O/T:- Why on earth do we think we are Covid cleverer?

[navypie]

Where is our leader now? He seems to have disappeared from the landscape.
You would think that after Piers Morgan and his news team called them outright liars in yesterday's GMB, they would at least challenge through some kind of statement.
Tomorrow's PMQ should be interesting because Tory HQ have asked for a bigger presence in the House so that Doris doesn't look quite so hopeless in the face of Starmer's forensic analysis.

House!!

[cher1]

TIme and time again other nations have stepped up sooner to the plate whilst we hang about "waiting for the science" or developing our own solutions.

What makes us think we are cleverer than everyone else?

FFS - if something is strange is not right with you then include Covid as a possibility until you can rule it out - but why wait to add Loss of Sense of smell? Why not put it in earlier then relax it if it turns out not to be the case. So what happens, health workers pass on the virus to a few hundred more people.

Masks - every nation that has experiences MERS, SARS was wearing masks of some sort early on. Us? Well the scientists hear the word "masks" and assume we are going to deprive the NHS of medical PPE - when the rest of the world is talking about cloth, homemade, or even industrial.

Overseas arrivals - what a nonsense we are making of this. And why can't all arrivals be tested?

This tracking app is going to be a disastrous implementation typical of so many large scale IT schemes in the UK. Why not just use what others have got going?

I'm sure there's more to add to the list but any thought that we are cleverer than the rest of the world dissipated when the motorcycle industry thought the answer to the Honda motorbike was to merely add indicators to British bikes in the early '60's.

Deluded.

JVT explained at the daily conference yesterday why they didn't include loss of sense of smell earlier. Tbh, what he said did make sense.

As for masks, the initial WHO advice was that masks/face coverings were not of any use, and that was the guidance we were following. That advice has now changed, and I agree with you that we should now make it mandatory to wear one in smaller enclosed spaces and anywhere social distancing is not possible.

On overseas arrivals, I agree we could have introduced quarantining at the outset. Not sure how many countries did, and what difference it has been shown to have made. Would be very interesting to see. Later, once the virus was reproducing rapidly, then presumably anyone arriving was straight into lockdown like the rest of us so the chance of them spreading it was small. It makes sense to introduce quarantining as restrictions are eased and interactions increase, which I think is what is going to happen.

As for track and trace, who knows whether it will work as well as, less well than, or better than anything out there already. Time will tell.

To be fair to the UK, we do at least appear to be moving faster than anyone on vaccine development thanks to Oxford and ICL. We also moved incredible rapidly to increase ITU capacity, and our system was never overwhelmed in the way Italy's was

A full public inquiry must happen once the worst of this is over. I'd particularly like to see what the root causes were of the horrific death rates at care homes. Also why BME death rates are so much higher. It will also be important to compare our deaths to other countries, which we just can't do at the moment as everyone appears to be counting differently. Once the excess deaths can be properly calculated for each country, things will be much clearer.

No political points to make here, am trying to look at things objectively.

[i961pie]

JVT explained at the daily conference yesterday why they didn't include loss of sense of smell earlier. Tbh, what he said did make sense.

As for masks, the initial WHO advice was that masks/face coverings were not of any use, and that was the guidance we were following. That advice has now changed, and I agree with you that we should now make it mandatory to wear one in smaller enclosed spaces and anywhere social distancing is not possible.

On overseas arrivals, I agree we could have introduced quarantining at the outset. Not sure how many countries did, and what difference it has been shown to have made. Would be very interesting to see. Later, once the virus was reproducing rapidly, then presumably anyone arriving was straight into lockdown like the rest of us so the chance of them spreading it was small. It makes sense to introduce quarantining as restrictions are eased and interactions increase, which I think is what is going to happen.

As for track and trace, who knows whether it will work as well as, less well than, or better than anything out there already. Time will tell.

