When will this shit end?

[stuartbert two hats]

38 minutes ago, gizmoman said:

If you are interested in her viewpoint this interview is a bit better,

 

Have you researched her? She seems to be best known as chair of the Irish version of UKIP

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Freedom_Party

Neutral scientific adviser she is not. She's a highly politically active person and that's probably why she's not being interviewed for her scientific views on a highly politically charged subject. Wider discussion here:

https://amp.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/gj0ytw/whats_the_story_with_that_computing_forever/

[gizmoman]

3 hours ago, gizmoman said:

She says no lockdown IF you take other actions, she makes a case for boosting peoples immunity and treatment with hydroxychloroquine, is she right? I'm not a microbiologist but she is and she seems to know her stuff. Having said that she wants Ireland to exit the EU so that probably makes any scientific qualification meaningless to many on here!

 

[Toilet Duck]

4 hours ago, gizmoman said:

I was talking in general, but there is serious doubt by some scientists regarding the lockdown, when Ebdon mentioned his mates website he actually led me to this video, it's an interview with a irish professor who has a totally different view to the lockdown, is she a conspiracy theorist? she certainly seems to be qualified to discuss this, it would be interesting to see what Toilet Duck thinks of this since he's from her neck of the woods. Here's her bio,

https://selectbiosciences.com/conferences/biographies.aspx?conf=admept2013&speaker=313126

 

I know her well. Worked in the same institute for 11 years and have even collaborated with her. Unfortunately, she lost the plot quite some time ago. It’s a pity, she was a decent scientist (and a nice person), but she had a rough time and it’s led to her believing the system is against her. No validity to her arguments at all. If you want the opinions of a lucid Irish immunologist, listen to Luke O’Neill.

 

While we’re at it, rubbishing the Imperial #9 report because it wasn’t peer-reviewed is also disingenuous. It wasn’t an academic paper, it was a report. While it wasn’t submitted for publication, it was made freely and publicly available. Far from not being peer reviewed, I reckon it’s been pored over by every epidemiologist and public health scientist in the world. Peer review is generally 3 other academics, this one has been scrutinised to a degree that most published papers never are. After all that, most scientific advisors the world over accept its conclusions. Only Swedish eugenicists seem to have a problem with it.

[tarw]

36 minutes ago, gizmoman said:

 

Of course her politics is relevant. An alt right scientist who believed in competition and survival of the fittest might think that loosing the oldest/unhealthiest 15% of the population to achieve herd immunity faster would be a good deal. A scientist  with a different political Standpoint would think it was a bad deal. 
Same data different conclusions. 

[Smeble]

4 hours ago, stuartbert two hats said:

I know the guy whose channel that is. He's one of those annoying "fans" that likes to do videos that just slag shows like Doctor Who off for being too woke. He's a complete c**t and makes a living from being a contrary knobhead. I won't be watching any interviews by him, especially one that has "must watch" in the title.

He’s an absolute bell end

[gizmoman]

7 hours ago, Toilet Duck said:

I know her well. Worked in the same institute for 11 years and have even collaborated with her. Unfortunately, she lost the plot quite some time ago. It’s a pity, she was a decent scientist (and a nice person), but she had a rough time and it’s led to her believing the system is against her. No validity to her arguments at all. If you want the opinions of a lucid Irish immunologist, listen to Luke O’Neill.

 

While we’re at it, rubbishing the Imperial #9 report because it wasn’t peer-reviewed is also disingenuous. It wasn’t an academic paper, it was a report. While it wasn’t submitted for publication, it was made freely and publicly available. Far from not being peer reviewed, I reckon it’s been pored over by every epidemiologist and public health scientist in the world. Peer review is generally 3 other academics, this one has been scrutinised to a degree that most published papers never are. After all that, most scientific advisors the world over accept its conclusions. Only Swedish eugenicists seem to have a problem with it.

Thanks for that, I suspected you would know something about her, will be interesting to see how she fares now, maybe the system will now be against her!  Will check out Luke O'Neill.

[gizmoman]

7 hours ago, Toilet Duck said:

I No validity to her arguments at all. If you want the opinions of a lucid Irish immunologist, listen to Luke O’Neill.

 

 

Well Luke might give her a chance if this quote is anything to go by!

"The ERC is funding the most outstanding science in Europe through its mechanisms, so why wouldn’t there be a programme during this emergency? They should say to European scientists: bring us your best, craziest, wackiest ideas because the ERC’s job is to fund this anyway.  

