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

I agree that the choice will most likely be taken out of my hands (regrettably).

Everyone I encountered in the pub yesterday evening had made the same decision I made. Perhaps they had friends or family that they put at risk as a result of their decision, but they were at the pub of their own volition, not because I was there (I hadn't even met them before).

Given the present government guidelines, I won't be in direct contact with friends and family so, unless this virus can be transmitted electronically, there is no risk whatsoever.

No-one is going to die, or even get ill, as a result of my pint.

You don't know that.

This thing is contact transferrable. You cannot say for sure who may end up contracting the virus as a result of your non-essential pint.
 
None of us really know what we would do if push came to shove, but if said document were legally binding I'd still be signing it in a heartbeat.

Unless you have a death wish, if your lungs were filling with fluid and you were gasping for breath... you would be thinking to your self "if only I didnt sign that".
 
Schools should have been closed by the useless government, and I would hope nobody is using the public transportation you mention unless it is essential for them to do so.

Going to the pub is very different.

Schools are not closed though and millions of parents are choosing to send their kids to them everyday. I hope you're equally as critical of them as you are the boozers.

As for "essential" travel, what is that really? Getting to work? Most adults in the UK could walk an hour to work if they really wanted to but prefer that extra hours kip so the buses are still full and the pavements are empty.

Give the bus wankers and the parents who leave their kids with 100s of snot-nosed mouth breathers the same stick you do the piss-heads, that's all I ask!
 
Does anyone think 18 months isolation is even feesible?

Even if the government told us it was 18 months, people would last 2 and think feck this I'll take my chances.

Imagine you're old and you live 17 months in isolation then die anyway.
 
You don't know that.

This thing is contact transferrable. You cannot say for sure who may end up contracting the virus as a result of your non-essential pint.
The following is a list of people I touched at the pub, or on the way home from the pub, or or will touch in the next few days; -


I agree with you that all of the above are at risk.
 
I agree that the choice will most likely be taken out of my hands (regrettably).

Everyone I encountered in the pub yesterday evening had made the same decision I made. Perhaps they had friends or family that they put at risk as a result of their decision, but they were at the pub of their own volition, not because I was there (I hadn't even met them before).

Given the present government guidelines, I won't be in direct contact with friends and family so, unless this virus can be transmitted electronically, there is no risk whatsoever.

No-one is going to die, or even get ill, as a result of my pint.

Exactly, and it's because people make stupid decisions like your one that the virus spreads. Of course your own decision is ultimately almost statistically irrelevant, but there's many many reasons why it's a terrible idea

There's a lot of stupid people in the world, making silly decisions - I've made a few of my own and would have done things differently had we been given better information earlier - but the only way we stop it spreading is by, collectively, doing the right things to avoid it spreading.

I have tremendous sympathy for what must seem an incredibly daunting period of loneliness, my housemate is immunocompromised and has the exact same thing ahead of him, but it doesn't give you carte blanche to avoid criticism for making decisions that are directly or indirectly going to put people at risk, increase strain on the NHS and get people killed because other people are doing it too.

I withold more criticism for the government for not taking the decision to close everything down themselves, but it's still within our own collective purview to follow the advice we've been given to slow the spread of it. Proudly flouting that you've ignored it, with an almost impressive lack of knowledge about how the virus spreads or is transmitted, is, obviously, going to rile people up.
 
Schools are not closed though and millions of parents are choosing to send their kids to them everyday. I hope you're equally as critical of them as you are the boozers.

As for "essential" travel, what is that really? Getting to work? Most adults in the UK could walk an hour to work if they really wanted to but prefer that extra hours kip so the buses are still full and the pavements are empty.

Give the bus wankers and the parents who leave their kids with 100s of snot-nosed mouth breathers the same stick you do the piss-heads, that's all I ask!

Your joking? My commutes and a lot of other peoples are a motorway drive to work.
 
Unless you have a death wish, if your lungs were filling with fluid and you were gasping for breath... you would be thinking to your self "if only I didnt sign that".
Perhaps yes, but it would still have been a decision I'd made 'eyes open' (this is actually something that goes way beyond Covid-19).
 
