Coronavirus (Non-Politics)

[Tangled up in Blue]

If the scientists had their way we'd have restrictions until the end of the year and never totally release us at all. Even Patrick Vallance at the press conference last night said we may have to have some restrictions in the winter/early next year.

You simply cannot live life like that. Life revolves around social contact, personal responsibility and perception of risk. Don't feel safe in somewhere that's open don't go, carry on keeping your distance and wear a mask if you like. But you cannot keep this restrictions forever.

My understanding of the new measures is that most of them are due to kick in by April 21st (and a few others like theatres opening up again and football matches by July).

Social contact. if it involves the potential spreading of new variants of the virus would be potentially lethal for some.

I'll go on wearing a mask in public as long as I'm legally obliged to (as in Spain or France).

Social distancing and other safety measures are likely to be with us for some time to come.

 

[jackj13]

My understanding of the new measures is that most of them are due to kick in by April 21st (and a few others like theatres opening up again and football matches by July).

Social contact. if it involves the potential spreading of new variants of the virus would be potentially lethal for some.

I'll go on wearing a mask in public as long as I'm legally obliged to (as in Spain or France).

Social distancing and other safety measures are likely to be with us for some time to come.

So we're unable to alter the vaccine for the vulnerable for new variants every year like the flu? Because that is exactly what we do.

 

[Tangled up in Blue]

So we're unable to alter the vaccine for the vulnerable for new variants every year like the flu? Because that is exactly what we do.

I'm sure that is exactly what will happen in the future but presumably not before everyone has been vaccinated this year.

 

[Member]

Funny how we shouldn’t compare ourselves to Sweden but so many compare them to other Scandinavian countries.

Andybody fancy explaining the success of Greece ?

Greece moved much more quickly than we did. As was the case with most other western countries.

We completely ****ed it with our first lockdown. Boris was going around shaking hands in hospitals and a month later he was in intensive care. We were too slow to react strongly and that enabled the virus to take hold the country. This then prolonged the lockdown necessary to bring it back down, after a huge amount of avoidable deaths. We then repeated the same mistakes over Christmas, which resulted in another delayed and then protracted lockdown.

Greece, and other countries were faster to react and this meant their lockdowns didn't need to be as severe or as long as ours.

Population density is very important. It's not just about cities and where people live, but it's about how people travel and work and mix across locations. A large proportion of our population haven't been able to afford to isolate, or work from home, as many of us are lucky to be able to do. Only 1/3 people in this country have isolated when advised to do so, meaning the majority of people haven’t isolated and have potentially been spreading the virus - some out of ignorance or selfishness, but many out of necessity.

Our economic support packages have not been sufficient to ensure the lockdowns have had the required effect on the cases and health outcomes. We've basically done everything half-arsed and ended up in the worst possible scenario. Scientists have advised about this throughout, but we all know that this government doesn't really like listening to experts. It seems like after lengthy lockdowns and awful statistics, they might be finally getting the message on how to handle this.

 

[rigsby]

Greece moved much more quickly than we did. As was the case with most other western countries.

We completely ****ed it with our first lockdown. Boris was going around shaking hands in hospitals and a month later he was in intensive care. We were too slow to react strongly and that enabled the virus to take hold the country. This then prolonged the lockdown necessary to bring it back down, after a huge amount of avoidable deaths. We then repeated the same mistakes over Christmas, which resulted in another delayed and then protracted lockdown.

Greece, and other countries were faster to react and this meant their lockdowns didn't need to be as severe or as long as ours.

Population density is very important. It's not just about cities and where people live, but it's about how people travel and work and mix across locations. A large proportion of our population haven't been able to afford to isolate, or work from home, as many of us are lucky to be able to do. 1/3 people in this country have isolated when advised to do so, some out of ignorance or selfishness, but many out of necessity.

