Worried about coronavirus part 10

[GPwife2411]

Previous thread www.mumsnet.com/Talk/coronavirus/3836973-To-be-worried-about-coronavirus-part-9

updated data on this page every day at 2pm until further notice.
www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-information-for-the-public#number-of-cases

It's not just like flu www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/01/yes-it-is-worse-than-the-flu-busting-the-coronavirus-myths

Why WHO not declaring a pandemic www.newscientist.com/article/2235342-covid-19-why-wont-the-who-officially-declare-a-coronavirus-pandemic/

Worldometer www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

BNO News bnonews.com/index.php/2020/02/the-latest-coronavirus-cases/

Link to WHO report www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019

The Lancet coronavirus hub - latest research and comment www.thelancet.com/coronavirus

JAMA coronavirus research centre jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/pages/coronavirus-alert

When I say "magical thinking" I mean hearing the WHO statement that the virus "is potentially containable" and taking it to mean that the virus WILL be contained. (In the UK, anyway)

Yep, they did a good job contact tracing around a single individual who was spreading.

But we are continuing to allow people in from affected countries with no screening. How many people have returned from affected areas in Italy or Iran in the past week?

When they have to try to contact trace 10 individuals, or 20 or more, suddenly the task will get away from them. Just like it has in every other country.

I suspect so BCF.

As I say, I think it will just need ONE thing to make people panic in the UK.

A large locally transmitted cluster in a community from one of the people who has returned from Italy should do it.

That town or county will go nuts and everyone else will see it on social media and hey pesto half the country is in road rage at Morrisons.

We dont know who the 100 are, probably so the world and OH don't turn up for testing!

@FlamingoAndJohn There are 100 clinics and some hospitals testing people for Coronavirus if they present with certain symptoms as part of a pilot. I believe the point of this is to try and work out how much community transmission is going on. This is part of the reason that such high numbers are being tested in the UK compared to some other countries. I believe the plan is to extend this program if it's deemed necessary.

Due to the fact that there are 2 people in the UK where we can't trace the transmission, we can assume there are/have been some cases in the community that have not been caught. However, due to the fact there are only those 2 cases (so far), I think it's fair to assume the spread in the community is not that widespread, because we would have caught more than 2 cases- in another scenario, the pilot could have turned up 100 cases straight away, and that would be a totally different scenario.

If you compare this to e.g. the Dutch situation, where they have 18 cases from only doing about 200 tests, and they have cases of community transmission already- then I think we do have a better picture of how many cases there are in the UK.

We're also not in the same situation as the US where cases of community transmission are turning up all over a large country and we can safely assume some people aren't getting tested due to their lack of insurance cover.

I'm not saying we have the situation under control in the UK at all- but I don't think there are loads of undetected cases in people who haven't traveled/been in close contact with someone who has traveled, yet.

This week we will start to see how many people brought it back from Italy with them, and then next week we may start to see who they have passed it on to, and that will give us a picture of what we are dealing with.

If there's a sudden spike in community transmission cases, then of course this all changes.

A school in my local area has asked all children to come in 10minutes earlier to wash hands before school starts. Impressive! Wish all schools wee as hot on this. Unfortunately not my son's school.

I’ve been lurking on this thread from the beginning, lurching between growing anxiety & then moments of calm at the relaxed attitude of so many people IRL. Felt more positive from the WHO briefing today. Then the Johnson interview today just filled me with doom though, it feels like the government is just going to let it burn through the population & see who’s left standing in belief there will then be immunity.
I was forwarded this today. It’s a Conservative party thing, but massively critical of government’s response - I suspect even Johnson’s fan base are getting twitchy at current weak response. Hand washing didn’t exactly work in China, did it? Be interested in people’s thoughts on some of these conclusions esp about school closures as DH is v keen to pull our kids out of school this week, which feels like a huge step to make:
freemarketconservatives.org/the-government-needs-to-be-much-firmer-in-its-response-to-covid-19/

Im not saying or believing its contained.

I said feasible, and that it is happening.

Yes, when, when....if...and lets hope not...that a sudden community cluster soread appears, that will change things significantly.

I don't believe there's any harm in remaining optimistic about the trail of cases so far having been contained, which will peter out hopefully over time.

Im just not seeing a pattern, other than expotential increase from external sources, which I find odd.

@username just that you could live in brighton, have the virus and be refused testing or help because you were not a close contact of a confirmed case. Equally it's not as infectious as flu so maybe they do know what they're doing

@Horehound thank you for that info, puts my mind at ease.

