Never has a virus been so oversold

[StitchInLime]

A friend just sent this article from The Spectator to our Whatssap group and I have to confess, I'm struggling to counter the statements made in it.

www.spectator.co.uk/article/never-has-a-virus-been-so-oversold

HAS this virus been oversold? Now we have a better understanding of it, is it time to relax a bit?

Or is this article wrong? And if so, how (no need to get into debate about the author and source, but I mean the quoted stats)? I feel I need to argue against it in the Whatssap group but am struggling with how.

... but lockdown was never about the prevention of deaths. Even now, the social distancing and increased hygiene is not about stopping the spread of covid-19... we are unable to get rid of this virus, just like all the others. IT'S ABOUT SLOWING DOWN THE TRANSMISSION OF THE VIRUS. More people will die either as direct or indirect result of this pandemic.

This was managed so badly...

We are an island, so we had a better chance to stop the virus coming in, yet somehow we failed to act when we could see what was happening across Europe...Lockdown was too late but mostly we failed to protect the elderly in care home.

There is a lot of misinformation though and there are many people who seem to think that the virus is a death sentence for anyone who catches it. When in fact the majority of people either have no symptoms or recover easily. The majority of those who die were elderly or already had health problems. This is not to say that their deaths was not a tragedy but I think we have lost perspective.

We destroyed the economy, stopped our kids' education, created a mental health timebomb and probably lost many, many lives because people could not access treatment for other conditions.

To me the balance between the fight against the virus and the need to weight the other consideration is too one sided.

The government needs to sort out its track and trace, give people a right to home working and we need to continue with hand-washing and mask-wearing but beyond that I want to see us carrying on. More lockdowns are just pointless and we are causing more destruction to society than the virus would...

I can't help but think that Sweden got it right.

How can people say Sweden got it right, when Norway locked down and had less deaths and less economic damage?

How can people say Sweden got it right, when Norway locked down and had less deaths and less economic damage?

^This. Why do we keep being told on here that Sweden got it right? They didn't at all. The country that got it right was South Korea, as they set up a proper test and trace programme. And Taiwan, because they'd learned from their experience with SARS.

And please can people stop ignoring the long-term consequences some of us are coping with rather than just deaths, which we know is very low risk for the majority of us.

www.independent.co.uk/news/health/coronavirus-news-live-update-uk-cases-deaths-covid-vaccine-stats-economy-latest-today-a9666196.html

The Independent Wednesday 12 August 2020 LIVE

Coronavirus news – live: UK sees highest daily case rise since June as country enters deepest recession on record

The UK has recorded its highest one-day rise in coronavirus infections since June, at 1,148.

The grim figure came after Covid-19 officially dragged the UK into recession, with the economy contracting by a record 20.4 per cent between April and June.

Meanwhile, Oldham is facing a return to full lockdown after the infection rate there doubled in a week.

I can't help but think that Sweden got it right.

Sadly, very sadly, the PM of Sweden does not agree with you. He has admitted they got it wrong

@Mittens030869

How can people say Sweden got it right, when Norway locked down and had less deaths and less economic damage?

^This. Why do we keep being told on here that Sweden got it right? They didn't at all. The country that got it right was South Korea, as they set up a proper test and trace programme. And Taiwan, because they'd learned from their experience with SARS.

And please can people stop ignoring the long-term consequences some of us are coping with rather than just deaths, which we know is very low risk for the majority of us.

This.

A friend of my daughter's got COVID, quite early on - April perhaps? She's in her mid-20S AND STILL ILL. She's going back into hospital next week where they'll do a barrage of test on her lungs and have her on oxygen and heaven knows what else.

I can't help but think that Sweden got it right.

I also have been coming round to thinking this too.

The figures - which have improved no doubt - but still mean one in 14 people who catch it in the U.K. news hospital treatment. That seems a scarily high number to me.

@Northernsoulgirl45

Very recently cases seem to be rising and testing not so much.

Have they mended the testing figures yet? Is the number of tests they report on the dashboard the number of tests processed now?

Otherwise they are still counting tests sent out but not processed and over 3 million of those haven’t been processed.

Probably. That makes the figures even worse.

It also makes it difficult for anyone using the dashboard to know whether the % of positive tests is rising or not.

I think they used to include duplicate tests as well. There was a number for the number of people tested as well, but they stopped publishing that ages ago. Hancock defended it by saying it wasn't important to know how many people were tested, just how many tests there were.

