A lockdown based on what though? Hospitalisation and deaths are declining, cases have been broadly static for the last 2-3 months.
SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)
- Thread starter Don't Kill Bill
- Start date
75% of local UK authorities are seeing a week on week increase in cases.
When you have a tooth infection you see a dentist and get it drilled and filled. You don’t wait until you get an abscess and the tooth has to be pulled.
Preventative action right now will go a long way to stopping any future winter lockdown.
Surely the vaccines can be tweaked pretty quickly to protect against this variant though?
Current case rate has been stable:
The data isn't suggesting we need to go into any lockdown in the future. The key point is the hospitalisation number, vaccines are working & booster uptake is rising. The UK about 50% down where we were this time last year in terms of hopistalisation's, and a downward trend is currently happening on that number. Again, based on that information, why would we need to go into a lockdown? It makes no logical sense on the current & expected position.It has been fairly stable in terms of the consistent number since the reopening. Various peaks and troughs on a linear level.
Everything stays the same but keeps getting worse.
Rinse & repeat?
Pretty much. It's difficult to feel any sort of positivity with this latest news, just expecting it to be very bad.
I think thats the prudent response.
Its so bloody messy, a new variant, vaccine mandates, different regions having different experiences etc etc.
We are now 19,000 people from having everyone above the age of 12 with at least one dose vaccinated and Aucklands outbreak has been stable between 150-200 cases a day for about 3 weeks now. Hope summer helps as well.
Thats what Im hoping can happen.
So, today's figures from South Africa make for some sobering reading:
Cases: 2,465 (up from 1275 yesterday and 589 a week ago)
Deaths: 114 (the most deaths since October 8th, up from 40 a week ago).
Cases: 2,465 (up from 1275 yesterday and 589 a week ago)
Deaths: 114 (the most deaths since October 8th, up from 40 a week ago).
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-11...trictions-imposed-over-new-covid-19/100652438
Well there goes our vaccine shield
Well there goes our vaccine shield
Ah shit, here we go again.
All this talk of boosters and now we may require a new round of altered vaccines. 
They haven’t yet been tweaked to give better protection against any of the previous variants. I’m not sure why. I think it’s because by the time a tweaked vaccine is ready to roll out the variant it’s designed to work against will probably already be old news. What we really need now is a vaccine that works against any and all coronaviruses. I know that one is being worked on. No idea how long it will be before it is available.
Last edited:
I thought Pfizer's Delta tweaked vaccine were due any day now?
Not that I’m aware of?
The case increase is interesting. The death one is rather odd because there is usually a time lag between case and death. The only potential explanation would be that the new variant has been in circulation for a while now.
is there any solace to take from the fact it’s spreading in a low vaccination take-up country like SA?
While Ireland seem to be doing well on the face of it, I really don't understand why they aren't hammering out boosters using any means necessary. Another Christmas ruined is going to drive people insane. Surely the lost taxes over that period if we go into lockdown outweighs the cost of setting up vaccine centres again?
I think the logic is that they’re rolling boosters out at a rate that will give everyone a booster 6 months after their second jab. And there’s no need to give them any sooner. I can’t see any downside to giving them sooner myself. With obvious upsides.
Are boosters even worth it now this new variant is coming?
People are still advocating more lockdowns complete looney tunes.
It’s been categorically proven you don’t need a lockdown to get over a wave of Covid, yet plenty of you absolutely lap it up. It surely at this stage has to be that many in fact enjoy lockdown?
Would you be alright living in & out of lockdown forever? It’s mindblowing for someone who has never experienced lockdown or mask mandate.
complete looney tunes.It’s been categorically proven you don’t need a lockdown to get over a wave of Covid, yet plenty of you absolutely lap it up. It surely at this stage has to be that many in fact enjoy lockdown?
Would you be alright living in & out of lockdown forever? It’s mindblowing for someone who has never experienced lockdown or mask mandate.
100%. Even if this new variant is much more resistant to vaccines than delta it won’t be like a switch being turned off. They will still give some protection. So it becomes even more important to boost that protection as much as possible.
What are the chances that a mutated strain could reinfect a recently recovered Covid patient? Is bypassing the vaccine the same as bypassing natural antibodies?
Where are you??People are still advocating more lockdowns
It’s been categorically proven you don’t need a lockdown to get over a wave of Covid, yet plenty of you absolutely lap it up. It surely at this stage has to be that many in fact enjoy lockdown?
Would you be alright living in & out of lockdown forever? It’s mindblowing for someone who has never experienced lockdown or mask mandate.
Not true. Other than in certain very specific circumstances. Unless we’re all imagining hospital systems getting completely overwhelmed in many different countries all over the world (including some European countries right now)People are still advocating more lockdowns
It’s been categorically proven you don’t need a lockdown to get over a wave of Covid, yet plenty of you absolutely lap it up. It surely at this stage has to be that many in fact enjoy lockdown?