"it will just need ONE thing to make people panic in the UK. "

Biggest impact might be if a sleb catches it
Hopefully not any of the elderly royals - that would genuinely add hysteria to the mix

Considerable discussion about whether the Pope has COVID

I see what you're saying now.

My point being that this was long enough ago now, and brighton is a very mixed cosmopolitan demographic strong london/commute links business community/international travel.

Surely if it was going to break it would have there and many would have it by now.

The UK does still have the considerable advantage of being an island

Despite the number of holidays abroad, geography still helps reduce the chances of a pandemic

@mac12 I agree with a lot of what's in that article- there are a huge amounts of unknowns at the moment. Very interesting what that article was saying about reinfections, though!

Re: Closing schools- I don't think we can use flu pandemics to model this outbreak, and using models from the 1918 flu are very outdated. They have kept schools closed for a while in South Korea, and it doesn't seem to be delaying the spread that much (although of course we can't know what would have happened if schools re-opened).

I think there is also the issue if you close schools too soon, you start getting pressure from parents to re-open them, potentially just at the wrong time.

I don't think there's a particular need to withdraw your children from school at the moment, unless they're immunosupressed or you've got some other specific reason.

I did post on a previous thread about what measures I do think the government should put in place re schools.

I do think more people, especially anyone returning from Northern Italy should be told to self-isolate, regardless of symptoms.

Despite the number of holidays abroad, geography still helps reduce the chances of a pandemic

The geography that screws us with Brexit aids us with Coronavirus.

sigh

I'm hoping the panic buying holds off until tomorrow afternoon at least.

I need to go buy milk and onion rings by order of the 5 year old.

I am eternally frustrated by the lack of spread info. The figures initially quoted were 3-4 but just how can that be, these clusters have just come to a dead halt

I don't think there's a particular need to withdraw your children from school at the moment

This.

Any pandemic is a marathon not a sprint.

It's not viable to close schools with a specific need to because of the knock on effects which could cause hardship, crucial labour shortages or even indirect deaths (through lack of child supervision for example or lack of medics)

Our society is different to those in the Far East who have closed schools.

The report today from South Korea saying nurses were quitting their jobs after running out of emergency child care was sobering.

Red and those with white want edges to leave but simultaneously didn't want to leave without a deal.

Lots and lots of variables.

I'm stocked up with loo roll to the eyeballs.

This is what I cannot understand.

I work on a site with about 2000 people.

Much travel and movement over half term to Italy etc.
One came back having travelled through Milan Airport.
Feels unwell.
111 won't test them.

????

That person came into the office for 1 day, stuffy office, close contact, close contact work. Probably came into contact with 40 that day. 28 closer quarters, less with 12 perhaps.

One of those people then feel ill, they call 111 and are told no testing because they have not been near anyone tested or a hot spot. They go home, pass onto partners, children who all start to spread whilst no symptoms. Non are allowed testing because no one has official been near anyone who has it official or a hot spot abroad... THIS is what I can't understand.

Am I going mad??

I'm confused by the high percentage of deaths in Italy.

Arghhhhhhh!!! Those who wanted to leave but not without a deal

@usernameishistory

The 3-4 are an average, and are based on the figures from China, where obviously there's a much larger sample size of patients.

At the moment, the sample size of cases in the UK is pretty small. I think we know of one case that may have affected 3 other close contacts. We may see more of this in the coming days (bear in mind it takes time to contact trace and process tests).

Just as some people are "super-spreaders", some people will spread the virus less than average. Maybe the Brighton case was someone like this. Maybe we will see more cases in Brighton over the next week or so as people start to become symptomatic.

I don't think we can describe a cluster as "coming to a dead halt" until the two weeks to show symptoms have passed.

A lot of the people being diagnosed in the UK are still people who've traveled recently. Some of them may have self-isolated straight away which would minimise the spread of the illness.

4th case of #coronavirus found in #Illinois as wife of infected man being treated at Arlington Heights hospital also tests positive.

#Coronavid19 #COVID19
t.co/aIjkenshvp

Italy has an older population

Am I going mad??

No 111 is crap. And our policy is incoherent nonsense.

I'm confused by the high percentage of deaths in Italy.

Outbreak started at a hospital. Lots of vulnerable individuals who arent representative of population as a whole were infected first.

Placeholded

@Springinsight That does sound really poor and ideally that person should have been tested.