Does anyone think 18 months isolation is even feesible?

Even if the government told us it was 18 months, people would last 2 and think feck this I'll take my chances.

Imagine you're old and you live 17 months in isolation then die anyway.
Nope. When the number of new cases goes to two digits (per day), I expect the restriction to loosen, maybe a bit similar to China, South Korea or Singapore. It might also go away in the summer (though in that case, the good governments would prepare for a second wave). And there are some chances that some anti-viral will be licensed in a few months, which might decrease the fatality rate to something manageable.

I think some extra-caution will be until the vaccine will come (so probably no clubbing until 2022), but some type of normality is going to return in a few months IMO.
 
The following is a list of people I touched at the pub, or on the way home from the pub, or or will touch in the next few days; -


I agree with you that all of the above are at risk.

I suspect you are drunk so engaging with you on this is probably futile, but contact transferrable means any door handle, traffic light, bar counter, glass, crisp packet, chair or other inanimate object you touched on the way to, from or while at the pub was a potential point of transfer for the virus.
 
Your joking? My commutes and a lot of other peoples are a motorway drive to work.

That's why i didn't say "all adults could walk to work".

I'm talking people using public transport (buses, the tube), not driving where there's zero risk of infecting someone else or getting infected yourself.
 
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I understand “mild” cases of this will include similar experiences like mine with the flu two years ago when it was the worst week of my life. Mild has a wide range!

Flu is a bitch but the worst I’ve ever had was throat infections... three years in a row, always just after Christmas in time for New Year. It felt like someone poked a bunch of needles into my throat. The first time nothing helped until I got antibiotics which sorted me out in like 2 hours.
 
I suspect you are drunk so engaging with you on this is probably futile, but contact transferrable means any door handle, traffic light, bar counter, glass, crisp packet, chair or other inanimate object you touched on the way to, from or while at the pub was a potential point of transfer for the virus.
Not to mention fecking breathing in a confined space for long periods of time . If it was purely by surface transmission it would have been much more manageable.
 
Not defending China's handling and delaying information at the start, but want to point out that it hasn't been officially confirmed that it came from the wet markets, only that it jumped from animal to human. H5N1 outbreak came from live chickens iirc, banning exotic animals wouldn't have prevented that.


Load of crap most probably, trying to mislead people. I don’t believe a single word of it.
 
Looking at the case number graph and the fatality number graph, it looks like the lines follow each other with about a 2 week lag.

We went up to 71 deaths today. 2 weeks ago, we had roughly the same number of cases. Similarity, we had our first death on 5 March. 2 weeks before that was our first case.

Before anyone says anything, I'm only doing this to get a rough idea of where we're heading rather than trying to come up with an accurate mathematical model. But if the number of cases is increasing by 30% per day, the CFR remains relatively steady at 2%, and the incubation period doesn't change, it makes sense that there'd be a predictable shift between the two datasets.

Anyway, if that pattern holds, I think we could be looking at about 1,500 people lost to the virus by the end of the month.

EDIT: and about 5,000 in the US (probably more because of their slow start)
 
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I think @Steerpike is talking a fair amount of shite in places but you can't just dismiss how huge an ask it is to expect retired people who live alone to just stop socialising for months on end, maybe more. Loneliness isn't some marginal concern in our current situation. It's one of the biggest problems we're going to face.

I’m extremely concerned about my gran. My grandfather died in January and she’s in her late 80s. Had a fall last week to make matters worse and I was going over there to see her as much as I could. I’ve been told her general mood has decreased massively in last two weeks because no one has been to see her (I was away on holiday). Loneliness can make people go insane.
 
Exactly, and it's because people make stupid decisions like your one that the virus spreads. Of course your own decision is ultimately almost statistically irrelevant, but there's many many reasons why it's a terrible idea

There's a lot of stupid people in the world, making silly decisions - I've made a few of my own and would have done things differently had we been given better information earlier - but the only way we stop it spreading is by, collectively, doing the right things to avoid it spreading.

I have tremendous sympathy for what must seem an incredibly daunting period of loneliness, my housemate is immunocompromised and has the exact same thing ahead of him, but it doesn't give you carte blanche to avoid criticism for making decisions that are directly or indirectly going to put people at risk, increase strain on the NHS and get people killed because other people are doing it too.

