COVID-19 — Coronavirus

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gavvo said:
Yep, most of us predicted a global pandemic of a disease requiring more ventilators than have ever been needed before.
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Anyone could see this was coming. Anyone applying their mind purposefully to the situation would know we would need more ventilators. Absolutely criminal that we’re begging for them at this stage. Incredible, actually.
 
Tricky_Trev said:
Have any companies said it’s doable yet? Seems like there’s major hurdles to overcome with supply chains? I worry we won’t get an increase in the number of ventilators quickly enough.
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I don't know, but the point is that graph's redline is our capacity now, and whatever the mass production effort is, the number of ventilators is only going to go up. They've suggested we could double the ICU beds, which if you move the red line from 8 to 16 makes a massive difference. I don't know how long that would take, but it will change things significantly.
 
Bellamy's Caddy said:
When the government actively advises people to work from home where they can its baffling that some companies/bosses (like mine) with WFH capability are still insisting on staff being in the office. Its presenteeism, lack of trust and worse than that a complete lack of common sense and potentially dangerous given how lethal this thing can be.

I'm not thrilled at having to use public transport at the moment and rightly people are avoiding it if they can. I've never seen the tram so quiet on weekday rush hour as it was on my way home tonight.

This does feel like some kind of weird groundhog day scenario. One of my mates likened it to being out in your car when the traffic lights stop working and no one has a clue how to proceed... It shows you how fragile humanity actually is.
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I had already made my mind up that I was working from home no matter what they said to me. I too would have to use public transport (trains) and I work in a building of around 3-4k people. There’s no way I’m going in since I have no calls to answer and can do literally everything from anywhere where I have an internet connection and a laptop. At some point, surely we just have to put health first? We’d still be doing the work and are following government advice. I’d say that trumps the opinion of a boss, but I don’t know how it would play out! Would be a very harsh disciplinary imo.
 
gordondaviesmoustache said:
We are so poorly equipped mentally to deal with this.
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It is unprecedented since the end of the second world war. We have a society used to instant gratification and plenty of it on demand. A generation who have never been told no or what to do, by teachers and parents and little respect for authority. A nation used to plenty. They better solve the puzzle and quickly or society is finished.
 
gavvo said:
Why ? It was obvious from the start of this outbreak that at least between 250,000 and 500,000 people would pass away from this irrespective of what the government did. If it ends up nearer to a million then they will have failed us miserably but Ive not seen anything over the last couple of hours that suggest that ?
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My definition of fucked is clearly different to yours. At least a quarter of million deaths and 18 months potential suppression is my definition of we're fucked.
 
I wouldn’t predict about what’s going to happen too much into the future tbh. One bit in the press conference that I was nodding my head in agreement too (as opposed to the vast majority of it) was Whitty saying about the importance of a test being available to show those that have already had it, not just those that currently have it. Getting that available and mass produced could be an absolute game changer, both in terms of social interaction allowed and the race to get a vaccine or effective treatments.
 
George Hannah said:
but are they still lying to you?
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Economical with the truth. I didn't hear any of the three stooges saying "to be honest it's a bit of a fuck up and the models we were following show 250,000 dead IF we had enough hospital capacity, which we don't, by a factor of 8"... "So it's all change and we've abandoned the clear and well thought through strategy of 5 days ago and are doing a big u-turn and switching to a completely different approach... indeed the one the rest of the world (and Chippy_boy) has been urging us to take all along".

So, as I say, economical with the truth.

Apart from the lying about closing sporting events to save on resources. That one is just a lie.
 
twosips said:
My definition of fucked is clearly different to yours. At least a quarter of million deaths and 18 months potential suppression is my definition of we're fucked.
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Yep, and I think the we’re fucked threshold of most people comes in significantly lower than that.
 
gordondaviesmoustache said:
i know you’ve been defending the government, and I think it’s all too easy to criticise; they’ve got a ridiculously difficult job to do at the moment, but the ventilator situation is absolutely disgraceful.
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The NHS has been stripped to the bare bones by 10 years of neglect and I know there's a separate politics thread but that's just a fact. We have 75% of the hospital beds we had in 2007.
 
twosips said:
I just don't feel like I can trust their models either, and why would I want to after they fucked up so bad the first time round?
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Too harsh that, they were modelling scenarios on a new virus with practically no reliable observable data, so they had to make best guesses for some parameters, for example the proportion of ICU beds required for COVID19 patients - they used the figure for viral pneumonia because that was the closest parallel they had reliable data for - now that more COVID19 data is becoming available it's clear that the proportion of ICU beds needed is much higher. Parameterised modelling is a whole lot easier when there's a solid base of data to work with.
 
Tricky_Trev said:
I had already made my mind up that I was working from home no matter what they said to me. I too would have to use public transport (trains) and I work in a building of around 3-4k people. There’s no way I’m going in since I have no calls to answer and can do literally everything from anywhere where I have an internet connection and a laptop. At some point, surely we just have to put health first? We’d still be doing the work and are following government advice. I’d say that trumps the opinion of a boss, but I don’t know how it would play out! Would be a very harsh disciplinary imo.
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You're right mate, far more important things. If they don't see sense tomorrow I'll be taking that approach.

Obviously I don't want to get ill but I'm more concerned about passing it to a relative or someone vulnerable especially if there are avoidable, sensible and practical measures that can be taken.
 
gavvo said:
Why ? It was obvious from the start of this outbreak that at least between 250,000 and 500,000 people would pass away from this irrespective of what the government did. If it ends up nearer to a million then they will have failed us miserably but Ive not seen anything over the last couple of hours that suggest that ?
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To be fair, that wasn’t obvious from the start of the outbreak at all. No one remotely thought there could be potentially six times the amount of deaths here as there has been confirmed cases in total in China.

If we get anywhere close to 250000 deaths then we’ve failed, both in terms of our government and as a society. The death rate is preventable through our behaviours.
 
twosips said:
My definition of fucked is clearly different to yours. At least a quarter of million deaths and 18 months potential suppression is my definition of we're fucked.
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Just to butt in but the ICL projections today are suggesting 7,000-20,000 deaths if we put in place the measures they've already said we will. Not 250,000.

Also it won't be 18 months suppression but 3-5, followed by a few relapses which if the vaccine or antibody comes quickly might not happen.

This is what I mean by saying I'm not as panicked as I was 2 hours ago. The fear and doom-mongerers will always come in first and take the worst figures out of context to scare people, and then the real figures come out a bit later.

That's not to underestimate it, this is a major event in human history, but deaths just went from 500,000 to 20,000 in a few comments. And if we can increase ICU beds which everyone says we can, that will drop even more, and if people like Rolls Royce mobilise and make ventilators like they're trying to that will drop more again.
 
paulchapo said:
That's my take on it too. The immediate future looks grim. If we don't die, no social interaction, for many work or money, holidays, hobbies or pastetimes for a good eighteen months. That isn't sustainable and society will break down.
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Not necessarily.
- A vaccine can be developed quickly (by November)
- The production of ventilators may deliver quickly.
- The possible Chloroquine anti malarial drug + LapinavirRitonavir treatment may well actually dramatically reduce mortality.
- The UK could use medical Ozone and Ozone Therapy as Germany does to help fight viral pnumonia.
 
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