The big Coronavirus thread

First.Aspect

At least you added the "its from the Daily Mail" caveat.

pblakeney

briantrumpet said:

First.Aspect said:

briantrumpet said:

It's the Mail, but...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10306211/DR-ANGELIQUE-COETZEE-alerted-wider-world-Omicron-believe-Britain-overreacting.html

Patients typically present with muscle pain, body aches, a headache and a bit of fatigue. And their symptoms don't seem to get any worse than that. After about five days they clear up, and that's it.

In the part of South Africa where I work, there haven't been many patients admitted to hospital with Omicron, and most have been treated at home, using anti-inflammatories, such as ibuprofen, and low doses of cortisone.

Bear in mind, too, that most of those who contract Omicron here are unvaccinated (only 26 per cent of South Africans are fully vaccinated). While this is certainly not an argument against vaccination — I cannot stress the importance of that enough — it's reassuring to know that even unprotected bodies fight off this variant much more easily than Delta. Current data indicates that the majority of cases admitted to ICUs are unvaccinated people.

In the UK, where the levels of vaccination are much higher, there is even less reason to worry. A Pfizer/BioNTech booster, given after an initial round of either Oxford/AstraZeneca or Pfizer, raises the level of protection, offering 70-75 per cent protection against symptomatic infection.

Anyhow, back to Covid.

Reading around this at lunchtime, looks more and more likely that the "less serious disease" observations loudly touted by opinionated clinicians in SA who should know better, is very possibly merely a reflection that more people have now had another variant since the last wave. Which is pretty damn obvious if you think about it and nothing more than the difference between UK data pre and post vaccination roll out.

The silver lining is that it does at least infer that the T cell response (from previous strains) is still effective. That's not the same as the T cells resulting from vaccination would also be as effective... I don't understand enough to know whether a whole virus induced T cell immune response could differ or not.

That report has now specifically been mentioned in the HoC debate as being potentially misleading. Serves me right for bringing it up.

On the other hand some in the HoC could do with some deflection.
Not to mention combating prior accusations of being too slow. Maybe. 🤞

pblakeney

First.Aspect said:

"Ms Sturgeon says: "For employers more generally, the guidance will make clear that enabling staff who were working from home at the start of the pandemic to do so again is now a legal duty." "

So, kids, what's the legal duty?

Hmmmm. Had a look...

"legal duty
n. the responsibility to others to act according to the law. Proving the duty (such as not to be negligent, to keep premises safe, or to drive within the speed limit) and then showing that the duty was breached are required elements of any lawsuit for damages due to negligence or intentional injuries."

Follow up for Ms Sturgeon (and BJ by probable future extension). What is the current law?

joe2019

All 11 countries will be taken off England's travel red list from 04:00 GMT on Wednesday, the health secretary announces.

briantrumpet

joe2019 said:

All 11 countries will be taken off England's travel red list from 04:00 GMT on Wednesday, the health secretary announces.

I won't yet be cancelling my trip to France for Christmas, though that makes it less of a risk of mega screw-up on the return - if they decide that all the extra testing before, during and after, is not necessary after all, I'll go: the Day 2 test, necessitating quarantine until a negative result is received could still be problematic at the moment, with the potential to impact on returning to work on time.

First.Aspect

pblakeney said:

First.Aspect said:

"Ms Sturgeon says: "For employers more generally, the guidance will make clear that enabling staff who were working from home at the start of the pandemic to do so again is now a legal duty." "

So, kids, what's the legal duty?

Hmmmm. Had a look...

"legal duty
n. the responsibility to others to act according to the law. Proving the duty (such as not to be negligent, to keep premises safe, or to drive within the speed limit) and then showing that the duty was breached are required elements of any lawsuit for damages due to negligence or intentional injuries."

Follow up for Ms Sturgeon (and BJ by probable future extension). What is the current law?

It is just hot air I think.

At best it's a legal duty to provide the option, but the where possible part suggests that it isn't a legal duty at all.

We are being told internally that it is merely guidance.

pblakeney

joe2019 said:

All 11 countries will be taken off England's travel red list from 04:00 GMT on Wednesday, the health secretary announces.

Two sides to that coin.
Who’s adding us to theirs?

First.Aspect

pblakeney said:

joe2019 said:

All 11 countries will be taken off England's travel red list from 04:00 GMT on Wednesday, the health secretary announces.

Two sides to that coin.
Who’s adding us to theirs?

I think pretty much anywhere in Europe is not so far in that travel restrictions are pointless. Even the who seem to agree. Don't book those flights to New Zealand though.

pblakeney

Worth keeping an eye on.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/uk-travel-bans-live-ryanair-22452199

kingstongraham

Quite a few vaccinated MPs posting tweets saying they can't be there to vote in favour of the vaccine passports because they are isolating after a positive test.

briantrumpet

kingstongraham said:

Quite a few vaccinated MPs posting tweets saying they can't be there to vote in favour of the vaccine passports because they are isolating after a positive test.

