Worried about coronavirus thread 22

[ofwarren]

@usernameishistory is busy and asked me to start a new thread.

Please see post 21 for more information about coronavirus.

[Edited by MNHQ at OP's request]

MH seemed so uncertain and shifty, I did wonder if he basically knows his advice is about to be out of date and he was having difficulty keeping the current party line.

The debate in the Houses of Parliament seemed so archaic and crap basically, nothing robust about it. All dodging the question and so much self-love. I know they are normally like that, but it's awful to see the tone it strikes when everyone is facing a pandemic head on and they are the ones in charge.

British holidaymakers have been urged to get travel insurance as soon as possible after one of the biggest providers withdrew sales t.co/QSMWnxiczP
The telegraph

www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/who-gets-hospital-bed/607807/
The Extraordinary Decisions Facing Italian Doctors
There are now simply too many patients for each one of them to receive adequate care.

Today, Italy has 10,149 cases of the coronavirus. There are now simply too many patients for each one of them to receive adequate care. Doctors and nurses are unable to tend to everybody. They lack machines to ventilate all those gasping for air.

Now the Italian College of Anesthesia, Analgesia, Resuscitation and Intensive Care (SIAARTI) has published guidelines for the criteria that doctors and nurses should follow in these extraordinary circumstances. The document begins by likening the moral choices facing Italian doctors to the forms of wartime triage that are required in the field of “catastrophe medicine.” Instead of providing intensive care to all patients who need it, its authors suggest, it is becoming necessary to follow “the most widely shared criteria regarding distributive justice and the appropriate allocation of limited health resources.”

The principle they settle upon is utilitarian. “Informed by the principle of maximizing benefits for the largest number,” they suggest that “the allocation criteria need to guarantee that those patients with the highest chance of therapeutic success will retain access to intensive care.”

The authors, who are medical doctors, then deduce a set of concrete recommendations for how to manage these impossible choices, including this: “It may become necessary to establish an age limit for access to intensive care.”

Those who are too old to have a high likelihood of recovery, or who have too low a number of “life-years” left even if they should survive, will be left to die. This sounds cruel, but the alternative, the document argues, is no better. “In case of a total saturation of resources, maintaining the criterion of ‘first come, first served’ would amount to a decision to exclude late-arriving patients from access to intensive care.”

In addition to age, doctors and nurses are also told to take a patient’s overall state of health into account: “The presence of comorbidities needs to be carefully evaluated.” This is in part because early studies of the virus seem to suggest that patients with serious preexisting health conditions are significantly more likely to die. But it is also because patients in a worse state of overall health could require a greater share of scarce resources to survive: “What might be a relatively short treatment course in healthier people could be longer and more resource-consuming in the case of older or more fragile patients.”

These guidelines apply even to patients who require intensive care for reasons other than the coronavirus, because they too make demands on the same scarce medical resources. As the document clarifies, “These criteria apply to all patients in intensive care, not just those infected with CoVid-19.”

We are getting hints from our local authority that by next Wednesday there will be school closures. North West London Borough. In the meantime there are schools here that have confirmed cases but remain open?? Dont know why next Wednesday is the chosen date though.

MangePasTesOnglesVilain true, I did say that. The more out of step we are with other countries, the larger my belief is that the "science" they are referring to is cherry picked to meet pre-ordained conclusions (or worse, non-existent).

Hi,

I've been following these threads from the beginning along with various twitter accounts of epidemiologists and virologists, as well as flutrackers and BNO. These are mostly from USA, Europe and Australia.

I'd like to know if you could recommend similar accounts to follow but based in the UK. I don't seem to be able to find much specific to our region.

Also, thanks to everyone constantly updating this thread. Somehow it's been reassuring to pop on here and see the info and read about peoples' thoughts. Even the bickering, as in real life I've experienced the two opposite end of the spectrum on how serious the virus may be. I've been alarmed since January but even my husband is only now getting on board with it all!

@nellodee Probably not what you are looking for - but there is loads of data about timings here github.com/midas-network/COVID-19/tree/master/parameter_estimates/2019_novel_coronavirus

RedToothBrush, that's grim reading.

www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/emilyashton/coronavirus-delay-phase?bftwnews=&utm_term=4ldqpgc&__twitter_impression=true
Britain Is Stepping Up Its Fight To Slow The Spread Of Coronavirus
Boris Johnson will chair a Cobra emergency committee meeting on Thursday where it's expected the response will be escalated to the "delay" stage.

It is not clear at this stage what this will mean in terms of new guidance and "social distancing" measures, but it is likely it will be targeted at elderly people and those with underlying health conditions who are most at risk from the virus.

And

One cabinet minister, not yet named, and junior health minister Edward Argar are self-isolating in case they have the virus; it comes after health minister Nadine Dorries became the first MP to contract the disease.

And

It is expected that the UK government will soon advise people who have only mild flu-like symptoms to stay at home for seven days. At present, that medical advice only stands for those with severe symptoms of flu.

Medical experts could also advise elderly people and those with chronic health conditions to take precautions and better protect themselves, for example by avoiding large crowds.

