Second wave

[excoriator]

The 7-day average of new infections per day has reached 1630 and is growing faster and faster. A list of local lockdowns and places where lockdowns may soon be imposed can be found here:

www.goodtoknow.co.uk/wellbeing/health/36-cities-local-lockdown-548615

It, too, is growing, and one cannot help but imagine a dyke being overtopped by rising flood water. Small breaks occur which are quickly sealed, but they grow relentlessly until the repair crews are overwhelmed. It is very clear that the current strategy is NOT working and sooner or later we will be forced into a national lockdown again.

For comparison the forst lockdown was implemented when the 7-day daily infection rate was 877 back on March 23rd. We are now about twice that and the second wave is building faster and faster. It is almost certainly going to gey a big boost from millions of students and schoolchildredn returning but all the government does is to attempt to polish this turd and tell us it's all under control.

The death rate has been reduced by a stroke of a pen, and we are encouraged to think that this manipulated figure reflects reality. Were the criterion for inclusion to be that given on death certificates by doctors who have actually treated the patient it would be a lot higher.

We need a national lockdown. It will be economically very damaging, but I do not believe that proecting the PM from political embarrassment - which is the true reason for the delay - is anything other than highly irresponsible. It painfully obvious that another national lockdown is coming and the sooner it comes the better. The more it is delayed the longer it will last and the worse the damage will be.

[aqua]

I sort of agree. Unfortunately, I also think the govt is seeking to test the water so it's got someone to blame. For instance most people want adults back at work, children back at school, young people at college, training or university. But there are massive risks in all this, which parents, say, will want to say they're not responsible for, as it's govt's decision.

Govt of course will say 'we gave you what you wanted and you don't want it any more, so we're now going to protect you by imposing the most ferocious lockdown the world has ever seen, which is what we wanted all along. It's a good exercise for all the things we'd like to do to you over the next few years, thanks to our stupidly large and undeserved majority.'

[jonjel]

It is an impossible problem to solve, but I think the lockdown of certain areas seems a reasonable step. However getting people to abide by the rules it another matter. We know a lot don't, but as long as maybe 75% do so, then we will get there.

We could of course shut everyone in their houses and get the army to deliver food parcels, and shoot anyone who ventured out. That would within a couple of weeks bring the 'new cases' count to zero, but the damned disease is still going to be there.

As far as 'fiddling the figures' all we have done is fallen in line with most other countries - a death within 28 days of diagnosis. That seems to make sense. For example a friend has been diagnosed positive from way back in April. If he suddenly became ill with something unrelated then he should not be considered as a new case.

We know a lot more than we did in the beginning, and that helps. However I think the different rules for people flying in and isolating when they might live only a few miles apart, England and Wales for example, is absurd. The rules should be the same for the whole of the UK

This is going to be with us for a very long time, and we cant simply shut down the whole country for the next 2 or 5 years. There will be new cases and people, some, will die. It is a question of balance. And drawing comparisons with other similar sized countries is misleading. Our population density is the highest in Europe so when one looks at figures in France where they have roughly the same size population but five times the geographic area then by comparison we are doing quite well.

[excoriator]

Local lockdowns are appropriate if the outbreak is local. But it isn't. There are more and more local lockdowns and the number of daily infections rises and rises. Today's was 2988!

Go look at: www.goodtoknow.co.uk/wellbeing/health/36-cities-local-lockdown-548615 and see how many blockdowns there are


The government needs to act and pull back the relaxations, and the sooner the better.

The first lockdown was late and it came in when the infection rate was 877 a day. We are now at 2988 a day and rising, and nothing is done except to encourage more and more socialising in schools colleges and work.

This is madness!

[excoriator]

I wonder how intelligent this virus is. It appears to not be very infectious in schools and workplaces or commuter trains or city centre sandwich shop etc, but woe betide you if it spots a group of more than six meeting socially. Then it WILL attack you.

Viruses as smart and fun-hating as this are new to science, but - thank heavens - we have a government composed of people of sufficient brilliance (led by Boris, the most brilliant of them all) to outwit it!

[aubrey]

We'll just rewrite the rules and pretend it's not happening. It will all be pretty academic in 3,4 months anyway.

[excoriator]

I downloaded the 7-day average of daily infections since the inter-peak low and displayed it as a graph. It looked exponential to me and OpenOffice will calculate various trend lines that fit the data best. I tried the exponential one and it showed the infection growing FASTER than exponentially.

[excoriator]

The virus has evidently laughed at the local lockdowns and continued to romp through the population. 6178 new confirmed infections today, and no doubt it will continue its climb.

Boris needs to choose between containing the virus or 'saving the economy'. It is clearly not possible to do both and as he cannot 'save the economy' without eliminating the virus anyway he need to make the virus top and only priority.

I got a 'Yougov daily' email today describing a poll on the 10pm curfew. 3% thought it would be 'Very effective', 22% thought it would be 'somewhat effective' 67% though it would not be effective.