I withold more criticism for the government for not taking the decision to close everything down themselves, but it's still within our own collective purview to follow the advice we've been given to slow the spread of it. Proudly flouting that you've ignored it, with an almost impressive lack of knowledge about how the virus spreads or is transmitted, is, obviously, going to rile people up.
This (bolded) is something I can agree with.

My initial thought was that I should simply go to the pub and to hell with the consequences (yes, I'm angry). My subsequent thought was that if everyone behaved in that way, the consequences would be great (effectively sabotaging the government's efforts to contain the virus).

So, I considered whether I should go or not. In the end, I decided that the way to resolve the question was to assess the actual risk - me, uninfected, going to the pub and taking sensible precautions - and to base my decision on that. If I'd had any of the symptoms associated with the virus, I would not have gone (and the pub's website had indeed asked for patrons to apply the same rules).

The government may decide to go 'French' and impose an almost total lockdown. That is their decision, and I guess I'll abide by it, albeit reluctantly. Right now, the government has issued guidance, but allowed individuals the leeway to decide. Whilst that leeway exists, I will use my own judgement to decide what I will or will not do.

The general feeling right now is that we should be doing everything we can to slow or stop (a pipedream) the virus. Eventually we will tire of the restrictions, some sooner than others, and that feeling will change. The difference between 'existence' and 'life' will become the debate, and I for one hope that happens sooner rather than later.
 
I’m extremely concerned about my gran. My grandfather died in January and she’s in her late 80s. Had a fall last week to make matters worse and I was going over there to see her as much as I could. I’ve been told her general mood has decreased massively in last two weeks because no one has been to see her (I was away on holiday). Loneliness can make people go insane.
Any lockdown needs to timed for maximum effectiveness and minimal length. We also need to make sure we don't do it so early that a second one is needed at a later stage.

It's easy to say "shut everything down and keep people locked in their homes", but the reality of that is just as terrifying as C19.
 
Does anyone think 18 months isolation is even feesible?

Even if the government told us it was 18 months, people would last 2 and think feck this I'll take my chances.

Imagine you're old and you live 17 months in isolation then die anyway.

It’s never going to happen and I think the media even saying things like this, even saying months has caused the mass panic buying. The max it will be is a month before people will come out of isolation due to work, lack of funds, boredom, loneliness. At that point a lot of people will take their chances. I think we have only a couple of weeks to contain it otherwise it’s just going to spread anyway. That’s just my opinion but how can you make billions of people sit at home for months without any way to fund it?
 
Any lockdown needs to timed for maximum effectiveness and minimal length. We also need to make sure we don't do it so early that a second one is needed at a later stage.

It's easy to say "shut everything down and keep people locked in their homes", but the reality of that is just as terrifying as C19.

Is there any chance that a second lockdown will not be needed ?
 
This thing is contact transferrable.


It's not literally "contact transferable", it doesn't burrow into your skin the moment it touches you. You have to touch your mouth, nose or possibly eyes after touching it.
 
It’s never going to happen and I think the media even saying things like this, even saying months has caused the mass panic buying. The max it will be is a month before people will come out of isolation due to work, lack of funds, boredom, loneliness. At that point a lot of people will take their chances. I think we have only a couple of weeks to contain it otherwise it’s just going to spread anyway. That’s just my opinion but how can you make billions of people sit at home for months without any way to funds it?
Yeah it's not going to work even people with rainy day funds are going to need to earn a living again at some point. Moreover, as the weather improves it will be almost impossible to stop people going out.

If this was happening in November a lockdown would be doable but we're on the verge of spring and nobody is going to sit indoors throughout the summer.
 
Is there any chance that a second lockdown will not be needed ?
The British policy is designed to try and avoid it. As far as I can tell, we're one of the few nations in the world that's worrying about doing so at the moment.

Whether it works out that way or not, it remains to be seen. I think it's a 50-50 chance.

The likes of Italy, Spain, China and South Korea will almost certainly need additional lockdowns.
 
