The big Coronavirus thread
Comments
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I thought that we were within capacity for COVID treatment - and other parts of the NHS, given the recent pleas to the public not to avoid coming to hospital to get other conditions treated.First.Aspect said:
True. But once it is within capacity, there's an argument that restrictions need to be released in such a way as to maintain the rate of Covid infections, because releasing those restrictions will bring other healthcare services back towards normality and thereby "save lives". There's also an argument that it is best to keep a lid on it and wait for the cavalry to arrive, in terms of a vaccine.rick_chasey said:
Yes I think with the increase in overall deaths people don't necessarily know if they are or are not covid related yet; there's some suspicion that they are mis-labelling corona deaths, particularly in care homes.First.Aspect said:
What are your thoughts on the recent overall deaths statistics for the UK. Record numbers. Only about half of increase associated with Covid-19?rick_chasey said:
How is this different to any other recent pandemic? Like, for example, the Ebola outbreak?kingstonian said:
Yes, they know how to treat this from a purely medical perspective. But there are more angles to this than just the medical angle.rick_chasey said:
I think it's fair to say WHO has experience in dealing with epidemics (*recently*) and know what they are talking about.morstar said:
Succinctly put.Pross said:@rick_chasey Do you genuinely think any country is capable of satisfying that first criteria? If everyone follows the WHO guidance no-one is coming out of lockdown until there's a vaccination rolled out. They are looking at it purely from a health perspective as you'd expect without taking account of the economic and political implications.
These are perfect world criteria.
It also steps into that dividing line between being an expert and a decision maker.
Experts offer clear, advice based on criteria. Decision makers have to absorb perfect world advice and then consider all of the other conflicting demands that they face.
One example - most countries will have locked down their country for between 6 - 10 weeks by the time they start lifting restrictions. From a purely medical perspective, their governments almost certainly knew that would be the necessary length of the restrictions, but communicated shorter increments because social psychologists advised that approach would be better received and more adhered to by the general population. Same outcome, but achieved a different way by not following a purely medical perspective.
I think it's a little condescending on the WHO, who have led multiple responses to epidemics, to assume they have not had to deal with other matters like the economic and other social costs until now.
There is tunnel vision going on - not least from the WHO - about the collateral damage here.
Hopefully this particular datum is a blip and we aren't just treading water here.
That aside, I think my point still remains; if hospitals are stretched to cater for corona patients, they won't be able to do all the normal services. If say, you stopped lock-down today, they would be overwhelmed in 3 weeks time and have no bandwidth to do much else.
Stopping the lockdown won't stem the deaths. You have to get infection levels down before anything else. It's that basic.
So most countries will try to strike a balance between semi-normal, and allowing the virus to progress at a manageable rate, combined with crossing fingers. If nothing else, if the vaccine does arrive, you've made it a bit easier to get to the herd immunity stage while all of the world's economies scramble to get hold of vaccine.
Looks to me just now that trying to keep the overall numbers of Covid deaths less than "N" will kill more than N people, but no one knows what N is. I fear that N is actually not very high."I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?0
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He sums it up pretty well.morstar said:
This was a good interview yesterday."I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
From what I've read there are fairly tenuous links to Trump regarding chloroquine and don't forget that it's no longer patented. He's not the only one who's been pushing it but it's difficult to assess drugs at the moment because of ethics (i.e. if you give a placebo to a patient who subsequently dies, could the drug have saved them?). Also, Trump is not to blame for idiots who use drink fishtank cleaner.First.Aspect said:
That'll be Chris Smith. Giant brain.Pross said:
It was discussed on a BBC Q&A on BBC1 yesterday afternoon with a Virologist. From memory he acknowledged that there appeared to be lower incidences in countries (I remember South Africa being one that got named) where the BCG vaccination is more common and that there was research from Johns Hopkins suggesting that it could help though with the caveat I mentioned that it hadn't been peer reviewed.First.Aspect said:Sure
Are you sure you haven't been "Trumped" here? He has shares in a generics manufacturer with a hydroxychloroquinine product and pushed the benefits very hard and very wrongly (causing a few deaths and an acute shortage for lupus sufferers).Pross said:
BCG vaccination is also appearing to provide a benefit but no-one seems sure why as that is designed to treat a bacterial infection rather than a virus. Apparently there has been some testing that supported anecdotal reports but it hasn't been peer reviewed yet.nickice said:
Some countries with notably good outcomes have been using chloroquine or hydoxychloroquine. I remember reading something about it being used in Germany but I can't be sure. There is a French professor who did two clinical trials on it but I believe neither had a proper control group. His argument was that it was unethical to do so.surrey_commuter said:DeVlaeminck said:Yes there are two possible explanations for Germany's low death rate - one that they have successfully limited the spread and two that they treat those infected more effectively. Ok maybe a third that their population is somehow more resilient than ours (age, ethnicity, general health etc).
