or propping up a bar watching flamenco.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
If most people have had their boosters by January as the PM intends zero chance of bodies piling up
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
Haha! Missing comma - apols to Big_G, I am sure he's fully jabbed!
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
If moat people have had their boosters by January as the PM intends zero chance of bodies piling up
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Thoughts on the broadcast. Boris Johnson is a one man nudge unit. Heave unit rather. He wants to scare people into social distancing without actually locking them down because that gets him into trouble with his party. It also means people who lose business or their jobs won't be compensated.
Well I have now had 2 vaccinations, Covid, and a booster. So assuming my immune system is as primed as it can be, I intend to party like it's 2019.
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Yes. I think the Omicron wave might turn out to be reasonably short lived one and less severe than the Delta one last January - if that counts as "mild". Thing is, this is an extra wave that we didn't think we were getting. We thought we were on the home straight with Covid.
Thoughts on the broadcast. Boris Johnson is a one man nudge unit. Heave unit rather. He wants to scare people into social distancing without actually locking them down because that gets him into trouble with his party. It also means people who lose business or their jobs won't be compensated.
Well I have now had 2 vaccinations, Covid, and a booster. So assuming my immune system is as primed as it can be, I intend to party like it's 2019.
If you really want to go large, party like Downing Street 2020....
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
It is a very valid point and it would be useful if across the political divide agreement to sanction anti vaxxers could be arrived at
I reckon give it 30 mins and the Guardian will be running with a leak from SAGE saying provided with new data, we are seeing rapid rates of transmission, poor protected against Omicron from vaccines and thus we have now advised the government a full lockdown is needed immediately.
Perhaps if the Government hadn't installed complacency and been utterly useless yet again over the summer we wouldn't be in this mess
Your partisanship is showing.
You call it partisanship, I call it the truth.
I have warned about this for months. Complacency setting in again.
No politician would over rule the JVCI, not Boris, not Starmer.
Starmer is irrelevant in this case. I am saying what I warned about
You would overule the JCVI on vaccines, it like telling the public to take horse dewormer....no responsible politician would do it.
This is the problem with having advisers that make the decisions. The MHRA ruled it safe for kids and said boosters are necessary for all adults yet the government handed the responsibility to another body that dithered and delayed for political reasons.
I could not understand their assumption regarding the proportion of each age cohort that would actually contract the virus in their vaccine side effect calculations.
The simplest and most accurate assumption for who was going to get it was not 1%, 5% or 20%, it was just 100%. Everyone.
Why nobody challenged their nonsense at the time I have no idea. If I'd been given a 'question from the public' it would have been the first one I asked.
At the time, Israel had double jabbed about 60% of the total population, and cases had diminished to basically zero.
Prior to Delta and Omicron, it looked like if you double jabbed 80% of adults, then there weren't enough infectious people for Covid to survive. It looked like - in developed countries - Covid had gone the way of Polio and Measles.
Of course, two things changed that. First, there were the variants, which were much, much more infectious. Second, there was evidence that vaccine immunity waned rather quicker than we'd have liked.
Delta changed the game, Chris Whitty said it in the summer, everyone is going to get COVID and displacing infections with lockdowns or NPIs has little to no value. As France are now seeing with a surge in hospitalisations (now 14k in hospital and going up by 3-4k per week, before Omicron).
Exactly.
Those nations that slapped themselves on the back for displacing cases over the summer are going to be more screwed than a dockyard hooker/stepmom on Pornhub.
Thank goodness we had our exit wave over the summer. Hopefully that combined with boosters will be enough for Omicron.
Why was he not wearing a wedding ring? Has Carrie dumped him already?
I don't wear mine. Never got on with having it on my finger.
I used to wear it and then started playing with it during the workday, then it fell on the floor and I couldn't find it for hours. After that I leave it at home in the drawer and only wear it to weddings and on our anniversary. I honestly think it would be a week in the spare bedroom if I lost it.
