I've no idea about figures but 20% of 100k is 20k. 20% of 50k is 10k. If the virus is much more transmissible it could be worse than the last as far as affecting the country is concerned. Officially : I'm sick to f**k of it all.
Yep.. The only hope is that although Omiocron is much more easily caught than Delta... Bonko is making a big gamble that it is less dangerous eg results in less deaths/hospitalisations. Especially if the Booster works. The other home nations would rather be safe than sorry... Bonko is frightened of his back benchers and being sacked as PM. So England may end up with more deaths or hospitalisations... cos of his own selfish reasons.
One thing to consider is climate as well. Omicron was announced on Nov 25th in South Africa (end of spring) so may certainly be milder in the southern hemisphere. Most countries spikes (from the brief glances i've had) appear to occur in the winter months.
The numbers don't work as flatly as that Currently, out of 100,000 people testing positive about 700 of them get admitted to hospital on a daily basis (based on post-vaccine, delta variant) If those 700 people are "80% less likely to need admission" then that means it's more likely to be 140 people per day This is on the basis that the vast majority of people wouldn't need hospitalisation whether they were jabbed or not This is really positive news - SAGE were talking about 10s of thousands per day where in fact it' likely to be in the low hundreds. Even if we hit 1,000,000 cases per day it would "only" be about 1,400 people per day being admitted. Even then the length of hospital stayed has more than halved (something Sage ignored in their analysis)
I know that, hence my opening remark. What I do know is that figures change continually and this virus springs endless surprises. I just don't believe you can apply logic or a formula otherwise we'd have seen the end of it by now. Sadly, if people believe it's just a tickly cough and no real need to immunise, it'll take longer for the country to function properly again imo.
On the face of it, the figures DO change but the trends behind them really don't. For example, the widely reported "spike" in cases has been matched with a "spike" in tests. It stands to reason that if you do more tests that you will find more cases. The % of people testing positive (as a percentage of all tests taken) has been fairly flat since the vaccine was rolled out So, back in Jan when the vaccine was only just being rolled out, around 10% of tests came back positive. That dropped to less that 1% once we got into the spring (with restrictions still in place). When the 3rd wave started towards the end of the summer that jumped to around 4%. Even with this so called "super variant" the % has only gone to 6%. but of course, that bland sort of news doesn't sell newspapers To put it simply, on 26th Nov (the day before there were any Omicron cases in the UK) we reported 50,091 positive cases from 1,048,739 tests (4,78%) Yesterday we reported 90,629 positive cases from 1,491,030 tests (6.08%) So, it's a rise, but relatively speaking it's a very small rise Also, the numbers of people in hospital is still dropping as are deaths (there tends to be a 2 week lag time from infection to hospitalisation but the numbers are encouraging. Very encouraging)
What's unhelpful is the way the Govt report the stats. For example we are seeing numbers of 8-900 people a day "admitted to hospital" but the number of people "in hospital" is actually falling week on week. So, what's happening to these 5,000 people a week going into hospital? Or are we simply talking about people reporting to A&E with symptoms? Something doesn't add up......
Head of a covid response team at a south african hospital has said all her ICU cases are unvaccinated (omicron variant) https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-12-22/south-africa-omicron-case-surge-peak-passed-/100721122 Also interesting that South Africa's average age is just 27 compared to 40 in the UK
Possibly but that doesn't oblige the current one to lie and cheat ... ... surely he should aspire to be better, not worse.
It seems the ToryGraph and Daily Heil have decided that Bonko is 'fighting to resist further restrictions. That is firing a shot across his bows to not bring in restrictions. So a little litmus test of whether or not Bonko will do what the data evidence suggests, eg if hospitalisations are rising; more restrictions are needed. However if he follows the 'Trump' right wing press and the more boggled eyed Tories he will not bring in more restrictions. Meaning he puts the preservation of himself being PM, above the needs of England. I wonder if Whitty, Valance and Van Tam will then break ranks as happened in the USA and its leading medical/scientists eg Fauci (?) with Trump
should have had a base on the moon by now, what the hell is this covid anyhow a total lockdown is needed then nobody leaves their houses for any reason for a month, then this will die out the streets need patrolling.
Just found out my son in the states has covid. He's 25, good health and double vaxxed yet it's knocked him around with high fever, aches, lost sense of smell and taste. Works in retail so wears a mask everywhere. ****ing selfish pricks are ****ing it up for people that do the right thing
You're probably right, Monty . . . . you should have had a base on the moon by now Most of us thought that you already had one, mind
It's easy for the other nations to **** their economies safe in the knowledge Westminster will bail them out. Johnson's decision is much more difficult. Like him or not, hospitalisations and deaths simply don't warrant more restrictions right now. Also consider that lots of people are testing more than usual over Christmas for good reasons, so cases were always going to go up. That isn't translating into a tidal wave of hospitalisations though. It's impossible now to depoliticise this unfortunately. Most people screaming for restrictions are only doing so in order to scream about evil Boris locking us up again. If you want to minimise your contact with others, great. There's nothing stopping you. We need to start reintroducing individual responsibility in this country.
You make some valid points... however I think its equally valid to point out that Bonko's decisions about restrictions are more about hanging onto his being PM, (due to pressure from his own MPs, whose ideology leads them to keep business open, cos a few hundred deaths don't matter) than hospitalisations which are slowly going up.
I think it would be impossible for the Tory party to justify at the next election removing him for doing something an awful lot of the electorate wants. I think the approach is about right. Wear a mask, get a booster. What I'd like to see is a set of figures published by the government where they would trigger further restrictions. Draw a line and ask the public to help in staying the right side of it. At the minute it seems to be either lockdown or total freedom as options. Neither will solve the problem.
