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

Stactix said:
Government really need to push the 'work from home if you can', it really shouldn't of changed. Those that can do their job completely remotely should not be going to work.
Some companies have kept employees at home, others just chucked them back in the first moment they could.
Eat out to help out wasn't well thought out, it's summer half price on food on 'these days only' basically meant that those days had numbers that put friday/Saturday to shame.


Obviously the current case numbers are behind by a few days.
Then death numbers are usually a few weeks behind.
Government being reactive rather than proactive once more.

Back in lockdown before Christmas I bet.

  • People in England who are told to self-isolate by NHS Test and Trace face fines of £1,000 - up to £10,000 for the worst offenders - if they fail to do so
  • This includes those who test positive and those identified as close contacts of confirmed cases
  • It also includes employers who force staff to ignore an order to self-isolate
  • NHS Test and Trace will make regular contact with those isolating to check compliance
  • The measures apply from 28 September and will be enforced by police and local authorities
  • Those in receipt of benefits or on low income and who cannot work from home may receive a £500 one-off payment if self-isolating

Why the FECK is this not starting now?
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Agree with that but If you stop going into the office you stop using the local shops, restaurants, cafes etc which is why the government switched their stance.

There must be a load of businesses close to folding by now but the government funding has probably bought them a couple of extra months.
 
Took a flight from San Francisco to Munich today. Never in my life saw a plane that empty. We were probably less than 50 people in an airplane that typically carries 300-400 people. I know that this is nowhere near the biggest concern, but will the airline companies really survive this for another year at least?
 
Revan said:
Took a flight from San Francisco to Munich today. Never in my life saw a plane that empty. We were probably less than 50 people in an airplane that typically carries 300-400 people. I know that this is nowhere near the biggest concern, but will the airline companies really survive this for another year at least?
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Some will and some wont is the simple answer. Working in the travel industry is harsh right now and our CEO believes 30pc of the companies in the sector will not survive. Booking and Expedia are too big to fail but my company has just 500 employees globally.
 
redshaw said:


https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/19/health/astrazeneca-vaccine-safety-blueprints.html
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That is a bit grim but it’s not really “news”. There’s nothing in there we didn’t know already. On a side note, the unprecedented scrutiny on every vaccine being developed will be music to the ear of anti-vaxxers. So many routine details that nobody would usually hear about ending up all over Facebook telling people to “wake up”. I honestly think uptake of any vaccine will be absolutely terrible, even if we do end up with a good one.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
That is a bit grim but it’s not really “news”. There’s nothing in there we didn’t know already. On a side note, the unprecedented scrutiny on every vaccine being developed will be music to the ear of anti-vaxxers. So many routine details that nobody would usually hear about ending up all over Facebook telling people to “wake up”. I honestly think uptake of any vaccine will be absolutely terrible, even if we do end up with a good one.
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Maybe a silly question or already answered but, what percentage of the UK population would need to take the vaccine (if we get one), for it to be deemed effective? In the sense of herd immunity(very unlikely), easing strain on the NHS, allowing us back into pre Covid conditions etc.
 
Giggzinho said:
Maybe a silly question or already answered but, what percentage of the UK population would need to take the vaccine (if we get one), for it to be deemed effective? In the sense of herd immunity(very unlikely), easing strain on the NHS, allowing us back into pre Covid conditions etc.
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I actually don’t know. IF we can develop a vaccine that is safe/effective in the elderly and IF we could get 90%+ of the population over, say, 60 years old to take it then the problem kind of goes away. Or becomes manageable without the current shitty restrictions we’re living with anyway. And that’s a relatively small proportion of the population as a whole.

Herd immunity is a different kettle of fish and the percentage of the population you need vaccinated will depend on how infections the virus is (how high is the R0). Again, I don’t know what we should be shooting for. Could well be as high as 70-80%. I don’t think that will ever happen.
 
Sultan said:
I'm stating the obvious.

There is an increase in Covid-19 cases due to an increase in testing. It's pretty safe to say if more people took IQ tests there would be an increase in idiots too. ;)
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partially true, it's likely that the numbers we are seeing now are not comparable to the numbers in March as the number of tests is so much higher.

But testing has been really high for a few months now, and the numbers of cases have been a lot lower. So there is no question there is a significant increase in COVID cases is occurring.
 
BluesJr said:
Horribly self centred way to view things. That’s the main issue in all of this.
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Yeah, I agree. Statutory sick pay for a couple of weeks is a pain for the individual. But we all have to go through a bit of pain with this, for the greater good, at some point or other. And if people won’t even make a small sacrifice like that then we really are screwed.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Yeah, I agree. Statutory sick pay for a couple of weeks is a pain for the individual. But we all have to go through a bit of pain with this, for the greater good, at some point or other. And if people won’t even make a small sacrifice like that then we really are screwed.
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Exactly. It’s absolutely pathetic.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Yeah, I agree. Statutory sick pay for a couple of weeks is a pain for the individual. But we all have to go through a bit of pain with this, for the greater good, at some point or other. And if people won’t even make a small sacrifice like that then we really are screwed.
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I don’t doubt this guy is probably just being a dick because he’s went out of his way to share that thought but we’re in no real position to say whether having to live on statutory sick pay is a small sacrifice for him or not.
 