I'm assuming their apparent success (leaving aside questions of whether that is just delaying the inevitable and whether that success is down to accident or design) is primarily down to the first reason but it's certainly possible 2 and 3 play a part - and the second possibly a major part.
I am really not sure what treatment helps. The suggestion is that BoJo went into ICU earlier than a standard punter so maybe early access to oxygen helps.
Germany does have a lot of recoveries but we don’t even bother to record them. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
I'd understood that there are indications that these drugs showed some potential to disrupt the virus particles in vitro, but that there hasn't been any evidence of this being the case in vivo.
It's worth trying to find as he covered quite a lot of issues (he covered the use of masks quite a bit) though at the end of the day his answers are only his opinion and others in the field may not agree.
I've heard him talk about those anti-malarials before, a couple of weeks ago when it was first mooted. I think there have been some early / weak indicators about those malaria drugs, with some anecdotal evidence of effectiveness in some patients, but if it is a magic bullet we should probably have heard more about it by now.
In the meantime Trump has made a bit of money and killed / seriously traumatised some innocent people, by plugging it.
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Does anyone else have facebook friends who are banging on about staying home/following the rules only to subsequently break them a few posts later?0
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So, if the lockdown were lifted tomorrow, and work excepted, how many people would go back to bars, restaurants etc?0
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Yeah, he was very good throughout a longer interview.Stevo_666 said:
He sums it up pretty well.morstar said:
This was a good interview yesterday.
Spoke from a GB perspective rather than solely Scottish focussed, answered the testing question at the end (not in this clip unfortunately) and is also the same person who put down rumours of England hogging PPE.
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I think he's promoting the untested drugs to people that they might not be suitable for because a) he wants an easy answer as always, and b) he will get to say "I told you so" if one of them is proven to work. He will then use it as a means to attack the biased media in a bad faith attack. I don't think this one is because of the cash.nickice said:
From what I've read there are fairly tenuous links to Trump regarding chloroquine and don't forget that it's no longer patented. He's not the only one who's been pushing it but it's difficult to assess drugs at the moment because of ethics (i.e. if you give a placebo to a patient who subsequently dies, could the drug have saved them?). Also, Trump is not to blame for idiots who use drink fishtank cleaner.First.Aspect said:
That'll be Chris Smith. Giant brain.Pross said:
It was discussed on a BBC Q&A on BBC1 yesterday afternoon with a Virologist. From memory he acknowledged that there appeared to be lower incidences in countries (I remember South Africa being one that got named) where the BCG vaccination is more common and that there was research from Johns Hopkins suggesting that it could help though with the caveat I mentioned that it hadn't been peer reviewed.First.Aspect said:Sure
Are you sure you haven't been "Trumped" here? He has shares in a generics manufacturer with a hydroxychloroquinine product and pushed the benefits very hard and very wrongly (causing a few deaths and an acute shortage for lupus sufferers).Pross said:
BCG vaccination is also appearing to provide a benefit but no-one seems sure why as that is designed to treat a bacterial infection rather than a virus. Apparently there has been some testing that supported anecdotal reports but it hasn't been peer reviewed yet.nickice said:
Some countries with notably good outcomes have been using chloroquine or hydoxychloroquine. I remember reading something about it being used in Germany but I can't be sure. There is a French professor who did two clinical trials on it but I believe neither had a proper control group. His argument was that it was unethical to do so.surrey_commuter said:DeVlaeminck said:Yes there are two possible explanations for Germany's low death rate - one that they have successfully limited the spread and two that they treat those infected more effectively. Ok maybe a third that their population is somehow more resilient than ours (age, ethnicity, general health etc).
