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

JPRouve

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Oh yeah, I'm aware of how strict the lockdown is in Italy and Spain, I should've mentioned that like I've done in the past.

France is interesting though, UK and France both lockdown at 330-340 deaths, both had very low rates of testing throughout, both talked about 25k per day and took a very similar amount of time to really get there but have seen a pretty quick fall. France had some earlier measures mind, not sure how strict the lockdown was.
We roughly have the same type of lockdown that Italy has. It isn't like the UK.
 

arnie_ni

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Oh yeah, I'm aware of how strict the lockdown is in Italy and Spain, I should've mentioned that like I've done in the past.

France is interesting though, UK and France both lockdown at 330-340 deaths, both had very low rates of testing throughout, both talked about 25k per day and took a very similar amount of time to really get there but France have seen a pretty quick fall. France had some earlier measures mind, not sure how strict the lockdown was and maybe UK outbreak is spread out more in a land size much smaller. London only is 20-25% of the cases when I've looked in the past, other countries might be more concentrated, Madrid was 50% for a long time.
France's lockdown was a lot more strict than the UK one
 

Smores

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Concerning for UK is the amount of cases, (6k today not on the graph) is how we're in this 4.5-6.5k range. You can say increased testing but Italy increased there's massively as well, as did Spain, Italy more so in fact and saw it down to 2-3k consistently by this time. While deaths are past the peak I fear they will keep kind of medium to high as these 5-6k cases per day unfold in the next month.


I think in our case it looks flatter due to how bad our testing was to start with and how many we weren't catching. If it was anything but that our death rates wouldn't be falling at this rate surely?
 

King Eric 7

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Concerning for UK is the amount of cases, (6k today not on the graph) is how we're in this 4.5-6.5k range. You can say increased testing but Italy increased there's massively as well, as did Spain, Italy more so in fact and saw it down to 2-3k consistently by this time. While deaths are past the peak I fear they will keep kind of medium to high as these 5-6k cases per day unfold in the next month.
The demographic catching the virus this month should differ from that catching the virus in mid - late March. I would suspect that apart from care homes the vulnerable should be significantly less likely to catch this disease due to shielding. So a higher number of new infections can be sustained but this doesn't lead to the same number of ICU admissions / deaths. That's what I would hope at least.
 

redshaw

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I think in our case it looks flatter due to how bad our testing was to start with and how many we weren't catching. If it was anything but that our death rates wouldn't be falling at this rate surely?
Possibly, we'll see if they keep falling. UK took a week longer to hit the 400-600 hospital deaths per day range from a peak of 900+ and we might see a longer period in that 400-600 range as well. Hopefully we don't get stuck in that too long and get a handle on the situation.
 

hp88

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Just started to watch NHS Heroes on C4, it looks horrendous for anyone who's working on the front line at the moment.
 

Fluctuation0161

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Yes it is.
And very simple 3 word messages.
But eventually, these empty promises and spin will be seen for what they are.
I hope so. But get the sense that there is not enough of a proportion of the "voice of reason" in any UK media. Government messages are repeated for weeks on end. Mistakes are reported for one day.
 

jojojo

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This is good news, right?
It is. Especially if they've not spent too much on a doomed solution.

As soon as you decide to take on Google (Android) and Apple (iPhone) in a single app and ask both companies to change their policy you're pushing water uphill. Asking users to live with a workaround that involves overriding normal phone security settings and kills battery life, it really is pushing your luck.

It's better for creating a multinational app as well. And that's just a couple of advantages before even thinking about security/private issues.
 

Pexbo

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This is good news, right?
It depends on how much you trust the government. Centralised could potentially allow the NHS to converge sensitive medical records with the collected data (if they got people to provide their NI Number) which you could then let some genetic algorithms (a type of AI inspired by genetics rather than specific to) attempt to build a predictive model to attempt to find patterns in the data which would help understand it.
 

VP89

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But you kind of made a comparison and drew a conclusion that was wrong. Paris and London metro areas are comparable in terms of population but Paris is significantly denser, it should be the worst hit area in Europe and I wouldn't be surprised if it actually is, London should be the second one and it probably is.