A second poll found 72% thought a second lockdown would be effective.

So I think it's pretty clear that a second lockdown would at least have the support of the public. Given the experience of the first it is also pretty clear that full national lockdowns work.

Somebody needs to point out that 'the economy' that he's trying to save is not his. It is not the property of the Conservative party either. And it is not the property of the businesses that pay for the Conservative party. It belongs to ALL of us, and if the majority are prepared to sacrifice it then that is what should be done.

I would refer him to the words of his worshipful predecessor M. Thatcher.

"The wishes of the people are paramount!"

[jonjel]

I agree in part with some of that Exco, but I think the government are between a very large rock and a very hard place, and will be damned if they do anything, and damned if they don't.

I am actually at a loss to make any sensible suggestions as to what could or should be done

[excoriator]

Basically the government - and the rest of us - have to accept that the coronavirus is going to finish off a lot of nonessential businesses, and live with it. Attempting to maintain the wealth of businesseslike Starbucks, Pret a manger and various property companies who have build vast luxurious city centre buildings for tenants who no longer want them is neither necessartr nor (in my opinion) desirable.

Containing this virus should be the top - indeed the only - priority for the immediate future. This is not impossible. A strictly enforced lockdown until infections fall to a planned predetermined level needs to be imposed. Schools and inessential businesses need to be closed. Whilst this is in place, a proper test and trace system should be set up using the NHS's netwoork of hospitals, local health authorities, clinics etc designed to handle at least the planned infection level at the end of lockdown.

Handing the T&T function to Serco, a company with no nationwide network or experience in notifiable diseases was a ridiculous decision, and follows the award of a ferry contract to a company with no ships as indefensible folly. No wonder it is in chaos.

I would point out that had a policy like this been established and followed when the outbreak occurred, we would not be now facing a second wave which on the face of it looks like it's going to be a lot worse than the first, given that no effective action to prevent it seems acceptable to the government. It should have been, but that is now water under the bridge.

However, we should have learned from it and it is not too late to apply this plan now.

Sadly, Boris and co seemed to have learned nothing from the experience and are set to dig the hole we are in even deeper. My personal opinion is that we are now embarking on a second wave which will make the first one look like a tiny ripple. Things are going to get very bad indeed. This government have turned a crisis into a catastrophe, and semm - unbelievably - equally set to crash us out of the transition period with no deal, trashing our reputation of sticking to international law in the process.

[jonjel]

Where do we begin on this?

The overriding problem is, even if we welded everyone into their homes and air dropped essential supplies although the infection rate would fall to pretty well zero the virus would still be there. Yes it would have fewer 'hosts' but it would lurk in the background. All that can be done (I think) is make sure it is under control for the foreseeable. And by under control I mean at a rate, not on recorded cases but on hospital admissions which is what I work on, so that the NHS will have some chance of dealing with those who are ill. I pity some of the people in under developed countries where they have effectively zero health care.

I agree, some of the businesses you mention seem to be non essential, but if people are not buying sandwiches then the people who make the bread, and the people who make the machines to make the bread, and those who produce the ingredients will all suffer. Knock on effect is just starting to affect my own business, We are OK, but the planned expansion is not going to happen for quite a long time.

I don't think closing schools is realistic now. Kids were off for 6 months and I hate to think how that would affect them if they were off for a year.

The only long term solution will be a vaccine, as it was with smallpox, and to some extent with measles. If you have 75% or more people immunised you start to break the cycle. Even before measles vaccine a high proportion of the population had a 'herd immunity' to measles. I am sure you know your history Exco, and when people from Europe went to places like the Pacific Islands indigenous people there died in their tens of thousands from measles as they had zero immunity to a common disease in Europe.

And much more important, how is the hound?

[jonjel]

This incidentally is pretty informative, and you can expand the data if you want to.

coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

[skylark]

If we welded everyone in their homes for (say) a month the infection would die out. With no-one to pass it onto, how could it survive? But of course we can't because vulnerable people will still need care, leaking roofs will still need mending and....


who will walk the dogs?

[excoriator]

I don't think you need to keep everyone indoors. Just close down places where people congregate in large numbers like work, schools, universities, sporting events, pubs and restaurants and inessential shops.

Yes this will have a devastating effect on business, but that is the nature of pandemics. We should not allow this to divert us from fighting it.

It is a clear nonsense to pretend that cross infection is unlikely to occur in a pub or a restaurant. It will happen. It IS happening. Closing them stops it. Completely.

[skylark]

I walked into town today and found my toe was hurting, so caught the bus back. It was school chucking out time, and soon after I sat down a girl sat in the seat in front and pulled off her mask. I moved to the back and two girls sat diagonally opposite, masks off and chatting animatedly to one another. I should have felt much safer in a pub where the licensee takes steps to ensure social distancing and enforces mask wearing.