To think Prof Chris Whitty deserves a knighthood

[Lemonwoe]

For his dedication to the country for the past 18 months.

I also secretly find him a bit attractive: reckon it’s his humble intelligence

@TableFlowerss

Yes, you’re right, there were so many people with covid that the hospitals clearly couldn’t cope. They were full to capacity.

So my question is, what do you think they should have done, if someone tested positive, keep them in hospital until their symptoms appeared? then decline someone else treatment for covid? Because there wasn’t an infinite number of beds etc...

So you believe sending them into a CH setting, with almost no infection control, whilst telling CH's there was little to no risk for them or staff was a good idea? Because thats what happened, this advice to CH stayed on the NHS England site into late April.

Whitty supported or came up with this solution, the idea was to stop the NHS being overwhelmed.

They kept the worst of CV in the Nov/Dec/Jan wave out of CHs, so why wasn't that done earlier?

NOA has already criticised Govt for lack of preparedness for a pandemic, as has their most (former) advisor.

Lets wait and see what any public inquiry says before people get given gongs.

At the point he recommended no testing there were no tests that were reliable or cheap enough to be used in the numbers that were needed.

That doesn’t excuse decanting hospital patients into care homes crammed full of the people most likely to die.

Late to the party but proper lolling at LaurieFairyCake

And yes to the knighthood.

@Blossomtoes

At the point he recommended no testing there were no tests that were reliable or cheap enough to be used in the numbers that were needed.

That doesn’t excuse decanting hospital patients into care homes crammed full of the people most likely to die.

Was that his fault was it?

@Blossomtoes

At the point he recommended no testing there were no tests that were reliable or cheap enough to be used in the numbers that were needed.

That doesn’t excuse decanting hospital patients into care homes crammed full of the people most likely to die.

I don't remember saying or thinking that it did!

That isn't how discussions go, you know? Get a response to A and B then insist that doesn't answer C!

But, to answer C, maybe the voice of someone who was there will be heard

www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2334

@Blossomtoes when my DF was in hospital after a fall and very ill with cancer (pre COVID) they were very keen to move him somewhere as soon as possible. Not just because he was taking up a bed but because, ironically, hospital is not always the best place to be when ill and he was much more likely to go downhill when there. Unfortunately they didn’t move him in time and he did in fact die in hospital.

I assume they were using the same reasoning, with the limited information/equipment they had at the time.

Also was it seen as an airborne virus at the time? The emphasis certainly seemed to be more about surfaces, whereas ventilation is now seen as key.

Was that his fault was it?

Given that it was on his advice, yes.

@Blossomtoes

Was that his fault was it?

Given that it was on his advice, yes.

So chris whitty, who has no power in parliament, said 'send all of the infected elderly into care homes' so everyone did. Sure

PHE, NHS, CMO and others all fed into the decision and have said that it was based on information that we now know was lacking and was slow to change once data started comng through.

Like a lot of other decisions made back then we can see just how and why they were wrong. That information will feed into the next pandemic plan.

That was kown and publicy said by the Public Accounts Committee LAST SUMMER! When more money, procedures , tests etc were made available across the sector.

It is no more a static situation now than it was then! No less novel.

PHE, NHS, CMO and others all fed into the decision and have said that it was based on information that we now know was lacking and was slow to change once data started comng through

Like a lot of other decisions made back then we can see just how and why they were wrong. That information will feed into the next pandemic plan

Basic infection control and tracing methods have been known about and practiced very successfully for at least 100years, certainly since the Cholera outbreaks, traced to a water pump.

Govt didn't follow this, to keep the elderly in hospital would have led to the NHS publicly being overwhelmed, so get the "bed blockers" out into privately run CH's, where there is no prying journalists.

UK wasn't unique in doing this but when it comes to Whitty, he was complicit so shouldn't get a knighthood.

FFS! Just stop it!

You can't follow age old procedures if you can't isolate the infection efficiently enough to formulate a test for it.

You can't test, track or trace if you don't know what you are looking for. That we could so soon is bloody miracle, on top of the one that gave us multiple vaccines so quickly.

That and the logistic of it. Such short memories that can't remember why tests etc coudn't be had... lack of all the constituent ingredients, from cotton swabs to glass vials, let alone the chemicals required.

And yes, 'bed blockers' were sent home. What would you prefer? That someone else whocould have been saved by ICU intervention died because a recovering peron was being kept in because their home might have been a risk? That at a time when asymptomatic infection was globally underestimated.

There have been many mistakes made during covid. But focusing on ones that had no immediate remedy, that were remedied once the immediate issues were fixed, is ludicrous!

You can't follow age old procedures if you can't isolate the infection efficiently enough to formulate a test for it.

And yet they managed it in Eyam over 300 years ago ...

@EgonSpengler2020

A year ago I would have agreed but after the revelations about the government using deliberate psychological tactics to scare the population into compliance I don't think any of them deserve commendation. He is a health professional first and foremost and should be calling out this kinds of unethical practice, which I have no doubt he was aware of.

I agree with this.

@Blossomtoes

You can't follow age old procedures if you can't isolate the infection efficiently enough to formulate a test for it.

And yet they managed it in Eyam over 300 years ago ...

WTF? They isolated covid19 300 years ago?

Disingenuous @CuriousaboutSamphire. You’re better than that.

Oh! You mean physical isolation. I meant identify and isolate the virus itself!

The science you need to be able formulate a test for it.

@Blossomtoes

Disingenuous *@CuriousaboutSamphire*. You’re better than that.

No, you misinderstood!

But thanks for the compliment

He has simply been doing his job.

As CMO, you have to assume that something like covid will come up sometime. It's been said in the media for years that we would have a pandemic at sometime, as diseases mutate and evolve, so it wil have been in his job description to cover such an eventuality.

Love Chris Whitty! Gentle, humble and clever. If it ever comes out he's into bondage and uses prostitutes I will be very upset 😂

@TurquoiseDragon

He has simply been doing his job.

As CMO, you have to assume that something like covid will come up sometime. It's been said in the media for years that we would have a pandemic at sometime, as diseases mutate and evolve, so it wil have been in his job description to cover such an eventuality.

Probably right at the top, given that the WHO has highlighted it as the top risk for donkeys’ years.

All he’s done is his job.

True, but the same goes for most people who get knighthoods.

@TheVolturi

Love Chris Whitty! Gentle, humble and clever. If it ever comes out he's into bondage and uses prostitutes I will be very upset 😂

😂

agree with you OP

All because it is in the job description doesn't necessarily mean you will have to deal with it. If the WHO have been highlighting it for donkey's years a number of CMOs have got away with not having to deal with something on such a scale.

I remember watching a dramatisation of the Salisbury poisonings and how the local director of public health had to deal with that. Again it was possibly somewhere in the job description but I bet they never thought they would have to deal with something like that.