The big Coronavirus thread

briantrumpet

Jezyboy said:

wallace_and_gromit said:

surrey_commuter said:

We were always 3-4 weeks behind italy so would argue travel restrictions could have helped manage the spread

My recollection is that we were "2 weeks behind Italy", but could be wrong.

I read during summer 2020 that the vast majority of first wave cases in the UK derived from strains already in continental Europe e.g. Spain, Italy, Austria and France, or put another way, the countries where Brits were likely to have been on HT hols. So "closing the borders" in any meaningful fashion would have meant tens of thousands of Brits stranded on the tarmac / holiday resorts, which was never politically a goer. I'm not sure it would be a politically acceptable even now.

Of course, we could have closed the borders to travellers from other countries, which might have looked impressive, but wouldn't really have achieved much. Per the comment above, once it's in, it's in.

"We are not 2 weeks behind Italy. It's rubbish to look at their numbers and then find the UK equivalent of positives and say that is how far behind we are. Both countries had patient zero at a similar time however Italy went weeks before catching up with contact tracing this patient. We knew all patient zero contacts (Brighton) very quickly."

I wonder what happened to that particular poster.

Probably busy swotting up on what 'exponential' implies.

TheBigBean

surrey_commuter said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

Pross said:

The obvious one for any future events from my persepctive would be to shut down incoming travel as soon as the danger becomes real. We were far too slow doing that at the start of the Covid pandemic. Being an island should be a benefit in these things. I do appreciate that getting the timing right so that it is a real and genuine threat before taking the financial hit of prevent people entering the country is a huge challenge though.

That is considered in the 2011 report. It delays things, but not by that much. For example, look at Omicron and how quickly it was spread despite flight bans from South Africa

It depends how brutal you are with it. In most cases, the UK government gave a couple of days' notice they were going to do it, and that inevitably prompts a panicked scramble, to avoid the sort of situations that NZ and Australia had, with people effectively banned from their own homes for weeks or months.

On the other hand, slowing things down - "delaying things" - is sometimes exactly what needs to happen in order to flatten peaks, Somewhere there's a balance between the brutal and the dithering, and there's probably no magic formula for all circumstances, other than it's probably better to be early and harder than late and weaker, until you know what's going on.

The other element in the report is how timing it is impossible and typically when a country realises it needs to suspend arrivals, it should have done it two weeks before.

If there's one thing that comes out of the UK enquiry, I'd hope it would be that Johnson's early dithering had disastrous results, and was called out at the time (they can cite Cake Stop, if they want).

His later 'dithering', on omicron, was a decent call. It has not helped other governments that they were ramping up draconian mandates to try to curb the rapid rise of omicron, when omicron was essentially what we needed. They've made it harder to retreat, and to take their populations with them next time.

I think we could be more charitable on the "later dithering on omicron" as he may have taken on board an early cake stop suggestion of buying a TV which would have allowed him to follow the news in S. Africa and act accordingly.

Of course TV was not around in 1919 but acceptance of it's existance could be incorporated into future pandemic planning.

We were always 3-4 weeks behind italy so would argue travel restrictions could have helped manage the spread

The UK thought it was 3-4 weeks behind Italy, but it was actually only 1-2 weeks behind. This is the point with viruses spreading, you only really know what you should do now, two weeks later.

briantrumpet

TheBigBean said:

surrey_commuter said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

Pross said:

The obvious one for any future events from my persepctive would be to shut down incoming travel as soon as the danger becomes real. We were far too slow doing that at the start of the Covid pandemic. Being an island should be a benefit in these things. I do appreciate that getting the timing right so that it is a real and genuine threat before taking the financial hit of prevent people entering the country is a huge challenge though.

That is considered in the 2011 report. It delays things, but not by that much. For example, look at Omicron and how quickly it was spread despite flight bans from South Africa

It depends how brutal you are with it. In most cases, the UK government gave a couple of days' notice they were going to do it, and that inevitably prompts a panicked scramble, to avoid the sort of situations that NZ and Australia had, with people effectively banned from their own homes for weeks or months.

On the other hand, slowing things down - "delaying things" - is sometimes exactly what needs to happen in order to flatten peaks, Somewhere there's a balance between the brutal and the dithering, and there's probably no magic formula for all circumstances, other than it's probably better to be early and harder than late and weaker, until you know what's going on.

The other element in the report is how timing it is impossible and typically when a country realises it needs to suspend arrivals, it should have done it two weeks before.

