36 COVID fatalities reported today. We are on the way out of this 🌟🌟

[Jkslays]

36 reported fatalities today (weekend caveat), the lowest number since the day before lockdown was announced. 77 & 115 the last two Sundays for comparison

Mercifully, the human toll of this crisis is easing

I'm hopeful the trends will continue to improve

As reported by Professor Karol Sikora on Twitter

This is amazing news and surely our schools should be able to open as normal come September!

So number of deaths reported today fell from 286 last week to 233 this week - so a fall of 20% from same date last week. That shows a good trend. It does still mean we are probably another month off from being at a consistently very low level but positive. And goes to show that lots of the things that were expected to lead to a second wave so far have not done so.

Tell us why it's a reason for gloom

I'm on standby too!

@HesterShaw1

Yes it's all over the news www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-53061281

Tell us why it's a reason for gloom.

Because you need to look at the whole study, not just a headline, because it's useful in the treatment of cytokine storm, which isn't the only serious effect of Covid, because, according to the article had it been used from the start 5000 lives would have been saved - which is means that between 40,000 and 60,000 people (depending on what figures you use) would have still died with no drug treatment available to help them.

So yes, it's a breakthrough but it isn't the key to turning this into a treatable disease.

Yes, I read the article too FFS. Other people besides your good self know what a cytokine storm is.

Believe it or not, people are not thinking "Hurray! There's a cure!"

They are acknowledging a positive development.

Now go and piss on your own chips instead of constantly doing it to everyone else.

So yes, it's a breakthrough but it isn't the key to turning this into a treatable disease

So although it's shown potential to save as many as a third of those on ventilators and a fifth of those on oxygen, it's not actually treating the disease?

You're starting to sound like a parody at this stage.

You asked me to give my opinion - I did.

I just choose to be realistic about these developments, rather than a Pollyanna.

So although it's shown potential to save as many as a third of those on ventilators and a fifth of those on oxygen, it's not actually treating the disease?

It depends on how you look at it doesn't it?

It may have saved 5000 people. I think that 40,000 people dying is terrible. The fact that 5000 might have been saved doesn't make me think a celebration is in order, no.

Is the new definition of "being a Pollyanna" someone who can acknowledge positive developments?

It depends on how you look at it doesn't it?

No not really. If thousands of lives could be saved, then the disease has been treated. Unless you have a different definition of 'treated' which doesn't actually involve saving lives?

It may have saved 5000 people. I think that 40,000 people dying is terrible. The fact that 5000 might have been saved doesn't make me think a celebration is in order, no

Oh give over with your strawman arguments about 'Pollyannas' and 'celebrating'. A cheap, safe, readily available drug has been shown to significantly improve survival rates. Anyone who isn't actually determined to wallow in doom and gloom would see that as a positive thing.

Be miserable if you want. It doesn't make you 'realistic' or clever. It just makes you miserable.

This medication is widely available and cheap. There are people being infected with Covid across the world, India and Brazil are seeing rising cases. This could save lives everywhere. Why can't you see the positivity in that?

Hearhoovesthinkzebras I’m honestly not having a dig and it’s a genuine question, are you depressed. I have a relative who is depressed and they have a very similar out look on life

hearhooves you remind me of my husbands great Aunt. There is no situation so good she can't find a negative comment to make.

No not really. If thousands of lives could be saved, then the disease has been treated. Unless you have a different definition of 'treated' which doesn't actually involve saving lives?

The disease hasn't been treated though. We've had what, nearly 300,000 cases in the UK and, depending on figures, between 40,000 and 60,000 deaths.

They estimate that 5000 deaths could have been prevented, so possibly around 10% of deaths.

How many serious complications could it prevent? So not deaths, but long term, life altering complications in people facing severe lung, heart, kidney, liver, brain damage for example?

If it can minimise infection, prevent complications and deaths then it's a treatment.

@cathyandclare

This medication is widely available and cheap. There are people being infected with Covid across the world, India and Brazil are seeing rising cases. This could save lives everywhere. Why can't you see the positivity in that?

Because it appears to be useful in specific circumstances and to treat one complication of Covid.

As has been said on MN so many times, death is not the only serious outcome. It's not binary - dead or fine.

Many people are surviving this but are left with serious long term health complications and organ damage - does this have any affect on that?

The disease hasn't been treated though. We've had what, nearly 300,000 cases in the UK and, depending on figures, between 40,000 and 60,000 deaths.

Yes we know that. You don't need to keep repeating it every post. Really, you don't. However, happily a drug has been found to significantly increase survival rates. That's a good thing, isn't it?

Isn't it?

How many serious complications could it prevent? So not deaths, but long term, life altering complications in people facing severe lung, heart, kidney, liver, brain damage for example?

FFS. A cheap, safe, easily available drug has been found to save lives. Now you're whining that it's useless because it hasn't been shown to prevent complications which occur in a minority of cases.

If it can minimise infection, prevent complications and deaths then it's a treatment

You just made up that 'definition' because the thought of any good news at all seems to trouble you.

Do you have such a sour attitude to everything in life, or just this?

