SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)

RedRover said:
I live in an area put under new rules today. It's interesting that for the first time in generations the Tory's won a few historically entrenched Labour seats but the "north south" divide issue is now being firmly pushed by local politicians. Middlesbrough's mayor has been particularly scathing stating it will "kill" jobs, and he's correct. I understand that rates of infection in my town are no more than in may places in the south, or certainly, weren't the last we heard.

I am aware that my local Council asked for these measures. Along with new measures comes significant extra funding. I am not suggesting for one moment that these two points are linked.

Small businesses in hospitality are shafted with this. The tap has been turned off and people will just have to starve.
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https://www.centreforcities.org/data/coronavirus-cases-uk-cities-large-towns/

Slough, Luton and Exeter are the only cities in the south with over 50 cases per 100k while Middlesborough is at nearly 80 cases per 100k. Leicester and Birmingham are the furthest south you get with more than Middlesborough and they've already faced local lockdowns. Add to that Middlesborough's spike is much sharper in the last week than any of the others above 75. Doesn't seem like you need to dig deep to find the truth there. Local councils are making shit decisions because they're in a shit situation.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Gah. Can’t find the fecking tweet but I saw a Tweet this morning showing a British regional incidence map for covid beside a map for the 1918 flu pandemic. They looked almost identical.
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Is it not as simple as housing is smaller, perhaps with more people packed in, less green areas, less open shopping areas etc?
Also people from those areas are more likely to continue working when sick as they have less disposable income
 
The traveling back by train after testing positive was hilarious.. how fecking stupid can one be?
 
F-Red said:
No, it's not that strange when you look at the data. Cases are all concentrated in the North.

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Yeah not exactly sure why say Devon, Cornwall and Essex who at this point have things under decent control should be punished for outbreaks 200/300 miles North, would be utterly ridiculous but will probably happen at some point.
 
Dancfc said:
Yeah not exactly sure why say Devon, Cornwall and Essex who at this point have things under decent control should be punished for outbreaks 200/300 miles North, would be utterly ridiculous but will probably happen at some point.
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Same reason my remain voting area are being punished for Cornwall voting leave?
 
acnumber9 said:
Maybe if you actually read it instead of bundling in with how right you always are you would understand. Quarantine from countries with a high prevalence of the virus makes sense if your own community transmission is low. If it’s exactly the same then you’re as likely to get it in the UK as you are in another country. That’s what I’ve said from the start if you would get off your high horse for one minute you may be able to see somebody else’s point.

It is otherwise because you’re not talking about something that has a finite resource. If there are 1000 infections in Manchester and 1000 infections in Madrid. Getting it in Manchester and bringing it to Birmingham is no different then getting it in Madrid and bringing it to Birmingham. I can go to Manchester without quarantining. My whole point is there’s no barrier here so community transmission is already rampant. Having a hard border and quarantining from places with similar rates will have next to no effect.

Now if it was 1000 cases in Manchester and 2000 in Madrid I would agree with what you’re saying. Which is what I said from the very start.
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Your point was that quarantine made no difference if the country of origin had similar infection rates to the UK. Your original post is quoted below. I told you how it does make a difference.

You then tried to pretend that you were talking about two towns in the uk that don't have a border and thus quarantine isn't involved. So an irrelevant attempt to move the goalposts.

Now you are back to incorrectly thinking that the comparative infection rate determines if quarantine works. It always works but the infection rate in the source country just varies how many infections quarantine prevents from being imported.

Country A has a 10% infection rate, country B has a 20% infection rate. For the sake of argument lets also say the UK has 1000 people with active infections.

If 10 people from country A arrive without quarantine the UK will now have 1001 active cases and if those 10 were from country B there would now be 1002 active cases. With quarantine there would still only be 1000 active cases. Each new case infects multiple others who in turn infect multiple others. So it can make a huge difference.

Hard borders and quarantine are one of the basic measures that have been shown to work well if done well in many places so it is just silly to think otherwise.