I'm assuming their apparent success (leaving aside questions of whether that is just delaying the inevitable and whether that success is down to accident or design) is primarily down to the first reason but it's certainly possible 2 and 3 play a part - and the second possibly a major part.
I am really not sure what treatment helps. The suggestion is that BoJo went into ICU earlier than a standard punter so maybe early access to oxygen helps.
Germany does have a lot of recoveries but we don’t even bother to record them. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
I'd understood that there are indications that these drugs showed some potential to disrupt the virus particles in vitro, but that there hasn't been any evidence of this being the case in vivo.
It's worth trying to find as he covered quite a lot of issues (he covered the use of masks quite a bit) though at the end of the day his answers are only his opinion and others in the field may not agree.
I've heard him talk about those anti-malarials before, a couple of weeks ago when it was first mooted. I think there have been some early / weak indicators about those malaria drugs, with some anecdotal evidence of effectiveness in some patients, but if it is a magic bullet we should probably have heard more about it by now.
In the meantime Trump has made a bit of money and killed / seriously traumatised some innocent people, by plugging it.
Hope they do work, but doctors in the US are already free to prescribe them if they may help.0 -
Probably right that Trump just wants to save the world by banging on about something that probably and unfortunately doesn't work, but for the record, you can patent a new use of an existing drug in the US.
(You can also patent an existing drug for use in treating a new condition elsewhere, but in most places not when you've already blabbed about it on twitter.)0 -
It would seem logical until you consider Singapore is the second most densely populated country on Earth, Tokyo is a lot more densely populated than London and Seoul is way more densely populated. I appreciate that Singapore and South Korea have taken more stringent measures but Japan doesn't seem to have done so.surrey_commuter said:Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?
There seem to be allsorts of issue causing inconsistencies in both rate of spread and mortality rates.0 -
Well one of my neighbours was threatened with the sack if he didn't show up for work as a groundsman today.nickice said:So, if the lockdown were lifted tomorrow, and work excepted, how many people would go back to bars, restaurants etc?
I noticed that he didn't go. Not spoken to find out the reasoning, or consequences but it gives you and indicator that some are not willing to jump back to normal as quick as some would think.The above may be fact, or fiction, I may be serious, I may be jesting.
I am not sure. You have no chance.Veronese68 wrote:PB is the most sensible person on here.0 -
Having just read the pages since I last posted (then spent a productive afternoon power hosing the patio and driveway) I can tell you there's a lot more agreement on this thread than you'd think as to the situation and the way out of this.
There's general agreement that just allowing the virus to spread (even within the capacity of the NHS) is an outlier opinion with an unacceptable death toll
That the current lockdown can't go on indefinitely and an exit strategy must be found
That the objective is to minimize the death count to buy more time, while causing the least amount of other harms
That the only 'final solution' is a vaccine whether a single vaccine, repeated or evolving.
That in the 'long run', in the absence of a vaccine, the virus will spread until herd immunity is achieved and this will come with a huge death toll (equal in the long run to just letting it spread but under NHS capacity)
That comparing to other countries isn't as straightforward as just comparing lines on a graph, there are reasons countries differ over and above government policy, but in there may be lessons to be learnt even in looking at these differences.
