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These are the doctors that need to be heard!

70 replies

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 09:41

Dr Dan Erickson, Covid-19 Briefing - Bakersfield, CA

Legitimate data rather than hypothesis

Compares data from other countries

Talks about immune systems around 17 min mark

Talks about the grave consequences he’s seeing at the hospitals because of the lockdown

OP posts:
SnydeValley · 24/04/2020 12:20

Do we want to scream at the government fot not loking down soon enough, or for locking down at all?

Well, as this doctor basically pointed out (but what a lot of people are thinking) is it's a rapidly changing situation with very serious consequences and that means decisions need to be made quickly.

People were screaming for an early lockdown. I wasn't screaming, but I wasn't against it either. I saw those pictures from Italy. I read those "it's killing healthy children - china lied!!" posts.

It's very easy to get caught up in all that.

But at the same time it's also pretty easy to look at what has actually happened. To look at the figures that we actually have, and ask if there is a better way?

Right now people suggesting it might be time to come out of lockdown and move to social distancing are being shot down in flames. Selfish is a word I have seen probably 50 times in the last 24 hours. I was called a disgrace for simply saying that I disagree with "saving covid lives at any cost"

Apparently that is not an acceptable stance and we must remain in lockdown until this magical vaccine appears.

I'd like a little less emotion and a little more fact.

This video is really interesting.

Someone needs to answer for why our daily briefings don't have more of this!!

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 12:22

It's not that we shouldn't have locked down rather that when this first happened we didn't know enough to formulate a more sophisticated response, some things that we understand now are things that we can only understand in hindsight.

SnydeValley · 24/04/2020 12:26

the welfare sustem is crap, as i the health system

I find this such a strange opinion. I have a slack chat with twenty American colleagues and of course politics comes up (we now have a pandemic channel!!) they are all in agreement that while they like the UK system of not having to pay and free healthcare for all, they would choose their US hospitals over our UK ones any day. They would just rather fund it proportionally through tax. I can assure you they view us just as poorly as a lot of us view them.

Did you actually watch the video? They are experiencing the same problems we are. Non-covid wards sitting practically empty.

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 12:27

I was called a disgrace
And of course you are not a disgrace, lots of people are very upset, under a huge amount of pressure and finding it very hard to cope, impulse control is much harder at these times.
A little less emotion would be helpful but feelings are running very high🙈

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 12:29

@LastTrainEast

"A local doctor (Erickson) says we shouldn't be locked down and the local health authority say he is wrong. Therefore you think the UK should follow HIS advice?'

This doctor has reliable scientific data. He is gathering information/research from his colleagues from around the US. He is gathering data from other countries and applying these findings to his study. This is a global pandemic and we need to work together.

The UK also needs to look at the results from the US. That is what I'm saying.

OP posts:
CuriousaboutSamphire · 24/04/2020 12:35

I was called a disgrace To be fair you did say you were going to break the rules to go and give your OP a hug. That might have been the reason for the personal response!

I don't disagree with some of what you say, but sometimes the terminology (like "magical vaccine", that could very easily be turned to mean you are an avid anti vaxxer) can obscure the message. As you say, emotions are running high, people are scared, bored, confused.

Given the news overnight we should just be grateful that none of our exerts or politicians have even vaguely suggested we self inject with Dettol!

CuriousaboutSamphire · 24/04/2020 12:37

This doctor has reliable scientific data. He is gathering information/research from his colleagues from around the US. He is gathering data from other countries and applying these findings to his study. This is a global pandemic and we need to work together. And, as I and others have pointed out WE ARE! Every speaker, at least one every day, says exactly that!

The UK also needs to look at the results from the US. That is what I'm saying. And again... WE ARE! It is pointless getting worried about something not being done when it actually IS happening, we are told it is hapening, we see slides with data that show it is happening - every day!

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 12:45

Look at results from the US
Oh yeah the country where the person they elected to be in charge wants to inject people with bleach (😳🤯😂)I'm not saying those doctors are wrong but the US has a major credibility problem!