Our economic support packages have not been sufficient to ensure the lockdowns have had the required effect on the cases and health outcomes. We've basically done everything half-arsed and ended up in the worst possible scenario. Scientists have advised about this throughout, but we all know that this government doesn't really like listening to experts. It seems like after lengthy lockdowns and awful statistics, they might be finally getting the message on how to handle this.

How comes more people have caught Covid and died AFTER they were admitted to Southend hospital than have died in the whole of Greece.

Same for Basildon and Romford......We know this for a fact because its happened to people who are regulars on here.

 

[blueblueblue]

How comes more people have caught Covid and died AFTER they were admitted to Southend hospital than have died in the whole of Greece.

Same for Basildon and Romford......We know this for a fact because its happened to people who are regulars on here.

What was quoted, was a spot on assessment from what we've all witnessed over the last year.

Half the time I have no idea what you're going on about. You seem to throw a spanner in the works at every opportunity which doesn't make much sense what you're actually trying to get at.

 

[blueblueblue]

So we're unable to alter the vaccine for the vulnerable for new variants every year like the flu? Because that is exactly what we do.

That's a fair point. The way I see it, Covid is very new and every new varient we're still learning about it. I'm guessing the Flu is slightly different because we know more about the Flu.

Fingers crossed we're able to tweak the Covid vaccine everytime a new variant comes along.

 

[Member]

How comes more people have caught Covid and died AFTER they were admitted to Southend hospital than have died in the whole of Greece.

Same for Basildon and Romford......We know this for a fact because its happened to people who are regulars on here.

There are many many factors as to why we've done worse than other countries. Also remember that variants emerge from having a lot of the virus in the community and so that's why there was a greater chance for a dominant variant to emerge in countries that have struggled (UK, South Africa, Brazil). Other places haven't suffered from these variants (or harboured their own) if they've kept community spread extremely low in 2020.

 

[Member]

I'm sure that is exactly what will happen in the future but presumably not before everyone has been vaccinated this year.

I actually think that we could have modified vaccines available very soon. It might be that for the general adult population the second doses are the modified vaccine. The modified vaccines don't need to go through the same type of lengthy trials as the original vaccine and so they're quick to design, approve, and roll out.

 

[rigsby]

What was quoted, was a spot on assessment from what we've all witnessed over the last year.

Half the time I have no idea what you're going on about. You seem to throw a spanner in the works at every opportunity which doesn't make much sense what you're actually trying to get at.

No we haven't. Some are here are allowed to claim things whilst others aren't.

The fact remains why are our individual hospitals more deadly than the whole of Greece.

 

[THE SEVENTIES NORTH BANK]

And now for some Covid news, not so serious for a change, but it did make me laugh. A headline in the Echo.....'Dogging is not essential travel'.......Police speak out over planned weekend meet up.

That's my weekend ruined then.

 

[GNH]

There are many many factors as to why we've done worse than other countries. Also remember that variants emerge from having a lot of the virus in the community and so that's why there was a greater chance for a dominant variant to emerge in countries that have struggled (UK, South Africa, Brazil). Other places haven't suffered from these variants (or harboured their own) if they've kept community spread extremely low in 2020.

While what you say is very plausible, it is not proven that the 'UK variant' is actually aything of the sort.

As these things tend to be 'named' after the place they are first discovered all this means is that our superior genome testing capacity means we detected it first. It is just as likely to have originated from elsewhere.

 

[Member]

No we haven't. Some are here are allowed to claim things whilst others aren't.

The fact remains why are our individual hospitals more deadly than the whole of Greece.

They've been completely overwhelmed. It's no surprise that nosocomial infections have occurred given how busy they've become. Especially given more transmissible variant in the SE of England. This is a deadly disease, even though throughout this thread you've been insistent on downplaying it.

 

[blueblueblue]

And now for some Covid news, not so serious for a change, but it did make me laugh. A headline in the Echo.....'Dogging is not essential travel'.......Police speak out over planned weekend meet up.

That's my weekend ruined then.