Alabamawhirly1

Many of the people that are against full nationwide lockdown, are so because of the massive detrimental effect its had on them or their families life.

And many of them because when they go abroad for holidays they will have to SI for 2 weeks which they CBA to do so they will send their kids in to school and go to work putting others at risk.

These are the same selfish people that would send their kids in to school after them throwing up all night.

That’s the sort of thing that would stop if we could be arsed to implement the regulations. Spot checks and a £1000+ fine would sort that out.

@TraffordDad75

The figures - which have improved no doubt - but still mean one in 14 people who catch it in the U.K. news hospital treatment. That seems a scarily high number to me.

Where did you get 1 in 14 from?

Where did you get 1 in 14 from?

I would also being interested to know this given that the overwhelming majority of people who get the virus are asymptomatic or only have very mild symptoms.

So how much non COVID hospital treatment would have happened if we hadn't locked down? As it was two hospitals nearly ran out of oxygen. Lockdown was to stop NHS being overwhelmed. It worked because other treatments were cancelled.

but still mean one in 14 people who catch it in the U.K. news hospital treatment

Can't be right - we know at least 17% of Londoners have antibodies. There have only ever been 25,000 Covid-19 hospital admissions in London. I make that 1 in 61, and it's probably even less

Whether or not we should have locked down is a moot point. The issue is where do we go from here? My worry is that we’re now heading towards a situation with no escape route. Policy and messaging seems to be moving towards any case is one too many and any outbreaks will be stamped on in the most draconian manner and we will continue to do this until a vaccine arrives on its white charger to save the day. The economy is ruined and there is no end in sight.

What Lasttraineast said.
Imagine losses if we'd done nothing?
Oh, and the lizard people thing...words fail.

Without doubt (Sherlock!) Covid has since the other real war (WW2) been the biggest UK resilience stress test of both political leadership and population behavioural patterns.

I do not believe in the space of a year will the UK suddenly be plunged into total catastrophic doom and gloom no mans land because of Covid and Brexshit. Yes it is a car crash but one in which we can survive if we all unite and get our shit together! It is time to collectively knock off all the selfish reckless self entitlement I am not going to told what to do crap and grow up behave and seriously follow international standard Covid risk mitigation best practice. That may include actual hard quarantine etc. Forget the it just a bit of flu nonsense or the kill rate is only 2-5% etc as this is serious in many ways not just in lives loss but also livelihoods. We all need to play the game nicely and appreciate that so far the government has finally reverted to full interventionist (very non blue!) and essentially dished out life support "free" helicopter money (furlough and bounce back) which is something that our children's generation will pay for eventually through taxation etc. If we stick to prescribed global standard Covid behavioural Covid risk mitigation norms we will eventually slowly recover but not before many big bumps along the way.

Imagine losses if we'd done nothing?

Doing nothing was never going to happen anyway - the question should be what would have happened if we'd have stuck with voluntary social distancing instead of hard lockdown.

The epidemics in Sweden, Brazil and the southern USA gives us a clue. We might not have had many more Covid deaths than we did, because herd immunity effects start to kick in earlier than expected - and of course we wouldn't have had all the lockdown deaths.

Looking at the data I think it's not impossible that we overreacted, and the overreaction killed more people than it saved.

I can't help but think that Sweden got it right.

We can only properly make that judgment when the dust has cleared in a year or two. Only a month ago, Sweden had more daily cases than the U.K. even though it’s 1/7th of the size, and was quarantined from the rest of Europe. Sweden may contain the virus brilliantly over the next few months, or it may be setting itself up for a huge second wave, we just don’t know.

We might not have had many more Covid deaths than we did, because herd immunity effects start to kick in earlier than expected - and of course we wouldn't have had all the lockdown deaths.

I’m not sure there’s much evidence for that.... The population of the U.K. has around 7% antibodies based on latest evidence i believe. I appreciate that antibodies aren’t necessarily everything and that it could well be the case that some people can be immune without them, but in certain heavily affected locations, antibody levels are well above UK levels, and upwards of 50% in some places, implying there isn’t a significant proportion of the population who have innate immunity, and that we are a long way from herd immunity in the U.K.

I suspect that there is a degree of herd immunity amongst that have continued to socialise and mix closely through the pandemic, but there are many people (and Sweden advised its over 70s to isolate like we did) who, whether it is mandated or not, are socially mixing far, far less than they would do. Only when these many millions get back to normal (proper normal, not a socially distanced trip to a cafe) would we really have an idea.

Sweden have had a higher infection rate than Spain; and quite a high death rate.