Off Topic Coronavirus

[Sooperhoop]

The way I see it is as follows, might well be wrong but it's just from what think i know.

Our original plan to deal with Covid19 was 'herd immunity'. I presume our experts advised the government on this or the government decided this. Everything that has since happened or not happened as the case may be, leads me to believe that this is still the strategy albeit slightly camouflaged. Half hearted lockdown, construction sites still open, lack of testing. Ppe has it's own story. I firmly believe that the government want as many people to get this disease as necessary to attempt to form some sort of immunity. Now, I'm not saying I disagree or agree with this (if true) but a bit of transparancy wouldnt go a miss. Then I see Gove on tv talking about reopening schools, maybe in May. Another helpful way to spread the disease. Hairdresser opening etc. I've never seen someone cut hair from 2 meters away but it should be amusing to see.

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[Star of David Bardsley]

You like misquoting don't you Watford... I said
"South Korea comes across as almost immune to it" I never said "they were immune"

Also, I was replying to Sb, not you.

They aren’t almost immune either. They’re bloody good at testing. That’s not the same.

 

[ELLERS]

They aren’t almost immune either. They’re bloody good at testing. That’s not the same.

I also covered testing
"They also tested very quickly and managed to produce affordable testing kits. Whereas we have not been able to do that."
As I have said previously Watford stop taking one piece out of my post and blowing it out of all proportions. the whole piece made sense.

 

[Star of David Bardsley]

I also covered testing
"They also tested very quickly and managed to produce affordable testing kits. Whereas we have not been able to do that."
As I have said previously Watford stop taking one piece out of my post and blowing it out of all proportions. the whole piece made sense.

You really should be more self-aware if you’re going to accuse people of that. Enough have pointed it out.

So are they almost immune or not?

 

[sb_73]

Okay firstly SB you choose countries that will favor your argument. Strangely you omitted France, Italy, Spain which are more of a representation as to size and population to the UK (as well as distance)
However, I will attempt to go through the interesting ones.


Denmark… Don’t be silly they only have about 5 million people?
Singapore… sorry, don’t know enough about coronavirus there.
Hong Kong… really? Have figures overseen by the Chinese government? I would always be skeptical about what comes out of there, however, a highly populated place so would have been good to collect information.

Let us discuss the ones we can trust…

Germany
It would be the nearest example to us and the most interesting case.
It has been well documented that Germany has a very good health care system as well as those 100 labs compared to our 4. It has amazing Pharma manufacturing and can deal with producing stuff very quickly.
Do you believe that Germany gets its testing kits from China? I bet they don’t rely on China as much as we do?
There have also been questions on how they record deaths. Plenty of articles will tell you this.

Lothar Wieler, president of the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin, the federal government’s health agency, has said the true mortality rate in Germany is probably higher than the officially recorded number. He reported on some tentative evidence that the number of new infections might be slowing down, but said it was too early to make firm conclusions.

https://www.ft.com/content/849308f8-75bc-11ea-ad98-044200cb277f

However, as I said Germany is a good example on the way forward. We are working closely with them… I think it was ‘Farrar’ (sorry for the wrong spelling). The medical director who confirmed this last week.
Finally, my mate works in German and he says they all pay into the medical system.

South Korea
This is an interesting example because they have high concentrations of people in a small space.

I recall reading a piece about the social and cultural differences which have helped them. A good example is when their government tells them to social distance or stay at home, the obey unlike people in the UK who often break the rules?
They also tested very quickly and managed to produce affordable testing kits. Whereas we have not been able to do that.
Funnily the best testing kits seem to be produced there and we may end up importing from them.

South Korea comes across as almost immune to it, which in itself is strange?
I also still think there are BAME links to consider in all of this.

I think in the end it comes down to political, social and cultural differences in each country. I don’t think it is fair/correct to compare us to another country. As long as we learn by our mistakes and take note of other successes then surely that is the way forward.

Well, if we can’t compare because ‘its not fair’ how can we learn? I haven’t studied these countries and how they have handled the virus, I just know that their death rate per million is much lower than ours.

Denmark - size of the country makes no difference, unless you believe small countries are better governed. The comparison is deaths per million of population, which I am sure you understand is a ratio, not an absolute number.

Singapore - small countries, lots of travel with Chinese community, strong initial lockdown, low deaths per million. The argument might be that as its nearly on the equator the hot climate might have a role in suppressing the virus. Look, gave you that for free.

Hong Kong - if Hong Kong was as closely controlled as China, we would know little about the months of protest about extradition and never hear about the imprisonments etc. Their data is pretty reliable.

Germany - I’d rather be seeing this out in Germany than here, wouldn’t you? Yes they have structural advantages over us, including having an industrial base and a health system with plenty of capacity. I reckon Germany is the country we should be trying to emulate in future as you do. Yes they do pay into the medical system, just like you do, but in a much more transparent way, it’s not part of general taxation. See my discussion with Stroller.