I managed to lose my original wedding ring at a friend's wedding. I was rather drunk...
I now wear my Great-grandfathers and never take it off.
Reminds me of a minor incident which ended well last summer.
A couple of guys jumped into the tidal pool at Polperro.. A moment later, I heard a loud howl of dismay, as one of the divers realised that his wife's grandfather's wedding ring had fallen off his hand into the drink. Earlier I had been (trying to take photos with a waterproof camera, and had packed face mask and snorkel in my rucksack.
I offered the guy the mask, and snorkel, given the size of the pool there was a good chance that he could recover the heirloom. I am happy to report he recovered the ring.
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
Well the UK is buying vaccines for 2022 and 2023, so 4 years is pretty much the minimum.
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
The 1889 “Russian Flu” outbreak (which may or may not have been a coronavirus) carried on intermittently for about 5 years.
Cheerful sod.
But quite so.
It does mean we’re getting on for halfway through. Another three years…three years ago today Theresa May survived that confidence vote.
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Yes. I think the Omicron wave might turn out to be reasonably short lived one and less severe than the Delta one last January - if that counts as "mild". Thing is, this is an extra wave that we didn't think we were getting. We thought we were on the home straight with Covid.
It's massively disappointing.
Not to be a negative nelly, but one thing I took from the Boris speech, he made a point of saying you might have heard it is milder, there is no evidence at the moment it is (or words to that affect).
Now that might be the SAGE doom mongers trying to get Boris to lockdown, it might be a nudge strategy to get people boosted, or it might be true.
Perhaps if the Government hadn't installed complacency and been utterly useless yet again over the summer we wouldn't be in this mess
Your partisanship is showing.
You call it partisanship, I call it the truth.
I have warned about this for months. Complacency setting in again.
No politician would over rule the JVCI, not Boris, not Starmer.
Starmer is irrelevant in this case. I am saying what I warned about
You would overule the JCVI on vaccines, it like telling the public to take horse dewormer....no responsible politician would do it.
This is the problem with having advisers that make the decisions. The MHRA ruled it safe for kids and said boosters are necessary for all adults yet the government handed the responsibility to another body that dithered and delayed for political reasons.
I could not understand their assumption regarding the proportion of each age cohort that would actually contract the virus in their vaccine side effect calculations.
The simplest and most accurate assumption for who was going to get it was not 1%, 5% or 20%, it was just 100%. Everyone.
Why nobody challenged their nonsense at the time I have no idea. If I'd been given a 'question from the public' it would have been the first one I asked.
At the time, Israel had double jabbed about 60% of the total population, and cases had diminished to basically zero.
Prior to Delta and Omicron, it looked like if you double jabbed 80% of adults, then there weren't enough infectious people for Covid to survive. It looked like - in developed countries - Covid had gone the way of Polio and Measles.
Of course, two things changed that. First, there were the variants, which were much, much more infectious. Second, there was evidence that vaccine immunity waned rather quicker than we'd have liked.
Yes, I did understand that was the idea. There was no chance that all countries were going to reach full immunity for years though, however many vaccines we gave away, so there were always going to be cases coming in, and consequently local outbreaks, particularly in schools.
Even without a vaccine escape it was likely that everyone would be exposed eventually, even if it was over a 5 - 10 year timescale. In which case, why wait?
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
If moat people have had their boosters by January as the PM intends zero chance of bodies piling up
And if hypotheticals were cash we’d all be rich.
Very consistent, mind, the insistence that the Tories are there to protect the interests of the moat people
I reckon give it 30 mins and the Guardian will be running with a leak from SAGE saying provided with new data, we are seeing rapid rates of transmission, poor protected against Omicron from vaccines and thus we have now advised the government a full lockdown is needed immediately.
Absolutely, it's written.