I was not saying anything about what measures should or should not be taken but just pointing out that your post contained an utterly incorrect assertion.

acnumber9 said:
Quarantining people coming from countries with similar infection levels to our own country couldn’t make any difference when people staying in the UK can still go to work etc.
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Abizzz said:
But do you just not exist if you don't go abroad / come from abroad ? If the infection rate is the same in the source as the destination country it makes just as much sense to randomly quarantine someone who has traveled as it makes sense to pick someone of the street and randomly quarantining them. They might have it, they might spread it, just as much as someone who just traveled.
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Internal restrictions of movement is another measure that helps. It is just easier to do at international borders or State borders if you have them.

Each measure aims to reduce infection. If you then make big gains or even elimination within a border you can then work on the next area and eventually join the areas up. This is what has happened in Australia. We are close to zero community infection nationwide except for Victoria who are down to about 15 daily cases.

State borders will soon open barring Victoria and soin after a travel bubble with NZ and some Pacific islands are possible. The principle also helps even if such low levels aren't the aim. It seriously helps flatten the curve as does mask wearing, social distancing etc
 
robinamicrowave said:
Was about to post this myself. Her writing on this pandemic has been incredible and basically spot-on since March.
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I've just read it myself just now, brilliant article and she's absolutely brilliant. If I remember correctly she's also one of the first journalist/scholar who underlined the importance of wearing face masks very early on in the pandemic. In any case, her article furthers my point (which was ridiculed at the time and plenty would still find it so) that full lockdowns for the sake of locking down are not the be all and end all, for they must be coupled with clear strategic directions.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Gah. Can’t find the fecking tweet but I saw a Tweet this morning showing a British regional incidence map for covid beside a map for the 1918 flu pandemic. They looked almost identical.
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This seminar about the US vaccine development effort and some of the reasons the pandemic is so bad in the US has a fantastic section overlaying various maps showing health inequalities, historical pandemics, and covid. The whole talk is excellent and the speaker is really engaging, but the section from 21-35 min on on public health is particularly interesting (and damning).
 
Pogue Mahone said:
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Interesting and well written.

In effect she is saying many of the factors we though were important e.g. poorly ventilated indooor places where social.distancing is also often problematic, are even more important than we thought. In many places/times of year this would be churches, pubs, meat factories, housing especially in lower socio-economic areas.

I'd be interested to know if there was anything special about individuals identified as super spreaders.
 
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Tony Babangida said:
This seminar about the US vaccine development effort and some of the reasons the pandemic is so bad in the US has a fantastic section overlaying various maps showing health inequalities, historical pandemics, and covid. The whole talk is excellent and the speaker is really engaging, but the section from 21-35 min on on public health is particularly interesting (and damning).
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Thanks. I'll try to watch later.

The Doherty Institute and indeed the man himself are awesome.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
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Interesting article. I'm surprised disappointed, but not surprised, to read that the contact tracing doesn't go backwards to the, "when/where do you think you got infected," question.

The idea that we infect our own household seems obvious. The mechanics of why it doesn't infect everyone in (most) households it enters also intrigues. Though that's perhaps a rather intrusive line of questioning.

On the other hand asking, "where do you think you caught it" might not just offer valuable information for track and trace, it might tell the rest of us something important about behaviours.
 
africanspur said:
Yes, on both counts.

What relevance does that have to what I've written?
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Just in relation to your comment "some Brits who just put themselves/ the country down at seemingly almost any opportunity.".

I think the UK has massively underperformed so to put this down to some kind of self critical Brit syndrome is not accurate. Although I appreciate you were responding to another poster who had made that point, so my post was also a response to that!
 
Wibble said:
Your point was that quarantine made no difference if the country of origin had similar infection rates to the UK. Your original post is quoted below. I told you how it does make a difference.

You then tried to pretend that you were talking about two towns in the uk that don't have a border and thus quarantine isn't involved. So an irrelevant attempt to move the goalposts.

Now you are back to incorrectly thinking that the comparative infection rate determines if quarantine works. It always works but the infection rate in the source country just varies how many infections quarantine prevents from being imported.

Country A has a 10% infection rate, country B has a 20% infection rate. For the sake of argument lets also say the UK has 1000 people with active infections.