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 13:12

There were quite a few epidemiologists and doctors who said the social distancing measures that were originally put in place were enough to slow the spread. Yes, the Swedish doctors were included.

unherd.com/thepost/coming-up-epidemiologist-prof-johan-giesecke-shares-lessons-from-sweden/

When the Imperial College Model came out, who are part of SAGE, the UK did a complete U-turn. They lost their nerve. One of the reasons is because there has been such scare-mongering from the media, which then lead to a very frightened public who of course clearly embraced the lockdown. The government also panicked, were unprepared and their gut-reaction was to lockdown.

The UK government has been accused of paying too much attention to epidemiologists over other experts
www.ft.com/content/1e390ac6-7e2c-11ea-8fdb-7ec06edeef84

It's like a domino effect of knee-jerk reactions by western governments... everyone waiting to see who does what next.

New virus -> unreliable data -> fear-mongering media -> panicked public -> knee-jerk reactions by governments -> lockdown -> ?

Neil Ferguson even said the NHS will not be breached and deaths will be significantly lower than 20K(obviously that's not the case now). Point being is that he said all this 2 days after lockdown.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/25/two-thirds-patients-die-coronavirus-would-have-died-year-anyway/

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/28/neil-ferguson-scientist-convinced-boris-johnson-uk-coronavirus-lockdown-criticised/

Swiss Research has been gathering sources since March 14th. There are several articles in other languages so unsure. I'm not saying all these sources are 100% correct. However, oppositional views have been squashed since the beginning of the outbreak.

swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/#latest

Overall, I'm 90% sure we would have had a similar outcome if we had not locked down. Due to the natural progression of virus's, they peak and go down. We were doing enough social distancing before the lockdown to slow the spread and get the NHS up to speed.

Now we're in a lose-lose situation. We have thousands of deaths along with a destroyed economy, which will harm livelihoods and lives. The consequences are grave.

OP posts:
BillywilliamV · 24/04/2020 13:16

if you look hard you can generally produce something in support of your own opinionsand prejudices!

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 13:21

90% sure we would have had similar outcome if we have not locked down
1, you sound like a trump apologist
2, we may be able to discern in hindsight that lockdown may not have been the best response, but we did not have enough information at the time to point us towards any other response.
3, probably the best response would have been contact tracking and tracing but we weren't in a position to do that.

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 13:26

The only way to determine the optimal pathway through this crisis will be to analyse it after the event. Hopefully the knowledge gained will put us in a better position to deal with future similar situations.

You seem to be arguing that we should apply knowledge gained in hindsight to the situation when it first exploded, in order to do this we need a time travel machine.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 24/04/2020 14:11

Yes gods! Another who has access to a TARDIS

I'm not playing that game. I'll stick to discussing more honestly.

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 14:15

@B1rdbra1n

It is incredibly unfair to bring-in political sides. I don’t follow Trump nor do I agree with him.

Does this virus choose right or left wing? NO

What I’m saying is we now have data to begin to ease restrictions.

But like I said, there were credible epidemiologists, scientists and doctors that were pushed aside due to fear.

The UK was on the right path but they cowered to panic.

Sweden and other countries that did not lockdown stayed true to themselves and didn’t cave. But as you can see, there was and still is pressure from others saying Sweden is wrong. Saying that their population is small and their land is bigger... fine, agreed. In the end, we should have stayed the course.

This isn’t just an “oops” reaction. Millions of lives are immensely affected from this... from delayed surgeries, treatments and care... to millions of job losses... to a decline in mental and physical health of the greater population... to loss of education... to loss of livelihoods... to loneliness... to domestic abuse and violence... increased poverty and hunger... and to deaths.

OP posts:
Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 14:17

@SnydeValley

I completely agree

OP posts:
CuriousaboutSamphire · 24/04/2020 14:18

Stayed true to themselves? Huh?!

You have no idea what Sweden actually did, so you?