"It’s absolutely in the ERC’s remit to specify this area and look for proposals. The ERC already says 'bring us your ideas in immunology’. So why not in the current emergency say ‘bring us your ideas in Covid-19’?"

https://www.rte.ie/news/coronavirus/2020/0410/1129831-the-eus-covid-19-crisis-how-science-got-political/

 

[Neil]

13 hours ago, gizmoman said:

She says no lockdown IF you take other actions, she makes a case for boosting peoples immunity and treatment with hydroxychloroquine, is she right?

whether she's right or not, surely that needs some follow-thru thought....?

Such as: "if she is right, can enough hydroxychloroquine be sourced in order for the world to follow her suggestion?"

To which the answer is "no", and that means she doesn't have a solution with her suggestion.  

Edited May 17, 2020 by Neil

[Homer]

11 hours ago, Cherry Tree said:

Which is remarkable as it only went in three months ago.

Please clarify ‘went in’

[Matt42]

Please understand that the reason people are even talking about hydroxychloroquine is because Trump mentioned it as a working drug and every trump apologist is now scrambling to prove its effectiveness.

Other politicians have mentioned several drugs, but it’s because of trump all our focus in on one.

[Homer]

3 minutes ago, Matt42 said:

Please understand that the reason people are even talking about hydroxychloroquine is because Trump mentioned it as a working drug and every trump apologist is now scrambling to prove its effectiveness.

Other politicians have mentioned several drugs, but it’s because of trump all our focus in on one.

Have they got the results back on disinfectant yet?

[Waterdeep]

Hydroxychloroquine can have some pretty mad side effects and has a long half life, it seems like it's only safe to properly administer it in a hospital in the doses required for SARS2.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2765631

[Toilet Duck]

As it stands, the data on hydroxychloroquine is anecdotal. It’s been given to COVID patients and they have recovered. Problem is, the vast majority recover without it too. So if you wanted to, you could point to anecdotal evidence that says not treating with hydroxychloroquine leads to COVID patients recovering (because they do). Selectively presenting one side of the story is dangerous. The anecdotal evidence was sufficiently strong to initiate quite a few clinical trials with the drug (they are all publicly described, there’s no grand conspiracy to not use it or properly test its potential use). To prove it works, you need to treat some patients with the standard of care, and a randomised, matched group of patients with standard of care + hydroxychloroquine. And see who does better. So far, the data emerging from those trials is that those not treated are “cured” at the same rate as those who are (ie, there is no statistically significant interaction between taking the drug and getting better...some patients get better, some don’t, but it’s not because of the drug). This is the gold standard in testing any treatment. Toxicity in those treated suggests that this is not a viable option at the moment. Subset analysis of the trials may identify certain patients that benefit, but we have no idea who they might be at the moment. Again, things could change, new data could emerge, but suggesting we treat everyone with it without a sound reason to do so is not how science and medicine works.
 

Preventive/prophylactic use is interesting, but strong records on prior use and infection rates need to be correlated in large epidemiological studies to identify a meaningful correlation...and this hasn’t happened yet, so again, suggesting it prevents COVID is speculative, not based on any sound scientific rationale, and doesn’t consider any number of confounding effects that could account for why the anecdotal evidence points in a particular direction. If we abandon the scientific method, we can make all kinds of claims without having to prove them. 

boosting immunity is a fine idea (and the basis of the suggestion that the BCG vaccine could be useful in the interim...that too is under ongoing clinical trials). Achieving that with vitamin supplements though is unproven (most randomised trials on vitamin supplementation don’t prove they work...gained via diet yes, better evidence, gained via a fizzy drink, less so).

The danger with these types of ideas is that people think, I’ll just take hydroxychloroquine, some multi vitamins and I’m cool...nothing to worry about and they abandon all other measures to protect themselves and others.
 

I won’t even get into the discussion on suggesting the the virus was engineered by selectively picking parts of Nature papers to reach conclusions comprehensively ruled out in the same paper...

[Crazyfool01]

So how long @Toilet Duck do you think it will take them to roll out this immunity test on some sort of decent scale ? Are we talking the same sort of timescales as the other test ? Or quicker ? 

[Toilet Duck]

Just now, crazyfool1 said:

So how long @Toilet Duck do you think it will take them to roll out this immunity test on some sort of decent scale ? Are we talking the same sort of timescales as the other test ? Or quicker ? 

The Roche test could be rolled out now. But it doesn’t tell us much other than helping us to track the disease. It’s not useful as a diagnostic test as it works about 2 weeks after you test positive by PCR, and it tells us nothing about whether the presence of antibodies equates to immunity in any meaningful form. It’s been reported as a game changer, but it doesn’t change the game of identifying cases and isolating contacts (which is the part of the game we are currently playing). 
 

