Interesting , did not expect that proportion.
SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)
- Thread starter Don't Kill Bill
- Start date
Population density possibly a factor? 72 people per square km versus UK with 278 people per square km.
The population density of Dublin is roughly the same as that of Manchester though, so who knows?
Worrying to hear Sajid Javid and Gavin Williamson recently about how letting go of all restrictions including mandatory mask wearing will make us "healthier"
In addition to scraping bubble systems in schools, isolation policies, no clear plans mentioned to get kids vaccinated despite MHRA approval and 9 in 10 parents in England surveyed saying they'd take up the offer for their kids to do so.
We're gearing up to be a variant-producing factory on this island.
What is worrying is lack of definitive plan to reduce the surge in cases. Talks about a break in link between cases to hospitalisations and deaths is fine, and while zero covid isn't a position most take here surely keeping cases down and reducing mutation chances is something that should be aspired to?
In addition to scraping bubble systems in schools, isolation policies, no clear plans mentioned to get kids vaccinated despite MHRA approval and 9 in 10 parents in England surveyed saying they'd take up the offer for their kids to do so.
We're gearing up to be a variant-producing factory on this island.
What is worrying is lack of definitive plan to reduce the surge in cases. Talks about a break in link between cases to hospitalisations and deaths is fine, and while zero covid isn't a position most take here surely keeping cases down and reducing mutation chances is something that should be aspired to?
They think the risk to their health is relatively low, lower than the risk of suffering severe consequences from getting the flu, which for the vaccinated population is an accurate assessment overall. The vaccine is a more effective measure than any practically plausible “non-pharmaceutical intervention” at this point. That was always the conditions under which these interventions were tolerated by enough people in society to make them workable. That was how it was positioned by the public health experts too; until we have a workable vaccine, these are the best measures we have
https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/publications-data/covid-19-guidelines-non-pharmaceutical-interventions
That isn’t the situation in the UK any more. The vaccines are here, they work, they work better than our best restrictions. Of course it doesn’t need to be one or the other but there are social and economic restrictions that the majority of the population won’t adhere to for the low levels of risk you’re talking about.
It’s not no risk but low risk. Most people are comfortable with low risk in daily life, and when they are in a direct trade-off vs. other vital aspects of life, that’s doubly true. More anxious people will feel that things are moving too quickly. That’s just an inevitable reality no matter when things normalise. Some people adapt to change slower than others, some people are losing out on more than others, etc. There is no way to make everyone happy.
Tory ideology versus facts, yet again.
Its absolutely insane. Nobody is really asking for it all in one go. Why not just keep relaxing measures for 3-5 months to gauge their impact.So the Sunday papers are reporting that all restrictions will be lifted two weeks Monday in England.
Mask wearing gone.
All social distancing gone.
As much as I want things back to normal, this all seems very worrying with infection rates exploding again
I’d sure as hell keep masks on public transport for the rest of the year. It’s an acceptable hardship as we run into fuller services, return to offices and winter on the way.
It's the way Johnson and his mates keep saying relaxation will be 'irreversible' that annoys me. They have no idea what variants may arise and or how deadly they may be, but apparently that won't matter.
Hopefully with the scientific progress on vaccine production that's being made then in time we will learn to deal with new variants quite quickly, but to rule out more restrictions whilst we are doing so, in advance, is just plain stupid.
We will never, ever get to ‘the end’. This virus is here to stay and the sooner we accept that and stop trying to stop it, the better.
It’s the flu that we don’t fully understand yet and will just need to vaccinated against it (if you choose to).
Do you not think that people will just continue to do certain elements of the ‘distancing’ and/or self protection??
I for one will certainly carry a mask with me at all times and I am certainly on the side that thinks we ‘just need to move on from it’
I’ll don my masks at various times but especially on public transport.
Agreed and also dont get how currently there is that significant a burden on mental health. Restaurants and pubs are open.So the Sunday papers are reporting that all restrictions will be lifted two weeks Monday in England.
Mask wearing gone.
All social distancing gone.
As much as I want things back to normal, this all seems very worrying with infection rates exploding again
They could find a way to get the Arts some much needed help by opening that sector up but keeping some measures in there.
Gradually alleviating things surely could have been achievable, financially viable rather than current policy of what sounds like encouraging suprespreader events en masse.