If 10 people from country A arrive without quarantine the UK will now have 1001 active cases and if those 10 were from country B there would now be 1002 active cases. With quarantine there would still only be 1000 active cases. Each new case infects multiple others who in turn infect multiple others. So it can make a huge difference.

Hard borders and quarantine are one of the basic measures that have been shown to work well if done well in many places so it is just silly to think otherwise.

I was not saying anything about what measures should or should not be taken but just pointing out that your post contained an utterly incorrect assertion.
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I said it makes no difference when you can freely move around regions with a similar rate of infection as those countries.

I didn’t change any goalposts. I merely pointed out that if the infection rate is the same or similar you’re just as likely to get it by being out in a UK City as a Spanish one. Using an example to illustrate is not changing the goalposts.

The example you are using is with double the infection rate which is not what I said. Double the rate is not similar. You’re changing the goalposts, not me.
 
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golden_blunder said:
https://www.rte.ie/news/2020/1001/1168767-covid-19-dublin-teenager/

It’s just a flu
If you’re young and healthy really you’ll be grand
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Cherry picking, stats confirm it’s very very unlikely.

I could pull up articles from flu, norovirus, tripping over a curb that resulted in the same outcome.

We have to accept there is a small risk to living.

This doesn’t mean I’d encourage everyone to act normal just stop this approach of so many died today of this & that it’s a terrible mindset to live in
 
Bosws87 said:
Cherry picking, stats confirm it’s very very unlikely.

I could pull up articles from flu, norovirus, tripping over a curb that resulted in the same outcome.

We have to accept there is a small risk to living.

This doesn’t mean I’d encourage everyone to act normal just stop this approach of so many died today of this & that it’s a terrible mindset to live in
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Sorry but in ireland at least there is a lot of information on FB and Insta etc misinforming teenagers that there is absolutely no danger to them when that is not true at all. Just because they are not the group that’s in most danger does not mean that they should be misinformed and discount the dangers

And since since when has tripping over a curb resulted in 3 hospitalisations and ongoing major health issues?

also the kid is just appealing to others to socially distance and wear their masks because there is a danger. What’s wrong with that mindset? They can still live their life but with precaution
 
golden_blunder said:
Sorry but in ireland at least there is a lot of information on FB and Insta etc misinforming teenagers that there is absolutely no danger to them when that is not true at all. Just because they are not the group that’s in most danger does not mean that they should be misinformed and discount the dangers

And since since when has tripping over a curb resulted in 3 hospitalisations and ongoing major health issues?
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it’s ended in death, which is worse.

we are all misinformed when did you last tell children you could die from the Flu or have serious complications.

until this whole thing kicked off if you told me 50k could die of a bad flu season I would of laughed at you.

nothing wrong with what the kid is saying I was picking up on your way of expressing it presenting as evidence that kids should be petrified that’s how it’s worded
 
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Wibble said:
Your point was that quarantine made no difference if the country of origin had similar infection rates to the UK. Your original post is quoted below. I told you how it does make a difference.

You then tried to pretend that you were talking about two towns in the uk that don't have a border and thus quarantine isn't involved. So an irrelevant attempt to move the goalposts.

Now you are back to incorrectly thinking that the comparative infection rate determines if quarantine works. It always works but the infection rate in the source country just varies how many infections quarantine prevents from being imported.

Country A has a 10% infection rate, country B has a 20% infection rate. For the sake of argument lets also say the UK has 1000 people with active infections.

If 10 people from country A arrive without quarantine the UK will now have 1001 active cases and if those 10 were from country B there would now be 1002 active cases. With quarantine there would still only be 1000 active cases. Each new case infects multiple others who in turn infect multiple others. So it can make a huge difference.

Hard borders and quarantine are one of the basic measures that have been shown to work well if done well in many places so it is just silly to think otherwise.

I was not saying anything about what measures should or should not be taken but just pointing out that your post contained an utterly incorrect assertion.
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I suppose the point would be that, if infection levels are the same in both countries, and there's fairly even numbers travelling each way, quarantining people coming from abroad is only as effective as randomly quarantining people within the country. We'd be unlikely to do the second of those because it would seem like a massive infringement on people's liberty, but we do do the first.
 
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