Some graphs illustrating why UK should probably wait a few more weeks to lift any lockdown measures.

[Guylan]

Firstly, I know the UK can’t stay lockdown forever, but I think there is a good argument that the number of cases need to be a bit lower before significantly lifting lockdown measures especially as the testing, tracing and isolating system is not ready yet.

Some other European countries had their peak a bit earlier than the UK so their daily cases are now lower and they can start to ease lockdown measures. This screenshot shows the number of daily cases amongst various European countries.

This petition - not asking anyone to sign - gives some useful info on how Johnson’s govt are still not following WHO advice. www.change.org/p/uk-government-the-uk-government-must-follow-who-advice-on-dealing-with-covid-19?recruiter=1084796503&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=share_petition&utm_term=share_petition

I fear UK locked down that bit too late and now are in danger of lifting measures that bit too early.

[Guylan]

follow this guy on Twitter and his graphs show the infection rate is dropping due to the fact we are testing much more.

There is no argument the cases are dropping and as we test more that will help with getting a better picture of case rate, though obviously still need much more testing to do that, but the argument is UK need just a few more weeks at this level until going onto the next step.

[Guylan]

@Birdiefriendreturns, no argument deaths are dropping but there not low enough quite yet. Also the NHS England data II believe is just for hospital deaths and don’t include community deaths.

[BirdieFriendReturns]

The petition is going really well so far. I’m sure they’ll be debating that in parliament tomorrow.

[FourTeaFallOut]

Apparently you are meant to close your ears and your eyes to the facts in front of your nose and 'be brave'. They seem to think it is the stoical thing to do but from my perspective it looks like learned helplessness. The 'be brave' posters seem to think that nothing we do will make a difference and so we should 'take it on the chin'. Yet we have perfectly good evidence that with a good push we could reduce the community cases further to allow for a more effective track, trace and isolate approach.

[nellodee]

Will we have the test and trace program ready to go, though?

[FourTeaFallOut]

For it to work effectively you need low community cases. It might work well in some parts of the country. Other parts are being dragged along in a London time table and all the more vulnerable for it. There are places in the North East and the North West where there has been an uptick in cases and the r0 is .85.

[FourTeaFallOut]

But then yes, I do think we'll be able to make it work.

[HotPinkLilies]

The problem is that the lockdown was never a proper lockdown. After two weeks of it people got fed up and started taking the piss. You don't get that kind of behaviour in many other countries. It should have been a police enforced lockdown. We're never going to get a handle on it at this rate.

[LilyPond2]

covid.joinzoe.com/data
Has anyone else become an avid follower of the maps generated by the JoinZoe app? The good news is that there has been a sharp fall in cases since lockdown was introduced, but depressingly today there is a clear trend of cases rising in much of the country. I think it's madness to extend school opening in areas where there is strong evidence that infection rates are rising (eg large parts of the Midlands at present). The government should be realistic about the fact that infection rates differ significantly between areas, and should have more sophisticated school opening plans, eg I'd be open minded about a cautious reopening of schools in carefully selected areas of South West England, but at the moment, reopening of schools in (for example) Birmingham is clearly a bad idea.

[JimMaxwellantheshippingforcast]

I suppose the good thing about Zoe is that if you report symptoms you now get offered a test, whereas before you just had to isolate yourself

[LilyPond2]

I don't think everyone reporting symptoms on Zoe gets offered a test. My understanding is that they only pick a sample of people reporting new symptoms.