What? Pull the shite published relating to the policy implementation[s] instead. Try to find where the obvious solution was it where it was ignored.
There's not many reflections on how shitty COVID prevention implementation was in the middle of the first pandemic, weirdly. If you mean generally. Here is the Vice President on HIV.
*co-incidentally there's lots of black people in this group. Weird.In November 2014, the first HIV infection in Scott County attributed to this outbreak was diagnosed. By January 2015, 17 new HIV infections had been recorded, and the Indiana State Department of Health began an investigation, but it wasn’t until late February 2015 that Indiana state officials even notified local authorities in Scott County about the crisis in their midst.
As late as early March 2015, Pence still resisted calls to establish needle exchange programs even though state legislators from Pence’s own party were now advocating for them. Pence supported the federal ban on needle exchange and also his state’s prohibition; a Republican state legislator, Ed Clere, told a reporter that Pence’s staff members “made it clear that he was categorically opposed to syringe exchange, period.”
However, after meeting with officials from the Indiana State Department of Health and the CDC, and an evening telephone conversation with Scott County Sheriff Daniel McClain on March 23rd, Pence said he would “go home and pray on it.”
On March 25, 2015, Pence finally declared a public health emergency, which permitted needle exchange in the town. Several days later, an HIV testing clinic opened. In early April, after consultations with Indiana State Department of Health, CDC and local law enforcement, Pence established a temporary syringe-exchange program for 30 days. Finally, in May 2015, Pence signed a bill that allowed counties in Indiana to apply for permission to establish syringe-exchange programs. These exchange programs were temporary and did not receive state money.
On the same day, however, Pence also undermined the effects of the new law, signing another bill that toughened the punishment for people found carrying needles. It upgraded possession of a syringe with intent to commit an offense with a controlled substance from a misdemeanor to a felony charge, subject to imprisonment for up to 2.5 years. Criminalizing possession of syringes, even clean ones, without a prescription undermines efforts to slow transmission of HIV among injection drug users, and may actually encourage needle sharing.
This happens all the time. Across all issues.
Criticising politicians for handling of this is so lazy. It's hit us all like a freight train and outside of police state measures (which are themselves inhuman), nobody has the first clue how to deal with it, especially in large complex nations. So Denmark are re-opening nurseries, well done them, they have 5.8 million people on a peninsula with one city more populous than Sunderland. You can't keep tabs on France, or Italy, or the UK, or America like that.
I'll ignore the whole concept of the 'government is bad' guy telling me that the government did all they can do shite.
I'm not the government is bad guy. You just think I am because you've put me in a lazy pigeon hole.
No doubt any government in the world COULD have handled it better, ranging from the Chinese communists to the mayor of Milan to us to Trump, but they had no way of knowing how or when or how much until the thing had already gone off like a rocket.
There are degrees of difficulty and complexity in decision-making. If I said managing Denmark was easier than managing a large nation, then imagine how much easier it is to manage a 50 man setup in Surrey. And then me, making decisions for my one man household, that's frankly been a piece of piss.
I'm not sure what you think you're telling me. Lots of people die of things around the world and nobody cares? I know. It's literally my entire approach to every miserable shit thing that happens the world over, and pretty much the entire reason I wasn't taking it all particularly seriously early doors, because why would you shut your country down indefinitely when even a hundred thousand dead is not really a lot in the grand scheme of things (we briefly had that discussion in this thread)?
Again, what obvious stuff was being discounted 'in the face of everything'?
If you follow that logic then everybody who had changed their policies weeks prior had also already failed by not instantly copying the Chinese quarantine efforts as soon as the first cases were detected in their countries (or even before). The Chinese had noticed the detail[s], so what were Italy and Switzerland and everyone else playing at? Their leaders must have been equally sensitive to the JCB share price as ours were.
The British government, like the other governments who apparently got it all right first time, embarked on a graduated policy accelerated (not 'changed' in the conventional sense) by new information coming in. The Italians, who were seemingly well ahead of the LOCKDOWN curve, to the point where us mongs ought to have been following their lead, didn't shut non-essential businesses until after we did. What obvious details were they missing that our clever lot hit upon?
If everybody's an idiot then nobody is an idiot, and it follows that your preferred response would have been to shut the entire country down six weeks (you apparently being on the case in mid-January) before the first death was even registered here. Fair play. Can't believe the scientists never considered that.
Your leaders had advance notice and did even less...
It’s absolutely pathetic how you try to hold the ‘lots of people dying... who cares?’ Position and the ‘we did all we could with the information at the time’ position at the same time.
Unless you're setting the bar to be South Korea, UK government have done fine in response to this. Even the decade of underfunding the NHS seems to have been made light work of with this Nightingale cheat (if they do indeed manage to keep their head reasonably above water with their ICU capacity).
I don’t like all this honest posting. Jimmy has a persona to keep up and without those, this place is nothing.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/j...box=1586291804
"I have nussin' to say"
It looks to me like some countries are doing more than others to try and control this virus.
