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

Infections are spiralling out of control and new variants are inevitable as a result. I fail to see how we can avoid a 3rd lockdown, seems like it will be a formality.
 
That’s not good.
It depends where we are in the wave in terms of behaviour. LSHTM think we won't change much in terms of inter-generational mixing after the legal limits go. In which case the peak may come in mid-August and is deemed manageable by the powers that be. If they're right then people have already changed behaviour to do as much family mixing etc as they're likely to do, and the oldies will avoid busy pubs etc. I've decided I'd like to believe this one is true, and will cling to it (at least emotionally) for now. I'm trying to sell my family on the, "don't mix oldies with young ones other than outdoors at a distance," concepts for the summer - fingers crossed.

Imperial and Warwick think that we'll see more mixing after the 19th, including across generations and across vaxxed/unvaxxed groups, but didn't anticipate the amount of mixing we're already doing (which may be why their hospitalisation estimates for this week are lower than the real thing). Warwick's mid-point model is also within what the NHS have been told to prepare for. If we starting heading into the high mixing territory of any of them I think we'll see a lockdown in September, just in time for the new school and college year :wenger:
 
I honestly feel sorry for people in England right now - you guys are fecked. I'm hopeful that our own idiots in NI won't just blindly follow and basically forget covid exists - our health minister actually seems to know what he is doing.

That’s encouraging to hear. Although your case numbers are still very high. What are you doing different to England?
 
That’s encouraging to hear. Although your case numbers are still very high. What are you doing different to England?
The ONS (population wide random survey) does give a bit of reassurance that things aren't racing away as fast in NI as in England. Wales remain impressive - a combination of high vaccine takeup and ongoing controls.



Incidentally that same ONS survey suggests that 1:40 in the NorthEast of England are currently infected.
 
Not opening everything up because we made a political promise to despite everything obviously going to shit.
The ONS (population wide random survey) does give a bit of reassurance that things aren't racing away as fast in NI as in England. Wales remain impressive - a combination of high vaccine takeup and ongoing controls.



Incidentally that same ONS survey suggests that 1:40 in the NorthEast of England are currently infected.


Great stuff. Wales and Norn Iron showing how it’s done.

Saw tweet about the NE earlier. Cases sky-rocketing across all age groups. Let’s hope they’re on the ball with their genotyping. Terrible bang of Kent off what’s happening there.
 
Further evidence that we have not passed all 4 of the relaxation tests.
Come on Boris. Open your eyes to the DATA and not the DATE as you committed you were going to do the the whole UK public. And don't piss around with the health or safety of the public you were voted in to serve.

Just my personal opinion, but I don't think he's ever respected his commitments or kept his promises. Plus, not sure how much someone who is allegedly ok with "letting the bodies pile up" is concerned about the h&s of the public.
 
With no public inquiry on the horizon, the stories start to emerge in bits and pieces. From Boris to burner phones to trying to explain the maths:


 
As deaths lag behind cases, its a little scary to think what the numbers will reach in 3 weeks
 
As deaths lag behind cases, its a little scary to think what the numbers will reach in 3 weeks
How many cases did Uk have every day 3 weeks ago ?

edit: apparently 15-20k.. so its about 3x now.. Checked the deaths are around 30/day.
Its mostly younger people and most of them seem to be recovering .. which is great..

Obviously the cases getting out of control is bad because it increases the chances of a high risk person getting infected.. but I dont think the deaths will reach anywhere near what it did around Dec-Jan
 
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How many cases did Uk have every day 3 weeks ago ?

edit: apparently 15-20k.. so its about 3x now.. Checked the deaths are around 30/day.
Its mostly younger people and most of them seem to be recovering .. which is great..

Obviously the cases getting out of control is bad because it increases the chances of a high risk person getting infected.. but I dont think the deaths will reach anywhere near what it did around Dec-Jan

I don’t think anyone is anticipating the daily deaths getting into four figures again, but they were at 60 yesterday, which is double what you’ve put it at. Even if that did only triple from here, 180 deaths a day is a lot, and only bound to get a worse.