If there's one thing that comes out of the UK enquiry, I'd hope it would be that Johnson's early dithering had disastrous results, and was called out at the time (they can cite Cake Stop, if they want).

His later 'dithering', on omicron, was a decent call. It has not helped other governments that they were ramping up draconian mandates to try to curb the rapid rise of omicron, when omicron was essentially what we needed. They've made it harder to retreat, and to take their populations with them next time.

I think we could be more charitable on the "later dithering on omicron" as he may have taken on board an early cake stop suggestion of buying a TV which would have allowed him to follow the news in S. Africa and act accordingly.

Of course TV was not around in 1919 but acceptance of it's existance could be incorporated into future pandemic planning.

We were always 3-4 weeks behind italy so would argue travel restrictions could have helped manage the spread

The UK thought it was 3-4 weeks behind Italy, but it was actually only 1-2 weeks behind. This is the point with viruses spreading, you only really know what you should do now, two weeks later.

Isn't that an even stronger argument for acting faster in such situations?

rick_chasey

Yes we all saw the UN expert in Feb who said something like perfection is the enemy, speed is your friend

mully79

Whitty back to playing spoil sport. Has no one told him we all have to stay on a self imposed lockdown as no one can afford to go out anymore ?

blazing_saddles

rick_chasey said:

Yes we all saw the UN expert in Feb who said something like perfection is the enemy, speed is your friend

The UN expect could have been talking about your posting style, Rick.

Stevo_666

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

The chief medical officer of Sweden himself said he’d do it differently and probably do some form of lockdown if he did it again

Can't imagine any country would do exactly the same again.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

You don't think there will be a next time? This is the the third novel respiratory virus in 20 years.

Very likely, but it won't be identical and could be something rather different.

It's significant that the countries that dealt with SARS were generally better prepared for SARS-COV-2.

Or we could pretend that we can't learn anything and that it's cheaper to cross our fingers and hope it won't happen.

The applicability of what we have learnt may well depend on how similar the next one is to this one, as I said above.

Anyhow, this one is all but over so I can now sell my shares in sofa manufacturers and retailers

shirley_basso

Don't forget to re-buy just before the next results announcement

kingstongraham

TheBigBean said:

surrey_commuter said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

Pross said:

The obvious one for any future events from my persepctive would be to shut down incoming travel as soon as the danger becomes real. We were far too slow doing that at the start of the Covid pandemic. Being an island should be a benefit in these things. I do appreciate that getting the timing right so that it is a real and genuine threat before taking the financial hit of prevent people entering the country is a huge challenge though.

That is considered in the 2011 report. It delays things, but not by that much. For example, look at Omicron and how quickly it was spread despite flight bans from South Africa

It depends how brutal you are with it. In most cases, the UK government gave a couple of days' notice they were going to do it, and that inevitably prompts a panicked scramble, to avoid the sort of situations that NZ and Australia had, with people effectively banned from their own homes for weeks or months.

On the other hand, slowing things down - "delaying things" - is sometimes exactly what needs to happen in order to flatten peaks, Somewhere there's a balance between the brutal and the dithering, and there's probably no magic formula for all circumstances, other than it's probably better to be early and harder than late and weaker, until you know what's going on.

The other element in the report is how timing it is impossible and typically when a country realises it needs to suspend arrivals, it should have done it two weeks before.

If there's one thing that comes out of the UK enquiry, I'd hope it would be that Johnson's early dithering had disastrous results, and was called out at the time (they can cite Cake Stop, if they want).

His later 'dithering', on omicron, was a decent call. It has not helped other governments that they were ramping up draconian mandates to try to curb the rapid rise of omicron, when omicron was essentially what we needed. They've made it harder to retreat, and to take their populations with them next time.

I think we could be more charitable on the "later dithering on omicron" as he may have taken on board an early cake stop suggestion of buying a TV which would have allowed him to follow the news in S. Africa and act accordingly.

Of course TV was not around in 1919 but acceptance of it's existance could be incorporated into future pandemic planning.

We were always 3-4 weeks behind italy so would argue travel restrictions could have helped manage the spread

The UK thought it was 3-4 weeks behind Italy, but it was actually only 1-2 weeks behind. This is the point with viruses spreading, you only really know what you should do now, two weeks later.