To be fair to the UK, we do at least appear to be moving faster than anyone on vaccine development thanks to Oxford and ICL. We also moved incredible rapidly to increase ITU capacity, and our system was never overwhelmed in the way Italy's was

A full public inquiry must happen once the worst of this is over. I'd particularly like to see what the root causes were of the horrific death rates at care homes. Also why BME death rates are so much higher. It will also be important to compare our deaths to other countries, which we just can't do at the moment as everyone appears to be counting differently. Once the excess deaths can be properly calculated for each country, things will be much clearer.

No political points to make here, am trying to look at things objectively.

Excellent post Cher

[Old_pie]

JVT explained at the daily conference yesterday why they didn't include loss of sense of smell earlier. Tbh, what he said did make sense.

As for masks, the initial WHO advice was that masks/face coverings were not of any use, and that was the guidance we were following. That advice has now changed, and I agree with you that we should now make it mandatory to wear one in smaller enclosed spaces and anywhere social distancing is not possible.

On overseas arrivals, I agree we could have introduced quarantining at the outset. Not sure how many countries did, and what difference it has been shown to have made. Would be very interesting to see. Later, once the virus was reproducing rapidly, then presumably anyone arriving was straight into lockdown like the rest of us so the chance of them spreading it was small. It makes sense to introduce quarantining as restrictions are eased and interactions increase, which I think is what is going to happen.

As for track and trace, who knows whether it will work as well as, less well than, or better than anything out there already. Time will tell.

To be fair to the UK, we do at least appear to be moving faster than anyone on vaccine development thanks to Oxford and ICL. We also moved incredible rapidly to increase ITU capacity, and our system was never overwhelmed in the way Italy's was

A full public inquiry must happen once the worst of this is over. I'd particularly like to see what the root causes were of the horrific death rates at care homes. Also why BME death rates are so much higher. It will also be important to compare our deaths to other countries, which we just can't do at the moment as everyone appears to be counting differently. Once the excess deaths can be properly calculated for each country, things will be much clearer.

No political points to make here, am trying to look at things objectively.

I too listened carefully to JVT and it didn't make sense in the situation we are in. His view was that you could not treat that person any differently because asnosmia presents itself in other situations and will not be there alone so may as well wait until other symptoms turn up. His words were along the lines of "no one missed treatment because of not adding asnosmia to the list". The result was then that people, including health workers, who lost their sense of smell carried on and therefore in some cases spread Covid unnecessarily. They got trapped into the same error as with masks, looking at a clinical view from the patient aspect only. These are not times to gamble. Lockdown was introduced, two weeks late in my book as I was already uncomfortable going out and so were some of my colleagues.

How on earth patients could be released from hospitals into vulnerable conditions is worthy of a public enquiry. Being led by a man who thinks shaking hands with sufferers (delusions of Diana) is a major concern. I suspect he's still not fully recovered and he made a few uncharacteristic mistakes in his fist clenching speech a few days back.

The excess death rate in the UK is currently in excess of 50,000 since March.

Clearly there are many things that we cannot control and we are into damage limitation and management of the situation but I for one would like to know how much influence Cummings had on early (non) policy.

However my post was not political either and I see this as a British "disease" and cited the manifestation that is embedded in our psyche and no doubt endemic throughout Whitehall, including JVT, going back at least to the 60's and probably most of last century.

When I was a kid British cars, health system, roads, rail, were the envy of most of Europe. Not so now nor for a long time.

[cher1]

I too listened carefully to JVT and it didn't make sense in the situation we are in. His view was that you could not treat that person any differently because asnosmia presents itself in other situations and will not be there alone so may as well wait until other symptoms turn up. His words were along the lines of "no one missed treatment because of not adding asnosmia to the list". The result was then that people, including health workers, who lost their sense of smell carried on and therefore in some cases spread Covid unnecessarily. They got trapped into the same error as with masks, looking at a clinical view from the patient aspect only. These are not times to gamble. Lockdown was introduced, two weeks late in my book as I was already uncomfortable going out and so were some of my colleagues.