So you have a point about the fact that it's not surprising to see the UK near the top but I had to quibble regarding Paris vs London. :D
Ha, no I do agree agree, Paris is more densely populated. My overarching point was that London is densely populated enough for the virus to spread like crazy, and it's population is multiple times more than Paris/Brussels and comfortably higher than Barcelona's, so a high death total was inevitable.
 

0le

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It depends on how much you trust the government. Centralised could potentially allow the NHS to converge sensitive medical records with the collected data (if they got people to provide their NI Number) which you could then let some genetic algorithms (a type of AI inspired by genetics rather than specific to) attempt to build a predictive model to attempt to find patterns in the data which would help understand it.
Some of your medical data is not private anymore. NHS already gave (some) access to Amazon for example. Most people also use gmail or outlook and their emails are scanned and read by Google and Microsoft respectively, who can easily build a picture of health profile if you have any emails/ messages revealing any information. Same story with communication services such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp. If you ever spoke to a friend about it, they already know. They may not know precise details, but they will have key words assigned to your profiles.
 

Skills

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It is. Especially if they've not spent too much on a doomed solution.

As soon as you decide to take on Google (Android) and Apple (iPhone) in a single app and ask both companies to change their policy you're pushing water uphill. Asking users to live with a workaround that involves overriding normal phone security settings and kills battery life, it really is pushing your luck.

It's better for creating a multinational app as well. And that's just a couple of advantages before even thinking about security/private issues.
Yeah a novel app was never going to be as good as a solution integrated into Android/Apple. Google are probably the best data business in the world - their data collection and machine learning is going to be hard to match for anyone making a novel solution. So why not just use the capability they've already developed and have been using for the last 10 years or so.
 

Pexbo

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Some of your medical data is not private anymore. NHS already gave (some) access to Amazon for example. Most people also use gmail or outlook and their emails are scanned and read by Google and Microsoft respectively, who can easily build a picture of health profile if you have any emails/ messages revealing any information. Same story with communication services such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp. If you ever spoke to a friend about it, they already know. They may not know precise details, but they will have key words assigned to your profiles.
Correct to an extent but there’s no way any of those companies would allow that data to be reidentified and converged with the decentralised and obfuscated corona data. The point is that the NHS with a centralised service could pair that data before obfuscation ready for data mining.
 

VP89

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I don’t think people appreciate how rigorous the lockdown has been in Italy and Spain. Kids not allowed out of their apartment under any circumstances for several weeks. Hefty fines regularly issued to anyone leaving their home without official documentation.

The Uk approach is a walk in the park (literally!) by comparison. So you would expect the UK “tail” to be much longer and taller than those two countries.
Also how has the testing capacity fared between the two countries? In the UK we have only ramped up ours very recently, and even still it seems to be driven by a political tick box.
 

JMack1234

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I've been highly critical of the lockdown.

However, in a few months we'll look back at the lockdown as some sunny period of national unity and furlough.

In the coming weeks we're going to enter the economic wild west.

Good luck everyone.
 

UNITED ACADEMY

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I just wish CCP can just corporate and let others to do investigation in their country. The longer they are being persistent then the worse it'll get even for them.

If they believe they aren't to blamed for this mess and they aren't the original of how the virus happened then they shouldn't be scared of the idea investigation. The point of investigation is not to blame China but to find the patient zero which is the origin of the covid 19 and by finding it'll increase the chance of all scientist to know more about the virus and find the cure for it. At the moment, the clue we only know is that it's started in Wuhan.
 

TMDaines

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Just started to watch NHS Heroes on C4, it looks horrendous for anyone who's working on the front line at the moment.
I’ve spent a lot of time at Saint Mary’s @ Wythenshawe this week after my wife gave birth at the weekend. From the perspective of not getting ill or picking up an infection whilst in hospital, I cannot imagine a better time to be there. Standards and vigiliance of cleanliness are so high right now. I imagine other “hot” areas of the hospital feel quite different, but I was so damn impressed with both the staff and protocols being followed in the maternity units.
 

Organic Potatoes

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Is The Atlantic worth subscribing to?
It was my most used resource for insightful long-form news articles along with some good science and environmental stuff before it went to a subscription model.