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 15:56

What this doctor says is correct. Let’s have an open-mind, parliament!

Across the globe, debate is raging about the best way to tackle the spread of coronavirus, with countries adopting radically different approaches in the fight against the disease.

But an Israeli professor claims all efforts will lead to the same result, because the disease is self-limiting and largely vanishes after 70 days – with or without any interventions.

Professor Isaac Ben-Israel, the head of the security studies programme at Tel Aviv University and the chairman of the National Council for Research and Development, claims his analysis proves that Covid-19 peaks at 40 days before rapidly declining.

Major General Ben-Israel, who was also head of the analysis and assessment division of the Israeli Air Force Intelligence Directorate and former chief Cybernetics adviser to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, claims shutting down major economies is having devastating consequences for little gain.

His calculations show that the pattern of daily new infections as a percentage of accumulated number of infections starts at around 30 per cent, but decreases to 10 per cent after six weeks, and ultimately reached a level of less than five per cent a week later.

...

Based on the new data, the team at Tel Aviv University has called on the Israeli government to start a phased lifting of its restrictions while keeping social distancing in place. "Given that the evidence reveals that the corona disease declines even without a complete lockdown, it is recommendable to reverse the current policy and remove the lockdown," the researchers said.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/23/coronavirus-dies-within-70-days-no-matter-tackle-claims-professor/amp/

OP posts:
Ormally · 24/04/2020 16:32

To those pinning their hopes on testing and tracing; yes, it does appear that this is best practice, but I can't say I have a lot of faith in the UK taking this on as a leading strategy for all, either due to costs, reliability or availability. Surely if they are prioritising NHS and care workers (which I thought they were), these sections of society would both have to have priority and potentially be back to test multiple times as there is no guarantee you would remain negative a week later if in contact with known cases?
I remember reading an account (possibly on here) of someone in China who had taken an elderly relative with symptoms in for testing - the drill described was that the man had to have 3 tests a week apart each time and only 2 and 3 were positive (so the first would not have given an accurate result). Whole household were then locked down away from their residence in separate hotel rooms with food left by their doors - even their dog sent to a 'quarantine kennels', again away from the house for the same amount of time.
I suspect that test and trace may be being saved for a point in the future - maybe distant - when there are more likely manageable population numbers to try it effectively.

Ormally · 24/04/2020 16:38

By 'manageable population numbers' I mean when the spread and ICU case numbers are down to much lower levels than now.

B1rdbra1n · 24/04/2020 16:47

It is incredibly unfair to bring-in political sides
my apologies for hurting your feelings Flowers
So, the dr's talk about how the immune system is built from exposure to viruses, yes exposure to microbes does play a key role in the development of immunity but then go on to use this as a justification for letting the virus run it's course!
I dont think the conclusion follows from the premise and I think these drs are also spin drs

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 17:05

@B1rda1n

No problemFlowers

I think the doctors are saying in general this is how our immune systems are built-up over time.

From what I gather, he’s saying we can’t escape Covid. It’s spreading far too fast and far too wide. Forcing people and families into their homes only brings the virus in with them. He agrees that the vulnerable should shelter in place.

OP posts:
Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 17:08

@Ormally

I know. Not testing hospital staff is horrendous. I thought care homes would have been most protected first given the fact that the elderly, especially those with co-morbidities would have lethal consequences.

OP posts:
RainMustFall · 24/04/2020 19:03

Lucky Trump is listening to his scientist

I am assuming it's not his scientist who told Trump to broadcast that people can beat the virus by injecting disinfectant/bleach.

Whatever doctors are doing in the US at the moment, I hope they don't have to treat a deluge of Trump supporters who followed his advice.

Mumlove5 · 24/04/2020 20:25

God, I hope not.

OP posts:
TiddyTid · 25/04/2020 11:17

Thanks for sharing OP. I'm finding I'm agreeing with them. And a briefing that makes sense, unlike our repetitive slogan throwing non answered crap ones!

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