Coronavirus (2021) thread

[roubaixtuesday]

Were doing double the amount of testing we did in january I'd call that a hell of a lot more testing

Whereas cases are up ~9 fold from their minumum... so like I said, clearly NOT testing driven.

Again, it would be nice to believe, but reality...

 

[Johnny Mars Bar]

Can someone explain to me how the admissions stats are worked out? If this current 'wave' is mostly young people, and those young people that end up in hospital are in there for a shorter period of time / needing less 'serious' care, then isn't bed occupancy a better stat than admissions?

It seems to me that an admission of a 25 year old needing a bit of oxygen for a day or two is a massively different scenario to an admission of an 85 year old spending a month in intensive care on a ventilator etc..

A lot of new admissions at the moment must be cancelled out by people being discharged, surely? Or am I missing something?

 

[BerkshireBlue]

Whereas cases are up ~9 fold from their minumum... so like I said, clearly NOT testing driven.

Again, it would be nice to believe, but reality...

again who cares about cases anymore, it's irrelevant at this moment in time

 

[Silvercloud]

Whereas cases are up ~9 fold from their minumum... so like I said, clearly NOT testing driven.

Again, it would be nice to believe, but reality...

I don't think cases are relevant any more are they? This is here to stay, it will always be around. The important thing now is the hospitalisation & death figures which are now both down as low a they have been.

 

[roubaixtuesday]

again who cares about cases anymore, it's irrelevant at this moment in time

You're the one who's arguing the toss over whether it's testing related or not.

 

[Bluemoon dan]

2 weeks till the start of the British grand prix 140,000 fans mingle a day before freedom day..going to feel weird

It is but there are a lot of reasons why its probably right that it does go ahead fully attended.
First, as you say, it's a day before the restrictions are going to be fully lifted. Purely from a pragmatic and financial point of view it would have been incredibly harsh to have it behind closed doors and then a few hours later have everything fully open.
Secondly, although 140000 people does sound a lot, they are spread out over the area of a decent sized town when placed around the track, and an even wider area when you include the campsites that surround it.
Third, the whole event is probably 99% outdoors for spectators. Most of the grandstands are uncovered and even the ones that aren't are scaffolding type structures (think the Gene Kelly stand) with no areas underneath that people can congregate or mix like you get a normal sports stadiums.
Fourth, and this is perhaps the most important, I'm going so don't want to miss out again having rolled my tickets over from last year!

 

[roubaixtuesday]

I don't think cases are relevant any more are they? This is here to stay, it will always be around. The important thing now is the hospitalisation & death figures which are now both down as low a they have been.

Cases are a leading indicator. They're currently doubling on a 10 day basis. I think that's relevant.

Hospitalisations are not "as low as they have ever been" - they are treble their May minimum.

You can debate how significant these numbers are, what the right (if any) policy response is, but let's deal with reality.

 

[Marvin]

Cases are a leading indicator. They're currently doubling on a 10 day basis. I think that's relevant.

Hospitalisations are not "as low as they have ever been" - they are treble their May minimum.

You can debate how significant these numbers are, what the right (if any) policy response is, but let's deal with reality.

You are too kind

 

[roubaixtuesday]

I'm going so don't want to miss out again having rolled my tickets over from last year!

Haha! We all want our own activities to be priorities, don't we? I had my justification for my French holiday in my head and am still fuming that I had to cancel...

 

[splinter]

It is but there are a lot of reasons why its probably right that it does go ahead fully attended.
First, as you say, it's a day before the restrictions are going to be fully lifted. Purely from a pragmatic and financial point of view it would have been incredibly harsh to have it behind closed doors and then a few hours later have everything fully open.
Secondly, although 140000 people does sound a lot, they are spread out over the area of a decent sized town when placed around the track, and an even wider area when you include the campsites that surround it.
Third, the whole event is probably 99% outdoors for spectators. Most of the grandstands are uncovered and even the ones that aren't are scaffolding type structures (think the Gene Kelly stand) with no areas underneath that people can congregate or mix like you get a normal sports stadiums.
Fourth, and this is perhaps the most important, I'm going so don't want to miss out again having rolled my tickets over from last year!

Have a great time..lets hope a month later the Etihad is full and we can go fucking mental..something we took for granted will feel amazing..x10

 

[Healdplace]

Case rates in Bolton local authority area from govt dashboard. I don't think this can be described as a spike that has gone?