Worth repeating...apparently the nonsense "Threat Level" is set by Witty / Valance, the government don't have a say over it. What got raised earlier today.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Yes. I think the Omicron wave might turn out to be reasonably short lived one and less severe than the Delta one last January - if that counts as "mild". Thing is, this is an extra wave that we didn't think we were getting. We thought we were on the home straight with Covid.
It's massively disappointing.
Not to be a negative nelly, but one thing I took from the Boris speech, he made a point of saying you might have heard it is milder, there is no evidence at the moment it is (or words to that affect).
Now that might be the SAGE doom mongers trying to get Boris to lockdown, it might be a nudge strategy to get people boosted, or it might be true.
Whether or not it is milder, with transmissibility like that it’s certainly going to be shorter.
I didn't say the vaccine programme was a failure, I said it has been ineffective.
"World beating" it is clearly not, I notice Tories have stopped calling it that, why?
It was very quick to get up and running, and did very well until second jabs started but unfortunately did not scale up proportionally from there. That saved somewhere in the region of 100,000 lives, so I would never call that first phase a failure. The real problem has been a complacency set in around that time, that the job was on its way to being done, that two jabs would be enough, that children probably wouldn't need vaccinating.
Right from the very start of this at the back of my mind I've thought we might need to crash vaccinate the population very rapidly in response to a new more dangerous variant. I just didn't expect that to happen this year or the next, and yet here we are in the last weeks of 2021 and that's what we are now trying to do.
If I was PM I would give someone the job of figuring out what it will take to go from identifying a new variant of concern to vaccinating the whole population with an updated vaccine in a matter of a few months. Because if we end up facing something more virulent as well as more transmissible we will need the capability.
I completely agree with this. First phase, very good as I said so at the time and am happy to say so again. But the reality is that all told, this vaccine programme has ended up being pretty middling and not "world beating". As you say, that is complacency.
I remember when we were going to destroy Europe on this, so far ahead they said. And yet we've ended up in the same position. Seems all so petty now arguing about EU policy or not when it seems to have made little difference in the end
Because the "deaths" figures doesn't count all deaths, does it. If someone dies from natural causes while under lockdown and lost their chance to see their family for a final time then is their death in your "deaths" tally or not?
Many people won't like it but you are making a fair point. On excess deaths, which for a whole host of reasons is the best measure we have, the UK isn't even in the top 50 nations now, I think we are now down around 70ish and still falling. Many nations that people think have done better than the UK have had more people dying, just not more people directly attributed to covid itself.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
Read the original post again Big_G. Slight punctuation error…
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
He was joking Big_G, at my expense rather than yours. And justifiably.
Thoughts on the broadcast. Boris Johnson is a one man nudge unit. Heave unit rather. He wants to scare people into social distancing without actually locking them down because that gets him into trouble with his party. It also means people who lose business or their jobs won't be compensated.
Well I have now had 2 vaccinations, Covid, and a booster. So assuming my immune system is as primed as it can be, I intend to party like it's 2019.
Despite being the most feckless prime minister of recent times, Boris Johnson has a responsibility you and the people you come into contact with presumably don't share. Having all that immunity doesn't stop you passing the disease on. Hence his broadcast. He wouldn't bother otherwise.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
All the more reason why you shouldn’t be made to suffer for want of proper punctuation…
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
All the more reason why you shouldn’t be made to suffer for want of proper punctuation…
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Yes. I think the Omicron wave might turn out to be reasonably short lived one and less severe than the Delta one last January - if that counts as "mild". Thing is, this is an extra wave that we didn't think we were getting. We thought we were on the home straight with Covid.
It's massively disappointing.
If by wave you mean infections, I'd agree. I'm far from convinced about a wave of hospitalisations and deaths. Speeding up the boosters doing seem like a worthwhile enterprise if the (unlikely) worst case scenario of omicron being severe, threatening the double vaccinated and ferociously transmissable are all true.
I didn't say the vaccine programme was a failure, I said it has been ineffective.