That the virus is widely spread through the UK so any exit strategy is going to be a huge undertaking
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On tracing, testing & isolating I know we can't ever find 100% off the contacts (you wouldn't even know that you had) or stamp out the virus (no one ever claimed it would) but may, combined with social distancing and ongoing restrictions on our day to day life, be the only path out [accepting that just allowing the virus to spread (even within the capacity of the NHS) is an outlier opinion with an unacceptable death toll]
Apart from anything else it's going to be the best way to direct testing resources.
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!3 -
I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.1 -
Pross said:
It would seem logical until you consider Singapore is the second most densely populated country on Earth, Tokyo is a lot more densely populated than London and Seoul is way more densely populated. I appreciate that Singapore and South Korea have taken more stringent measures but Japan doesn't seem to have done so.surrey_commuter said:Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?
There seem to be allsorts of issue causing inconsistencies in both rate of spread and mortality rates.
Worth mentioning there have been suspicions that Japan hasn’t been as transparent as most other countries with their C-19 statistics (theory goes they were burying bad news before the decision was taken to postpone the Olympics)0 -
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.0 -
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.0 -
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.0 -
Even Sunak’s money-printer-goes-brrr has run aground at the delivery point, which is as critical as the policy in the first place at this point.0
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Air pollution is already known to cause respiratory problems and increase the incidence of heart disease - two risk factors for C19. Of course pollution tends to correlate with population density as well, but as the dataviz guy from the FT points out, population density correlates very weakly with C19 incidence. Maybe people will take the early deaths associated with air pollution a bit more seriously after this now that they can physically see the difference in the air.surrey_commuter said:Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
It’s not a personal attack Btw but yes, yours is one of the most outlying opinions.rick_chasey said:
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.
Lots of people have engaged with the many points you’ve made in constructive ways. I guess yours is an opinion that will not be swayed in any way.
Personally, mine is both evolving and full of conflicting ideas. The only thing I am certain of is the fact that this is not a simple problem with a templated solution.0 -
It's this sort of comment that puts you at the extreme negative end of the spectrum. You post what come across as snide criticisms without posting any detail. It's not helpful.rick_chasey said:Even Sunak’s money-printer-goes-brrr has run aground at the delivery point, which is as critical as the policy in the first place at this point.
Also, maybe some of us slightly older than yourself accept that errors will have been made but that those in charge are desperately trying to make good choices for the benefit of us all.
Many of us also understand that short term figures are not a good measure of a medium or longer term situation.0 -
In a crisis you want everyone's full attention and effort on solving the problem. You don't want them diverting resources to arguing over whose fault it is when mistakes inevitably happen. You definitely don't want them more afraid of an angry public reaction than of making the mistake itself because that's when people start diverting energy into covering up mistakes rather than learning from them and moving on.rick_chasey said:
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Let the experts take care of the situation. The government are being held to account every press conference.0
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Just on the Government thing, I don't think it's unreasonable to cut them some slack when they are dealing with something no Western country has dealt with in 100 years. Mistakes are being made as they are with most countries. There also doesn't seem much consistency in what does and doesn't work.rick_chasey said:
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.
I also know there's an argument that we had the advantage of a couple of weeks seeing how it affected other countries but that really isn't much time to develop and implement policies on a massive scale. If they aren't better prepared for a second wave I'll be less generous.0 -
I think the two go together. London also has long distance commuters, which places like Singapore and Hong Kong don't. They are islands smaller than London, and (almost) all the workers live on the island, rather than commuting in from up to 100 miles away. It's easy to see how London could pick up Covid 19 from patient zero if they arrived in the country anywhere from the south coast to the midlands.And once it's in, the commuters will spread it and take it out to all points of the compass (including holiday homes). I think New York has a similar demographic to London in this regard, but a lot of city workers come in from the neighbouring state of Jersey, so the city mayor and state governor have limited control over their behaviour outside work. And as a huge number of emergency workers live in New Jersey, they can't just shut the border.surrey_commuter said:Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?