Would you be alright living in & out of lockdown forever? It’s mindblowing for someone who has never experienced lockdown or mask mandate.
Probably. That’s the most likely explanation for the current surge in South Africa after the delta wave was ended more by natural immunity than vaccines (only 25% vaccinated)
Tell you what would have been a novel idea, spend some of those utter insane lockdown costs that have ran into the hundreds of billions and the past two years on actually improving hospitals, building new ones, training new nurses and hugely increasing pay in the health sector.
Instead it’s the same short term attempts at a quick fix.
And yes, it has been proven.
In a place that thankfully doesn’t lose it’s mind when covid cases rise, and understands that the rise simply cannot continue exponentially where 80% of the country all have the same virus at the same time. It works in waves, like all other viruses.
Honestly, looking on here closing in on two years I wanna fecking scream, we’re finally getting back to normal, I took my oldest daughter home for the first time last week which was great. Yet the stupid as feck and economy crippling short term fix of a lockdown is being advocated again by loads. Do people realise this is forever? Surely you’ve all understood the inevitability of it all by now?
People should be screaming from the fecking rooftops at those making decisions telling them to think long term for a change and build a health system with these billions than can actually fecking deal with it, instead of wasting monumental amounts of money on short term thinking.
Last edited:
That could be very dangerous for those getting over a bad bout of Delta/compromised immune system if so.
No. It hasn’t. At least have the decency to read posts before replying.
You also don’t seem to understand the timeframes involved in building (and, crucially, staffing) a load of new hospitals.
South Africa also has another massive complication when it comes to looking at their data. About 20% of SA adults are HIV+ and not all of them are in a drug controlled stable condition.
However many people have been previously infected or vaccinated in SA, the number of people who are actually resistant to infection may be relatively low. Relatively in this context meaning that covid rates can run high in a country like the UK where more than 90% of the population have antibodies, so more than 10% susceptible will still allow rapid growth.
Any kind of additional immune evasion from the new variants will be very visible. Plus, I think SA have mostly used J&J which hasn't had the greatest effectiveness numbers against infection. Hopefully the protection against hospitalisations and deaths is better.
Edited to say: apparently about 6m people have had J&J and about 9m have had Pfizer in SA of a population of 68m.
Last edited:
Latest I've heard, obviously changing by the hour:
- More contagious than Delta
- More likely to evade immediate immune response i.e. higher risk of infection, and particularly re-infection for those with natural immunity
- T-cells are key, and likely to protect against severe infection (hospitalisation and death)
Where’s the proof? Maybe substantiate a claim before making it.People are still advocating more lockdowns
It’s been categorically proven you don’t need a lockdown to get over a wave of Covid, yet plenty of you absolutely lap it up. It surely at this stage has to be that many in fact enjoy lockdown?
Would you be alright living in & out of lockdown forever? It’s mindblowing for someone who has never experienced lockdown or mask mandate.
Can't even pretend to know the answer, because I don't think anyone has the numbers yet. Now SA and Botswana have identified it and alerted the scientific community to the risks, they'll all be digging deeper.
The fact that it (like Alpha but unlike Delta) has a mutation that certain PCR tests can spot will mean that labs globally will be on alert, looking for any recent rises in the proportion of PCR "dropout" tests. We'll know more, literally within days. Because more people will start the delicate business of linking tests to people's vaccine status and to their previous PCR history.
What we hear next and from who will really depends on how far it has spread, but SA has strong data analysis teams - so I think we'll get updates from them regularly now.
The HIV thing is interesting. After the theory that Alpha developed from a prolonged infection in an immune compromised patient you’d have to wonder if the same is true here.
The amount of travel around the world, day by day, hour by hour, kind of blows your mind. You could go to every major capital city in the world and see at least one, often several, flights from South Africa coming in to land every day. And from almost every other country you can think of. It’s a head melter when it comes to containing this fecking thing.
Makes you wonder if the “delta wave” slamming most of Europe might already be partially “nu wave” (coincidentally, also a genre of not very good music)
Do you reckon that governments around the world will start to remove some of the "benefits" of being fully vaccinated? Particularly when it comes to travel and quarantines?
Personally I think this might be a bad decision long-term as it might create a sharp increase in vaccine skepticism, which is the last thing we need now. Plenty of people have only taken the vaccine for the "benefits". Can you imagine their reaction if only a few months after the second doze they lose all/most of these benefits? Then there are those who were scared of the vaccine and needed a lot of convincing.
Personally I think this might be a bad decision long-term as it might create a sharp increase in vaccine skepticism, which is the last thing we need now. Plenty of people have only taken the vaccine for the "benefits". Can you imagine their reaction if only a few months after the second doze they lose all/most of these benefits? Then there are those who were scared of the vaccine and needed a lot of convincing.