COVID-19 — Coronavirus

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To be fair, we were arguing they should be in the Brexit thread, for several years.

I was willing to give them the benefit of doubt in the beginning, as what’s the point in having them if you’re not going to use them? But I’m now feeling like they got it wrong and 2020 will be a very bad year, made worse by some of these people.

It’s astonishing how the world was so unprepared for this, when the medical profession, specifically epidemiologists in certain areas, were saying a pandemic was inevitable.
They didn't do anything when China was in lockdown and the inevitable was staring them in the face.
 
To be fair, we were arguing they should be in the Brexit thread, for several years.

I was willing to give them the benefit of doubt in the beginning, as what’s the point in having them if you’re not going to use them? But I’m now feeling like they got it wrong and 2020 will be a very bad year, made worse by some of these people.

It’s astonishing how the world was so unprepared for this, when the medical profession, specifically epidemiologists in certain areas, were saying a pandemic was inevitable.
I'm all for listening to the experts mate but won't go as far as taking all they say as gospel.
Obviously my hope is that they know what to do going forward but the many conflicting viewpoints make it hard to determine.
 
For me, it doesn’t diminish Peston’s cunitishness by one iota.

Maybe not, but its quite depressing watching everyone cream themselves over him being owned online today, despite the information being passed on incorrectly. It's hugely concerning in fact. It means they get away with continuously making mistakes. That will cost lives. Bleak.
 
In quarantine in China still. Day 8. Going slightly mad. Cannot leave this government hotel room. I'm safe but I am bored. Anyone who visits my post on my blog will receive satisfaction (in their minds) that a fellow Blue's words have been read (or at least clicked).

I even did a little sample, like a proper writer or paper would do. Call it half-efforted click bait.


Regarding the foods within quarantine, if the toilet pipes block here, that’s me tipping corn congee, on a daily basis; flicking corn from my lunch and generally burying the uneaten corn as far away from my single-use plastics as possible. Food has been a mixture of just good enough, and adequate. There isn’t anything to rave about, but I wouldn’t moan too much about it either. The hotel’s range in sustenance and fodder are more varied than some other people will be experiencing these days. I’m lucky. Three meals a day, plus the option to have food delivered where needed. I can’t complain.

Want to read more? Please visit my post on my blog. I'm so lonely...

How's the bat soup going down. & the puppy blamange desert..
 
I'm all for listening to the experts mate but won't go as far as taking all they say as gospel.
Obviously my hope is that they know what to do going forward but the many conflicting viewpoints make it hard to determine.

Same with me but I’m just pointing out that the same people who have been against their strategy in this instance, have been for them previously.
 
In quarantine in China still. Day 8. Going slightly mad. Cannot leave this government hotel room. I'm safe but I am bored. Anyone who visits my post on my blog will receive satisfaction (in their minds) that a fellow Blue's words have been read (or at least clicked).

I even did a little sample, like a proper writer or paper would do. Call it half-efforted click bait.


Regarding the foods within quarantine, if the toilet pipes block here, that’s me tipping corn congee, on a daily basis; flicking corn from my lunch and generally burying the uneaten corn as far away from my single-use plastics as possible. Food has been a mixture of just good enough, and adequate. There isn’t anything to rave about, but I wouldn’t moan too much about it either. The hotel’s range in sustenance and fodder are more varied than some other people will be experiencing these days. I’m lucky. Three meals a day, plus the option to have food delivered where needed. I can’t complain.

Want to read more? Please visit my post on my blog. I'm so lonely...
Good luck mate.
Which part of China are you holed up in?
 
One of the UK’s leading experts in the study of infectious diseases has predicted that the devastating impact of the pandemic will begin to subside “in a couple of months" — but warned we may require tougher lockdown measures to achieve this.

Professor Tom Solomon, director of the University of Liverpool’s Institute of Infection and Global Health and one of a group of scientists currently advising the government over its approach to Covid 19, also said he was confident progress was being made over the mass supply of testing kits that would show whether someone had already had the virus.

Asked if he could offer any optimism in a week in which fatality and infection rates rose dramatically across the UK, Prof Solomon said: “The first thing to say is that it will not last forever. It’s going to be over in a couple of months.

"In a couple of months, we’ll see things coming down. And then probably the lockdown measures will be eased a little bit."