"World beating" it is clearly not, I notice Tories have stopped calling it that, why?
It was very quick to get up and running, and did very well until second jabs started but unfortunately did not scale up proportionally from there. That saved somewhere in the region of 100,000 lives, so I would never call that first phase a failure. The real problem has been a complacency set in around that time, that the job was on its way to being done, that two jabs would be enough, that children probably wouldn't need vaccinating.
Right from the very start of this at the back of my mind I've thought we might need to crash vaccinate the population very rapidly in response to a new more dangerous variant. I just didn't expect that to happen this year or the next, and yet here we are in the last weeks of 2021 and that's what we are now trying to do.
If I was PM I would give someone the job of figuring out what it will take to go from identifying a new variant of concern to vaccinating the whole population with an updated vaccine in a matter of a few months. Because if we end up facing something more virulent as well as more transmissible we will need the capability.
I completely agree with this. First phase, very good as I said so at the time and am happy to say so again. But the reality is that all told, this vaccine programme has ended up being pretty middling and not "world beating". As you say, that is complacency.
I remember when we were going to destroy Europe on this, so far ahead they said. And yet we've ended up in the same position. Seems all so petty now arguing about EU policy or not when it seems to have made little difference in the end
Where are you getting that idea from?
I think using European Union as a block is a little misleading, because some of the Eastern bloc are incredibly vaccine-sceptic (and/or only bought Russian vaccines).
A better compare would be to look at us relative to France/Germany/Italy/Spain, and there we're well ahead, but they've picked up the pace.
It is also worth noting that AZ-AZ-Pfizer is likely to be meaningfully more efficacious than Pfizer-Pfizer-Pfizer, which works in our benefit.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
Read the original post again Big_G. Slight punctuation error…
Sorry, it is over 60 years since I achieved my English 'O' level and missed the punctuation error
Is it worth pointing out that old Swedish Chris Witty, Anders Tegnell, said he thought the pandemic would be going on for 3-4 years....and not to judge countries based on the first few months.
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
Well the UK is buying vaccines for 2022 and 2023, so 4 years is pretty much the minimum.
Has anyone asked the Chinese whether they are experimenting with anything new at the Wuhan Lab?
That hubris thing that Leon and I have referred to has been playing in my mind. A few weeks ago TSE posted up a thread in which he stated that unless there was some flesh-eating mutant form of covid he expected Boris' tories to surge ahead in the polls: 10% I think was quoted.
That's not a pop at TSE. It's a caution that whenever we think this bloody thing is beat, it comes back and bites us ... hard.
To be fair the idea that a more transmissible variant might emerge approx 6 moths after the last more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the first more transmissible variant that emerged approx 6 months after the start of the pandemic was basically unimaginable.
Yes. I think the Omicron wave might turn out to be reasonably short lived one and less severe than the Delta one last January - if that counts as "mild". Thing is, this is an extra wave that we didn't think we were getting. We thought we were on the home straight with Covid.
It's massively disappointing.
If by wave you mean infections, I'd agree. I'm far from convinced about a wave of hospitalisations and deaths. Speeding up the boosters doing seem like a worthwhile enterprise if the (unlikely) worst case scenario of omicron being severe, threatening the double vaccinated and ferociously transmissable are all true.
I don't know, of course. But I expect the wave to include hospitalisations and potentially deaths, but maybe not at the levels of early 2019. Even during the summer and autumn trough, hospitalisations have been running at a quarter or a fifth of the January peak. Those numbers will rise significantly.
I remember when we were going to destroy Europe on this, so far ahead they said. And yet we've ended up in the same position. Seems all so petty now arguing about EU policy or not when it seems to have made little difference in the end
No you are wrong there. The whole point of what we did with early approval, buying multiple vaccines, and stretching the dosing intervals was to go fast. We did go fast. It was a fundamentally different goal from the EU, speed versus volume basically. It saved a lot of lives. So on that aspect you are in error.