How on earth patients could be released from hospitals into vulnerable conditions is worthy of a public enquiry. Being led by a man who thinks shaking hands with sufferers (delusions of Diana) is a major concern. I suspect he's still not fully recovered and he made a few uncharacteristic mistakes in his fist clenching speech a few days back.

The excess death rate in the UK is currently in excess of 50,000 since March.

Clearly there are many things that we cannot control and we are into damage limitation and management of the situation but I for one would like to know how much influence Cummings had on early (non) policy.

However my post was not political either and I see this as a British "disease" and cited the manifestation that is embedded in our psyche and no doubt endemic throughout Whitehall, including JVT, going back at least to the 60's and probably most of last century.

When I was a kid British cars, health system, roads, rail, were the envy of most of Europe. Not so now nor for a long time.

I'm going to have a listen back to what JVT said, certainly seemed sensible to me -although I was walking the dog at the time! - given what we knew then (bearing in mind we didn't have the benefit of hindsight at that point). It wasn't even clear that anosmia (assume that's what you're talking about?) was a definite symptom until much more recently. If they had added it to the initial list of 2 symptoms on what was then just a hunch, many health staff, almost all of whom would not have had Covid would have been self isolating. That would have put additional strain on other healthcare staff and increased their viral load, which we know increases the likelihood of serious illness and death.

I'm afraid I don't understand your point about masks. They were following WHO guidance at that time, I think that's as much as you can ask of any government.

History will show we probably did lockdown too late. Then you look at Germany who only fully locked down a day before us. France did it a week before us. I think there was an element of hoping the public would do as asked, in much the same way as we police by consent in this country. And then you look at the scenes in Matlock Bath just before lockdown and it was clear we needed to be forced to do it. It's interesting that there have been protests against lockdown in many countries across the world, but not here In the UK.

I'd hope any public inquiry looks at the decisions taken based on the information available at the time they were taken, compared to other countries and evidence based best practise. Singling out Cummings wouldn't achieve anything, quite the opposite. The elected government must take responsibility for any failings, allowing Cummings to be a scapegoat would detract from where the responsibility lies.

Afraid I don't get the relevance of the loss of manufacturing etc to the government's handling of the biggest pandemic in a century. It needs to be investigated from an unemotional, apolitical, and most importantly of all, scientific point of view.

[magpie_mania]

I'm going to have a listen back to what JVT said, certainly seemed sensible to me -although I was walking the dog at the time! - given what we knew then (bearing in mind we didn't have the benefit of hindsight at that point). It wasn't even clear that anosmia (assume that's what you're talking about?) was a definite symptom until much more recently. If they had added it to the initial list of 2 symptoms on what was then just a hunch, many health staff, almost all of whom would not have had Covid would have been self isolating. That would have put additional strain on other healthcare staff and increased their viral load, which we know increases the likelihood of serious illness and death.

I'm afraid I don't understand your point about masks. They were following WHO guidance at that time, I think that's as much as you can ask of any government.

History will show we probably did lockdown too late. Then you look at Germany who only fully locked down a day before us. France did it a week before us. I think there was an element of hoping the public would do as asked, in much the same way as we police by consent in this country. And then you look at the scenes in Matlock Bath just before lockdown and it was clear we needed to be forced to do it. It's interesting that there have been protests against lockdown in many countries across the world, but not here In the UK.

I'd hope any public inquiry looks at the decisions taken based on the information available at the time they were taken, compared to other countries and evidence based best practise. Singling out Cummings wouldn't achieve anything, quite the opposite. The elected government must take responsibility for any failings, allowing Cummings to be a scapegoat would detract from where the responsibility lies.

Afraid I don't get the relevance of the loss of manufacturing etc to the government's handling of the biggest pandemic in a century. It needs to be investigated from an unemotional, apolitical, and most importantly of all, scientific point of view.

There have been some small scale protests although I don't know how big they were in other countries. Jeremy Corbyn's brother was arrested at one!