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Some of that summarises pretty well, although the 'outlier' disagreement has already been mentioned.tailwindhome said:Having just read the pages since I last posted (then spent a productive afternoon power hosing the patio and driveway) I can tell you there's a lot more agreement on this thread than you'd think as to the situation and the way out of this.
There's general agreement that just allowing the virus to spread (even within the capacity of the NHS) is an outlier opinion with an unacceptable death toll
That the current lockdown can't go on indefinitely and an exit strategy must be found
That the objective is to minimize the death count to buy more time, while causing the least amount of other harms
That the only 'final solution' is a vaccine whether a single vaccine, repeated or evolving.
That in the 'long run', in the absence of a vaccine, the virus will spread until herd immunity is achieved and this will come with a huge death toll (equal in the long run to just letting it spread but under NHS capacity)
That comparing to other countries isn't as straightforward as just comparing lines on a graph, there are reasons countries differ over and above government policy, but in there may be lessons to be learnt even in looking at these differences.
That the virus is widely spread through the UK so any exit strategy is going to be a huge undertaking
...
On tracing, testing & isolating I know we can't ever find 100% off the contacts (you wouldn't even know that you had) or stamp out the virus (no one ever claimed it would) but may, combined with social distancing and ongoing restrictions on our day to day life, be the only path out [accepting that just allowing the virus to spread (even within the capacity of the NHS) is an outlier opinion with an unacceptable death toll]
Apart from anything else it's going to be the best way to direct testing resources.
The conundrum for any government is the conflict between your first and second points. Any move to lift/partially lift the lockdown will result in more infections and so more deaths, but most people agree that the lockdown cannot continue for a long period without significant and long lasting economic damage - and all that goes with that
It's not so much much question of allowing the spread - I don't believe it can be stopped, only slowed or managed. And on that basis, keeping it within NHS capacity is key.
My own outline thought on how the lockdown might be lifted probably involves keeping the elderly and vulnerable isolated/locked down but allowing significant sections of the economy to restart, with continuing safeguards where possible."I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
I have heard that also. There will be other countries that have done similar, albeit for different reasons.kingstonian said:Pross said:
It would seem logical until you consider Singapore is the second most densely populated country on Earth, Tokyo is a lot more densely populated than London and Seoul is way more densely populated. I appreciate that Singapore and South Korea have taken more stringent measures but Japan doesn't seem to have done so.surrey_commuter said:Rather than pollution could the correlation be with population density?
There seem to be allsorts of issue causing inconsistencies in both rate of spread and mortality rates.
Worth mentioning there have been suspicions that Japan hasn’t been as transparent as most other countries with their C-19 statistics (theory goes they were burying bad news before the decision was taken to postpone the Olympics)"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
Yeah I don’t cut them that slack. Absolutely not. Especially as others have done it better.Pross said:
Just on the Government thing, I don't think it's unreasonable to cut them some slack when they are dealing with something no Western country has dealt with in 100 years. Mistakes are being made as they are with most countries. There also doesn't seem much consistency in what does and doesn't work.rick_chasey said:
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.
I also know there's an argument that we had the advantage of a couple of weeks seeing how it affected other countries but that really isn't much time to develop and implement policies on a massive scale. If they aren't better prepared for a second wave I'll be less generous.
I do find it hard to separate it from the fact that going into this, multiple people in cabinet already had a reputation for being various shades of incompetent. I don’t care what colour your rosette is, I have never wanted low talent people in charge and this is why. Let alone two people including the PM who have lost jobs for lying.
I could also do without the dodging the questions and the lying about when BoJo was and wasn’t doing work; it leads me to believe they do not have the right priorities.
Same goes for not being part of the bulk EU PPE order. Their priorities were wrong.
When this was kicking off over in China Priti Patel was briefing against the civil service so badly to the point that he is sueing her!!!! Someone who lost her job once already for breaking the rules.