Hahaha that is funny. Seriously, the Echo done an article on dogging? They must be hard up with story lines (excuse the pun).

I hope they use full PPE.

 

[rigsby]

They've been completely overwhelmed. It's no surprise that nosocomial infections have occurred given how busy they've become. Especially given more transmissible variant in the SE of England. This is a deadly disease, even though throughout this thread you've been insistent on downplaying it.

Your blaming it all on Boris, which to me is playing it down. The NHS has been overwhelmed with cases that originated in their own hospitals and care homes. Not beer gardens, football stadiums or even Asda.

 

[Member]

While what you say is very plausible, it is not proven that the 'UK variant' is actually aything of the sort.

As these things tend to be 'named' after the place they are first discovered all this means is that our superior genome testing capacity means we detected it first. It is just as likely to have originated from elsewhere.

Variants are most likely to become dominant in areas where the virus is allowed to spread because that creates the chances for mutations to occur and then take hold due to mutational advantages.

You're right that we do far more sequencing than anywhere else, and so there is a chance that it occurred somewhere else and then only was identified here (similar for South Africa where they also do lots of sequencing), I think that's quite unlikely and goes against what scientists have reported. Variants pass through families (like a family tree) and so the sequencing we've done over time suggests that the UK variant B117 has come from the UK because you can track back its families/lineage.

So we're probably both correct, we've spotted these dominant variants because we do the sequencing but they've come from here because of the large amount of cases in general. There could be other variants occurring in other countries with high cases but they've just not yet been detected yet.

 

[GNH]

Variants are most likely to become dominant in areas where the virus is allowed to spread because that creates the chances for mutations to occur and then take hold due to mutational advantages.

You're right that we do far more sequencing than anywhere else, and so there is a chance that it occurred somewhere else and then only was identified here (similar for South Africa where they also do lots of sequencing), I think that's quite unlikely and goes against what scientists have reported. Variants pass through families (like a family tree) and so the sequencing we've done over time suggests that the UK variant B117 has come from the UK because you can track back its families/lineage.

So we're probably both correct, we've spotted these dominant variants because we do the sequencing but they've come from here because of the large amount of cases in general. There could be other variants occurring in other countries with high cases but they've just not yet been detected yet.

I thought that there were huge case numbers across the globe? We have a little over 4m of a total of 112m cases worldwide.

Following that logic isnt it more likely it originated in the US or India and then came to this country as they have nearly 40m cases between them?

If it didn't then where are the numerous variants sweeping the US and India? Perhaps they are and their poor genomic sequencing hasn't picked it up. I know the US sequences less than 0.3% of its cases

 

[THE SEVENTIES NORTH BANK]

Hahaha that is funny. Seriously, the Echo done an article on dogging? They must be hard up with story lines (excuse the pun).

I hope they use full PPE.

They certainly did. Currently the No1 story. Click below.
'Dogging is not essential travel' - police speak out over planned weekend meet up

 

[blueblueblue]

No we haven't. Some are here are allowed to claim things whilst others aren't.

The fact remains why are our individual hospitals more deadly than the whole of Greece.

I have no idea, but I'm sure you'll be able to tell us.

Have you been banned from this site in the past by any chance? You seem to have an answer for everything. This site should be called Rigsbyzone.

 

[Member]

I thought that there were huge case numbers across the globe? We have a little over 4m of a total of 112m cases worldwide.

Following that logic isnt it more likely it originated in the US or India and then came to this country as they have nearly 40m cases between them?

If it didn't then where are the numerous variants sweeping the US and India? Perhaps they are and their poor genomic sequencing hasn't picked it up. I know the US sequences less than 0.3% of its cases

Maybe, but in September or so when it was first traced we had high levels of cases. There's nothing to suggest it was imported, but it's theoretically possible. The same or similar variants haven't been traced anywhere else.

There are likely to be variants of concern emerging in all corners of the world, it's why global measures to bring cases down are critically important, along with surveillance so we can ensure that vaccines continue to work against them.