When will this shit end?

[Crazyfool01]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/25/uk-coronavirus-mass-home-testing-to-be-made-available-within-days?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WhatsApp

this looks positive ...? maybe 

[priest17]

that URL makes it look like they can test with an android app. 

[oneeye]

Apologies if already posted

https://covid.joinzoe.com/

 

[Deaf Nobby Burton]

Mostly good news within this article:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52035615

[marcoolio]

11 hours ago, eFestivals said:

It's plausible, but tracing done by WHO reckons all major outbreaks in Europe originate from from a first case in the Netherlands (from China), where others were infected and then spread it around Europe.
(The USA got its first cases from China).

But you're right about the first infections being a while before the first positive tests. That same analysis says it was in Europe from December (I think, from memory. It may have been January).

Late response but, are you sure about this? As far as I can ascertain, the first case in the Netherlands was reported on February 27, about a month after the first cases were reported in countries like the USA and UK. Did you mean Italy?

[Flysheet]

11 hours ago, eFestivals said:

It's plausible, but tracing done by WHO reckons all major outbreaks in Europe originate from from a first case in the Netherlands (from China), where others were infected and then spread it around Europe.
(The USA got its first cases from China).

But you're right about the first infections being a while before the first positive tests. That same analysis says it was in Europe from December (I think, from memory. It may have been January).

I and many many others had a flu bug with identical symptoms in December. Knocked me flying for weeks. 

[squirrelarmy]

4 minutes ago, Flysheet said:

I and many many others had a flu bug with identical symptoms in December. Knocked me flying for weeks. 

There’s a few of us in my office with a similar story. Weather it was seasonal flu or covid is unknown. 
 

There is a lot of plausibility in the theory that this virus has been with us for some time and we have only just started testing for it. I’m definitely interested in taking one of these new antibody tests to see if I have had already had it. 

[Superscally]

7 hours ago, zahidf said:

😮

 

 

That's not a problem. It's actually a strategy. We need a series of small spikes. Restrictions will be brought in, eased, brought in, eased etc.

 

[zahidf]

1 hour ago, Deaf Nobby Burton said:

Mostly good news within this article:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52035615

Mostly. Worth noting that the deaths massively down today compared to yesterday in the UK. Probably just an anomaly but good news potentially?

 

(47 today, 81 yesterday)

Edited March 25, 2020 by zahidf

[Avalon_Fields]

Yes, I read some encouraging reports today, one model indicating there is a very widespread Covid-19 infection already in the UK, the vast majority with no, or minimal, symptoms, so we could after all be on the way to protection by herd immunity. OK it’s only another model but good to see some optimism.

Also the testing kits coming soon, so we will hopefully have a shorter lockdown when we can properly identify and control the virus spread.

I guess the next two weeks are crucial.

 

[eFestivals]

10 hours ago, marcoolio said:

Late response but, are you sure about this? As far as I can ascertain, the first case in the Netherlands was reported on February 27, about a month after the first cases were reported in countries like the USA and UK. Did you mean Italy?

nope.

What I read* about WHO analysis wasn't about reports of infections, but was done by tracing something unique about the exact strain** of virus people have. It's apparently possible to trace back to a 'zero' case.

** that apparently changes a little as it goes around, without that change being regarded as a mutation or different virus.

*caveat: it's not impossible I'm repeating bullshit. I read some geezer's own take on the work WHO supposedly did, which did give a link back to WHO in his piece but I didn't follow that link to verify anything about what he was saying. (It was days ago now, and I'm not sure I could find it again).

[eFestivals]

8 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

nope.

What I read* about WHO analysis wasn't about reports of infections, but was done by tracing something unique about the exact strain** of virus people have. It's apparently possible to trace back to a 'zero' case.

** that apparently changes a little as it goes around, without that change being regarded as a mutation or different virus.

*caveat: it's not impossible I'm repeating bullshit. I read some geezer's own take on the work WHO supposedly did, which did give a link back to WHO in his piece but I didn't follow that link to verify anything about what he was saying. (It was days ago now, and I'm not sure I could find it again).

found it.  

https://www.fagain.co.uk/node/60

It's about the 'Genomic epidemiology of novel coronavirus'.