You won’t get the variety and ‘anonymous source’ DC stuff that you’ll get with the Washington Post or New York Times, the first two I would consider subscribing to after The Atlantic to keep myself informed stateside.
 

TMDaines

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This is good news, right?
It is better late than never, but my word are the government swinging and missing at everything non-Rishi Sunak related: the Nightingales increasingly look like a panic move with far too limited scope to be useful even though the shit has hit the fan; the volunteering app has been way too slow to truly get going; PPE availability has been sketchy at best; the testing goal completely failed to be met; and now the original design of the track and tracing app that they were so confident in has now been bottled.
 

sglowrider

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I just wish CCP can just corporate and let others to do investigation in their country. The longer they are being persistent then the worse it'll get even for them.

If they believe they aren't to blamed for this mess and they aren't the original of how the virus happened then they shouldn't be scared of the idea investigation. The point of investigation is not to blame China but to find the patient zero which is the origin of the covid 19 and by finding it'll increase the chance of all scientist to know more about the virus and find the cure for it. At the moment, the clue we only know is that it's started in Wuhan.
Absolutely. Just like when the other countries were invited to investigate the WMD/Iraq scam put forward by the GWB/Blair regimes.

Oh wait...
 

Carolina Red

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Don't Sodexo run catering at a lot of hospitals? I remember them taking over a catering contract where I once worked and they were ****
Most likely. They’re a massive conglomerate and food service is one of their biggest services. They ran one of the restaurants at the university I attended.
 

Suedesi

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I don't really understand what we're doing at this point. I havent really understood at any point but now it's just bordering on sheer lunacy.

I thought the whole point of lockdown was to allow the health service to cope during the peak period which would also potentially have come at a time when they are already stretched. Now we are past both of those possibilities and ae still carrying on exactly the same.

Who are we even saving at this point? The virus is not going to go away and one way or another most people will get it before there is a vaccine...unless they are literally made to live a life of misery as permanent prisoners in their own home. Even those who don't get it before there is a vaccine...the vaccine wont help a lot of them who the virus is actually a risk to.

I don't know anyone who's been affected by corona virus, yet know countless people who've lost jobs, income, opportunities, who are living in misery or who's mental health has been severely affected. A friend of a work colleague has committed suicide. My dad who's been forced to self isolate has seen his health deteriorate where he can't exercise and has been drinking and smoking more. My mum has severe mental health issues and I'm not even allowed to see her to check she is ok. things like this are 500x more widespread as corona virus and for a signnifiant percentage of people are a far bigger risk.

We're on the verge of a point now where we are killing and torturing people rather than helping them, I'm afraid. I see people laughing at people who think they're being "opressed"...but the reality is we've all had most of our freedoms taken away with no guarantee we'll ge tthem back, and if I asked anyone to explain what it's actually achieving, it's very hard to say it's achieving anythhing at all as there is literally NO evidence or plan to support any argument.

We're at 30,000 deaths, plus probably a whole load more, plus a whole load more again that are due to lockdown measures rather than the virus. The recorded overall death numbers suggest lockdown is killing thousands a week already. There will be a much bigger death toll number next to the lockdown/economic impact in the longer term. If the aim is to save lives where is the evidence that it is doing that?
 

jojojo

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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52569364

400k gowns from Turkey don't meet safety standards so are stuck in a warehouse.
Hmmm, I get that they want their money back and don't want to be treated like mugs, but what is wrong with them?

They still might be better repurposed to somewhere rather than sent back. We've still got places making aprons out of bin liners for care workers etc.
 

Sky1981

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Hmmm, I get that they want their money back and don't want to be treated like mugs, but what is wrong with them?

They still might be better repurposed to somewhere rather than sent back. We've still got places making aprons out of bin liners for care workers etc.
When they say doesnt meet safety standards it doesnt always means it's ragged or disfunctional. Most of the times discrepancies on technicalities exist and can cause an item to be labelled as doesnt meet standard.

It could be it doesnt pass the needle detector test. Or doesnt or hasnt been tested by certified lab due to backlog. Again I'm saying it could have been