It's nuts that they still don't have a proxy or remote voting system in place, given how long this thing has been going on.

Pross

longy said:

Pross said:

pblakeney said:

Whisper it. More schools are required.

This is a downside of those people that fight against large housing developments. Large developments come with all the facilities such as schools but people get up in arms about there being 2000 new houses near them so you get piecemeal development of 50 or 100 houses where the developer hands over cash towards school places and once there's enough cash in the pot they'll add a classroom to an existing school or, maybe, eventually build a new school.

Not always.

I was involved on the fringes of setting up a Free School locally. We met several times with the Chief Exec of the local authority who bemoaned the fact that there was an acute shortage of secondary school places in the area especially with the new 400 family homes that were being built on a development (without considering any of the other local developments with permission). I did ask him why no provision had been made for a school during the planning process and he did not/could not/would not answer it.

I fully appreciate that ring-fencing x acres of land in a proposed housing development may make the difference between it being viable enough to go ahead but this is a pattern being repeated time and again.

400 units is more the sort of mid-sized development that creates the issue. It isn't big enough to justify a new school on its own but creates probably a hundred or more extra kids that need places. I'm working on a new school at the moment where exactly that has happened, several mid-sized developments and none were required to set aside land for a school. As a result a large new primary school (600 places) is required and the only available site means a walk of a few hundred metres along a busy A road with 50mph speed limit so a significant chunk of the budget is needed to improve the road for pedestrians and get speeds down.

Get something like Sherford or Cranbrook which are effectively new towns / villages and the Masterplan includes for everything with trigger points such as the school needs to be open by the 500th occupation.

kingstongraham

briantrumpet said:

kingstongraham said:

Quite a few vaccinated MPs posting tweets saying they can't be there to vote in favour of the vaccine passports because they are isolating after a positive test.

It's nuts that they still don't have a proxy or remote voting system in place, given how long this thing has been going on.

It's nuts they can't join the dots and see that it was testing, not vaccination that has stopped them now spreading it.

kingstonian

So what is the eventual way out of Covid? Feels a long way off to me.

kingstongraham

kingstonian said:

So what is the eventual way out of Covid? Feels a long way off to me.

Not sure there is a way out, it's adjusting to its presence. Annual vaccine, keep testing, keep making behaviour changes when there's a lot of it about.

Jezyboy

First.Aspect said:

briantrumpet said:

It's the Mail, but...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10306211/DR-ANGELIQUE-COETZEE-alerted-wider-world-Omicron-believe-Britain-overreacting.html

Patients typically present with muscle pain, body aches, a headache and a bit of fatigue. And their symptoms don't seem to get any worse than that. After about five days they clear up, and that's it.

In the part of South Africa where I work, there haven't been many patients admitted to hospital with Omicron, and most have been treated at home, using anti-inflammatories, such as ibuprofen, and low doses of cortisone.

Bear in mind, too, that most of those who contract Omicron here are unvaccinated (only 26 per cent of South Africans are fully vaccinated). While this is certainly not an argument against vaccination — I cannot stress the importance of that enough — it's reassuring to know that even unprotected bodies fight off this variant much more easily than Delta. Current data indicates that the majority of cases admitted to ICUs are unvaccinated people.

In the UK, where the levels of vaccination are much higher, there is even less reason to worry. A Pfizer/BioNTech booster, given after an initial round of either Oxford/AstraZeneca or Pfizer, raises the level of protection, offering 70-75 per cent protection against symptomatic infection.

Anyhow, back to Covid.

Reading around this at lunchtime, looks more and more likely that the "less serious disease" observations loudly touted by opinionated clinicians in SA who should know better, is very possibly merely a reflection that more people have now had another variant since the last wave. Which is pretty damn obvious if you think about it and nothing more than the difference between UK data pre and post vaccination roll out.

The silver lining is that it does at least infer that the T cell response (from previous strains) is still effective. That's not the same as the T cells resulting from vaccination would also be as effective... I don't understand enough to know whether a whole virus induced T cell immune response could differ or not.

Surely even if its merely a reflection of more people having a different variant, the end result is still that it is in effect a milder disease?

First.Aspect

kingstongraham said:

kingstonian said:

So what is the eventual way out of Covid? Feels a long way off to me.

Not sure there is a way out, it's adjusting to its presence. Annual vaccine, keep testing, keep making behaviour changes when there's a lot of it about.

It won't always mutate like this, or, rather it will run out of places to go. Might be rather longer than next year though. I remember seeing a plot of successive waves out to 5 years when all of this started. That's feeling more realistic the longer this goes. Going to be at least 3 isn't it?

surrey_commuter

A clever man good at explaining things to thickos told me this...

...a lethal variant infects less people because the victim is laid up

... a mild variant infects far more people as victims go about their business.

I see this latest variant as a huge step towards normality

We just need to peel the anti-vaxxers off the herd

kingstonian

Yes, certainly feels that we’ll still be in this in 2023

TheBigBean

surrey_commuter said:

A clever man good at explaining things to thickos told me this...

