Will Coronavirus lead to the cancellation of Glastonbury?

[eFestivals]

Just now, Havors said:

Does it though? There is a what...? 60 million population and we expect the peak to be what?? 15k people.... the chances of a lot of glasto workers being sick is pretty low

15k in hospital, which is reckoned to be 5% - so about 300,000 who'd be ill.

[Field Commander Jefferson]

24 minutes ago, northernringo said:

Yea, I mentioned that a couple of days ago in my update. Good news of course but for the country as a whole it might be some time before it hits its peak. 

The thing is, how long can you keep things locked down and then as soon as that's lifted does the infection pick up pace again?

[Breeze]

3 minutes ago, Havors said:

Does it though? There is a what...? 60 million population and we expect the peak to be what?? 15k people.... the chances of a lot of glasto workers being sick is pretty low

Interesting I hadn't heard 15k - where is that figure from?

[efcfanwirral]

43 minutes ago, northernringo said:

Not going to do the full update today as the John Hopkins site seems to have updated for some countries but not all (looks like about 50% have been updated). My own scraper will hopefully be up and running by Monday.

Some brief points:

• Anywhere that did update in East Asia saw small increases again, except Hong Kong which was down again. Japan, Singapore and South Korea haven't updated their figures. China's numbers have dropped again by a decent amount.
• In the Middle East, again quite a few countries don't seem to have been updated. A small increase for UAE. 1,000 new cases for Iran.
• In Africa, Algeria started announcing their first recoveries so down a bit. Gabon, Kenya and Ghana announced their first cases. All in all not much change and no major outbreak in Africa yet.
• In Europe, Sweden is up another 100 and Norway is up just under 100. Germany up by 1,000. France by around 600. Spain by 1,500. Italy by 2,500. Netherlands by 100. Switzerland up 200. Denmark up 250. These numbers are pretty terrifying. Things will continue to get worse it seems.
• Very little change in Central America and South America
• Jump of around 400 in USA. No new figures for Canada
• India and Russia up slightly. No change for New Zealand. No new figures for Australia.

All in all, things are getting much worse in Europe and look like they will continue to do so. No sign of Italy and Iran peaking which is worrying.

Yesterday was the first day I was now more confident that Glastonbury will be cancelled than I was that it wouldn't be unfortunately. Not a foregone conclusion though by any means.

This is brilliant every day- thanks for doing it. The concerns here are what is going on in those countries to get to those numbers. We now know testing here will only happen on people serious enough to be in hospital so the numbers won't go up that much, definitely not enough to point towards the real numbers. This in turn reduces the perceived risk ("only 2000 out of a country of x million - ha as if I'm going to give up anything. Media scaremongering") which means people won't take it seriously? 

so with other countries doing the same/more/less testing how much can we trust official numbers? 

 

Edited March 13, 2020 by efcfanwirral

[henry bear]

Those in the ‘at risk’ groups will be much better off getting the virus now, whilst the hospitals can cope. Obviously they’ll be better off not getting at all..

[jparx]

The football suspension is interesting. I wonder if that will speed up the government's plan and schools will close sooner than desired? Seems like the government's plan was to coordinate all of this, so if football has jumped the gun will everyone else follow suit? If the medical advice is correct, it makes sense to do all or nothing, surely.

[Breeze]

Just now, henry bear said:

Those in the ‘at risk’ groups will be much better off getting the virus now, whilst the hospitals can cope. Obviously they’ll be better off not getting at all..

True. If you are a single person who may have a tough time you may be better off before the hospitals are maxxed out. Of course if everyone has that idea and gets infected at the same time it would not work out well.

[Breeze]

1 minute ago, jparx said:

The football suspension is interesting. I wonder if that will speed up the government's plan and schools will close sooner than desired? Seems like the government's plan was to coordinate all of this, so if football has jumped the gun will everyone else follow suit? If the medical advice is correct, it makes sense to do all or nothing, surely.

Govt. likely thinking they can hold out until Easter break and see where they are at near the end of that.

[Havors]

4 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

15k in hospital, which is reckoned to be 5% - so about 300,000 who'd be ill.

Then that begs the question how ill? A sniffle?  Point still stands is a massive assumption to say that a lot of staff will be ill, and another to assume they wont just be replaced. 

[shuttlep]

2 minutes ago, Breeze said:

Govt. likely thinking they can hold out until Easter break and see where they are at near the end of that.