As far as the Uk coronavirus experience has gone, the glass half empty types have consistently been far more accurate with their predictions than the opposite extreme. It would be great if her concerns here buck that trend. Great but unlikely.
Many will. Many won’t. The kind of people that won’t wear a mask to protect you from them, are the same kind of people that will go to super spreader events with reckless abandon.
Yeah. Fair point.
Im not sure what you’d class as a super spreader event but I’ll be going back to OT in August without any questions asked.
Her commentary on the South African & Brazilian variants didn't really amount to her trend. I acknowledge her fears, but it's a very selective area to call out and one which has a very low first dose percentage in comparison to the rest of the country.
Based on current data, schools would be classed as super spreader events. It's definitely the elephant in the room.
Is that right? Good news if so. Where are you seeing these data? How big is the variation in vaccine uptake between NE and SW (the two regions compared in her tweet)
Highest case rates in the UK per 100k and first dose % in the far column.
More localised information tells the red; story, younger ages not fully vaccinated yet and in areas of higher case rates.
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Please don’t get me started on that!!
That whole situation is a fecking joke!!
Be surprised if me 2 kids spend their full time in school over the next 3 weeks having just been off for the past week because of one kid with the virus.
I don`t know what to believe anymore. Cases rising, surge in the North East , doctors warning about relaxing restrictions too soon. On the other hand we have got huge gatherings all over Europe of unmasked football fans singing, hugging and in close contact , wimbledon crowds , music events , less mask wearing than ever and talk of ending social distancing and mask wearing alltogether in a couple of weeks. Something doesn`t add up.
A couple of my 40-something family members tested positive on their routine LFT tests earlier this week. Both primary school teachers, both double vaccinated. They and their unvaccinated teenage son have all now tested positive on PCR. None of them seriously ill fortunately, and they're all quarantined, but it's still grim news.
It's like a viral/vaccine experimentation Petri dish out there.
The spike in cases doesn't normally take place until 2-4 weeks after the event.
If there was outbreak at a football match we should see the rise in cases next week or the week after. Moreover, the right factors need to be in play for an outbreak to happen.
It adds up. People are tired and bored of the virus, unfortunately it hasn't yet got bored of us. The vaccines need time, and in the UK we might just get away with it, especially as we've also had a big percentage with some immunity as they've been infected before.
For a big chunk of the less vaccinated world, where Delta is spreading fast, you've just got to hope that they can keep it away from the old and the vulnerable, and that can handle the medical consequences of uncontrolled infection rates in younger groups.
Will people stop calling it the bloody flu?
The answer is ‘money’
Younger cases not relevant to her concerns. Which is based on surge of cases in over 30s in NE.Highest case rates in the UK per 100k and first dose % in the far column.
More localised information tells the red; story, younger ages not fully vaccinated yet and in areas of higher case rates.
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My UK geography is crap but - based on that table you shared - it doesn’t look like NE is significant outlier in terms of vaccine delivery?
For young people - the majority of the unvaccinated in the UK - the health outcomes for covid are similar to the flu, for the youngest age groups the flu typically causes more severe effects. That’s been true since the start of the pandemic and it is based on assessment by the CDC.
For vaccinated older people, the flu is more dangerous than covid. That starts to even out when people get their flu jabs too, but flu jabs are less effective than all of the covid vaccines currently used in the UK, so it’s not impossible that the flu will cause more damage to that population too this winter.
Depends a lot on variants from here, but in the current context, a comparison to the flu in terms of impact and risk is valid. It wasn’t this time last year but the situation is vastly different.
So we are most likely going to be ok in the UK due to high rates of vaccination and can look forward to restrictions ending in a couple of weeks , no masks , big events with no real social distancing anymore. I hope so and I can understand why so many have stopped wearing masks and are pretty much just getting on with things as normal now.
Things are looking grim for the less vaccinated world by the sounds of it then?
I do apologise!!!
no idea what other virus to compare it to. I am just joe public and I appreciate that your level of knowledge and expertise in this field is well above mine.
please don’t be offended
It's not, though city centres in particular have poorer vaccine coverage than other areas. Mostly due to age profile, but also complications with GP registrations and hard to reach groups. This is the UK vaccine map by local area:
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/interactive-map/vaccinations
"NE1 7RY" will give you a town centre to start from.