There never was an explanation of why the government advisors thought it was four weeks when every number was screaming two weeks.

briantrumpet

kingstongraham said:

TheBigBean said:

surrey_commuter said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

briantrumpet said:

TheBigBean said:

Pross said:

The obvious one for any future events from my persepctive would be to shut down incoming travel as soon as the danger becomes real. We were far too slow doing that at the start of the Covid pandemic. Being an island should be a benefit in these things. I do appreciate that getting the timing right so that it is a real and genuine threat before taking the financial hit of prevent people entering the country is a huge challenge though.

That is considered in the 2011 report. It delays things, but not by that much. For example, look at Omicron and how quickly it was spread despite flight bans from South Africa

It depends how brutal you are with it. In most cases, the UK government gave a couple of days' notice they were going to do it, and that inevitably prompts a panicked scramble, to avoid the sort of situations that NZ and Australia had, with people effectively banned from their own homes for weeks or months.

On the other hand, slowing things down - "delaying things" - is sometimes exactly what needs to happen in order to flatten peaks, Somewhere there's a balance between the brutal and the dithering, and there's probably no magic formula for all circumstances, other than it's probably better to be early and harder than late and weaker, until you know what's going on.

The other element in the report is how timing it is impossible and typically when a country realises it needs to suspend arrivals, it should have done it two weeks before.

If there's one thing that comes out of the UK enquiry, I'd hope it would be that Johnson's early dithering had disastrous results, and was called out at the time (they can cite Cake Stop, if they want).

His later 'dithering', on omicron, was a decent call. It has not helped other governments that they were ramping up draconian mandates to try to curb the rapid rise of omicron, when omicron was essentially what we needed. They've made it harder to retreat, and to take their populations with them next time.

I think we could be more charitable on the "later dithering on omicron" as he may have taken on board an early cake stop suggestion of buying a TV which would have allowed him to follow the news in S. Africa and act accordingly.

Of course TV was not around in 1919 but acceptance of it's existance could be incorporated into future pandemic planning.

We were always 3-4 weeks behind italy so would argue travel restrictions could have helped manage the spread

The UK thought it was 3-4 weeks behind Italy, but it was actually only 1-2 weeks behind. This is the point with viruses spreading, you only really know what you should do now, two weeks later.

There never was an explanation of why the government advisors thought it was four weeks when every number was screaming two weeks.

Maybe they thought that that would count as buying time in a pandemic.

Stevo_666

shirley_basso said:

Don't forget to re-buy just before the next results announcement

I think I'll buy nappy manufacturer shares next time.

rjsterry

Stevo_666 said:

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

The chief medical officer of Sweden himself said he’d do it differently and probably do some form of lockdown if he did it again

Can't imagine any country would do exactly the same again.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

You don't think there will be a next time? This is the the third novel respiratory virus in 20 years.

Very likely, but it won't be identical and could be something rather different.

It's significant that the countries that dealt with SARS were generally better prepared for SARS-COV-2.

Or we could pretend that we can't learn anything and that it's cheaper to cross our fingers and hope it won't happen.

The applicability of what we have learnt may well depend on how similar the next one is to this one, as I said above.

Anyhow, this one is all but over so I can now sell my shares in sofa manufacturers and retailers

😆
Well we can certainly pretend it's over by not testing. And ignoring the huge NHS backlog.

wallace_and_gromit

pblakeney said:

Could have closed the borders to non-residents and quarantine for residents returning.
Doubt it will ever happen.

2 weeks quarantine done properly (i.e. off plane, go straight to government provided hotel, do not pass supermarket etc.) for all returning HT holidaymakers two years ago would have been a political stretch too, I think. And probably logistically challenging to set up at short notice. And that's without worrying about lost schooling as most folk on hols at HT have high school age kids.

A half-a*sed "quarantine at home" scheme might have worked politically and logistically but would likely have been of little use.

briantrumpet

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

Could have closed the borders to non-residents and quarantine for residents returning.
Doubt it will ever happen.

2 weeks quarantine done properly (i.e. off plane, go straight to government provided hotel, do not pass supermarket etc.) for all returning HT holidaymakers two years ago would have been a political stretch too, I think. And probably logistically challenging to set up at short notice. And that's without worrying about lost schooling as most folk on hols at HT have high school age kids.

A half-a*sed "quarantine at home" scheme might have worked politically and logistically but would likely have been of little use.

