The big Coronavirus thread
Comments
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Blows my mind more people aren’t angry that Germany can manage half a mill tests a week and the U.K. can’t even manage 1/7th of that.0
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The Mail is very angry. Front page news.rick_chasey said:Blows my mind more people aren’t angry that Germany can manage half a mill tests a week and the U.K. can’t even manage 1/7th of that.
I'm more surprised that you haven't brought up the inherent racism in that the west effectively dismissed all the news and research coming out of Asia0 -
What, Gove lies?
"Gove said there were shortages of chemical reagents used for testing live cases of the virus. However, the Chemical Industries Association told ITV it was not aware
of any shortages and was contacting Gove’s office to find out what he
meant."0 -
The shadow health secretary said it might be to do with approved suppliers.briantrumpet said:What, Gove lies?
"Gove said there were shortages of chemical reagents used for testing live cases of the virus. However, the Chemical Industries Association told ITV it was not aware
of any shortages and was contacting Gove’s office to find out what he
meant."0 -
TheBigBean said:
The shadow health secretary said it might be to do with approved suppliers.briantrumpet said:What, Gove lies?
"Gove said there were shortages of chemical reagents used for testing live cases of the virus. However, the Chemical Industries Association told ITV it was not aware
of any shortages and was contacting Gove’s office to find out what he
meant."
Well, it does seem like an unlikely subject to get caught out on, but Gove's record does give one reasons to question the veracity of his statements.0 -
The The Telegraph, it's good to see it's got its priorities sorted. This is right below the CV-19 panel on the website:
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I was about to suggest that the inherent smug English belief that we are the best in the world at everything has, in this case, proved to be a positive thing.rick_chasey said:Blows my mind more people aren’t angry that Germany can manage half a mill tests a week and the U.K. can’t even manage 1/7th of that.
Then I realised that it just allows the best Parliament, Civil Service and health service in the world to keep messing up because they can not get any better.0 -
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.0 -
Too late, I've now seen people calling for us to do away with Children in Need, Comic Relief and Red Nose Day (seemingly unable to determine that the last two are actually the same thing) and raise money for the NHS instead. I wonder how they would react to being told tax was going up to pay for the NHS?Pross said:pblakeney said:Just as a little aside, anyone think there may be an impact on people's materialism at the end of this? Adequate provisions of blogroll aside... 😉
I'd also like to think we'd hear an end of people moaning about charities doing stuff for people in Africa when we're struggling at home as we've shown we can barely cope with an emergency that wouldn't even cause a ripple to the people being helped over there.
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The fact that people react differently to the prospect of taxes going up compared to charity fundraising, surely demonstrates that REd nose day CIN etc are just to salve people's conscience and make themselves feel better.0
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Starting to feel more and more like a cover-up taking place.coopster_the_1st said:
Lie could be correct but I use smell because I trust Prof Chris Whitty (CMO), Dr Jenny Harries (Deputy CMO) & Sir Patrick Vallance (CSO). They are saying the same things on testing so must know the real reason. Also, the CMO's of Scotland, Wales and NI would also know this and I really can't see Nicola Sturgeon covering up for this government.tailwindhome said:
You voted for them to own the libscoopster_the_1st said:tailwindhome said:"We need a reason why we aren't testing"
"Tell them we don't have chemicals"
"Brilliant. No one will ever check"
Something doesn't smell right about this from the government side.
and the word you're looking for is 'lie'
On the other side it is Peston and that says enough as he has an ego to maintain
If we get some headline grabbing announcement in the briefing this afternoon, to take the heat off this testing question, then yes there is a cover-up going on.0 -
https://www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/alexwickham/uk-coronavirus-testing-explainer?__twitter_impression=true
buzzfeed offer some explanations.0 -
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
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Current estimates recon it'll be about twice as bad as the GFC with a 4-5 year recovery.Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
So the worst since the depression.0 -
P
Ok!!!! That is my theory for lack of preparation (indolence and stupidity are still available) though I admit I had not stretched it into a conspiracy theory that they are still sacrificing us on the altar of herd immunity.rick_chasey said:https://www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/alexwickham/uk-coronavirus-testing-explainer?__twitter_impression=true
buzzfeed offer some explanations.0 -
Some noise on reddit that ineos BP and the like (i.e. The typical members of the chemical industries association) don't make chemicals for the medical industry.TheBigBean said:
The shadow health secretary said it might be to do with approved suppliers.briantrumpet said:What, Gove lies?