(will have another read of it now).

Edited March 26, 2020 by eFestivals

[squirrelarmy]

Warning extreme tin foil hat area. Interesting post though so thought I’d share it. 
 

[Madyaker]

Hang on till I find my monacle

Edited March 26, 2020 by Madyaker

[UEF]

Shanghai avoided it by going into lockdown and wearing masks while we were all still taking the piss about such measures 

Edited March 26, 2020 by UEF

[eFestivals]

11 minutes ago, squirrelarmy said:

Warning extreme tin foil hat area. Interesting post though so thought I’d share it. 
 

it's full of easily-proved-wrong bullshit, such as the claim Russian has had no reported cases. It's had 650 reported cases (and an unexplained huge surge in pneumonia [that's very definitely not c-19, oh no]).

 

[Matt42]

China just lied about their numbers. Or they did the same thing as most of Europe have done (say up until now) by not testing many people.

Testing is the source of all of this. China was welding people in their apartment blocks to force people to stay at home. Keep everyone locked up and prioritise who they let into hospitals.
 

China at the start didn’t want it to look like a problem so they were being careful about releasing their testing numbers. It’s nothing massive. They didn’t want to look weak nor signal to their country that they were having a problem. Plenty of governments (not just China) have adopted this “well maybe it will go away” approach until they physically can’t anymore.

Once testing is in people’s hands it’s much harder to conceal how out of control this is. That’s why every country is being hesitant on releasing testing to their nation. It’s not rocket science.

Edited March 26, 2020 by Matt42

[Madyaker]

17 minutes ago, UEF said:

Shanghai avoided it by going into lockdown and wearing masks while we were all still taking the piss about such measures 

Shanghai hasn't avoided anything and the Chinese haven't really avoided anything. It took them 6 weeks to respond though the eventual response was impressive. They basically just locked down Hubei province and sat on it until the population there had developed herd immunity. Then through extremely agrressive and contact tracing and testing they've managed to track all the other cases in the country and are now basically hoping that they can keep this up and prevent another outbreak until a vaccine comes along early next year but another large outbreak in China is quite possible. There's still hundreds of millions of people there who were never infected and have no natural immunity. Although if another large outbreak did occur I would expect them to shut the entire area down over night, it sure as hell won't take them 6 weeks the second time around.

[Deaf Nobby Burton]

Read something interesting yesterday while I was looking into the plausibility of the virus having circulated for longer. China didn’t even admit the virus could spread from human to human until 21st January, so the WHO or any government including our own would not have been at all worried about it up until that point. If your perception is that it can only spread from animal to human then it’s not any sort of real risk. So it was looking at the possibility that a few cases could’ve gone under the radar here in January and early Feb as pneumonia. Apparently pneumonia kills 30,000 people in the U.K. every year which is roughly 80 people a day. So would 5/10 extra deaths per day nationally have realistically been picked up at a point that we had no idea the virus would become an issue?

But the other interesting thing is that the main precursor to pneumonia is flu, so I think what is it, 8k people die of flu on the U.K. each year? But in reality many of those will go on to get pneumonia which will kill them instead. In turn a common secondary infection from pneumonia is sepsis, which kills 45k people a year.

None of this is meant to diminish the seriousness of Covid-19, however getting Flu is actually a lot more deadly than just the mortality rate for flu itself suggests. This also goes hand in hand with the recent statement by one of the people behind the Imperial college report that a lot of the deaths predicted from corona in their modelling would’ve occurred anyway in the next year.

Edited March 26, 2020 by Deaf Nobby Burton

[Matt42]

2 minutes ago, Deaf Nobby Burton said:

Read something interesting yesterday while I was looking into the plausibility of the virus having circulated for longer. China didn’t even admit the virus could spread from human to human until 21st January, so the WHO or any government including our own would not have been at all worried about it up until that point. If your perception is that it can only spread from animal to human then it’s not any sort of real risk. So it was looking at the possibility that a few cases could’ve gone under the radar here in January and early Feb as pneumonia. Apparently pneumonia kills 30,000 people in the U.K. every year which is roughly 80 people a day. So would 5/10 extra deaths per day nationally have realistically been picked up at a point that we had no idea the virus would become an issue?