...a lethal variant infects less people because the victim is laid up

... a mild variant infects far more people as victims go about their business.

I see this latest variant as a huge step towards normality

We just need to peel the anti-vaxxers off the herd

Not sure covid works like that though as it has always spread before symptoms appear or when they are mild.

focuszing723

focuszing723 said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ss1LSwjtrhA

Still positive news in terms of how mild omicron is with regards data from South Africa.

One concerning point is raised towards the end though, because people who unfortunately die (lung complications) occur towards the end of the infectious period, the virus at that point has already had ample time to spread and moved on. This consequently means there is no evolutionary motive for Covid not to kill it's host, where is the advantage/disadvantage if the virus has already spread?

In other words strains could become milder or stronger. I hope this is proved to be wrong (click to jump to point in the video).

First.Aspect

TheBigBean said:

surrey_commuter said:

A clever man good at explaining things to thickos told me this...

...a lethal variant infects less people because the victim is laid up

... a mild variant infects far more people as victims go about their business.

I see this latest variant as a huge step towards normality

We just need to peel the anti-vaxxers off the herd

Not sure covid works like that though as it has always spread before symptoms appear or when they are mild.

This. It may die down by good fortune, or because new variants become less dissimilar to the previous ones we already have an immunity to.

DeVlaeminck

I think there's still an evolutionary reason for it to become less virulent even if it's not as strong as with many other viruses.

Let's say Omicron is generally less serious than Delta - people are on average going to be more likely to go about their lives with Omicron even if they have some symptoms. All other things being equal the opportunity for infection is still going to be greater than with Delta and that goes for any variant that is less virulent than another.

Of course we might get a variant that is highly infectious and symptomless for a few weeks or some other factor that makes it dominant despite being more harmful - there are no guarantees - just like you might get a winning streak on roulette - but over time you'll lose money and Covid will get less virulent.

mully79

ONS insights on deaths are fairly revealing now that the data has had a significant time period.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19latestinsights/deaths

Looks like about 17% with no pre conditions. The rest of the deaths are amongst risk groups that have serious underlying issues that you would expect to be vulnerable.

I do think they miss a trick by not allowing further breakdown ie. how many of the no pre-conditions were not vaccinated.

kingstonian

mully79 said:

ONS insights on deaths are fairly revealing now that the data has had a significant time period.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19latestinsights/deaths

Looks like about 17% with no pre conditions. The rest of the deaths are amongst risk groups that have serious underlying issues that you would expect to be vulnerable.

I do think they miss a trick by not allowing further breakdown ie. how many of the no pre-conditions were not vaccinated.

Agreed it would be useful to overlay vaccination status on these stats.

briantrumpet

Hmm, now trying to work out how I can make France travel work for Christmas.

Looks like I can take a (paid for) lateral flow test to get into France, a (paid for) LFT to fly back (I can take the test out with me, and register the test via an app for approval), but the sticking point might be the Day 2 PCR test, as I'm due to arrive back on NYE in the evening, and though I can do the test as soon as I get back (don't have to wait till the third day now), I'm not sure how long it would take to get it processed.

Any thoughts/ruses?

kingstongraham

This doesn't look promising

briantrumpet

kingstongraham said:

This doesn't look promising

The infections are indeed going nuts (though, curiously, edging downwards in Devon), but it's going to be the hospitalisation rates that will be the thing to watch. At the moment (I think) it's looking promising. Talking to some consultants tonight, the RD&E is having a tough time, but not because of covid, but because (as discussed earlier) because they can't get places to discharge people to, as much as anything.

Pross

briantrumpet said:

Hmm, now trying to work out how I can make France travel work for Christmas.

Looks like I can take a (paid for) lateral flow test to get into France, a (paid for) LFT to fly back (I can take the test out with me, and register the test via an app for approval), but the sticking point might be the Day 2 PCR test, as I'm due to arrive back on NYE in the evening, and though I can do the test as soon as I get back (don't have to wait till the third day now), I'm not sure how long it would take to get it processed.

Any thoughts/ruses?

From memory my Randox day 2 test went in the drop box around midday and I got the result the following day.

briantrumpet

Pross said:

briantrumpet said:

Hmm, now trying to work out how I can make France travel work for Christmas.

Looks like I can take a (paid for) lateral flow test to get into France, a (paid for) LFT to fly back (I can take the test out with me, and register the test via an app for approval), but the sticking point might be the Day 2 PCR test, as I'm due to arrive back on NYE in the evening, and though I can do the test as soon as I get back (don't have to wait till the third day now), I'm not sure how long it would take to get it processed.

Any thoughts/ruses?

From memory my Random day 2 test went in the drop box around midday and I got the result the following day.

Thanks - it's the BHWE that's the sticking point, and whether any labs will be processing results. My summer ones were done in Taunton, so I'm trying to find out if they will be working then.