I don’t think Boris is remotely interested about deaths at this point, it’ll be about hospitalisations. I don’t know how much more it has to increase to reach a point where the NHS is really stretched, but I suspect we’ll reach it.
 
In Ireland one in twenty people infected are vaccinated which is a worry. 1000 cases today so i imagine the opening up will be delayed.
 
i think we’ll certainly go back to lockdown at some point before September. Either hospitalisations will exceed their margin of error (seems likely currently) or a new variant of concern will emerge due to the perfect breeding ground we’re feeding it. I think we have to be realistic that we’ve got another year or more of this before we can conceivably consider returning to normal - to be honest I think we might need to get used to a new normal now that is never like it once was. It does make me laugh where I hear things online like “I’d rather die than permanently wear masks in shops!!” Erm, no, no you wouldn’t!
 
I don’t think anyone is anticipating the daily deaths getting into four figures again, but they were at 60 yesterday, which is double what you’ve put it at. Even if that did only triple from here, 180 deaths a day is a lot, and only bound to get a worse.

I don’t think Boris is remotely interested about deaths at this point, it’ll be about hospitalisations. I don’t know how much more it has to increase to reach a point where the NHS is really stretched, but I suspect we’ll reach it.
They know the hospitalisations will double, they think they may quadruple - much higher than that or not falling back and they've got serious problems that even Boris can't easily ignore. What they'll do then will probably get decided in a Daily Mail opinion poll - so I'm expecting them to send a flag to everyone's house with a songsheet for a national street party of mourning.
 
i think we’ll certainly go back to lockdown at some point before September. Either hospitalisations will exceed their margin of error (seems likely currently) or a new variant of concern will emerge due to the perfect breeding ground we’re feeding it. I think we have to be realistic that we’ve got another year or more of this before we can conceivably consider returning to normal - to be honest I think we might need to get used to a new normal now that is never like it once was. It does make me laugh where I hear things online like “I’d rather die than permanently wear masks in shops!!” Erm, no, no you wouldn’t!

We could be wearing masks for a while.
 
I'll certainly be wearing my mask still from Monday onwards. Was going to a music festival for a day in middle of August so will knock that on the head along with any live football match that has more than 5k. Small things but just feels too risky currently.

Must admit I was in favour of relaxing regulations compared to doing it from September onwards (which worked well last year). However I naively assumed it wouldn't happen until at least 75%/40m had their second doses which probably is still 4-5 weeks away. Oh and the euros starting and ending with 20k in the grounds rather than seemingly more thna 70k in for the final. Premier league imo should stick with 20% capacity they had for end of season games for first two months of this season but seems they really will be allowed full houses which seems mental and a massive breeding ground.
 
I'll certainly be wearing my mask still from Monday onwards. Was going to a music festival for a day in middle of August so will knock that on the head along with any live football match that has more than 5k. Small things but just feels too risky currently.

Must admit I was in favour of relaxing regulations compared to doing it from September onwards (which worked well last year). However I naively assumed it wouldn't happen until at least 75%/40m had their second doses which probably is still 4-5 weeks away. Oh and the euros starting and ending with 20k in the grounds rather than seemingly more thna 70k in for the final. Premier league imo should stick with 20% capacity they had for end of season games for first two months of this season but seems they really will be allowed full houses which seems mental and a massive breeding ground.

People and the media will talk about the fact that there’s little or no transmission outside. Never acknowledging the fact that people spend the better part of 2-6 additional hours mixing in internal spaces with strangers before, during and after the game they spend sat in that outdoor seat. Cabs. Buses. Trains. Tubes. Pubs. Concourses. It’s Fcuking madness.
 
Here's a question - we kept hearing about how the vaccines could be tweaked to keep up with any variants. But I've not heard anything about how they are getting on with that and updating them to deal with Delta. Anyone heard any updates?
 