"Gove said there were shortages of chemical reagents used for testing live cases of the virus. However, the Chemical Industries Association told ITV it was not aware
of any shortages and was contacting Gove’s office to find out what he
meant."0 -
You wonder whether implicit in that original 'herd immunity' decision is the idea that the NHS is just not well set up or funded to actually deal with it effectively, and that that is the best they can do given the circumstances.surrey_commuter said:P
Ok!!!! That is my theory for lack of preparation (indolence and stupidity are still available) though I admit I had not stretched it into a conspiracy theory that they are still sacrificing us on the altar of herd immunity.rick_chasey said:https://www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/alexwickham/uk-coronavirus-testing-explainer?__twitter_impression=true
buzzfeed offer some explanations.0 -
Not sure what the difference is between hitting pause and a standard economic downturn as effectively they amount to the same thing. A shock to the system that takes time to recover from.Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
We have managed to damage the UK economy and the only thing keeping it out of recession is Govt stimulus. For background I think that Brexit will reduce growth by 0.5% per annum forever.
C19 is (in my opinion) an onrushing economic apocalypse. If UK GDP fell by double digits I would not be surprised (but I don’t think it will)
If you take this forum as a very upmarket straw poll then people are already losing their jobs and having earnings reduced. Anybody who gets away with a pay freeze should celebrate as I would not be surprised if we all earned 20% less next year. There will be a lot of businesses not hear next year and a lot of people unemployed.
These are just my opinions and whilst I am no expert I know more than most due to what I am exposed to in different roles.
As a warning to all those in the know are battening down the hatches and are very wary of who they have exposure to.1 -
If the end date is basically 'as long as it takes' how long do you think people are going to put up with that? Especially as a lot of the rules are not well thought out. Remember how the police lost control during the London riots despite having the support of most of the public? Already, in Southern Italy (admittedly a part of the World with more than its fair share of existing problems) cracks are beginning to show: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/01/singing-stops-italy-fear-social-unrest-mount-coronavirus-lockdownrjsterry said:
Everyone would love an end date, but I think we would just be kidding ourselves. Best we can do is aim for something and review regularly. The modelling is the best guess we have but as has been shown already, you need to review and adjust as the real data arrives.nickice said:
;Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
I think it's important to put an end date on things, though. The French PM has basically said that we'll be in lockdown for as long as it takes and that's no way to obtain the consent of the population. It's important to remember that if people feel the lockdown is too strict or pointless then they won't respect it. They should really explain what the reasons for certain measures are and, most importantly, what the actual scientific evidence behind them is (at least more than 'just in case')
I'm not saying lifting everything now is a solution but people's patience will run out.0 -
I'm not expecting any income next year. I'll be pleased if it is not negative,surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what the difference is between hitting pause and a standard economic downturn as effectively they amount to the same thing. A shock to the system that takes time to recover from.Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
We have managed to damage the UK economy and the only thing keeping it out of recession is Govt stimulus. For background I think that Brexit will reduce growth by 0.5% per annum forever.
C19 is (in my opinion) an onrushing economic apocalypse. If UK GDP fell by double digits I would not be surprised (but I don’t think it will)
If you take this forum as a very upmarket straw poll then people are already losing their jobs and having earnings reduced. Anybody who gets away with a pay freeze should celebrate as I would not be surprised if we all earned 20% less next year. There will be a lot of businesses not hear next year and a lot of people unemployed.
These are just my opinions and whilst I am no expert I know more than most due to what I am exposed to in different roles.
As a warning to all those in the know are battening down the hatches and are very wary of who they have exposure to.0 -
I forsee public sector bailout and ownership being bigger and longer lasting than that following the GFC. The Tories will hate doing it, but protecting essential infrastructure including health supply chains will not be left exposed to market forces in the same way.0
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Whilst I can see merit in testing of key workers, so that they don't need to isolate themselves, and in testing samples of the population, I am still not convinced that much can be gained by testing everybody else. It's not like early medical intervention has an impact nor is it possible any more to have teams doing track and trace.