Now where we went wrong is with step two. What do you do for the long term? What is the UK's steady state of covid vaccination? It wasn't scaled up to allow very rapid vaccination of the whole population, it was initially focused on purely boosting the vulnerable. That would probably have been fine with Alpha, and maybe even just about tenable with Delta, but Omicron has completley blown that plan out of the water. Omicron has almost sent us back to the start where speed matters above all once again.
I can report that Lustau Fino del Puerte is technically very good, but nowhere near as good as it is in situ in Jerez at the bodega, or propping up a bar watching flamenco.
Big fan of their vermouths
Yes, they were pushing their Vermut Rojo, dark and sweet in the Spanish style. Quite nice, but not something I would drink at home. Waitrose stock it. The Fino del Puerto is half way to a Manzanilla, which for some reason I like less (and I usually like manzanilla). I did have lunch in Sanlucar one day at La Cigarrera, but the best experience was just propping up the bar in the tabanco.
Clearly SAGE have told him Omicron isnt much milder, or not sufficiently milder to not overwhelm the NHS.
We are back to flatten the curve.
That's what my friend/source flagged up the other day.
The NHS collapsing will put the Tories out for decades.
Another lockdown will put the Tories out for years.
So Boris took the best course, mass rollout of boosters including the army to save the NHS. However not a single word about a future lockdown or even further vaxports being on the cards either
If bodies are piling up in January-February this stance is going to put the tories out for 50 years.
We obviously ought to have tighter restrictions, even if not an actual lockdown. The recklessness given the evident peril of the situation is breathtaking.
Seems the four nations have endorsed the message tonight and so has Starmer so collectively they are together on this tonight
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
We should just lock down the unvaccinated Big_G. That's where we will end up, so let's do it now.
Free the Big_G One!
I am not sure why you say that when my wife and I are so grateful that we have had our boosters and flu vaccine and have so much to be thankful for
Read the original post again Big_G. Slight punctuation error…
Sorry, it is over 60 years since I achieved my English 'O' level and missed the punctuation error
So did I when I wrote it and my English 'O' level was only 55 years ago, so no excuse. 🤭
I am operating under the assumption that the Government doesn't believe the vaccination goal is attainable. This dramatic pledge is just to help get as many people as possible boosted as soon as possible.
Everyone who can be vaccinated within the system is being vaccinated. The purpose of the broadcast, I suspect, is to jolt people into changing their behaviour without the government at this stage imposing lockdown.
I am operating under the assumption that the Government doesn't believe the vaccination goal is attainable. This dramatic pledge is just to help get as many people as possible boosted as soon as possible.
Everyone who can be vaccinated within the system is being vaccinated. The purpose of the broadcast, I suspect, is to jolt people into changing their behaviour without the government at this stage imposing lockdown.
Or maybe it was just an attempt to recover some self-respect and initiative, after the past week, by doing something supposedly prime ministerial? Even if he couldn’t be arsed to tidy himself up for it.
Comments
(With no weak self-adminstered LFT alternative either.)
Throws hand grenade and runs away.
At the time, Israel had double jabbed about 60% of the total population, and cases had diminished to basically zero.
Prior to Delta and Omicron, it looked like if you double jabbed 80% of adults, then there weren't enough infectious people for Covid to survive. It looked like - in developed countries - Covid had gone the way of Polio and Measles.
Of course, two things changed that. First, there were the variants, which were much, much more infectious. Second, there was evidence that vaccine immunity waned rather quicker than we'd have liked.
If the leave it to the Swedes themselves to decide was the right one, not so sure about that.
What about if your last year of life is under restrictions so you lose your last year of life and lose any opportunity to see your family and loved ones before your death?
There are people who haven't been able to see their loved ones since before the pandemic began due to restrictions. Many of those will have died from natural causes and never see their loved ones ever again as a result.
Are their deaths in your "deaths" figures or not?