The NE did have fewer cases during the second wave than similar (age, population density, deprivation) areas, so there may be a different immunity by infection level in the area. That in itself could cause its R number to start to turn at a different point on the curve. Scotland has a similar story - lower past infections that may mean a lower level of overall level of immunity in the younger groups now.
Sorry pal, it’s just an annoyance of mine, a hangover from non-believers last year saying it was no worse than the flu as people were dropping dead.
no offence taken and none intended
Wasn’t exactly what I meant. I certainly didn’t mean to dampen the effects of COVID in any way.
It was a badly put phrase that was meant to allude to the fact that it is a virus that the world is starting to deal with and that it isn’t going to away - like flu didn’t and won’t go away. Unfortunately, we have to live and deal with it as best as we can
Part of it depends on what we mean by OK. The infection rate is about to go so high that we're right on the edge of the prediction models. Chances are that hospitals in most of the country will get really busy in August and a lot of them will have to stop doing elective surgery etc just as it was trying to restart - but by the time they do the government will point out that the cases are showing signs of falling again. Death rates will rise again, but we've got so used to seeing the UK deaths go over a 1000/day during the peaks of waves, that 100+/day won't scare people. Things should start to calm down again September, if the models are right and the vaccines hold and no new mutations kick us.
Meanwhile the story from the politicians etc will be that concerned people should look at their own personal risk - and presumably stay away from anyone under 40 or crowded places until they decide the gamble is worth it.
Ignore.
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Was flicking through the Metro paper on the train the other day and was mentioned as an aside Durham area was showing a huge rapid number of cases compared to areas within 100 mile radius so assume it's connected to this.
Are Blackburn/Bolton areas under control now as remember the mass panic two months back so one positive is this is happening now rather than in three-four months and only have to look at October-November last year to see what happened nationwide a few weeks later.
There's no real hope for 2021 is there whatever Government say will happen in two weeks. Just like July 2020 the current status is as good as it will get now for rest of the year.
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Yeah sorry I get that, just in that moment it sounded very familiar. Anyway apologies
HIT can never ever happen even if 90 % of adults have both doses and then majority of school kids have jabs in September?
Is it some utopian dream now when some scientists are stating it's a realistic possibility albeit the virus will still linger around.
We’re still at least a year or two away from your flu analogy working. The R0 of this virus is many multiples higher than flu because there are still millions and millions of people to whom it is still completely novel. It will rip through an unvaccinated population far quicker, with much more devastating consequences than flu can. Which has consequences for the older, vaccinated population who will be surrounded by a level of community transmission that is completely unheard of in any previous flu epidemics (1918 being a possible honourable exception)
That analysis rests on an unknown factor, a pessimistic assumption on your part and an optimistic one on mine, with lots of messy, seemingly contradictory evidence to support either assumption. And it is odd that people gloss over the fact these assumptions even play a role in our views, as if the evidence speaks for itself.
It will move through the population quicker, but will it have devastating consequences? That depends on how severe the symptoms are for the unvaccinated population. What is the hospitalisation rate for the unvaccinated population? That depends on the make up of the population.
Let’s assume it’s heavily weighted towards the youngest segments of the population, as current vaccination rates and attitudinal data suggests. What’s their hospitalisation rate? The CDC did some analysis on it based on the alpha variant which put it lower than the flu. Substantially so for the largest segment of the population that will be unvaccinated: kids and teenagers. There is some question of increased severity among younger populations with the current variant, but little confirmatory evidence
It also rests on an assumption on how large that group of voluntarily unvaccinated folks will be.
So I certainly wouldn’t rule out your predictions coming true. I just think it’s worth pointing out that there is a wider range of possibilities than the prevailing views on here suggest, which are still grounded in evidence and careful analysis.
Isn't that good news? People with the vaccine won't get seriously ill. Outside of its relation to the pandemic, people getting flu like symptoms and recovering isn't news.
As long as they don't give it to anyone else or suffer complications or long covid themselves it's only a problem to the kids who don't have teachers this week. Hopefully the same will be true of the other 150k positive covid tests we'll see this week or the million or so we'll see over the next month - maybe they'll all be lucky and so will the people affected by their absence from work and caring duties.
Provided of course that none of the people affected spawns a viral mutation change that creates a variant that dodges the vaccine or infection immunity people have developed so far.