Worth noting that Korea does track and trace and isn't in lock down. The UK has chosen lock down.0 -
It is 'interesting', as you put it, now!Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
All these furloughed now are at high risk of losing their jobs as the business may not be there in 3 months time. Even if the business does survive, do you think they will be transacting as much business as before this? That means less employees needed.
Add to that businesses are driven by making a profit, and they are unlikely make this year, will cut the workforce to get back to a profit making business. Middle management and the boots on the ground at highest risk here.
Let's take restaurants. Do you think the country will return to eating out as much when this is over especially as the population is belt tightening? No, so another gap created in the economy.
We are currently in a servere contraction and once the downward spiral starts it is very hard to stop. It's not like businesses were flush with cash before this, many were surviving because of historically cheap debt.0 -
It'll be interesting from a 'normal' person's point of view. Admittedly this is probably wishful thinking but provided people don't die or lose their jobs en masse (thanks to the NHS and government schemes), interest rates stay ridiculously low, businesses remain viable and potentially house prices drop the impact might not feel as bad as previous recessions. Maybe a reward for sacrificing all our old people. I'll let the OH know, that'll take the pain out of losing her granddad at the weekend.rick_chasey said:
Current estimates recon it'll be about twice as bad as the GFC with a 4-5 year recovery.Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
So the worst since the depression.0 -
So what will happen when your patience runs out?nickice said:
If the end date is basically 'as long as it takes' how long do you think people are going to put up with that? Especially as a lot of the rules are not well thought out. Remember how the police lost control during the London riots despite having the support of most of the public? Already, in Southern Italy (admittedly a part of the World with more than its fair share of existing problems) cracks are beginning to show: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/01/singing-stops-italy-fear-social-unrest-mount-coronavirus-lockdownrjsterry said:
Everyone would love an end date, but I think we would just be kidding ourselves. Best we can do is aim for something and review regularly. The modelling is the best guess we have but as has been shown already, you need to review and adjust as the real data arrives.nickice said:
;Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
I think it's important to put an end date on things, though. The French PM has basically said that we'll be in lockdown for as long as it takes and that's no way to obtain the consent of the population. It's important to remember that if people feel the lockdown is too strict or pointless then they won't respect it. They should really explain what the reasons for certain measures are and, most importantly, what the actual scientific evidence behind them is (at least more than 'just in case')
I'm not saying lifting everything now is a solution but people's patience will run out.0 -
I think the key difference, and you'll know more than me, is the cause. Usually there is a shortage of credit and a lack of confidence. This all takes time to spread through the system.surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what the difference is between hitting pause and a standard economic downturn as effectively they amount to the same thing. A shock to the system that takes time to recover from.Jeremy.89 said:
I think the economic impact will be, to say the least, interesting. The figures will undoubtedly look very grim, but from my perspective effectively hitting pause on large sections of the world economy is quite different from a typical economic downturn. There was lots of talk that there were investments that were just waiting on clarity on brexit to go through. Well this time there are many more business and personal spending opportunities that are just waiting on lockdown ending.surrey_commuter said:
If you mean graduate recruitment schemes then you have no idea how massive the negative impact on our economy is going to be. I doubt they or football come in the top 1,000 reasons of when to reverse lockdown.Jeremy.89 said:
Graduate schemes. The premier league contributes (a lot) more to GDP than fishing, and football is pretty important socially to a massive number of people. Ultimately I think the health of the nation would be improved by some semblance of normality, even if sport is trivial...surrey_commuter said:
Not sure what grad schemes are but you are definitely over-estimating the importance of sport.Jeremy.89 said:
I don't think the straight up herd immunity policy really stands up to any scrutiny. However, I think the timings of our lockdown have worked reasonably, although we'll have to wait for a while to really know one way or the other.surrey_commuter said:
I disagree it looked terrible at the time. To misquote TBB if only they knew more than him they would have done so much better and all he had was a small box that allowed him to see two weeks into the future.rick_chasey said:In hindsight, how on earth was the gov't going to do 'herd immunity' without any testing?
The response until about March 15th in hindsight looks absolutely terrible.
I would set September up as a month to work towards for lots of things, school university grad schemes and sport.
That doesn't mean I don't think things should go on in the meantime, finishing off the Premier league behind closed doors would seem sensible, so long as the lockdown is giving results, and so long as there are plenty of anti body tests flying about.
Having said all that, I'm not keen when politicians/Toby Youngs talk about setting precise dates on these things.