There are other tests under evaluation that really would be game changers for where we current are. Tests that identify infected cases within 24h of exposure, prior to becoming infectious. If that test works, coupled to an effective contact tracing programme, it would change how we manage this entirely. 

[Matt42]

Trump can do no wrong it seems.

[Crazyfool01]

2 minutes ago, Matt42 said:

Trump can do no wrong it seems.

U need to stop watching fox ..  

[zahidf]

Scientists in Hong Kong have established that face masks do reduce transmission of coronavirus (at least among hamsters). This just in from AFP:

Tests on hamsters reveal the widespread use of facemasks reduces transmission of the deadly coronavirus, a team of leading experts in Hong Kong said Sunday.

The research by the University of Hong Kong is some of the first to specifically investigate whether masks can stop symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19 carriers from infecting others.

Led by Professor Yuen Kwok-yung, one of the world’s top coronavirus experts, the team placed hamsters that were artificially infected with the disease next to healthy animals.

Surgical masks were placed between the two cages with air flow travelling from the infected animals to the healthy ones.

The researchers found non-contact transmission of the virus could be reduced by more than 60 percent when the masks were used.

Two thirds of the healthy hamsters were infected within a week if no masks were applied.

The infection rate plunged to just over 15 percent when surgical masks were put on the cage of the infected animals and by about 35 percent when placed on the cage with the healthy hamsters.

Those that did become infected were also found to have less of the virus within their bodies than those infected without a mask.

“It’s very clear that the effect of masking the infected, especially when they are asymptomatic - or symptomatic - it’s much more important than anything else,” Yuen told reporters.

[Crazyfool01]

There was me wondering how on earth they got hamsters wearing face masks ... must read whole article  

[Matt42]

49 minutes ago, crazyfool1 said:

U need to stop watching fox ..  

It’s hard not to at the moment as their hot takes are all over social media. I feel like it’s a route cause of all of this unrest at the moment.

[Crazyfool01]

25 minutes ago, Matt42 said:

It’s hard not to at the moment as their hot takes are all over social media. I feel like it’s a route cause of all of this unrest at the moment.

U might need to clear some cookies 🍪  

[Toilet Duck]

50 minutes ago, zahidf said:

Scientists in Hong Kong have established that face masks do reduce transmission of coronavirus (at least among hamsters). This just in from AFP:

Tests on hamsters reveal the widespread use of facemasks reduces transmission of the deadly coronavirus, a team of leading experts in Hong Kong said Sunday.

The research by the University of Hong Kong is some of the first to specifically investigate whether masks can stop symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19 carriers from infecting others.

Led by Professor Yuen Kwok-yung, one of the world’s top coronavirus experts, the team placed hamsters that were artificially infected with the disease next to healthy animals.

Surgical masks were placed between the two cages with air flow travelling from the infected animals to the healthy ones.

The researchers found non-contact transmission of the virus could be reduced by more than 60 percent when the masks were used.

Two thirds of the healthy hamsters were infected within a week if no masks were applied.

The infection rate plunged to just over 15 percent when surgical masks were put on the cage of the infected animals and by about 35 percent when placed on the cage with the healthy hamsters.

Those that did become infected were also found to have less of the virus within their bodies than those infected without a mask.

“It’s very clear that the effect of masking the infected, especially when they are asymptomatic - or symptomatic - it’s much more important than anything else,” Yuen told reporters.

Here is the advice given to SAGE. Pretty clear on why we should be wearing masks in public where social distancing is difficult.

[Ozanne]

Do they make little, tiny face masks for hamsters? They sound adorable.

Edited May 17, 2020 by Ozanne

[FestivalJamie]

33 minutes ago, Toilet Duck said:

Here is the advice given to SAGE. Pretty clear on why we should be wearing masks in public where social distancing is difficult.

Unfortunately the new government “advice” that masks should be worn on public transport and in shops doesn’t seem to be working. Went to Waitrose yesterday and I was the only one wearing one.

I honestly cannot see why pretty much every country in Europe and Asia has made face coverings compulsory yet we are still one step behind as per usual. Look at all those other countries maintaining low transmission rates yet ours are back on the rise again...

Edited May 17, 2020 by FestivalJamie

[DareToDibble]

13 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

Do they make little, tiny face masks for hamsters? They sound adorable.

I quick google of "hamster mask" just gave me this absolute delight 😃