Why isn’t this information getting more air time?

[Floralapron]

I heard on the radio earlier that when infections in Leicester rose, the hospital admissions and deaths didn’t.
Surely this information should be made more of? I’m confused!

I wondered this too op. I thought lockdown was supposed to be about making sure the NHS isn't overwhelmed. Hospitals are not at capacity, death rates haven't increased. The increased infections registered are due to increased testing.

@FluffyKittensinabasket

In England, the number of people in hospital with the virus continues to drop. It's now 769, a month ago it was over 2000.

There are 68 patients in mechanical ventilation beds, a month ago it was over 200

My doctor friend (working with covid patients) said this to me a couple of days ago. She said it seems like the virulence is dropping but too soon to be certain, of course.

So that's 0.6% don't survive - equates to 40,000 of the uk's population of 66 million. Given cso are looking at more than 64,000 excess deaths we're 50% higher than the WHO average.

To put this in context, it means that in 6 months covid has killed almost as many uk civilians as died in the whole of WW2 (67,000)

Should we treat WW2 as over-egged because only 67,000 civilians died?

You won't get much sense here, OP

Have a look at www.lockdownsceptics.org
It has lots of links to analyses of the data etc

@Jussayingisall spot on!

"Because you get covid you die was the first MN mantra. Now that's clearly bullshit, the new line is everyone has long term damage and eventually will die. Just own up to the fact that 99.999999999% of people will be absolutely fine."

But nobody sensible has made either of those extreme claims "everyone has long term damage" or "you get covid you die".

And your claim that "99.999999999% of people will be absolutely fine" is also false given the fatality rate of around 0.6% (reasonably consistent with the expert estimates from near the beginning of 0.5 to 1%) and growing concerns amongst scientists and doctors about long term and in some cases potentially permanent health issues in a minority of people:
www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/07/brain-fog-heart-damage-covid-19-s-lingering-problems-alarm-scientists

Because it’s clear that with the U.K. being an international hub, at first it had a clear run at all of us - with large numbers of vulnerable people infected. Now those people are being careful, and testing being further established, it would be expected that there would be more positive tests and fewer deaths

People who live in or around Leicester know exactly why they went into lockdown again but the media can't say that. If this virus was that fatal there would be lots more deaths and hospital admissions.

Thanks MrsIceCream. I thought at the peak there were 20,000 people hospitalised. Not sure how many in ICU,

Could be several reasons... partially because the younger and healthier we’re infected so it converted to less deaths BUT locking down will have slowed that increasing spread to stop it reaching more of the vulnerable

And partially because serious cases and deaths take 3-4 weeks to show in data

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.vox.com/platform/amp/2020/7/6/21314472/covid-19-coronavirus-us-cases-deaths-trends-wtf

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.businessinsider.com/why-us-coronavirus-deaths-arent-rising-younger-cases-lag-time-2020-7%3famp

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/07/03/health/coronavirus-mortality-testing.amp.html

Here’s a few articles where it was discussed in the US a month ago. They are now posting record levels of deaths in some states on a daily basis.

We could have the same discussion here, but it shouldn’t change the outcome. It would be better to learn from the mistakes of others and continue to lockdown in those areas where there looks to be increasing community transmission

@Jussayingisall why did Leicester go into lockdown?

The areas in Leicester are of a poor demographic and very very heavily bame. There was zero social distancing all the way through. Multi generational households. Shops did not shut on the narborough road (what they always show on the news) at any time. Quite a few factories where Asian people were massively exploited to work all the way through, no social distancing, no hand sanitizer or washing stations. It was inevitable.

Perhaps many have had it previously and have residual resistance? Or perhaps vitamin D levels are higher? Or both?

The media thrives and sells on fear. Whatever the story is covid or not the headline will always be a negative spin rather than the positive.

And partially because serious cases and deaths take 3-4 weeks to show in data

I remember reading that earlier serious cases felt terrible, then better for a spell then went to ICU. Not sure how widespread that pattern was - but perhaps we'll see it repeated here.

I agree it’s been reported as a younger demographic. Several times.

@BluebellsGreenbells

I agree it’s been reported as a younger demographic. Several times.

A younger group of cases surviving doesn't sell as many papers as older cases dying unfortunately its really that simple. No science or statistics needed where the media is concerned.

Younger demographics can pass it to older demographics though. Hence why they locked down.

@Floralapron

And deaths/hospital admissions still haven’t gone up.

Yes because it's mostly the young getting it and the shielded have only just been made to come out, wont be long before theres more deaths and hospital admisions

'wont be long before theres more deaths and hospital admisions'

Not necessarily. There are countries with close to none restrictions where the cases are indeed increasing but deaths and hospital admissions are steadily falling. This is I believe what's been expected as 'second wave'.

In the height of the pandemic 900 people died in one day In England’s hospitals, in July the highest death number in one day is 8 and the numbers are still dropping. I think it is also down to the treatments are a lot better now, the doctors have learnt a lot from the first wave of the pandemic.

www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/08/COVID-19-total-announced-deaths-3-August-2020.xlsx

Taken from the article linked.
"As strain on the NHS has eased, the researchers say it is possible that there is room to admit patients who would not have met the stricter threshold for hospital care at the height of the epidemic."

There was a large percentage of people who died because they didn't get hospital treatment. That includes people in their 30's and four Nurses that I read about. The paramedics refused to take them. The 'lips turning blue' was too late, it meant death.

If we refused to treat people with chest infections, people would die. I've been hospitalised with pneumonia, we all would have died had we not been admitted.

Germany showed us that this isn't as deadly as thought, as long as people are treated. We are locking down because we won't spend money on treating people. Why there isn't outrage at that, I don't know. Chris Whitty has said that we are in the position we are in because of a serious lack of investment.

There's a partial lock down locally to me in South Liverpool and surrounding parks. The population probably mirrors Leicester.