Not so sure... even if imperfectly implemented and adhered to, if it had been facilitated with the sort of largesse shown to business (furlough and loans), paying for time off work and checking on quarantine (home visits etc), at least it might have slowed the spread and thus flattened the peaks considerably, and would have been a very visible indicator of how seriously the government was taking it.

wallace_and_gromit

briantrumpet said:

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

Could have closed the borders to non-residents and quarantine for residents returning.
Doubt it will ever happen.

2 weeks quarantine done properly (i.e. off plane, go straight to government provided hotel, do not pass supermarket etc.) for all returning HT holidaymakers two years ago would have been a political stretch too, I think. And probably logistically challenging to set up at short notice. And that's without worrying about lost schooling as most folk on hols at HT have high school age kids.

A half-a*sed "quarantine at home" scheme might have worked politically and logistically but would likely have been of little use.

Not so sure... even if imperfectly implemented and adhered to, if it had been facilitated with the sort of largesse shown to business (furlough and loans), paying for time off work and checking on quarantine (home visits etc), at least it might have slowed the spread and thus flattened the peaks considerably, and would have been a very visible indicator of how seriously the government was taking it.

Possibly. But I think it took the news emerging from Italy to get us to collectively take the virus seriously.

pblakeney

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

Could have closed the borders to non-residents and quarantine for residents returning.
Doubt it will ever happen.

2 weeks quarantine done properly (i.e. off plane, go straight to government provided hotel, do not pass supermarket etc.) for all returning HT holidaymakers two years ago would have been a political stretch too, I think. And probably logistically challenging to set up at short notice. And that's without worrying about lost schooling as most folk on hols at HT have high school age kids.

A half-a*sed "quarantine at home" scheme might have worked politically and logistically but would likely have been of little use.

I never said it would be easy. I never said it would be popular.
Schooling was lost anyway.

Half-a*sed rarely works and should not be planned for. All or nothing.
Our government went with nothing. Can this be improved on?

Dorset_Boy

Brian - who would have done the home visits?

briantrumpet

Dorset_Boy said:

Brian - who would have done the home visits?

Some of the £37bn of test-and-trace might have been better used...

Dorset_Boy

briantrumpet said:

Dorset_Boy said:

Brian - who would have done the home visits?

Some of the £37bn of test-and-trace might have been better used...

That may be true, but initially, no one had been recruited, and if they were doing home visits, they would need to be 'cleared', something that would have taken time. My point being that to close the border and impose home quarantines immediately, might have been possible, but checking compliance by way of home visits from day 1, or even day 14 would not have been possible in reality at that stage. Later on after a month or more, sure.

There was also the issue of the sheer number of passenger movements through London's transport hubs each day pre-lockdown, which were more than any other city in the world.

wallace_and_gromit

pblakeney said:

I never said it would be easy. I never said it would be popular.

Schooling was lost anyway.

That's with the benefit of hindsight. At the time closing the border / quarantining returning holidaymaking Brits would have made a difference (late Feb?) the virus was something that wasn't being taken seriously by the masses or indeed governments in the West. Forcing mandatory quarantine on the returning Brits would have looked at the time like 2 weeks lost schooling - and hence disadvantage in the summer exams - for those unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

pblakeney

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

I never said it would be easy. I never said it would be popular.

Schooling was lost anyway.

That's with the benefit of hindsight. At the time closing the border / quarantining returning holidaymaking Brits would have made a difference (late Feb?) the virus was something that wasn't being taken seriously by the masses or indeed governments in the West. Forcing mandatory quarantine on the returning Brits would have looked at the time like 2 weeks lost schooling - and hence disadvantage in the summer exams - for those unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

No, not hindsight.
From May 2020.

pblakeney said:

morstar said:

Comparing densely populated, hugely interconnected, global business and travel hub London which was near to a heavily impacted continent with New Zealand is meaningless.

The most glaring comparison is that NZ closed their hub while ours maintained open. Until this week when the horse is way past long gone.

Dorset_Boy

pblakeney said:

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

I never said it would be easy. I never said it would be popular.

Schooling was lost anyway.

That's with the benefit of hindsight. At the time closing the border / quarantining returning holidaymaking Brits would have made a difference (late Feb?) the virus was something that wasn't being taken seriously by the masses or indeed governments in the West. Forcing mandatory quarantine on the returning Brits would have looked at the time like 2 weeks lost schooling - and hence disadvantage in the summer exams - for those unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

No, not hindsight.
From May 2020.

pblakeney said:

morstar said:

Comparing densely populated, hugely interconnected, global business and travel hub London which was near to a heavily impacted continent with New Zealand is meaningless.

