A professor claims that UK on course for further 30,000 deaths unless Boris Johnson changes approach

[Guylan]

UK on course for further 30,000 deaths unless Boris Johnson changes approach according to a member of the non government Independent Sage Group.

Also from article:

“The UK is emerging from “our long national hibernation”, as Mr Johnson put it, with infections at a much higher level than other EU countries which are unlocking.

Independent Sage warned that:

• A “steady decline in new cases since April has stopped” – with 2,000-4,000 new infections each day.

• The test-and trace system was only catching and obtaining contacts from about one-third of people with symptoms.

• It was also failing to provide any data on how many people contacted are isolating – or how many go on to develop symptoms and get tested.”

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-coronavirus-deaths-change-course-lockdown-plan-sage-a9587541.html

I don’t understand why anyone would disagree with this statement. In every other country there is a resurgence of cases after lockdown has stopped. Why would we buck the trend?
Oh ... we’re England and an Island so that will protect us. It didn’t in March, even though we had adequate warning from January. We’re an island with very porous borders and we don’t yet have an efficient track and trace. What else is going to happen?
The government scientists cannot afford to publicly disagree with the government. They can advise but not necessarily agree with the way things go. We’ve seen a very wintry Witty and Valance recently.

our long national hibernation
except we've not been fucking hibernating, we've all been going fucking mental more like
the economy has been hibernating, the people have been suffering and getting very stressed!!

I read an interesting article today about the difference between a 'spike' and a 'wave' . It said we will most likely get localised spikes which can be brought under control. Much like the spikes in germany spilling from meat factories. It talked about how this could prevent a big 'wave' like we have just experienced. It is estimated 100,000 a day were being infected in the weeks before lockdown. I think it is unlikely it will get out of hand like that again with increased public awareness, social distancing and understanding of how it spreads etc

"I think they believe which ever scientists say the thing that suits their political purpose- or at least they cherry pick the bits that suit."

The job of the scientists is to produce information about the epidemic and what interventions they think will be likely to control the spread of Covid now based on that information.

Politicians also have to consider the effects of those interventions on the rest of people's lives, their livelihoods, their mental health, their other-than-Covid health etc. And the longterm effects. They also have to bear in mind that people need government-funded assistance now and in the future, so the government needs incoming funds. So, for politicians, it's not just a case of reducing the infection rate at all costs.

@teta

I don’t understand why anyone would disagree with this statement. In every other country there is a resurgence of cases after lockdown has stopped. Why would we buck the trend? Oh ... we’re England and an Island so that will protect us. It didn’t in March, even though we had adequate warning from January. We’re an island with very porous borders and we don’t yet have an efficient track and trace. What else is going to happen? The government scientists cannot afford to publicly disagree with the government. They can advise but not necessarily agree with the way things go. We’ve seen a very wintry Witty and Valance recently.

I don't think i have heard a single person say there will be no resurgance though? Quite the opposite. Who has said that and when? Whitty yesterday said he expects a resurgance as lockdown eases and even boris has said so. I think they hope it will be local spikes rather than countrywide. I keep hearing whack-a-mole alot.

*I'm uncomfortable with Independent SAGE.
Yes they are more knowledgeable than me.
They are also self-appointed busybodies.
You only believe Indie-SAGE instead of SAGE if either A) you prefer what Ind-SAGE are saying B) you think that the actual SAGE are compromised or incompetent.
So recipe for confirmation bias.

Who is to say the Indie-SAGE aren't just as politically compromised or incompetent or zealously agenda driven as genuine SAGE are accused of? How would I know? Seems like Ind-SAGE are just there to promote themselves even if they undermine all trust in science otherwise.

Bad taste in the mouth*

I agree with this.

The so called "Independent SAGE" are just a group of self-appointed scientists who've given themselves a fancy name. That's not to say they aren't knowledgable or to deny that what they're saying is accurate - time will tell - but it is the nature of a novel virus that much of what is being said is basically educated guesswork. The self-appointed 'independent SAGE' are probably not all that independent of their own biases and political agendas.

I wish people would stop saying the UK. In Scotland we have managed to suppress the virus well. No deaths for 2 days and hardly any infections on a daily basis. We have moved more slowly but seems to be working well

@sashagabadon

According to Johnson, no country has an app, he told Starmer this 2 days in a row!!! and Starmer naming 4 countries that have the apple/google one.
The current track and trace system won't be fully up and running for (by their own admission) many months, an app won't be either, because they pursued their own version, Apple deny they have cooperated with the UK Govt, despite Hammonds claim otherwise.

So no i don't believe they are.

Clearly I'm the only one to think that if we had 5% infections leading to ~60k deaths (from excess deaths) then we should be grateful to come out of winter with only 30k more. I doubt the UK government are deliberately trying not to get Track / Trace effective, I'm not sure what OP thinks is gong on there.

I never liked the badger killer in his own era in the role, and I'm suspicious of Independent Sage's motives, which largely seem to be attention seeking rather than being useful. Their group name is deliberately designed to mislead the public into thinking their quotes disagreeing with the government come from Sage, so I'm surprised they're allowed to use it.

@InOutofmymind - Apple/google is actually an API, not an app. Each country then needs an app to sit on top and needs to integrate it with their own track and trace plus test systems. There are issues with the API working out distance incorrectly that have been noted by many different countries; also noted have been battery draining issues leading to peoppe switching off Bluetooth or uninstalling whichever country app. Getting an app and integration sorted out shouldn't be hard and appeared to have been done for the trials in Isle of Wight, the issues seem to be whether to go ahead given the current flaws or fix them first.

doubt the UK government are deliberately trying not to get Track / Trace effective, I'm not sure what OP thinks is gong on there.

That's not the issue. The issue is that the government is incompetent.

They ignored the advice of Apple and Google, decided to go their own way, and it did not work. It didn't even slightly work according to the trials.

Oh and it cost £11 million. For nothing. No deliverable at all.

Wouldn't you interested to know who's pocket that money ended up in?

it's on my Twitter about Norn getting an App up and running very soon. I am not interested enough to understand the technical details, but seems like it's been easy enough for Norn to buy into same app as RoI.