At the moment we are probably hovering over whether we need a stricter lockdown before we start unwinding it which will be reversal of the previous process
How does a reversal of the previous process go? When are people who are capable of working from home going to feel happy to go back in to the office? Many employers take their duty of care pretty seriously nowadays too.
I agree that the private sector took the lead on lockdown so will not be rushed back. When you see the numbers of TFL workers not turning up it is a reminder how workshy the average British worker is.
We have managed to damage the UK economy and the only thing keeping it out of recession is Govt stimulus. For background I think that Brexit will reduce growth by 0.5% per annum forever.
C19 is (in my opinion) an onrushing economic apocalypse. If UK GDP fell by double digits I would not be surprised (but I don’t think it will)
If you take this forum as a very upmarket straw poll then people are already losing their jobs and having earnings reduced. Anybody who gets away with a pay freeze should celebrate as I would not be surprised if we all earned 20% less next year. There will be a lot of businesses not hear next year and a lot of people unemployed.
These are just my opinions and whilst I am no expert I know more than most due to what I am exposed to in different roles.
As a warning to all those in the know are battening down the hatches and are very wary of who they have exposure to.
This time around a significant amount of economic activity has immediately stopped, not because there isn't the money or (in many cases) desire to do it, but because we want to limit physical exposure to other human beings temporarily. (Further down the line there will be a shortage of money and desire of course).
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To be fair, what health system is? Who can afford to have thousands of extra ventilators in storage and, presumably, requiring ongoing maintenance and loads of spare staff trained to ICU requirements but working in other roles on a day-to-day basis just in case a 1:100 year pandemic comes along? I think the Government are doing increasingly badly on some subjects (most notably testing where they keep over-promising and under-delivering then making up excuses that are bordering on downright lies).rick_chasey said:
You wonder whether implicit in that original 'herd immunity' decision is the idea that the NHS is just not well set up or funded to actually deal with it effectively, and that that is the best they can do given the circumstances.surrey_commuter said:P
Ok!!!! That is my theory for lack of preparation (indolence and stupidity are still available) though I admit I had not stretched it into a conspiracy theory that they are still sacrificing us on the altar of herd immunity.rick_chasey said:https://www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/alexwickham/uk-coronavirus-testing-explainer?__twitter_impression=true
buzzfeed offer some explanations.
There are only a couple of countries that have reacted quicker than us and they are ones with recent history of dealing with similar epidemics locally. I liken it to when the UK has unusually heavy snowfall like 2 years ago and people complain about how we deal with it. They'll cite countries like Canada and parts of the States where that kind of weather is commonplace but ultimately we can't keep hundreds of snow ploughs and millions of tons of grit mothballed for something that happens maybe once every 10 years if that.0 -
I agree with this.TheBigBean said:Whilst I can see merit in testing of key workers, so that they don't need to isolate themselves, and in testing samples of the population, I am still not convinced that much can be gained by testing everybody else.
There is an underlying pressure behind the testing outrage that people want to know they have had it, because they think they have had the symptoms, so they the potential death, albeit very small is lifted off their shoulders
Also, imagine the advantage you will have in the job market if you can present a certificate that you have had the virus. e.g. Certified post virus *plumber can visit any home without worry, and with all the old and vulnerable out there will be able to match supply with demand via pricing his services.
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Yeah, so I think the virus may have made it's way into our household.
Mrs TWH complaining 2 days ago of a general feeling of fatigue. Nothing really more than that. No temperature. Felt like a hangover. The occasional cough.
Yesterday she felt fine, then last night the coughing became more frequent and she feels like sh1t today. Up and about, working from home but feeling ropey.
So we have to assume it is CV and the key thing for us is to delay the spread around the house and self isolate to keep it within the house.
“New York has the haircuts, London has the trousers, but Belfast has the reason!0 -
I can imagine the whingeing in respect of our 'civil rights' in the country if the Government tried to find out who we had been in contact with would be higher than those complaining about the impact the lockdown is having on our freedom.TheBigBean said:Whilst I can see merit in testing of key workers, so that they don't need to isolate themselves, and in testing samples of the population, I am still not convinced that much can be gained by testing everybody else. It's not like early medical intervention has an impact nor is it possible any more to have teams doing track and trace.
Worth noting that Korea does track and trace and isn't in lock down. The UK has chosen lock down.0