Here's a question - we kept hearing about how the vaccines could be tweaked to keep up with any variants. But I've not heard anything about how they are getting on with that and updating them to deal with Delta. Anyone heard any updates?

As I said a few posts higher up, they’re trying to hit a moving target. Hard to know which variant to put their resources behind and even the most optimistic development timeliness would be six months or so. Six months ago Delta was only an issue in India. Feck know what variant we’ll be most needing vaccines for in another six months from now.

They got results from a tweaked version of the Moderna vaccine a couple of months ago. It was tested against the South African and Brazilian variants. Both a big deal when they decided to run these trials. Neither of them causing problems in Europe now.
 
Here's a question - we kept hearing about how the vaccines could be tweaked to keep up with any variants. But I've not heard anything about how they are getting on with that and updating them to deal with Delta. Anyone heard any updates?
Lots of trials underway. Some with tweaked vaccines, some just with boosters of the original vaccine. Moderna and AZ have done updated versions. Pfizer haven't decided whether they want to update theirs.

The main mutation targeted is the Beta strain as it seems the best at dodging vaccines so far and the antibodies to it, seem to neutralise the other common variants as well. It's not known whether they'll be used though.

There's an AZ phase 3 trial underway in the UK:
 
How confident are people that the uptake of booster jabs will be high enough? I know a few people who got both jabs and are saying they just don't want to go through it again, especially those that were a bit ill afterwards initially. I'm not saying they're right, i'm just wondering if this might be an issue.

My first jab was a pretty bad experience and although i'm definitely having the second, I can't say I'm keen on going through all that again.
 
How confident are people that the uptake of booster jabs will be high enough? I know a few people who got both jabs and are saying they just don't want to go through it again, especially those that were a bit ill afterwards initially. I'm not saying they're right, i'm just wondering if this might be an issue.

My first jab was a pretty bad experience and although i'm definitely having the second, I can't say I'm keen on going through all that again.

If it means safely seeing my nearest and dearest, put it in my veins.

I had a tough few days after my second shot, but presumably nowhere close to what id experience with the virus itself.
 
How confident are people that the uptake of booster jabs will be high enough? I know a few people who got both jabs and are saying they just don't want to go through it again, especially those that were a bit ill afterwards initially. I'm not saying they're right, i'm just wondering if this might be an issue.

My first jab was a pretty bad experience and although i'm definitely having the second, I can't say I'm keen on going through all that again.
Booster for me. 2 days pain for months of gain.
 
If it means safely seeing my nearest and dearest, put it in my veins.

I had a tough few days after my second shot, but presumably nowhere close to what id experience with the virus itself.
Not the best idea. Vaccinations are supposed to be intramuscular.
 
As I said a few posts higher up, they’re trying to hit a moving target. Hard to know which variant to put their resources behind and even the most optimistic development timeliness would be six months or so. Six months ago Delta was only an issue in India. Feck know what variant we’ll be most needing vaccines for in another six months from now.

They got results from a tweaked version of the Moderna vaccine a couple of months ago. It was tested against the South African and Brazilian variants. Both a big deal when they decided to run these trials. Neither of them causing problems in Europe now.
Lots of trials underway. Some with tweaked vaccines, some just with boosters of the original vaccine. Moderna and AZ have done updated versions. Pfizer haven't decided whether they want to update theirs.

The main mutation targeted is the Beta strain as it seems the best at dodging vaccines so far and the antibodies to it, seem to neutralise the other common variants as well. It's not known whether they'll be used though.

There's an AZ phase 3 trial underway in the UK:

Thanks for the replies. Interesting stuff, but slower progress than I'd hoped for.
 
I wore mine in the supermarket today, the only bod that did. Shameful really
Went to a kebab shop for my tea last night, in Wales where unlocking is behind England and masks still very much mandatory. I was worried as I left my car that I’d forgotten my mask, was ready to explain apologetically and suggest that they could take my order outside the door. Fortunately inside there were about six customers and a similar number of staff and not a mask in site - “Yes Boss?” Relief.