Coronavirus - UK
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@pakman said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Kiwiwomble said in Coronavirus - UK:
@pakman said in Coronavirus - UK:
A lockdown of some sort allied to border closure and track and trace makes some sense BEFORE large amount of virus around. c.f. NZ, Uruguay.
Once it's widespread than the evidence is that lockdowns per se make little difference. People's behaviours do.
I might not be smart enough to understand this so apologies if ive missed something....but, if people went into very strict lockdown, not interacting with anyone...how can that not stop the spread?, even if very wide spread, and if you do it for long enough how can it not allow for people to develop and then recover/ become noncontagious?
if the vast majority of people aren't interacting with others outside their household how would it keep spreading?
@Kiwiwomble, one has to differentiate between a lockdown allied to border closure when there were few cases of the virus around (NZ/China, etc.) and those employed once the virus was established (e.g. Western Europe and many other places).
The former were effective.
What I was referring to was the latter.
The problem is that once there's lots of virus around you're just not going to get rid of it with a lockdown. At best you'll slow its spread, but as soon as you unlock, groups of people congregating indoors are likely to set it off again.
but people congregating don't create the virus, if you can largely eliminate the virus in the community with a very strict lockdown and yes, stronger border control...then how would it flare back up?
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You’re right that if you’re talking about say NZ the virus could and was eliminated.
Too late for that in UK, which is the scenario I’m taking about.
The good news is we’ve vaccinated more people than the rest of Europe put together, and that is our way out of this.
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@Kiwiwomble said in Coronavirus - UK:
but people congregating don't create the virus, if you can largely eliminate the virus in the community with a very strict lockdown and yes, stronger border control...then how would it flare back up?
Because fuckwits from areas with high infections rates and strict restrictions drive 300 miles to areas with low infections rates and minimal restrictions.
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@pakman said in Coronavirus - UK:
@MajorRage said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Siam said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Godder said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Siam Sure, but what cost the constant in and out of restrictions? Nobody's keen to just let it wash over the country and see what happens, so the restrictions come and go at various levels to try to keep the R value below 1 and avoid overwhelming the NHS with serious cases.
Also, if I'm honest, 6 weeks on a ventilator before dying alone strikes me as a pretty miserable way to go.
I think the last sentence sums up the difference in opinions quite well.
Suicide has killed more young people than the virus (Australia expecting 500 more youth suicides).One side puts the lives of 80 year olds before the lives of everyone else. The other side accepts that old people die every day
The third side is that the NHS is completely overrun and currently incapable of helping anybody out & this must be controlled.
Reality is that we need to go through this for the longer overdue wake up calls to change things
- Britain is incredibly unhealthy
- The NHS is a poorly run dogs dinners. It doesn't need more money, it needs better management.
- There are many fuckwits who can't get it through their thick skulls that going to parties and having fun with their friends is like fuel on the fire and ultimately kills people's grannies.
Surely grannies can do what a contact has done in the UK. Self isolated. They had food delivered and went out walking by kept well away from others.
Another friend who has a f++ked immune system locked himself in his house for months. Surely this is preferable to locking young healthy people up Who want to enjoy life still. Just focus on restricting the young that are sick. In other words a more balanced approach. Amd accepting some risk
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Kiwiwomble said in Coronavirus - UK:
but people congregating don't create the virus, if you can largely eliminate the virus in the community with a very strict lockdown and yes, stronger border control...then how would it flare back up?
Because fuckwits from areas with high infections rates and strict restrictions drive 300 miles to areas with low infections rates and minimal restrictions.
Mmmmm .... not sure your argument makes sense.
The second flare up commenced up north. I think the cold is the biggest enemy we have here.
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An important variable missing here is the story that a PCR test tells.
I heard from Sucharit Bakhdi ( whose videos have been removed by YouTubeand twitter- another unexplained curiosity), that pcr tests can detect fragments of the virus genetic material, even dormant already dead and not effective genetic material. That is, people who have already recovered.
Scientists on a vid I posted earlier (below) hypothesise that the virus was in the community months before the first march lockdown. It's just behaved as viruses do from that point: big surge then tapering off as it moves about getting steadily beaten by evolving immune systems. They also surmise that seasons effect Coronavirus the most, not lockdowns.
Perhaps an explanation of how it's too late to replicate a nz style elimination. Also why people don't know they've got it until test results return a positive.
I dunno but some more variables for this murky soup.
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A lockdown could eliminate the virus anywhere if it's strong enough and people comply for long enough.
The issue is that if it has to run for months to work mathematically because of the size of the starting numbers, hard to see how people will sustain it.
Side note, the UK lockdown looks like NZ's level 3. If the R value of that is 0.2, then it would take around 4-5 incubation cycles (i.e. 8-10 weeks) to reduce the current cases of 2.65 million to below 10,000, but obviously that assumes they know of all the current cases, which they probably don't, and that very few will come through the border in that time.
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Fair point. I was more referring to the loons who boarded crowded trains from London when it went into tier 4 and helpfully spread the new variant around the country.
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Ah gotcha. I thought you were talking summer trash to
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@taniwharugby said in Coronavirus - UK:
@Godder and relying on compliance, which this deep in, probably aint gonna work as they hope
For sure, that was partly what I meant by not sustainable.
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I recall Chris Whitty saying testing passengers on arrival is ineffective as it won't pick up those who have been infected on the flight nor poss. those infected just before boarding the flight.
Best option is to quarantine and then test. Unclear how effectively that's being carried out.
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Coronavirus - UK:
I recall Chris Whitty saying testing passengers on arrival is ineffective as it won't pick up those who have been infected on the flight nor poss. those infected just before boarding the flight.
Best option is to quarantine and then test. Unclear how effectively that's being carried out.
Quarantine is effectively self-policed ie useless as a strategy.
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@sparky said in Coronavirus - UK:
I'm positive I read somewhere last night that 3 day negative test before flying to the UK was going to become mandatory.
But I can't find it now. Maybe I dreamt it. It's all a daze right now after I kept waking up to check on Kane through the night!
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@MajorRage said in Coronavirus - UK:
@sparky said in Coronavirus - UK:
I'm positive I read somewhere last night that 3 day negative test before flying to the UK was going to become mandatory.
But I can't find it now. Maybe I dreamt it. It's all a daze right now after I kept waking up to check on Kane through the night!
Sounds like something’s coming. Window dressing at this point.
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@Godder said in Coronavirus - UK:
@sparky said in Coronavirus - UK:
If everyone is in lockdown and arrivals will just go into lockdown anyway, it probably doesn't matter that much, but FFS, talk about not reading the room.
You're still allowed out even in Lockdown - shopping, work.
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@Godder said in Coronavirus - UK:
A lockdown could eliminate the virus anywhere if it's strong enough and people comply for long enough.
The issue is that if it has to run for months to work mathematically because of the size of the starting numbers, hard to see how people will sustain it.
Side note, the UK lockdown looks like NZ's level 3. If the R value of that is 0.2, then it would take around 4-5 incubation cycles (i.e. 8-10 weeks) to reduce the current cases of 2.65 million to below 10,000, but obviously that assumes they know of all the current cases, which they probably don't, and that very few will come through the border in that time.
We'll never know, becuse once the most vulnerable have been vaccinated the measures will be relaxed.
But the mathematical point is correct. For various reasons a lockdown of three months is unviable. The only thing which is is social distancing.
Interesting to think about how one country would cope if no one else had it. Not sure the strategy of printing money would be treated quite so kindly in isolation by forex markets. At some point economics would play a part.