All of that stuff erodes the slack I would give them. I’m fairly confident they have made bad decisions and they have led to thousands more deaths than had they made better decisions. I also believe, though am less confident, that it was the hostile environment to advisors, civil servants and experts that they created that significantly impaired the decision making progress.
I am absolutely furious about it and I will do what little I can to make sure they are not let off the hook. I fear and think it is likely they will.
I find it hard to see why this is unreasonable as more or less everything I have pointed to is well documented. It just depends on whether you want to engage with it or not.
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This isn’t snide. It’s a real problem. Businesses that are eligible can’t get the money.Dorset_Boy said:
It's this sort of comment that puts you at the extreme negative end of the spectrum. You post what come across as snide criticisms without posting any detail. It's not helpful.rick_chasey said:Even Sunak’s money-printer-goes-brrr has run aground at the delivery point, which is as critical as the policy in the first place at this point.
Also, maybe some of us slightly older than yourself accept that errors will have been made but that those in charge are desperately trying to make good choices for the benefit of us all.
Many of us also understand that short term figures are not a good measure of a medium or longer term situation.
How is that not a critical problem?0 -
Well given that we have this government for the next 4 1/2 years, being a bit more fatalistic might help?rick_chasey said:
Yeah I don’t cut them that slack. Absolutely not. Especially as others have done it better.Pross said:
Just on the Government thing, I don't think it's unreasonable to cut them some slack when they are dealing with something no Western country has dealt with in 100 years. Mistakes are being made as they are with most countries. There also doesn't seem much consistency in what does and doesn't work.rick_chasey said:
If that is a reference to me, I’m nowhere near as extreme as you make out, I’m just a lot angrier at how the govt has fumbled it than most people, and i can’t get my head around why more people can’t see it, so I’ve kicked off a bit to try and show you lot why you should be angry.morstar said:
I’d say we cover a broad spectrum and are fairly evenly distributed. There are two obvious outlier opinions, one at either end of the spectrum.kingstongraham said:
This is true, and I don't think it's really an outlier on here.morstar said:I can’t help but feel your outlier policy is very close to our actual policy.
We are aiming to be testing enough to understand what is happening and protect NHS capacity. No more.
GB testing will ramp up massively only when it is an antibody test they are happy with.
I just don't know.
What I guess I hadn’t expected is most people are much more forgiving of their govt in the middle of a crisis or don’t find it helpful at all.
I can only hope that a) the bungling is mitigated by better action from now on and b) they get their comeuppance, though I am deeply sceptical of both right now.
I also know there's an argument that we had the advantage of a couple of weeks seeing how it affected other countries but that really isn't much time to develop and implement policies on a massive scale. If they aren't better prepared for a second wave I'll be less generous.
I do find it hard to separate it from the fact that going into this, multiple people in cabinet already had a reputation for being various shades of incompetent. I don’t care what colour your rosette is, I have never wanted low talent people in charge and this is why. Let alone two people including the PM who have lost jobs for lying.
I could also do without the dodging the questions and the lying about when BoJo was and wasn’t doing work; it leads me to believe they do not have the right priorities.
Same goes for not being part of the bulk EU PPE order. Their priorities were wrong.
When this was kicking off over in China Priti Patel was briefing against the civil service so badly to the point that he is sueing her!!!! Someone who lost her job once already for breaking the rules.
All of that stuff erodes the slack I would give them. I’m fairly confident they have made bad decisions and they have led to thousands more deaths than had they made better decisions. I also believe, though am less confident, that it was the hostile environment to advisors, civil servants and experts that they created that significantly impaired the decision making progress.
I am absolutely furious about it and I will do what little I can to make sure they are not let off the hook. I fear and think it is likely they will.
I find it hard to see why this is unreasonable as more or less everything I have pointed to is well documented. It just depends on whether you want to engage with it or not.
If you really want to feel gloomy, read the latest article on the Grauniad that this could go on until 2022... or 2025...0