There is no way NZ would have the resources or political will to implement something like this. So instead, we have been in lockdown since 25th March. We've had 1 death so far.
Phonics knowing about the magnitude of this in mid-January and not sharing with us is a bit of a blow to the community. Could've saved a few TTH's.
Meanwhile, I passed 4 (FOUR) temperature checks today
Last edited by John Arne; 08-04-2020 at 11:39 AM.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...study-predicts
World-leading disease data analysts have projected that the UK will become the country worst hit by the coronavirus pandemic in Europe, accounting for more than 40% of total deaths across the continent.
The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) in Seattle predicts 66,000 UK deaths from Covid-19 by August, with a peak of nearly 3,000 a day, based on a steep climb in daily deaths early in the outbreak.
The analysts also claim discussions over “herd immunity” led to a delay in the UK introducing physical distancing measures, which were brought in from 23 March in England when the coronavirus daily death toll was 54. Portugal, by comparison, had just one confirmed death when distancing measures were imposed.
The IHME modelling forecasts that by 4 August the UK will see a total of 66,314 deaths – an average taken from a large estimate range of between 14,572 and 219,211 deaths, indicating the uncertainties around it.
The newly released data is disputed by scientists whose modelling of the likely shape of the UK epidemic is relied on by the government. Prof Neil Ferguson, of Imperial College London, said the IHME figures on “healthcare demand” – including hospital bed use and deaths – were twice as high as they should be.
The IHME, which is responsible for the ongoing Global Burden of Disease study, calculated the likely need for hospital admissions and intensive care beds and projected deaths in European countries hit by Covid-19.
Looking at the measures taken by the UK to curb the spread of the disease, the institute says the peak is expected in 10 days’ time, on 17 April. At that point the country will need more than 102,000 hospital beds, the IHME says. There are nearly 18,000 available, meaning a shortfall of 85,000.
The same grim picture applies to intensive care beds. At the peak, 24,500 intensive care beds will be needed and 799 are available, the analysts predict. There will be a need for nearly 21,000 ventilators, they say. At the peak the UK will see 2,932 deaths a day, the IHME forecasts.
The death toll in other European countries that are now struggling with Covid-19 will be lower, they say. Spain is projected to have 19,209 deaths by the same date, Italy 20,300 and France 15,058. All three countries have imposed tougher lockdown measures than the UK.
The IHME bases its forecasts in large part on the trajectory of deaths rather than case numbers and the speed with which distancing measures were put in place.
The UK will be severely short of beds, it finds. Germany, by contrast, is predicted to have enough hospital beds, including ICU beds, needed for its peak. The IHME predicts Germany will have 8,802 deaths in total by 4 August.
France will have enough general beds but will be about 4,000 short of ICU beds at the peak, says the forecast. There are projected to be just over 15,000 deaths there. Both Italy and Spain are past their peaks, says the IHME.
The IHME, based at the University of Washington in Seattle, published its forecast for the US on Sunday, revising down the projected number of Covid-19 deaths there from 93,500 to 81,800. These figures were relied on in part for the US government’s own, higher predictions of the coronavirus death toll.
In March, modellers relied on by the UK government, led by the team at Imperial College London, said deaths could reach 260,000 in the UK with no restrictions on movement, but they hoped to get deaths down to 20,000 through the lockdown strategy.
Ferguson said he did not think the predictions could be relied on. “This model does not match the current UK situation,” he said, adding that the numbers used by the IHME were at least twice as high as they should be for current bed usage and deaths in the NHS. “Basically, their healthcare demand model is wrong, at least for the UK,” he said.
The IHME said its model was designed to be updated from day to day as the pandemic goes on. For a country such as the UK, which is quite early on in its outbreak, the uncertainty was higher and the headline numbers might change over the next few days as more data is collected.
The high predicted numbers of UK deaths were driven by three factors, the IHME said:
- What had happened in other countries that are ahead in their epidemics, such as Italy and Spain.
What had happened so far in the UK.
When physical distancing measures were put in place.
In the early stages of the UK outbreak, deaths climbed steeply, which the IHME says is a major driver of predicted deaths.
The flirtation in government with the idea of “herd immunity” as a way out of the epidemic meant there was a delay in implementing physical distancing until 23 March, when there were already 54 daily deaths.
“We are expecting a foreboding few weeks for people in many parts of Europe,” said the IHME director, Dr Christopher Murray. “It seems likely the number of deaths will exceed our projections for the United States.
“It is unequivocally evident that social distancing can, when well-implemented and maintained, control the epidemic, leading to declining death rates.
“Those nations hit hard early on implemented social distancing orders and may have the worst behind them as they are seeing important progress in reducing their death rates.
“Each nation’s trajectory will change – and dramatically for the worse – if people ease up on social distancing or relax other precautions.”
Murray cautioned that easing these precautions too soon during the first wave of the pandemic could lead to new rounds of infections, hospitalisations and deaths. He defined the end of this “wave” as a ratio of 0.3 deaths per 1 million people.
