The virus. PPE. Part 1

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cambsno said:
And that will not work - people will not put up with more lockdown and restrictions. It was 'fine' for a few weeks, to burst the bubble, but we cannot live like this forever. If you are under 60 and in good health then you have nothing to fear. People do not see Covid as something dangerous to them, and anyone vulnerable should be isolating anyway. We have been in lockdown for 7/8 weeks, and it is starting to impact on peoples health, finances and general well-being.
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Recent polls seem to indicate that the publics support for the lockdown is holding pretty firm. Don't confuse a few, so called vocal libertarians with wishes of the overall population.
 
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cambsno said:
Its different working in an environment with a lots of infections and meeting up with a few mates down the park or for a BBQ. The amount of exposure too could be an issue. Rightly or wrongly though, people who are low risk are seeing that its probably doing them more harm than good.
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It's certainly true that healthcare workers in contact with COVID-19 patients are at a greater risk of innfection, though I think the jury is still out on whether the infectious dose influences the severity of disease (rather than just the chance of becoming infected). But the point is that the general risk in the community is still far too high to relax restrictions to allow (say) congregating and sharing food at a BBQ, even if you are young and healthy. We still have (by far) the highest number of new cases per day in western Europe, more than we were seeing at the start of the lockdown (though obviously there's a lag in the reported statistics).
 
sphexx said:
Welcome to new world of home working, it’s just come earlier than expected. This is how it used to be before the Industrial Revolution crammed people into factories and towns. Home working & local working are the future :).
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Not everyone can work from home and not everyone has the privilege of being able to work locally.
 
Retune said:
If that were true, NHS staff under 60 would abandon PPE, since they would have nothing to worry about.
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Age is related to risk of death, not infection. They would get infected and spread the virus.
 
nilagin said:
Not everyone can work from home and not everyone has the privilege of being able to work locally.
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Yes, though soon all the manufacturing will be done robots :)
 
arclight said:
That sounds disgraceful.
Is the head honcho Kim Jong-Un ?
I think the press would have a field day with that narrative.
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In what way ?
Someone trying to protect vulnerable elderly people from idiots who can't obey the guidance rules ?
They own their houses and a small patio, the rest of the grounds are owned and maintained by the management company
for everyone's use.
I don't tend to use the grounds very much, prefer to be away from the estate for my outside exercise, but others
can't do that and many don't want to be put at risk, they may be old but they still have a right to live
 
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nilagin said:
Age is related to risk of death, not infection. They would get infected and spread the virus.
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Yes, of course. But they aren't only concerned about spreading the virus, they are concerned about the risk to their own health. And it's not only the over 60s who are at risk. Healthcare staff in all age groups have died during the pandemic. The median age of deaths in one study was 54, older than the average medic in contact with patients, but by no means restricted to those who were just about to retire.
 
Retune said:
Yes, of course. But they aren't only concerned about spreading the virus, they are concerned about the risk to their own health. And it's not only the over 60s who are at risk. Healthcare staff in all age groups have died during the pandemic. The median age of deaths in one study was 54, older than the average medic in contact with patients, but by no means restricted to those who were just about to retire.
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Age isn't the only factor in deaths. 63% of healthcare cases have been BAME, and obesity seems to be playing a part in alot of deaths.
 
nilagin said:
Age isn't the only factor in deaths. 63% of healthcare cases have been BAME, and obesity seems to be playing a part in alot of deaths.
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Yes, various things have been associated with increased risk, including existing conditions, ethnicity, and even being male. But nobody should assume they are safe.
 
nilagin said:
Age isn't the only factor in deaths. 63% of healthcare cases have been BAME, and obesity seems to be playing a part in alot of deaths.
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Yes, obesity, heart disease and diabetes feature very noticeably. I heard a doctor on the radio this morning say that obese people have fatty cells in their lungs and the the virus cells "attaches" (apologies, but I cannot recall the exact term used) to the fatty cells.

There seems to be hardly a day goes by without more scientific information about coronavirus surfacing. The people doing all the investigation are the unsung heroes in the virus war.
 
danbroad said:
No. Wrong.
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Yep, but he continually puts this and similar points across all through the thread, pretty obvious selfish attitude that I do my best to ignore.
 
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Retune said:
Yes, various things have been associated with increased risk, including existing conditions, ethnicity, and even being male. But nobody should assume they are safe.
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Absolutely correct and perhaps people need to judge the effect of this virus on more than death. Many people escape with their lives, but have lung damage. If the organs that put oxygen in and take carbon dioxide out become impaired then other organs and body functions are degraded. That is bad news for anyone.
I was chatting to a 60 yo man last week. He has had Covid. It was considered mild and he was not hospitalised except for one night when he had breathing difficulty (that was around 6 weeks ago). He is considered to be free of the virus, but his breathing remains impaired.
 
danbroad said:
No. Wrong.
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Really? The stats would suggest otherwise. They said I think a 0.1% mortality rate in the under 40 age group and of those that died it did not mention how many had health issues. They said statistically your chance of dying increased the same as if you were to commute from London to Swindon every day!!!
 
Fuji Dave said:
the loss of life from either the virus or other things and not being able to be with loved ones is a killler.
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This will be true for some and not for others. Humans display a wide range of responses to the same stimulus, which is why some people love to be in tight packed stadiums and others prefer to walk empty hills while others will sit happily on a couch and watch a football match with just a friend for company.