View attachment 20437

Causing hospital admissions of perhaps a third of previous peak (Bolton NHS Trust, no idea if these are exactly the same area)

View attachment 20438

Clearly nowhere near as bad as last two waves, but equally not trivial.

[Link for source: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nhsTrust&areaName=Bolton NHS Foundation Trust#card-patients_admitted_to_hospital]

I said this last night in my data updates on GM. Bolton has gone from worst to joint best in 6 weeks but its cases have plateaued at about 3 times where they should be in normal times.

 

[inbetween]

The idea that this wave is test driven just doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

The first wave was completely different, but we're not doing that much more testing than we were in January.

The current wave is real - deciding how to respond to it should be driven by reality, not wishful thinking on testing IMO.

I'm not saying exactly that it's test driven but rather that previous statistics were definitely not test driven in comparison.

At the moment I am actively encouraged to get tested regularly in the NW regardless of symptoms, if I tested positive then it would be a big surprise. Back 6 months ago I wouldn't of been able to get tested at all unless I had one of the three holy symptoms. Such a possible case like this would previously never get discovered.

This regime leads to the capture of further cases and specifically we've seen a wave in Bolton which was supplemented by asymptomatic surge testing. Cases have fallen but how is it possible that cases can fall when there has been no change in restrictions?

Either the vaccines are having a massively understated effect (amazing news), there's been a reduction in testing (asymptomatics go undetected as before) or the delta variant isn't quite as infectious as we've been led to believe.... It must be one of these.

 

[Gabriel]

Have a great time..lets hope a month later the Etihad is full and we can go fucking mental..something we took for granted will feel amazing..x10

Of what is this you speak? ;-)

 

[andyhinch]

I do worry how long the NHS can cope with this sustained pressure, both in terms of fatigue and resources.

 

[ctwrd]

I do worry how long the NHS can cope with this sustained pressure, both in terms of fatigue and resources.

So true let’s lockdown again.

 

[Silvercloud]

Cases are a leading indicator. They're currently doubling on a 10 day basis. I think that's relevant.

Hospitalisations are not "as low as they have ever been" - they are treble their May minimum.

You can debate how significant these numbers are, what the right (if any) policy response is, but let's deal with reality.

If you're going to quote somebody, try and make sure you quote what they have written, not what you think they wrote.

 

[roubaixtuesday]

Either the vaccines are having a massively understated effect (amazing news), there's been a reduction in testing (asymptomatics go undetected as before) or the delta variant isn't quite as infectious as we've been led to believe.... It must be one of these.

On Bolton...

1. The local vaccination drive may well have made a significant difference. Perhaps @Healdplace can tell us the increase in vaccination % since the campaign started?
2. Reduction in surge testing may have had an impact - but I've no idea what testing levels there have been in Bolton - however nationally this can't possibly be the driver as positive tests have risen 10x since their minimum.
3. People changing their behaviour voluntarily may have had a significant impact given the huge level of publicity. That could also explain the "plateau" currently seen as people have relaxed again.
4. Numbers of pupils taken out of school for bubbles may have impacted as cases rose.

And of course, there may just be other things going on that we don't know about or understand.

 

[BerkshireBlue]

You're the one who's arguing the toss over whether it's testing related or not.

I'm really not. I was just picking up on you saying incorrectly the number of tests were similar to January levels when in fact they are double. I didn't mention testing is related to cases at all

 

[roubaixtuesday]

If you're going to quote somebody, try and make sure you quote what they have written, not what you think they wrote.

What wrote precisely was

The important thing now is the hospitalisation & death figures which are now both down as low a they have been.

Which I interpreted as Hospitalisations are "as low as they have ever been"

I thought that has the same meaning, but there's a typo and it seems I've misunderstood you. What was your meaning - please correct me!

 

[Silvercloud]

What wrote precisely was

The important thing now is the hospitalisation & death figures which are now both down as low a they have been.

Which I interpreted as Hospitalisations are "as low as they have ever been"

I thought that has the same meaning, but there's a typo and it seems I've misunderstood you. What was your meaning - please correct me!

You quoted me saying "ever" when this wasn't the case. It hasn't the same meaning at all.

I said that cases are as low as they have been, which is correct. You intentionally putting an erroneous "ever" in the quote you typed.