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-a9518506.html

[drillerpie]

I'm going to have a listen back to what JVT said, certainly seemed sensible to me -although I was walking the dog at the time! - given what we knew then (bearing in mind we didn't have the benefit of hindsight at that point). It wasn't even clear that anosmia (assume that's what you're talking about?) was a definite symptom until much more recently. If they had added it to the initial list of 2 symptoms on what was then just a hunch, many health staff, almost all of whom would not have had Covid would have been self isolating. That would have put additional strain on other healthcare staff and increased their viral load, which we know increases the likelihood of serious illness and death.

I'm afraid I don't understand your point about masks. They were following WHO guidance at that time, I think that's as much as you can ask of any government.

History will show we probably did lockdown too late. Then you look at Germany who only fully locked down a day before us. France did it a week before us. I think there was an element of hoping the public would do as asked, in much the same way as we police by consent in this country. And then you look at the scenes in Matlock Bath just before lockdown and it was clear we needed to be forced to do it. It's interesting that there have been protests against lockdown in many countries across the world, but not here In the UK.

I'd hope any public inquiry looks at the decisions taken based on the information available at the time they were taken, compared to other countries and evidence based best practise. Singling out Cummings wouldn't achieve anything, quite the opposite. The elected government must take responsibility for any failings, allowing Cummings to be a scapegoat would detract from where the responsibility lies.

Afraid I don't get the relevance of the loss of manufacturing etc to the government's handling of the biggest pandemic in a century. It needs to be investigated from an unemotional, apolitical, and most importantly of all, scientific point of view.

I don't want to speak for Old Pie but regarding masks I agree with him. You're absolutely right that the WHO wasn't advising people to use masks or face coverings, but during this crisis the WHO has proved itself (like a lot of very large organisations) to be cumbersome and slow in reacting.

Plenty of other countries made face coverings obligatory in public areas before it was official WHO policy.

If we are going to blindly outsource decision making to the WHO, there doesn't seem much point in paying a Chief Medical Officer.

[cher1]

I don't want to speak for Old Pie but regarding masks I agree with him. You're absolutely right that the WHO wasn't advising people to use masks or face coverings, but during this crisis the WHO has proved itself (like a lot of very large organisations) to be cumbersome and slow in reacting.

Plenty of other countries made face coverings obligatory in public areas before it was official WHO policy.

If we are going to blindly outsource decision making to the WHO, there doesn't seem much point in paying a Chief Medical Officer.

In normal circumstances I'd agree, but when there is a worldwide pandemic (bit clumsily put together phrase but you know what I mean) then that's when the WHO should be taking the lead. There were very few Western European countries with mandatory mask rules in place until recently. Some Eastern European countries did interestingly, but apart from Luxembourg, I think Germany was the first to mandate it towards the end of April and now other counties have recently joined them. The reality is no-one really knows whether they work or not, and some think they might increase the likelihood of spread. This shows how divisive the subject is https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/a...ectid=12330388

Who knows eh?

[Old_pie]

Afraid I don't get the relevance of the loss of manufacturing etc to the government's handling of the biggest pandemic in a century. It needs to be investigated from an unemotional, apolitical, and most importantly of all, scientific point of view.

The point is that there is a British arrogance that we can go our own way, which may once have been true but for a long time has not been the case but we still seem to persist.

The NHS app, going against what other countries already have up and running:

"Coronavirus: Security flaws found in NHS contact-tracing app"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-52725810

I'm fairly sure this will end up being a flop for a variety of reasons that were being raised on technical forums from the outset.

[cher1]

Just been reading up about the protests. The London one was about 100 people. There were protests in Stuttgart, Cologne, Munich, Berlin and Frankfurt each involving thousands. Some 75,000 people in Italy protested by opening up their bars, shops etc but not actually serving anyone. The French have also been protesting but that's just a normal day for them really 😂

The protests in America have been astonishing. Don't know if anyone saw the footage from Michigan with the armed protestors?

We're quite a passive lot really aren't we!