South Korea was simply very well prepared and has the systems in place to do things at population level probably because they are ready for biological attack from the north. Again we can learn from this. I haven’t studied them at all. Why could they produce testing kits quickly and we can’t? Innate superiority? I think not. Learning to be had. Not sure if they have a you g population compared to us, which might help them. They don’t appear to be immune, they do die in far smaller numbers.

France, Italy and Spain - they might have something to teach us, but their death rates are higher than the UK published one, so obviously I wouldn’t include them on my list of places to copy.

I notice that you omitted commenting on New Zealand - am island country, with a similar population and culture, no industrial and research resources yet with much lower death rates than us.......

Don’t worry, no need to prolong this. It seems we have on this and many other things a very different perspective.

 

[rangercol]

Here's a link to the full Times article

https://t.co/AFaFO9IqHC?amp=1

Mmm....reeks of a civil service leak.
Highly politicised, mentioning brexit time and again.
This paper has a recent history of disliking Johnson and was vehemently against brexit.

There are valid criticisms there, but heavily coated with bias.

Seems just about everyone has an axe to grind.

Who to believe?

 

[Star of David Bardsley]

Mmm....reeks of a civil service leak.
Highly politicised, mentioning brexit time and again.
This paper has a recent history of disliking Johnson and was vehemently against brexit.

There are valid criticisms there, but heavily coated with bias.

Seems just about everyone has an axe to grind.

Who to believe?

It’s a real mystery, Col.

 

[qprbeth]

Just for correction Ellers..this is not a criticism but a correction of a false piece of information ( I am a bit like the BBC here).
"It has been well documented that Germany has a very good health care system as well as those 100 labs compared to our 4."

We have plenty of labs that can do the test. Every major tertiary hospital can do those tests. Every major hospital centre (probably around 100 I would guestimate) has the facility to test for virus's and they do it every single day of the week...EBV, Flu, etc. What we do not have is the right test kits in the numbers required.

FROM THE POSTED ARTICLE
Amazingly, she(the chairperson of UK diagnostic agency) says her organisation did not receive a meaningful approach from the government asking for help until April 1 — the night before Hancock bowed to pressure and announced a belated and ambitious target of 100,000 tests a day by the end of this month

The kits are made in factories belonging to the pharma and those are mainly situated on the continent. I suspect for logistical reasons (closeness), national ties, money and also being part of the EU procurement proceedure (which we had the opportunity to be in, but decided against joinin), we are towards the back of the queue in getting those kits.

 

[bobmid]

Mmm....reeks of a civil service leak.
Highly politicised, mentioning brexit time and again.
This paper has a recent history of disliking Johnson and was vehemently against brexit.

There are valid criticisms there, but heavily coated with bias.

Seems just about everyone has an axe to grind.

Who to believe?

Not too tricky considering the history of some.

 

[ELLERS]

Well, if we can’t compare because ‘its not fair’ how can we learn? I haven’t studied these countries and how they have handled the virus, I just know that their death rate per million is much lower than ours.

Denmark - size of the country makes no difference, unless you believe small countries are better governed. The comparison is deaths per million of population, which I am sure you understand is a ratio, not an absolute number.

Singapore - small countries, lots of travel with Chinese community, strong initial lockdown, low deaths per million. The argument might be that as its nearly on the equator the hot climate might have a role in suppressing the virus. Look, gave you that for free.

Hong Kong - if Hong Kong was as closely controlled as China, we would know little about the months of protest about extradition and never hear about the imprisonments etc. Their data is pretty reliable.

Germany - I’d rather be seeing this out in Germany than here, wouldn’t you? Yes they have structural advantages over us, including having an industrial base and a health system with plenty of capacity. I reckon Germany is the country we should be trying to emulate in future as you do. Yes they do pay into the medical system, just like you do, but in a much more transparent way, it’s not part of general taxation. See my discussion with Stroller.

South Korea was simply very well prepared and has the systems in place to do things at population level probably because they are ready for biological attack from the north. Again we can learn from this. I haven’t studied them at all. Why could they produce testing kits quickly and we can’t? Innate superiority? I think not. Learning to be had. Not sure if they have a you g population compared to us, which might help them. They don’t appear to be immune, they do die in far smaller numbers.

France, Italy and Spain - they might have something to teach us, but their death rates are higher than the UK published one, so obviously I wouldn’t include them on my list of places to copy.

I notice that you omitted commenting on New Zealand - am island country, with a similar population and culture, no industrial and research resources yet with much lower death rates than us.......

Don’t worry, no need to prolong this. It seems we have on this and many other things a very different perspective.

I didn't appreciate that you wanted to discuss NZ. I would probably say per capita they have lots of space. I would also think about temperature in Jan/Feb/March... although Prof Simon Clarke says we will have to wait until the end of the year for information on heat v virus.

 

[bobmid]

I didn't appreciate that you wanted to discuss NZ. I would probably say per capita they have lots of space. I would also think about temperature in Jan/Feb/March... although Prof Simon Clarke says we will have to wait until the end of the year for information on heat v virus.