Except that it was clear from what I read, here and elsewhere, that this should have been a fortnight ago - in that time we could have done 5-10 million boosters, and built capacity quicker. As so often, the right decision reached a bit later than it should have been.
I think we have to assume the target is 'given'.
Nobody remembers that Market Garden achieved 90% of its objectives, as that clown Montgomery optimistically described it in his report. They just remember it failed to capture Arnhem and diverted Allied efforts from Antwerp.
If further measures are needed they will be taken but the idea we can keep locking down the nation is simply not sustainable not only for economic reasons but also mental health
Complacency. We had all summer
The current vaccines minister is Mrs Invisible. Zahawi gave me a lot more confidence.
What a complete load of grade A bollocks. https://twitter.com/dizzy_thinks/status/1470114209497325578
“Mate, my computer is playing up, I think it’s got a virus.”
“Turn it off. Done. No more problems.”
Right from the very start of this at the back of my mind I've thought we might need to crash vaccinate the population very rapidly in response to a new more dangerous variant. I just didn't expect that to happen this year or the next, and yet here we are in the last weeks of 2021 and that's what we are now trying to do.
If I was PM I would give someone the job of figuring out what it will take to go from identifying a new variant of concern to vaccinating the whole population with an updated vaccine in a matter of a few months. Because if we end up facing something more virulent as well as more transmissible we will need the capability.
But quite so.
Oh not those nubmers you mean.
In fact, the vaccination programme has been hugely effective. We've gone from about 9% of cases resulting in hospitalisation to about 2%.
I remember when we were going to destroy Europe on this, so far ahead they said. And yet we've ended up in the same position. Seems all so petty now arguing about EU policy or not when it seems to have made little difference in the end
Put the politics on one side and back this message as the four nations and Starmer has in the interest of the country
It's massively disappointing.
Those nations that slapped themselves on the back for displacing cases over the summer are going to be more screwed than a dockyard hooker/stepmom on Pornhub.
Thank goodness we had our exit wave over the summer. Hopefully that combined with boosters will be enough for Omicron.
A couple of guys jumped into the tidal pool at Polperro.. A moment later, I heard a loud howl of dismay, as one of the divers realised that his wife's grandfather's wedding ring had fallen off his hand into the drink. Earlier I had been (trying to take photos with a waterproof camera, and had packed face mask and snorkel in my rucksack.
I offered the guy the mask, and snorkel, given the size of the pool there was a good chance that he could recover the heirloom. I am happy to report he recovered the ring.
Now that might be the SAGE doom mongers trying to get Boris to lockdown, it might be a nudge strategy to get people boosted, or it might be true.
Even without a vaccine escape it was likely that everyone would be exposed eventually, even if it was over a 5 - 10 year timescale. In which case, why wait?
Edit: And then came Delta (as Max points out)
SKS has expelled the wrong sort of Jews and has tried to bury the report investigating racism in the Labour Party
You must be gutted that Starmer is 9 points ahead
We all appreciate you are fully jabbed!
A better compare would be to look at us relative to France/Germany/Italy/Spain, and there we're well ahead, but they've picked up the pace.
It is also worth noting that AZ-AZ-Pfizer is likely to be meaningfully more efficacious than Pfizer-Pfizer-Pfizer, which works in our benefit.
Keep attacking former Labour voters though I am sure you wont need their votes at the next GE.
This "why don't you f**k off and join the Tories" People's Front of Judea attitude is endemic within the Labour Party.
Now where we went wrong is with step two. What do you do for the long term? What is the UK's steady state of covid vaccination? It wasn't scaled up to allow very rapid vaccination of the whole population, it was initially focused on purely boosting the vulnerable. That would probably have been fine with Alpha, and maybe even just about tenable with Delta, but Omicron has completley blown that plan out of the water. Omicron has almost sent us back to the start where speed matters above all once again.
It has strong March 2020 vibes.