“To decrease the risk of a second wave in places where the first wave is controlled by robust social distancing, governments would need to consider mass testing, contact tracing and quarantines for those infected until a vaccination is available, mass-produced and distributed widely,” Murray said.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “Our response to coronavirus – including decisions on which measures we introduce and when – is based on the latest scientific advice, modelling and evidence, and we are working round the clock with world-renowned clinicians, public health experts and scientists to keep this country safe.
“In England alone, the NHS successfully has freed up more than 33,000 beds – the equivalent of 50 new hospitals – and we are increasing the number of ventilators and opening more Nightingale hospitals, all of which will save even more lives in the coming weeks.”
Oh, and you're welcome.
Looks promising…
Minister Dung.
I will repay Vice Minister Dung's gesture by eating some silky rice noodles when this is over.
I'd say that's fair recompense for my V-League Special.
Those numbers don't seem to really make any sense unless I'm missing something. 799 available beds? As in that's the total capacity of ICU beds in the whole of the UK? Or 24000 new ones will be needed on day X but only 799 will remain by that point? It sort of looks like the total hospital beds and total ICU beds columns have been shifted.Looking at the measures taken by the UK to curb the spread of the disease, the institute says the peak is expected in 10 days’ time, on 17 April. At that point the country will need more than 102,000 hospital beds, the IHME says. There are nearly 18,000 available, meaning a shortfall of 85,000.
The same grim picture applies to intensive care beds. At the peak, 24,500 intensive care beds will be needed and 799 are available, the analysts predict. There will be a need for nearly 21,000 ventilators, they say. At the peak the UK will see 2,932 deaths a day, the IHME forecasts.
Yeah, I don't hold much weight with projections now. You won't know the peak until you're in it and you can't predict how quick it'll drop off. 14,000 to 200,000 is a big fucking range to draw from and those numbers are always being revised down. The US went from 100,000 projected deaths to 81,000 after just a couple of days extra data.
Glad to see two people I know, one with a failing dog grooming business that employs no staff (having blown her business loan on a new horse) and another who has been alternating work going through the books between two companies in a legal way that allows him to dodge tax have been given the £10k grants while they sit at home, I'm battering the laptop to keep the railway running like a mug not even guaranteed overtime paid as cash yet.
If we get 66,000 dead with almost all of those coming in the month of April, as per that prediction, we'd be into bodies piling up in the streets territory. I don't sense that from my ivory tower here at spare pistons HQ.
On another note, one thing I have noticed while driving to and from work on the otherwise empty roads is that the quality of cyclist out and about now is TERRIBLE. People getting their bikes out for the first time in years just wobbling in and out, there will be deaths from this to add to the tally.
No, letting a load of people die is what I would have done. I recognise, however, that, out there in the real world (the soft-touch world), that was as much of a non-starter as your top secret January proposals to shut the country and save us all. With that in mind, I see what the government has done as a pretty reasonable middle ground accounting for this, that, and the other.
I go every other morning, it's quite nice finding the most recently resurfaced roads that are now almost completely empty.
https://covid19.healthdata.org/
There's nothing finely tuned about it. America's supposed to peak in 4 days. Assuming that peak is effectively NY's peak, it'll drop like a stone next week.
EDIT: Just seen the UK peak for deaths. Their projections:
6/4/2020 - 1,258 deaths - range from 574 to 2,500 (actual - 768)
7/4/2020 - 1,233 deaths
Last edited by Shindig; 08-04-2020 at 11:42 AM.
Got a really nasty sounding cough creeping in starting this morning.
IMHE's data for Spain appears to be the most bollocks. 400 deaths for today lads. Oh.
I had the radio on about an hour ago and couldn't help but chuckle a little bit when Jeremy Vine segued nicely from Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" straight into a segment on the virus wiping out old people in care homes. /
https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/news...x-hull-4029366
lol at that anonymous tip-off.
Are all regional news sites utter fucking cancer? Just a raft of pop ups and overlays.
And half the national ones.
This virus will finish off the newspaper industry for good. The big titles will hang on but the regionals will all die.
On the cycling front I was going to say that in 10 to 15 years we're in for a crop of top cyclists as every child who can walk is ostensibly now learning to ride a bike, probably more successfully that in the world of being able to do other stuff.
I'm curious as to what is happening with things like A&E waiting times now that there is little to no traffic, no going out on the lash and everyone is terrified to go anywhere near a hospital unless they absolutely have to. Presumably that'll all be lost in everything turning into a covid ward, but it'd be interesting to know the extent to which time-wasting twats being put off helps the system function. My suspicion has always been a lot.
I know from my sister and her friends when they all had kids of young ages that a lot of A&E time was being wasted by parents dashing to A&E at all hours with their kids over some non-ailment or another.
There was a period of time when I felt like I was being told every week or two that somebody they knew had "had to" go to the hospital with wee Hamish at 3am because he had a stomach ache and wouldn't go to sleep or some fucking nonsense that they were having a flap over.
936, on track for most in Europe.
But let’s clap for Boris