The most glaring comparison is that NZ closed their hub while ours maintained open. Until this week when the horse is way past long gone.

Slight difference though would be London's 850,000 passenger movements per day compared to NZ's maybe 50,000.

Jezyboy

The long term comparisons with NZ will be interesting.

They have spent less time in official lockdown than the UK and far fewer deaths.

It does look like a bit of a win to me.

pblakeney

Dorset_Boy said:

pblakeney said:

wallace_and_gromit said:

pblakeney said:

I never said it would be easy. I never said it would be popular.

Schooling was lost anyway.

That's with the benefit of hindsight. At the time closing the border / quarantining returning holidaymaking Brits would have made a difference (late Feb?) the virus was something that wasn't being taken seriously by the masses or indeed governments in the West. Forcing mandatory quarantine on the returning Brits would have looked at the time like 2 weeks lost schooling - and hence disadvantage in the summer exams - for those unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

No, not hindsight.
From May 2020.

pblakeney said:

morstar said:

Comparing densely populated, hugely interconnected, global business and travel hub London which was near to a heavily impacted continent with New Zealand is meaningless.

The most glaring comparison is that NZ closed their hub while ours maintained open. Until this week when the horse is way past long gone.

Slight difference though would be London's 850,000 passenger movements per day compared to NZ's maybe 50,000.

The numbers are irrelevant. The principle can be done.
There were a lot of people saying that locking down an entire country was impossible.

kingstongraham

Jezyboy said:

The long term comparisons with NZ will be interesting.

They have spent less time in official lockdown than the UK and far fewer deaths.

It does look like a bit of a win to me.

Will be a good indication of how much the boosted vaccines prevent deaths from Omicron compared to prior infection (plus vaccines and boosters). They have successfully delayed the inevitable so long that they are going to get hit by the less deadly version. They've done alright.

Stevo_666

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

rjsterry said:

Stevo_666 said:

TheBigBean said:

rick_chasey said:

The chief medical officer of Sweden himself said he’d do it differently and probably do some form of lockdown if he did it again

Can't imagine any country would do exactly the same again.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

You don't think there will be a next time? This is the the third novel respiratory virus in 20 years.

Very likely, but it won't be identical and could be something rather different.

It's significant that the countries that dealt with SARS were generally better prepared for SARS-COV-2.

Or we could pretend that we can't learn anything and that it's cheaper to cross our fingers and hope it won't happen.

The applicability of what we have learnt may well depend on how similar the next one is to this one, as I said above.

Anyhow, this one is all but over so I can now sell my shares in sofa manufacturers and retailers

😆
Well we can certainly pretend it's over by not testing. And ignoring the huge NHS backlog.

I suppose you can argue it's not over in the same way that flu isn't 'over'. As far as I'm concerned (and most other people I think), the pandemic is as good as over and it's now endemic. Like flu etc. So people are getting on with their lives pretty much as normal. It's a bit like Brexit in some ways

First.Aspect

Would anyone like to give any predictions as to when the next variant comes along and puts the kibosh on all the talk of the pandemic being over? I'm going to say May.

Fwiw Stevo a minority of the people I interact with think the way you do.

Stevo_666

First.Aspect said:

Would anyone like to give any predictions as to when the next variant comes along and puts the kibosh on all the talk of the pandemic being over? I'm going to say May.

Fwiw Stevo a minority of the people I interact with think the way you do.

Depends who you mix with I guess. Life goes on - just not beyond the sofa

First.Aspect

Stevo_666 said:

First.Aspect said:

Would anyone like to give any predictions as to when the next variant comes along and puts the kibosh on all the talk of the pandemic being over? I'm going to say May.

Fwiw Stevo a minority of the people I interact with think the way you do.

Depends who you mix with I guess. Life goes on - just not beyond the sofa

Possibly, or how old or vulnerable the people you mix with are.

kingstongraham

First.Aspect said:

Would anyone like to give any predictions as to when the next variant comes along and puts the kibosh on all the talk of the pandemic being over? I'm going to say May.

Fwiw Stevo a minority of the people I interact with think the way you do.

I'm going with never. But I'd expect another booster jab this November for us over 50s.

I've got a few tests in the cupboard because I still don't want to pass it on to anyone if I can avoid it by knowing I have it, but if the ONS survey says there's not much around, I'll probably stop doing that.