Feeling a bit duped about the seriousness of Covid....

[mostwonderfultime]

Found out my district of 55,000 people there have been 156 confirmed covid cases since March. Now I hear there is an enquiry into the over reporting of Covid deaths in England. Average death rate has now lower than average indicating many people who died from Covid would probably died in the next month or so. No surge in Covid cases or deaths since relaxing lockdown measures (I know about Leicester, but we all know reasons why they have more cases and again they haven't had a spike in deaths).
In the meantime, the economy is screwed, Kids have been off school for months, best friends business has gone bust.

@Gwenhwyfar

"You could argue that if we'd had social distancing, working from home where possible, and banning large gatherings in February maybe we wouldn't have had to lockdown in March. There was huge community spread because there had been no measures until too late.

Compare S Korea and New Zealand."

I think we also would have needed more tests. If you know who's got it and where they are, it's easier to contain.

I think we now also know it was brought into the country over a thousand times separately rather than there being one patient zero. That won’t have helped.

Had we locked down earlier more direct deaths would have been avoided but the economic consequences could possibly have been even worse and a tanking economy definitely means deaths from other causes.

But if you look at Sweden as an example, that just isn't true - they never locked down and they've had a double whammy of high death rate and the economy has been decimated. It only doesn't feature on either the death rate list or economy lists due to how small it is. But the numbers are clear, not locking down caused BIGGER economic issues.

@mostwonderfultime

Found out my district of 55,000 people there have been 156 confirmed covid cases since March. Now I hear there is an enquiry into the over reporting of Covid deaths in England. Average death rate has now lower than average indicating many people who died from Covid would probably died in the next month or so. No surge in Covid cases or deaths since relaxing lockdown measures (I know about Leicester, but we all know reasons why they have more cases and again they haven't had a spike in deaths). In the meantime, the economy is screwed, Kids have been off school for months, best friends business has gone bust.

Can you tell me where you found that info OP as I would like to see the numbers for my district.

@ClimbDad, if the body reaction to Covid will mainly based on innate immune system, then surely, our aim should be to work on the terrain instead (as Pasteur would have said).

I’m thinking here at the studies onn thé impact of obesity, vitamin D and the fact many people are deficient in. Some. Nutrients due to our diet and the impact of. Medications.

I'm actually the opposite OP. Back in February/March I did think it was much like flu, but that's because I take flu seriously and don't pretend a mild cold is flu like so many people do.

However, I am not keen on the stories I am hearing about it having long term effects and I am more concerned about catching it now than I was in March.

"I think we now also know it was brought into the country over a thousand times separately rather than there being one patient zero. That won’t have helped."

It wasn't everywhere at the same time though was it? Even now there are geographical variations.

Perhaps it’s an England/Scotland difference in treatment
Yy I wonder this. My relative has been diagnosed with cancer and started treatment during lockdown. So is it just England that isn't diagnosing and treating cancer and other serious illnesses atm?

@etopp

You seem to be showing “true believer” syndrome... You were against lockdown when it was announced, because you thought Covid was pretty inconsequential... We then had a massive and unprecedented spike in excess deaths (see link below, very similar data exists for the U.K.), despite lockdown, but you choose to overlook it and focus only on snippets of information that supports your original view despite the clear and incontrovertible evidence to the contrary.

images.app.goo.gl/Mk4dnaRdta3WqvGRA

If you want to estimate what the U.K. would have been like had we “carried on regardless”, thinking it was only a “little flu”, try looking at Bergamo’s stats - Covid’s epicentre in Europe which reacted far too late as it spiralled out of control. Scale their 6,000 excess deaths out of a population of 1.1m and you get 350,000 deaths in the U.K.

Yet you still persist....

So is it just England that isn't diagnosing and treating cancer and other serious illnesses atm?

Must be trust dependent. We didn't stop diagnostic screening or treatment for most.

Every country near enough has locked down though (barring the horror show seen in Brazil).

Even much of Brazil took Covid seriously. If the regional governors had been like Bolsonaro, the tragedy would be many times worse.

If you want to improve the economy, you need to control the virus through appropriate measures including masks, social distancing etc (including in schools). Going 'back to normal' is going to achieve precisely the opposite and cause more economic damage.

Trying to go back completely to normal now would be the most economically stupid and irresponsible thing to do possible.

Not if you have friends who are medics, and know someone, who you worked with, and another, basically fit healthy,no underlying health issues, not old who has been in ITU vented for 13 weeks, no.

"Must be trust dependent. We didn't stop diagnostic screening or treatment for most."

Treatment for existing cancers was supposed to continue, but in some cases was delayed. If someone in still having problems with this, they should write to their elected representatives.

I think screening did stop for a while, but is back up now.

Just one comment about the 65k who died. Why did they when other countries managed to keep the number of deaths in the 100s??

Because the Government paid too much heed to those with @etopp ‘s outlook back in early March.