But the government has said there is no scientific basis on which to start cancelling big sports events and public gatherings, or close down schools. The UK's approach contrasts with the draconian measures taken by countries such as Italy, the worst-hit nation in Europe, which has ordered the whole population into lockdown and shut down bars, restaurants and most stores.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to chair Cobra meeting tomorrow afternoon and the decision is expected to move to the "delay phase" of the coronavirus outbreak
Sky breaking news

mobile.twitter.com/10DowningStreet/status/1237760980450451456

Nellodee

Sorry for stalkerish memory. I can remember stuff like that but forget to let the dog back in...

Unfortunately I can't remember that paper with the recovering then deteriorating patient although there is a reference in the New Yorker to a patient like that,

But what if those who are vulnerable have dc in school? How can they isolate if LA don't relax attendance fines?

Yes, I’m interested to know who the minister is but got the impression it was due to seeing Nadine Doris, not because they actually have coronavirus.

Saudi Arabia reports 24 new cases of coronavirus, more than doubling the country's total to 45 cases t.co/eUoE2b20hL
BNO NEWSROOM

amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/11/disease-dodging-worried-wealthy-jet-off-to-disaster-bunkers?__twitter_impression=true
Super-rich jet off to disaster bunkers amid coronavirus outbreak
‘Self isolate’ for some of world’s richest means Covid-19 tests abroad, personal medics and subterranean hideouts

Many are understood to be taking personal doctors or nurses on their flights to treat them and their families in the event that they become infected. The wealthy are also besieging doctors in private clinics in Harley Street, London, and across the world, demanding private coronavirus tests.

And

Mark Ali, chief executive and medical director of the Private Harley Street Clinic, said: “This has led to huge demand from very wealthy people asking if they can pay for private testing. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer testing, as the NHS has said all tests should be done centrally.” The Department of Health and Social Care has mandated that all tests must be carried out by the NHS and Public Health England (PHE).

However, an employee at another Harley Street practice, who declined to be named, said their clinic had arranged for concerned clients to be tested in other countries, or for samples to be sent abroad for testing.

We also have some real quacks cashing in with unscientific bollocks treatment

Ali said his clinic was also offering the worried wealthy an intravenous infusion of vitamins and minerals to boost their immune systems. “We know that 90% of adults have a deficiency in vitamins – what better to improve that than an IV immune boost? An intravenous infusion ensures instant and optimal delivery of these nutrients to the body’s cells and the nutrients should include vitamins such as vitamin C, vitamin B12 complex, glutathione, zinc and essential amino acids such as arginine, taurine, lysine and citrulline.” The treatment costs £350.

Worth a read

Here’s what I’m going to cover in this article, with lots of charts, data and models with plenty of sources:
How many cases of coronavirus will there be in your area?
What will happen when these cases materialize?
What should you do?
When?

medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-act-today-or-people-will-die-f4d3d9cd99ca

I think you have to have confidence now that enough people will have their children off, the schools will not be able to chase them, and Matt Hancock did say that he would relax Ofsted targets (one of the only things he did confirm). So, if I had an immune compromised or child with asthma, or a vulnerable adult at home, I would pull them or at the very least get someone else to take them there to minimise social contact at pick up. Ultimately, as someone else said, we all have to take our own decisions that we can live with.

Rocketmam have you spoken to the school?

Perhaps they can authorise it as ‘exceptional circumstances’.

I'm on a Facebook group of people who've pulled their kids because of coronavirus. There are 700 members.
I totally deregistered rather than have the hassle.

@windexworksforeverything

mobile.twitter.com/devisridhar

American, but currently a prof at Edinburgh University Medical School.

Coronavirus: UK action plan poised for 'social distancing' phase t.co/rOIDv9erKi
The guardian

www.itv.com/news/2020-03-11/italy-doctors-coronavirus-covid-19-quarantine-milan-health/
'Healthcare on brink of collapsing': Doctors share stories from inside the Italy coronavirus quarantine

The first identifies herself as Martina, but I believe she is Martina Crivellari, an intensive care cardiac anaesthesiologist at the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan.

She said: "There are a lot of young people in our Intensive Care Units (ICUs) - our youngest is a 38-year-old who had had no comorbidities (underlying health problems).

"A lot of patients need help with breathing but there are not enough ventilators.

"They've told us that starting from now we'll have to choose who to intubate - priority will go to the young or those without comorbidities.

"At Niguarda, the other big hospital in Milan, they are not intubating anyone over 60, which is really, really young."

She added: "This virus is so infectious that the only way to avoid a 'massacre' is to have the least number possible getting infected over the longest possible timescale.

"Right now, if we get 10,000 people in Italy in need of ventilators - when we only have 3,000 in the country - 7,000 people will die.

And

"We've had no critical cases among children but with children, viruses are much less aggressive - think chickenpox or measles.

"But the very young are crazy carriers.

"A child with no symptoms will go to visit its grandparents, and basically kill them. So it’s essential to avoid contact between them".

And

The other voice on the recording is a male doctor who we have so far not been able to identify, except that he works at Niguarda Hospital in Milan, one of the biggest in the city.

And

"All the resuscitation bays are full. They’re having to triage, deciding who to intubate and who to let die."

He added: "You have no idea how many young people are here, I mean even 20-year-olds with no underlying conditions, in need of assisted breathing because of horrible pneumonia.

Perhaps they are looking at school closures only in certain areas (London?) That would explain why some schools seem to be indicating it may happen, while others haven't heard anything...

I've effectively missed an entire thread, in the last 4 hours.

It doesn't seem as though anything new/different is happening though!