The following is a list of people I touched at the pub, or on the way home from the pub, or or will touch in the next few days; -


I agree with you that all of the above are at risk.
You are an idiot and exactly how community spread happens.
 
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I suspect you are drunk so engaging with you on this is probably futile, but contact transferrable means any door handle, traffic light, bar counter, glass, crisp packet, chair or other inanimate object you touched on the way to, from or while at the pub was a potential point of transfer for the virus.
I am by no stretch of the imagination drunk!

I accept the point you make about the ability of the virus to persist on solid surfaces. Having said that, I'm as confident as I can be that I arrived at the premises virus free (there are people who get it and remain entirely asymptomatic, so without testing I can't entirely rule out having it - the odds are extremely low).

If I touched the kinds of surfaces you talk about, and I most likely did, then there is a risk that I could have picked up the virus from someone else. If so, I will start to exhibit symptoms in a few days and will self-isolate. There is no-one who I came into close contact with between leaving the pub and arriving home, and no-one I am likely to come into close contact with between now and the point at which I would become symptomatic.

In short, the only risk has been to myself, and I'm happy to accept that risk.
 
We will be having a police curfew with armed army etc from tomorrow here in Serbia. Because people are stupid and simply wont listen. We are at the 72 registered cases so far but there is probably much more.
 
The British policy is designed to try and avoid it. As far as I can tell, we're one of the few nations in the world that's worrying about doing so at the moment.

Whether it works out that way or not, it remains to be seen. I think it's a 50-50 chance.

The likes of Italy, Spain, China and South Korea will almost certainly need additional lockdowns.
I don't think they're going to just finish the lockdown, I imagine it will be done in stages to prevent a second one being needed. All these countries must be aware that a second one could happen so I think they'll take small steps before things go back to normal.
 
I’m extremely concerned about my gran. My grandfather died in January and she’s in her late 80s. Had a fall last week to make matters worse and I was going over there to see her as much as I could. I’ve been told her general mood has decreased massively in last two weeks because no one has been to see her (I was away on holiday). Loneliness can make people go insane.

Are you or anyone nearby able to set her up with some type of video calling software on a computer? One that you can make simple for her with a list of contacts and tell her just to leave on. I don't know if it's feasible but could be an idea.
 
Does anyone think 18 months isolation is even feesible?

Even if the government told us it was 18 months, people would last 2 and think feck this I'll take my chances.

Imagine you're old and you live 17 months in isolation then die anyway.
The reality of a 'lockdown' is only just starting to dawn on people. It would be tolerated for a while if the benefit was obvious and demonstrable, but the truth is that people are not good at social isolation. We enjoy the company of friends and family, we enjoy participating in activities with like-minded individuals, and for many it is precisely those opportunities that make life worthwhile.

The more draconian the measures put in place, the more quickly they will break down. The current mood is one of stopping the spread of the virus at all costs, but that will change. Sooner or later, the question will be about whether the restrictions are really worthwhile.

I'd be surprised if we get past 3 months before that question is asked seriously.
 
The British policy is designed to try and avoid it. As far as I can tell, we're one of the few nations in the world that's worrying about doing so at the moment.

Whether it works out that way or not, it remains to be seen. I think it's a 50-50 chance.

The likes of Italy, Spain, China and South Korea will almost certainly need additional lockdowns.
South Korea has never been in lockdown, and China outside of Hubei has not been in lockdown.

South Korea's strategy is probably the best one. Extreme social distancing, but life still goes on, people go to work, kids go to school. But be very careful at managing the situation, ban big gatherings, and so on.
 
You are an idiot and exactly how community spread happens.
You don't know me, but I'm very definitely not an idiot.

I'm looking forward with great anticipation to your ground breaking explanation of how an uninfected person can spread a virus (or maybe you're simply an idiot).
 
You don't know me, but I'm very definitely not an idiot.

I'm looking forward with great anticipation to your ground breaking explanation of how an uninfected person can spread a virus (or maybe you're simply an idiot).
Ok I see two options here
1) You are the only person in the world that gets a siri voice notification of the sort : Ding, Covid 19 has entered your system .
2) You indeed have mental deficiencies .