@Jkslays

Hearhoovesthinkzebras I’m honestly not having a dig and it’s a genuine question, are you depressed. I have a relative who is depressed and they have a very similar out look on life

Nope, not depressed. Just able to apply critical analysis to a subject rather than blindly seizing a headline and accepting it without looking deeper and understanding the full picture.

This is exactly the same as people who have seized on the headline about vaccines and the autumn and who are utterly convinced that it will be available this autumn because it said so in a headline.

These are green shoots. They may, or may not, grow into something. We have to watch and wait. That's not pessimism, that's realism.

Obviously you aren't ready for that conversation.

Nope, not depressed. Just able to apply critical analysis to a subject rather than blindly seizing a headline and accepting it without looking deeper and understanding the full picture

So basically, anyone not seized with doom and gloom is incapable of 'critical analysis'?

So I guess the extremely well-qualified doctors leading the study lack the expertise and 'critical analysis' of Hearhoovesthinkzebras?

*Peter Horby, professor of emerging infectious diseases in the Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, and one of the chief investigators for the trial, described it as “an extremely welcome result”.

“This is the only drug that has so far shown to reduce mortality, and it reduces it significantly. It is a major breakthrough, I think,” he said.

Martin Landray, professor of medicine and epidemiology at the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, was also one of the chief investigators.

He said: “Covid-19 is a global disease – it is fantastic that the first treatment demonstrated to reduce mortality is one that is instantly available and affordable worldwide.”

Prof Landray added: “It’s been around for probably 60 years.

“It costs in the order of £5, £5 for a complete course of treatment in the NHS, and substantially less – probably less than one dollar – in other parts of the world, for example in India.”

Prof Horby said: “The survival benefit is clear and large in those patients who are sick enough to require oxygen treatment, so dexamethasone should now become standard of care in these patients.”*

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras

[quote Jkslays]
Hearhoovesthinkzebras I’m honestly not having a dig and it’s a genuine question, are you depressed. I have a relative who is depressed and they have a very similar out look on life

Nope, not depressed. Just able to apply critical analysis to a subject rather than blindly seizing a headline and accepting it without looking deeper and understanding the full picture.

This is exactly the same as people who have seized on the headline about vaccines and the autumn and who are utterly convinced that it will be available this autumn because it said so in a headline.

These are green shoots. They may, or may not, grow into something. We have to watch and wait. That's not pessimism, that's realism.

Obviously you aren't ready for that conversation.[/quote]
It’s not a head line. The chief medical officer for the UK is praising it. Because it’s positive news.

I could kind of understand where you were coming from if you were depressed but your not and you clearly like sucking the joy out of a room.

What are you getting out of this thread? What keeps you coming back?

If it can minimise infection, prevent complications and deaths then it's a treatment

Actually it's a treatment if it can do any of those. This has been shown to reduce deaths and improve respiratory function. They've announced the results at an early stage because they're so significant they need to be reported. It will require long term follow up to ascertain whether it reduces morbidity.

Although reducing deaths is a good first step.

Although reducing deaths is a good first step

You'd think so, wouldn't you?

There is no news that these people will acknowledge as positive without sticking some sour quip on the end. Unless you could jump into a time machine and lockdown a month earlier and even then they’d fine something to moan about.

It’s interesting because the shielded people that I have in my life as so much more realistic and accepting of making amendments to their life to bring pleasure. They go for walks at times when the roads: pavements are quieter and meet friends at a distance because they realise from 2 or 3m apart then they know the risks are tiny.

It’s not a head line. The chief medical officer for the UK is praising it. Because it’s positive news.

Yes Patrick Valance has just said for every 8 patients in ITU 1 life will be saved, so it is a step in the right direction.

Well I am a doom sayer (about everything generally! Childhood trauma makes me see the worst!) and even I am a little bit excited about today’s news.

I don’t want to get too excited in case of a second wave but bloody hell some good news finally!

It’s interesting because the shielded people that I have in my life as so much more realistic and accepting of making amendments to their life to bring pleasure. They go for walks at times when the roads: pavements are quieter and meet friends at a distance because they realise from 2 or 3m apart then they know the risks are tiny.

Isn't it amazing, almost as though "the shielded" are a group of individuals rather one homogeneous group who all act and think the same.

I'm choosing to follow the guidelines given to me. If other people think they can bend them or adapt them then that's their choice but they aren't actually shielding in that case.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras

It’s interesting because the shielded people that I have in my life as so much more realistic and accepting of making amendments to their life to bring pleasure. They go for walks at times when the roads: pavements are quieter and meet friends at a distance because they realise from 2 or 3m apart then they know the risks are tiny.

Isn't it amazing, almost as though "the shielded" are a group of individuals rather one homogeneous group who all act and think the same.

I'm choosing to follow the guidelines given to me. If other people think they can bend them or adapt them then that's their choice but they aren't actually shielding in that case.

She didn’t say that. She said the sheilded people that she knew.

This is/was trying to be a positive thread. Why are you here? Why do you keep coming back to it like a dementor?