The bloke isn't actually a shop assistant.

I think he's just highlighting the problem of weighing this up as a financial punishment - it's still probably better value going into work - and perhaps the government should address it in a different way or more severe way.
 
RK said:
The bloke isn't actually a shop assistant.

I think he's just highlighting the problem of weighing this up as a financial punishment - it's still probably better value going into work - and perhaps the government should address it in a different way or more severe way.
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This.
 
Walked to the shop last night in my little village (5000 people), the streets were packed with young people and the bars were rammed. Of course we’re going to have a second wave, the virus just doesn’t disappear when people feel like getting pished. Not that I blame them.
 
acnumber9 said:
I don’t doubt this guy is probably just being a dick because he’s went out of his way to share that thought but we’re in no real position to say whether having to live on statutory sick pay is a small sacrifice for him or not.
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I assumed it was a hypothetical scenario. And I’m not trying to judge any individual. I just think - at a population level - if enough people are self-centred enough to risk the health of everyone around them by going into work with obvious covid symptoms because they’re not willing to suck up a couple of weeks on sick pay then we’re absolutely screwed.

The tweet is a classic example of someone looking to blame the government for absolutely everything that is going wrong in this crisis. There’s a lot of them about. It’s quite possible that the government has done a shitty job and the public are also playing their part in this all going so badly wrong.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
That is a bit grim but it’s not really “news”. There’s nothing in there we didn’t know already. On a side note, the unprecedented scrutiny on every vaccine being developed will be music to the ear of anti-vaxxers. So many routine details that nobody would usually hear about ending up all over Facebook telling people to “wake up”. I honestly think uptake of any vaccine will be absolutely terrible, even if we do end up with a good one.
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Were the protocols already known, seems they released them the other day.

I agree though and if they do fast track a vaccine and a few more have side effects it could ruin vaccines for a long time so they have to get this right.
 
3889 today 18 deaths.

205 admitted to hospital and +19 on ventilators.

7 day average


DateCasesDeaths
6/9/2018127
13/9/20305011
Today367921
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I assumed it was a hypothetical scenario. And I’m not trying to judge any individual. I just think - at a population level - if enough people are self-centred enough to risk the health of everyone around them by going into work with obvious covid symptoms because they’re not willing to suck up a couple of weeks on sick pay then we’re absolutely screwed.
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£95.85 per week and a ton of other people won't be able to access it.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
I assumed it was a hypothetical scenario. And I’m not trying to judge any individual. I just think - at a population level - if enough people are self-centred enough to risk the health of everyone around them by going into work with obvious covid symptoms because they’re not willing to suck up a couple of weeks on sick pay then we’re absolutely screwed.

The tweet is a classic example of someone looking to blame the government for absolutely everything that is going wrong in this crisis. There’s a lot of them about. It’s quite possible that the government has done a shitty job and the public are also playing their part in this all going so badly wrong.
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Yeah I get the hypothetical scenario now and I don’t disagree that it’s a little disingenuous but it’s still a valid point that yet again it’s the people most at threat from the illness that are having to take the decision between their health and their finances.
 
Sweet Square said:
£95.85 per week and a ton of other people won't be able to access it.
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Yeah. It’s shit. And someone was saying that in Sweden the government will give full pay for the whole two weeks out. Which could well be the most important factor in their number staying paradoxically low. I just found the tweet annoying because it feeds into the narrative that because the government is making loads of crap decisions we can all throw our hands up and stop thinking about everyone else.

In my opinion, anyone who goes into work with obvious covid symptoms is being incredibly selfish. That is literally prioritising your own bank balance over being personally responsible for the death of (potentially a large number of) other people. I get that there will be some people for whom that temporary cut in their income will cause extraordinary and unbearable hardship but I’m fairly sure they’re rare enough as to not really matter in the bigger picture.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Yeah. It’s shit. And someone was saying that in Sweden the government will give full pay for the whole two weeks out. Which could well be the most important factor in their number staying paradoxically low. I just found the tweet annoying because it feeds into the narrative that because the government is making loads of crap decisions we can all throw our hands up and stop thinking about everyone else.

In my opinion, anyone who goes into work with obvious covid symptoms is being incredibly selfish. That is literally prioritising your own bank balance over being personally responsible for the death of (potentially a large number of) other people. I get that there will be some people for whom that temporary cut in their income will cause extraordinary and unbearable hardship but I’m fairly sure they’re rare enough as to not really matter in the bigger picture.
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Millions of people are living dangerously close to breaking point in terms of their finances and barely have enough to scrape by. Rather than chastising such people as selfish you should look towards the government who are forcing people to choose between their own and other people’s health in a pandemic or the ability to pay the rent at the end of a month. SSP is a joke and not fit for purpose.
 