I think they will wait till two weeks before the Easter Break then have a 4 week Easter break

[Havors]

5 minutes ago, jparx said:

The football suspension is interesting. I wonder if that will speed up the government's plan and schools will close sooner than desired? Seems like the government's plan was to coordinate all of this, so if football has jumped the gun will everyone else follow suit? If the medical advice is correct, it makes sense to do all or nothing, surely.

I hope not. I hope the Government stick to science and not popular demand or panic. 

[Havors]

7 minutes ago, Breeze said:

Interesting I hadn't heard 15k - where is that figure from?

I pulled it right out of my arse as an example haha! comparing it to Italy  

[fred quimby]

7 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

 

My 80+ year old mother is certainly well aware that she's in a higher risk group, and is thinking about the choices she makes on where she goes that might put her at risk of infection. 

My Dad is 93 on Sunday (Mum 90 with alzheimers) so we have been talking about what we are going to do.

We arwe out for a meal on Sunday and I did ask if he still wanted to.

His answer

I am sure we will drink enough to keep a virus at bay

They are however staying in from then on

[jparx]

1 minute ago, Havors said:

I hope not. I hope the Government stick to science and not popular demand or panic. 

I agree, but there seems to be two schools of thought - ban events and close schools immediately or hold off to soften the peak. If sport is postponed but schools remain open, we're kinda doing neither? I'm not knowledgeable enough on this at all, but I'd imagine it's not the most effective to ban some and not others?

[eFestivals]

7 minutes ago, jparx said:

The football suspension is interesting. I wonder if that will speed up the government's plan and schools will close sooner than desired? 

I reckon that if they're going to shut schools, they'll do their best to push it as near towards the easter holidays as they can.

It should mean fewer childcare issues, because those kids would need childcare then anyway.

The downside with that is that lots of that childcare is going to disappear, because granny is going to be less keen to share their space with a possibly infected kid.  

[Gilgamesh69]

My friend is a teacher at a school. He's said there's been discussions about possibly keeping the school closed after the Easter holidays. Nothing concrete yet though

[jparx]

2 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

I reckon that if they're going to shut schools, they'll do their best to push it as near towards the easter holidays as they can.

It should mean fewer childcare issues, because those kids would need childcare then anyway.

The downside with that is that lots of that childcare is going to disappear, because granny is going to be less keen to share their space with a possibly infected kid.  

I know where I work that is currently the hope so teaching isn't impacted and people can work from home easier. I just wonder if sport and other events postpone everything immediately whether it might force the government's hand.

[thrillhouse188]

My university has pulled easter break forward a week and our school has encouraged PhDs/postdocs to work from home where possible. Have also cancelled all seminars, colloquia, outreach etc until 20th April, as well as all lectures, labs and all other teaching activities from Monday (these were off anyway as it's easter)

[BluePaul]

I think the football shutdown is less about spectators and more to do with the number of players/staff who are displaying symptoms?

[jparx]

2 minutes ago, thrillhouse188 said:

My university has pulled easter break forward a week and our school has encouraged PhDs/postdocs to work from home where possible. Have also cancelled all seminars, colloquia, outreach etc until 20th April, as well as all lectures, labs and all other teaching activities from Monday (these were off anyway as it's easter)

Are there cases there? Or is it precautionary?

[Earth_pig]

I am sure they have thought of many of the scenarios brought up like the build of the festival, before making the announcement yesterday. They have been in the game nearly 50 years.

[Lycra]

1 hour ago, Joshuwarr said:

I think there is minimal risk to the event itself being held. *However* my assumption is there may be a major impact on the build up and its hard to know what impact there will be on the supply chain. 

Others may know more than I on this!

You're overlooking the duty of care the festival has to anyone who attends the site or is connected with the event in any way. This begins way before any festival goer gets on site and extends to all contractors, riggers, roadies, artists et al. Just look at what's happened with the Aussie F1 overnight and UK football today. 

[Hugh Jass]

I’m prepared for the worst.

[thrillhouse188]

Just now, jparx said:

Are there cases there? Or is it precautionary?

Not as far as I know, just precautionary, although there are cases in Hampshire, so who knows how close to Soton it is now. To note, officially the uni is still open as usual over easter, the instruction regarding working from home are specifically from our school

[eFestivals]

Just now, Lycra said:

You're overlooking the duty of care the festival has to anyone who attends the site or is connected with the event in any way.

I'd say you're stretching that. No one thinks about holding the festival responsible for catching flu there.

There's always a risk where ever you go of catching something nasty.