It's the tendency to pick on one type of behaviour as a paradigm that's causing much of the current confusion about what needs to happen next. The primary duty of the government, I think, is to work out what will cause the least harm to the fewest people and do whatever is necessary to achieve that aim. It's a balancing act that the current government doesn't seem capable of performing.
 
cambsno said:
Really? The stats would suggest otherwise. They said I think a 0.1% mortality rate in the under 40 age group and of those that died it did not mention how many had health issues. They said statistically your chance of dying increased the same as if you were to commute from London to Swindon every day!!!
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You'd claimed that people under 60 (not 40) had nothing to fear. For those in their 50s, the infection fatality rate estimate the government is using is 0.6%, with more than 10% of symptomatic patients requiring hospital treatment, with an unknown risk of serious long-term effects.
 
My daughter went to Spain on a post-grad internship some months ago, was due to come back 8 weeks ago, actually got back yesterday because of the lockdown there.
Firstly, she couldn't get back because she couldn't get a flight - several were booked but they were all cancelled. The British embassy were no help at all, they just send automated responses to emails and can only be contacted by phone in an emergency, and being stuck there isn't an emergency. There's no repatriation service either because commercial flights are available, even though they only actually became available on Friday, so zero help there.

Her brother had the bright idea of driving out to get her, 1300 miles each way, but couldn't do it because both France and Spain took the situation seriously and he couldn't get permission to go there to bring her back.

On arriving at Heathrow there was no mention of self-isolation and no questions about her health.

She told me that in Spain, everyone is taking the whole thing very seriously and maintaining strict distance from other people and as soon as she got back here she was struck by the lack of precautions, everyone was just ignoring social distancing.

The main difference between the two countries seems to be that the Spanish government tell people what to do and actually stops them from travelling, our own government just asks us to cooperate . . .
 
Fuji Dave said:
Also the Mental Health of folk during this lockdown will be a big worry, the loss of life from either the virus or other things and not being able to be with loved ones is a killler.
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It's a difficult balancing act because you also need to consider the mental health risks from a less strict lockdown regime that could well have given us deaths in the hundreds of thousands, rather than the tens of thousands we are seeing. Watching your loved ones die, and watching services possibly collapse as the staff slowly die off could well bring far more serious mental problems than the lockdown is going to. As well as more serious physical health problems and possibly greater impact on the economy than we are seeing (with the implied mental problems of maybe even more personal financial problems than the lockdown is bringing).

I'm not disagreeing with you, just reflecting on the options
 
Retune said:
You'd claimed that people under 60 (not 40) had nothing to fear. For those in their 50s, the infection fatality rate estimate the government is using is 0.6%, with more than 10% of symptomatic patients requiring hospital treatment, with an unknown risk of serious long-term effects.
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Ok. So under 40s have nothing to fear and those 40-60 very little, probably need to see further data on when the risk changes i
On a greater scale like 50 or 55. Again though the 0.6 rate you quoted will include people with health issues. But we need a non vaccine escape route for lockdown and keeping a lockdown will kill the economy even further and put many more people at risk from different things.
 
cambsno said:
Ok. So under 40s have nothing to fear and those 40-60 very little, probably need to see further data on when the risk changes i
On a greater scale like 50 or 55. Again though the 0.6 rate you quoted will include people with health issues. But we need a non vaccine escape route for lockdown and keeping a lockdown will kill the economy even further and put many more people at risk from different things.
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I would not say that people in their 50s (with >10% chance of hospitalisation if symptomatic) or 40s (nearly 5%) have 'very little' to fear. Nor would I dismiss the effects on younger people, especially when we consider the numbers who will be at risk. If we let the virus burn through the population, it may not stop until about 80% of the population have been infected, which will kill hundreds of thousands and leave many more with serious long-term health issues. I agree that we need a way out of the lockdown without a vaccine. We already know what a relatively safe route looks like - when transmission falls to a manageable level, use an aggressive programme of testing, tracing and isolating to prevent infections. This will take a massive effort, and it won't work if we exit the lockdown prematurely or don't have the resources and infrastructure in place when they are needed.
 
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Fuji Dave said:
There are still folk dying in china, and they still won`t admit that folk are dying.
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But you are quoting an item that says they are reporting them :), eg “But by Saturday, the province had reported a total of 125 locally transmitted cases, including two deaths, state media reported.”

(my bold)
 
Fuji Dave said:
Must be this lot screwing up then, as it`s false.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
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I think we need to use the total excess deaths for country comparisons, as argued here:

”All countries collect total mortality data. Gaming the data is hard, because the total number of deaths cannot be hidden.”

”London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) say fair and accurate comparisons can be made by looking at the total deaths each week since Covid-19 took off and comparing them with total deaths from the same week in the years before it existed.”

“This total excess mortality expressed as a percentage, they say, gives a true picture of the public health impact. It captures not only the Covid-19 deaths, whether or not they were certified as such, but also the extra deaths caused by cancer, heart attacks, stroke or any other condition that was neglected because of the pandemic”

“David Spiegelhalter, the Winton professor of the public understanding of risk at the University of Cambridge, told the independent organisation Full Factthat all-cause mortality was the best measure.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...ut-global-coronavirus-comparisons-experts-say
 
Retune said:
Even South Korea doesn't get everything right.

View: https://BANNED/BBCWorld/status/1262250310514413570
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That has potential for some innovative commercial enterprise.

Sex dolls ......... pay for a seat with one .......... half time entertainment ............. think about it :mooning:
 
arclight said:
That has potential for some innovative commercial enterprise.

Sex dolls ......... pay for a seat with one .......... half time entertainment ............. think about it :mooning:
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It might take more than than that to get me to football game ... cricket now :)
 
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