What's the temps in spain like at the moment. Asking for a friend

 

[sb_73]

Which is fine, but dependant on how strict, or otherwise, the regulation is and how universal the provision is.

The provision is universal. The regulation is, I suppose, pretty good though I’m sure it’s not perfect. If we went the same way but were unable to regulate effectively (as, to be fair, seems to be the case now), that would cause me to severely doubt our state/government capacity to actually manage social care properly.

 

[rangercol]

Just for correction Ellers..this is not a criticism but a correction of a false piece of information ( I am a bit like the BBC here).
"It has been well documented that Germany has a very good health care system as well as those 100 labs compared to our 4."

We have plenty of labs that can do the test. Every major tertiary hospital can do those tests. Every major hospital centre (probably around 100 I would guestimate) has the facility to test for virus's and they do it every single day of the week...EBV, Flu, etc. What we do not have is the right test kits in the numbers required.

FROM THE POSTED ARTICLE
Amazingly, she(the chairperson of UK diagnostic agency) says her organisation did not receive a meaningful approach from the government asking for help until April 1 — the night before Hancock bowed to pressure and announced a belated and ambitious target of 100,000 tests a day by the end of this month

The kits are made in factories belonging to the pharma and those are mainly situated on the continent. I suspect for logistical reasons (closeness), national ties, money and also being part of the EU procurement proceedure (which we had the opportunity to be in, but decided against joinin), we are towards the back of the queue in getting those kits.

How much blame do you think should the scientific and medical experts take for their poor advice?

 

[Staines R's]

Now up to 13 deliveries and 68 meals for the food bank......read into that what you will.

Funny story of the day is one old boy jokingly asked if I was a pirate ‘cos I was wearing my St Pauli/Skull and Crossbones T-shirt...
‘No’ I said, ‘I’m an anarchist and this is a German anarchist football team’.........spent 10 mins trying to explain to him what anarchism really is about and not to believe everything that he reads......

He still didn’t get it but nice fella

 

[rangercol]

Well, if we can’t compare because ‘its not fair’ how can we learn? I haven’t studied these countries and how they have handled the virus, I just know that their death rate per million is much lower than ours.

Denmark - size of the country makes no difference, unless you believe small countries are better governed. The comparison is deaths per million of population, which I am sure you understand is a ratio, not an absolute number.

Singapore - small countries, lots of travel with Chinese community, strong initial lockdown, low deaths per million. The argument might be that as its nearly on the equator the hot climate might have a role in suppressing the virus. Look, gave you that for free.

Hong Kong - if Hong Kong was as closely controlled as China, we would know little about the months of protest about extradition and never hear about the imprisonments etc. Their data is pretty reliable.

Germany - I’d rather be seeing this out in Germany than here, wouldn’t you? Yes they have structural advantages over us, including having an industrial base and a health system with plenty of capacity. I reckon Germany is the country we should be trying to emulate in future as you do. Yes they do pay into the medical system, just like you do, but in a much more transparent way, it’s not part of general taxation. See my discussion with Stroller.

South Korea was simply very well prepared and has the systems in place to do things at population level probably because they are ready for biological attack from the north. Again we can learn from this. I haven’t studied them at all. Why could they produce testing kits quickly and we can’t? Innate superiority? I think not. Learning to be had. Not sure if they have a you g population compared to us, which might help them. They don’t appear to be immune, they do die in far smaller numbers.

France, Italy and Spain - they might have something to teach us, but their death rates are higher than the UK published one, so obviously I wouldn’t include them on my list of places to copy.

I notice that you omitted commenting on New Zealand - am island country, with a similar population and culture, no industrial and research resources yet with much lower death rates than us.......

Don’t worry, no need to prolong this. It seems we have on this and many other things a very different perspective.

New Zealand's population is similar to ours?

Mmm.

 

[Staines R's]

I'm not a betting man, but I have a sinking feeling that come the next due pay day at end of April, this 80% pay furlough scheme will not be ready.
I forsee trouble ahead as millions I reckon will suddenly find no money in their banks for May.
Of course I might be totally wrong and will be positive news

I might be wrong but I think a lot of firms are paying their employees then claiming from the government.....this is definitely the case at British Airways

 

[bobmid]

I might be wrong but I think a lot of firms are paying their employees then claiming from the government.....this is definitely the case at British Airways

That's the case yet many firms I know still haven't received anything. One has had to lay 3 lads off as the reimbursements just haven't been forthcoming. Only another 6 weeks or so for the self employed to wait. Let's hope they have good on the table

 

[Staines R's]

That's the case yet many firms I know still haven't received anything. One has had to lay 3 lads off as the reimbursements just haven't been forthcoming.

That ain’t good mate.......dare I say it but seems some firms are being let down by the government

 

[bobmid]

Turkish, has your Mrs received a letter regarding 12 week isolation due to her condition? Mine hasn't which is quite incredible really.

 

[bobmid]

That ain’t good mate.......dare I say it but seems some firms are being let down by the government

It's a great idea in principle but unfortunately too slow as with most things theyve done