But the other interesting thing is that the main precursor to pneumonia is flu, so I think what is it, 8k people die of flu on the U.K. each year? But in reality many of those will go on to get pneumonia which will kill them instead. In turn a common secondary infection from pneumonia is sepsis, which kills 45k people a year.

None of this is meant to diminish the seriousness of Covid-19, however getting Flu is actually a lot more deadly than just the mortality rate for flu itself suggests. This also goes hand in hand with the recent statement by one of the people behind the Imperial college report that a lot of the deaths predicted from corona in their modelling would’ve occurred anyway in the next year.

This is why we need wider testing. We need to try and work out how far this has spread. I don’t understand the logic behind only testing those with critical symptoms, it means that the public have a warped sense of how intense the virus is and leads to more panic.

If in theory we test a million people and all of those tests came back positive, and say 900,000 report that they didn’t even notice they had it — it would greatly improve how we deal with this virus. I’m sure there is a strong argument on the other side, but the WHO all along have been advocating for greater testing as this tells us the most about the virus.

[Crazyfool01]

its getting far too close to home now .... half my Glastonbury group have it  

[Deaf Nobby Burton]

4 minutes ago, Matt42 said:

This is why we need wider testing. We need to try and work out how far this has spread. I don’t understand the logic behind only testing those with critical symptoms, it means that the public have a warped sense of how intense the virus is and leads to more panic.

If in theory we test a million people and all of those tests came back positive, and say 900,000 report that they didn’t even notice they had it — it would greatly improve how we deal with this virus. I’m sure there is a strong argument on the other side, but the WHO all along have been advocating for greater testing as this tells us the most about the virus.

The lack of ability for testing can surely only be down to availability? In my limited brain it makes no sense to chuck trillions at the economy if instead it was logistically possible to get enough tests to test as much of the country as possible. It would cost a huge amount but surely would save billions in the long run. That said, it wouldn’t be much use without is also having the antibodi test which I believe is just round the corner.

[Madyaker]

10 minutes ago, Matt42 said:

This is why we need wider testing. We need to try and work out how far this has spread. I don’t understand the logic behind only testing those with critical symptoms, it means that the public have a warped sense of how intense the virus is and leads to more panic.

If in theory we test a million people and all of those tests came back positive, and say 900,000 report that they didn’t even notice they had it — it would greatly improve how we deal with this virus. I’m sure there is a strong argument on the other side, but the WHO all along have been advocating for greater testing as this tells us the most about the virus.

They are only testing certain people because they have very limited capacity, its the same here in Ireland. Stupid people will panic regardless and one thing I've learned from this crisis is that very few people understand statistics or basic science.

The antibody test is what you're really looking for. It will hopefully be here soon and will just be a simple pin prick test like how diabetics used to test their blood sugar, then it shows the result in a similar manner to a pregnancy test, from what I've read anyway. People should be able to do it at home so then we can all know if we've had this virus not.

Edited March 26, 2020 by Madyaker

[Deaf Nobby Burton]

3 minutes ago, Madyaker said:

They are only testing certain people because they have very limited capacity, its the same here in Ireland. Stupid people will panic regardless and one thing I've learned from this crisis is that very few people understand statistics or basic science.

The antibody test is what you're really looking for. It will hopefully be here soon and will just be a simple pin prick test like how diabetics used to test their blood sugar, then it shows the result in a similar manner to a pregnancy test, from what I've read anyway. People should be able to do it at home so then we can all know if we've had this virus not.

That is going to be the game changer. The only issue will be is that priority will need to go to critical NHS staff first before it’s available to the rest of us. There would need to be some coordination with results as well for it to have its maximum benefit, so an associated app that we can enter the results into.

[Madyaker]

Oh an app is a good idea. Yeah healthcare staff should obviously get it first, but even so this should still be widely available in the next few months, much sooner than a vaccine. I suspect most of us will test positive.

Edited March 26, 2020 by Madyaker