But explaining how this was likely to be achieved, the Director of the National Institute for Health Research’s Health Protection Research Unit in Emerging and Zoonotic Infections warned that the government could introduce further tough measure to ensure that social distancing was observed fully.

“I should warn you that the lockdown measures may strengthen before they ease," said Professor Solomon.

“We’re still only on a soft lockdown. We could do more. And depending on what we see the curve doing over the next couple of weeks, we may have to actually say we are going to go for a hard lockdown."

Asked what that would mean, he pointed to countries such as Italy.

“We’re still letting people out of the house — we’re saying, go for exercise once a day.

"We’re saying, go shopping once a week, whereas we could say all shopping is going to be by home delivery. We’re saying to people work from home, but if you can’t, you can go to work.

“But the next step will be to say no, you cannot go to work unless you are doing an essential function.”

Professor Solomon refused to be drawn on criticism that the British government had also been too slow to introduce testing of the population, in line with countries such as Germany, for the virus.

“I would say the UK response was very good to begin with — it was like a textbook response to containing an outbreak,’’ he said.

“But this virus is one that spread more easily than anyone realised to begin with and therefore this was never going to be about containing it — containing means just stopping the spread. So it’s about minimising that and spreading out the curve.

“Okay. I think it is challenging for us now we don’t have the testing ability that we would like to have, but we are wrapping up the testing."

Professor Solomon is currently involved in research for Public Health England into “care diagnostics so that people can be tested in their own homes.’’

He is part of unit of 50 senior scientists and 250 junior scientists working on testing projects.

“There’s various things happening on the testing front,’’ he said. “One thing is the swab. You can do that at home now and send it in. The problem in this country though is we don’t have capacity to do those tests.

“So we’re testing people in hospital as a priority. And the second thing is we’re testing healthcare workers.

“The other test is a test to see whether you’ve had the virus and cleared it. And that can be done on a blood test and you can do it on saliva.

“One of the things we are doing in Liverpool is testing the kits that people make for sale to see if they are reliable.

“It’s all coming, but nothing is going to happen overnight."

The professor was also keen to point out that the release of shockingly high fatality figures over recent weeks did not come as surprise.

He said: “We are at that stage where the curve takes off, and that means the number of cases is shooting up and the number of deaths is shooting up.”

He added that after the control measures came into force, the number of cases would still rise, but not at the same rate.

“We will see that two weeks after we started the lockdown,’’ he added. “And the deaths will follow two weeks after that.

“For the control measures to impact on deaths, that takes four weeks.’’
 
The "deferring to expertise" argument must be seen in the context of why. it's easy to call out the "expert" in this case when you look at the outline of the discussion and cite the trail being conducted. But if like me you then go and look for evidence to support either opinion you can quickly find the grey which wasn't discussed.

I would hope the "expert" has a handle on the details. However, the forum of the debate and the tone of the questions certainly didn't lend itself to a proper discussion. The type of discussion being had by groups of "experts" around the globe.

So it's easy to dismiss the quick and dirty "but he's an expert" argument. but it's not so easy to dismiss expert opinion. That's not to say they don't get it wrong. But when they do you need to dig a little to understand why.
Well the Government has got its scapegoats I suppose unless of course they are as understanding of apparent mistakes as you infer in the process of offering reliable expert advice.
Most of us learn off our own mistakes, yet I understand the best Generals learn off other Generals mistakes.
Perhaps there is this reasoning in delaying the UK decisions but surely not if an incorrect decision is made?

Time will tell but the signs are ominous.
 
I'm sure this has been covered many times but it's a bloody big thread, are the figures coming out of Italy and spain anything to do with cultural lifestyles? Eg, multi generational households, very huggy and kissy family/friends interactions? Surely it has to play a part. Whereas notoriously personal space conscious countries (scandanivia) are doing better?
 
I'm sure this has been covered many times but it's a bloody big thread, are the figures coming out of Italy and spain anything to do with cultural lifestyles? Eg, multi generational households, very huggy and kissy family/friends interactions? Surely it has to play a part. Whereas notoriously personal space conscious countries (scandanivia) are doing better?

It absolutely will be down to cultural lifestyles as well. You also have a lot of elderly relatives that live with their families in Italy a lot more than here.
 
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