You talk about bank balances, but for a decent amount of people it isn't just losing some money, it could be eviction or something of that magnitude. I agree that it's selfish for someone that could potentially survive on the sick pay for a few weeks, but there are plenty of people that wouldn't be able to. While it's still ultimately selfish, what do they do? Much more difficult decision.
 
esmufc07 said:
Millions of people are living dangerously close to breaking point in terms of their finances and barely have enough to scrape by. Rather than chastising such people as selfish you should look towards the government who are forcing people to choose between their own and other people’s health in a pandemic or the ability to pay the rent at the end of a month. SSP is a joke and not fit for purpose.
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It’s not an either/or scenario. I am chastising the government and people who will deliberately put their colleagues/customers health at risk. The only way out of this is if the government gets their shit together and every individual does their bit. I understand that living in poverty is terrible and I have huge sympathy for them. What I can’t agree with is the idea that taking two weeks off work sick is unendurable financial hardship for any more than a tiny minority of people. It’s a one off financial hit, which they should be able to recover from quick enough. At least they have jobs to go back to. Many don’t.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
In my opinion, anyone who goes into work with obvious covid symptoms is being incredibly selfish. That is literally prioritising your own bank balance over being personally responsible for the death of (potentially a large number of) other people. I get that there will be some people for whom that temporary cut in their income will cause extraordinary and unbearable hardship but I’m fairly sure they’re rare enough as to not really matter in the bigger picture.
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Why are you like this?
 
SalfordRed18 said:
Hes not. It's an incredibly ignorant take.
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Not really considering it's actually illegal to deliberately put others at risk. It's 2 weeks we're talking about here. For a small minority that can be make or break obviously and there should absolutely be more support given by the government I'm not disputing that.

The overall issue is though is that people are so inherently selfish and self obsessed that they don't really care about their actions.
 
cyberman said:
Take 2 weeks off if you have it. Its not that hard. Or infect fellow workmates and get the entire place shut down as a hotspot anyway.
Tough choice
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Which, in turn, could potentially put the whole place out of business permanently. Making you - and everyone you work with - unemployed. There’s loads of small businesses (eg, cafes, restaurants, retail shops) on death’s door as it is. If they get shut down because they’re at the centre of a cluster that could be game over.

Even if we completely ignore the health consequences, going into work with covid can put you and your colleagues in a much worse hole, financially, than doing the right thing.
 
BluesJr said:
Exactly. It’s absolutely pathetic.
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Especially as people usually get more than statutory sick pay, as many employers pay full rate for staff for the first few weeks of sickness. My work do for 6 months for example.

The main issue is the poor sods on zero hour contracts, as they can be left with nothing.
 
decorativeed said:
Especially as people usually get more than statutory sick pay, as many employers pay full rate for staff for the first few weeks of sickness. My work do for 6 months for example.

The main issue is the poor sods on zero hour contracts, as they can be left with nothing.
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Yeah that's obviously horrible but that is at least being looked at with this £500 thing? Very late in coming though.
 
decorativeed said:
Especially as people usually get more than statutory sick pay, as many employers pay full rate for staff for the first few weeks of sickness. My work do for 6 months for example.

The main issue is the poor sods on zero hour contracts, as they can be left with nothing.
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The zero hour contracts thing is a massive problem here. Lots of chickens coming home to roost. I wouldn’t lump them in alongside people unhappy with their sick pay. There should be some sort of legislation to temporarily force any company using zero hour contracts to pay sick pay. No idea how you make that work within the current employment law though.
 
I can see both sides. Imagine you’re on minimum wage, you’ve been furloughed on 80% pay for six months and you now have to take two weeks of getting £100.

Added to this is the pressure of not turning up to work. A lot of jobs might have the situation where if you don’t turn up, someone else will do the work, or it waits until you’re back. But I’ve had jobs before where if I don’t turn up, the shop doesn’t open for the day. It can be more than just financial pressure.

I think if you’ve got a positive test and you go out to work, that’s really bad. But there will be a lot of people who might have some mild symptoms, but are unable to book a test nearby. They then have to choose whether to stay in or not, and it’s not their fault.
 
SalfordRed18 said:
Hes not. It's an incredibly ignorant take.
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I disagree. I say this as someone who has cobbled a living together from multiple zero hour contracts. It would suck, and I'd be forced to try to borrow from friends and family to pay the bills, but it isn't worth risking other people's health and possibly lives over.
 
There's no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look after themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then, also, to look after our neighbours.
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Those workers understand the system and are behaving correctly.
 
decorativeed said:
I disagree. I say this as someone who has cobbled a living together from multiple zero hour contracts. It would suck, and I'd be forced to try to borrow from friends and family to pay the bills, but it isn't worth risking other people's health and possibly lives over.
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And what about those who aren't in that position to borrow from friends and family?
 
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