If they are only counted those who died within 28 days of a +ve covid test people like my cousin wouldn't be counted? He died directly of covid (no previous known health conditions and 47) but I'm sure it was longer than 28 days after the positive test that he died because he was on a ventilator for 24 days

Referrals for cancer diagnosis, treatment and other urgent symptoms where appropriate in our practice in England. Local acute providing treatment where appropriate - What has been affected may be the best approach to treatment where the risk of COVID infection and availability of ITU alters the cost benefit for patients likely to be immune-compromised after treatment. Not the NHS closing down, just recognising that some patients would be more likely to die after treatment than waiting. Seems entirely sensible to me. Haven't seen a single patient for whom the treatment decisions looked flawed in the circumstances.

Did I see M Ps getting a pay rise?

BTW the cancer issue may also include Wales along with Scotland - one of my friends had radiotherapy (entire course) during lockdown and my dad has been diagnosed with lung cancer during it (and although not having chemo it was mentioned as an option rather than you can't have it due to covid) - different trusts

@853690525d

Don't suggest the lancet isn't a reputable journal. Yes Wakefield got one over on them but it's ridiculous to knock their credibility on that basis. There are reputable journals and this is one of them. Unless you don't want to believe that for a personal agenda of your own, in which case don't bother opening the lancet or anything else.

It is nothing to do with my agenda, or a lack of respect for the Lancet, but about understanding the source of the information.

Being a reputable medical journal does not mean that they themselves have overseen, tested or checked everything they publish. There is peer review but this is not deep analysis. It is the author who is publishing, not the journal.

It is an industry paper, not designed to directly inform the public.

For example, they published the subsequently debunked research that hydroxychloroquine would cure Covid back in June. It was picked by media and the US President before they retracted it because the data was incomplete.

Being a reputable scientific journal does not mean it is an infallable source if the information is not used in the way it was intended.

My Wakefield example was one I thought tou would recognise. It also shows how papers published with can gain traction when the information is misused.

At a time when everyone is racing to get a vaccine and publishing is cruical to career advancement in medical research, there is massive incentive to rush to publish and jumping on every paper is not a good way to get accurate information.

Has anyone watched Hester's video? I got interrupted at the point when the interviewee was still asserting the lockdown was based on assertion. I'll try and complete it on principle.

At one of the WHO’s thrice-weekly press briefings Monday, Van Kerkhove noted that when health officials review cases that are initially reported to be asymptomatic, “we find out that many have really mild disease.” There are some infected people who are “truly asymptomatic,” she said, but countries that are doing detailed contact tracing are “not finding secondary transmission onward” from those cases. “It’s very rare,” she said.

Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO’s technical lead on the Covid-19 pandemic.

I'd take ignorant a million times over hysterical, btw

ONS reported this week that deaths are down on average this week by 6% which does as some substance about people who would die might die anyway.

44000 extra people died in 2015 and similar in 2000, and 2010 was 28000 so there is additional figures some years.

I don't feel duped as I made my own assessments of the risks. I do feel very angry about how the government were so slow to prepare and so slow to react and this caused the virus to circulate out of control causing thousands of unavoidable illnesses and deaths which in itself has spread fear. They failed at stocking up on PPE, Care Homes, lockdown, Testing, Track and Trace, confused messaging, it really couldn't have been handled any worse. It also meant that social distancing measures to get the virus under control had to be harsher and longer.

OP, the 40,000 excess deaths happened even though potential spreaders were locked down and unable to travel to your area. How many excesd deaths if there had been no lockdown? 200,000? What affect would that have had on the economy, public transport, schools and the NHS? Imagine laying out the bodies of 200,000 people on football pitches and you get the idea of the scale of it and of the associated grieving families. Kudos to you for living in an unaffected area.

*I'm actually the opposite OP. Back in February/March I did think it was much like flu, but that's because I take flu seriously and don't pretend a mild cold is flu like so many people do.

However, I am not keen on the stories I am hearing about it having long term effects and I am more concerned about catching it now than I was in March.*

Yeah, i'm the same there. I wasn't too concerned about catching it in March. Partly I thought we're all going to get it anyway and I thought it was like flu. However, as you say flu itself is nasty and high death rates are only avoided with annual mass vaccinations of the vulnerable (even then you still get bad flu seasons that kill a lot of people).

Because of the unknown of this virus i'm more fearful now even 4 or 5 months on from when it took off here. I don't expect to drop dead if I get it, but I don't want to be wiped out for months either, or have side effects for ages with a family to support. With the reasonable possibility of a vaccine not too far away (or at least better treatments) i'd rather bide my time for now and avoid getting it, whereas back in March when it was spreading like wildfire I was resigned to getting in and maybe feeling ill for a couple of weeks.

@Zilla1

Has anyone watched Hester's video? I got interrupted at the point when the interviewee was still asserting the lockdown was based on assertion. I'll try and complete it on principle.

Thats funny. I stopped reading your posts when you spouted that the mortality rate was 1-2%...