Do people actually realise how few are dying from coronavirus now?

[Mrschickpeabody]

It’s all still doom and gloom on the news as normal regarding coronavirus. Loads about cases going up, local lockdowns, negativity regarding schools going back but nothing about the fact that hardly anyone is actually dying from coronavirus or being admitted to hospital. Can we not hear about positive things for once?

[quote XingMing]@FoolsAssassin. I have a friend who has been Type 1 diabetic since the age of seven. She's now about 66, and has had a pancreas transplant. It was experimental surgery a few years ago, and she hasn't been outdoors in months for shielding reasons, but that apart, she is no longer really regarded as a diabetic except for medical study.

Your DS may well be offered the transplant surgery that has transformed her life, but the medical profession will want to be CERTAIN that it will work. They spent 24 months tweaking her adjustments, and every tweak involved surgery. You wouldn't want to do that to a child unless you were sure it would be a success.[/quote]
It’s my DH not DS. He has clocked up half a century now and no one has mentioned a transplant to him or to my T1 Cousin who is a few years older.

My friend is Lead Diabetes nurse at a hospital and her T1 brother in 40s or 20:year old son also have not had transplants. Neither has other local friend who is 50 or her teen daughter.

Just asked DH about it and he has said from his perspective yes it may sort his diabetes but then he would have to be on another drug and live with threat of rejection.

@Alex50
Reading a bit further... you may see that some doctors report 30% of their patients with complications. In hearts and kidneys.

Data is hard to compile at this stage and it's difficult to assess the long term impact.

On diabetes and transplants, I have a good friend who was diabetic type I. He got a kidney transplant because he was on dialysis and at risk of life. His sight is very limited.
He also got a pancreas transplant and is not diabetic now. But, according to him, it might be temporary.

It seems that such transplants are still offered as a last resort when lives are threatened.

The misinformation on this thread is spectacular, on both sides of the debate. The majority of deaths are counted, the 28 test is the same as the rest of the world, with the odd exception and was a change England and Wales made, Scotland and NI have always recorded this (St Nicola). The majority, vast majority people infected have no symptoms, are tiny tiny minority die and a tiny minority have long term effects, usually severe cases with pre existing conditions.

Deaths and infections are fairly stable at the moment because of the steps that have been taken to reduce the spread; not because the virus has died out or is any less dangerous for many people.

We would have been here much earlier if the government had not fiddled while Rome burned at the beginning. The estimate from independent SAGE is that 50,000 people in the UK could die unnecessarily.

Please do not trivialise this virus - do you honestly think that so many countries have taken these drastic measures and risked damage to their economies on a whim? Or maybe global hysteria? We must all get real.

So how can anyone on mumsnet know 1000’s of young people have long term health issues from coronvirus when there isn’t any data yet?

It say 30% of patience who obviously were not asymptotic, who had been quite ill so yes you would expect long term health issues.

@JKRowlingIsMyQueen Flipping heck! I know thanks very much that people grandads die every day but mine was healthy and recovering and Covid finished him off as he caught it in hospital! That’s why we have to have restrictions so people who are going through treatments like cancer can go ahead as much as normal and catching Covid is less of a worry. You don’t want cancer patients dying of Covid before there treatment has finished. How is the correlation so hard to understand, hope I haven’t patronized you like you did me.

@XingMing you seemed to be suggesting that people should remediate their health so they could also join the hair ubermensch skipping around in covid-ridden high streets, then suggested someone get a transplant. Can you not see the illogic?

The point was, is and will forever be that a large number of people are vulnerable THROUGH NO FAULT OF THEIR OWN and suggesting that they are the only ones to social distance or self isolate to prevent inconvenience to others is, well, cunty.

That is my understanding too Lweji. It would be ridiculous for DH to risk one when his control is good. We probably had Covid in March. He has fared better than me although had Shingles after as is back to normal.

I was a bit fitter than him (though he is pretty fit) but had had surgery 6 months previous. I am still wheezing pretty permanently and breathless nearly 6 months later and knackered. I’m not on any figures at the moment as nit spoken to GP at time I was ill or since then. Am going to have to soon though.

*their
Plus we haven’t yet got a reliable test, my grandfather had 4 negative tests before he got a positive, his consultant said negative results are only about 38% effective, we still need to be really careful.

Just in case you still don't get my argument, the pancreas transplant at the JR in Oxford (one of the first performed outside the USA -- the appalling centre of privatised medicine, which nevertheless pioneers more medical breakthroughs than anywhere else in the world) has enabled doctors to learn more about how it works, and what achieves successful results will gradually be taken aboard in the NHS. But the NHS would never have ventured the surgery without learning from the pathfinders. And medicine's trail blazers are currently mostly American.

I repeat @XingMing, it's not about the transplant, an it's about the vulnerability and your illogic

@Alex50 There are many many people suffering long term. I don’t have the figures, the majority, like myself have not reviewed any proper help from doctors, as they have no idea how to treat it or what’s happening.
I’m not old or unhealthy, 42 with no underlying health problems. The people I’ve seen worldwide in forums are a range of ages from 20 to their 60’s, the majority i’d say were previously in very good health.
Six months on here and I still suffer aching all over, burning in hands and legs, tight chest, stomach issues, sneezing, changes in heart rate, tinnitus, hair loss, headaches, vision problems, very odd moods, dizziness, nausea..the list goes on.
This is after a mild case in March. You have no idea, I genuinely do hope you don’t have to go through something like this. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

*they’re quarantining people from Portugal because cases are 20 per 100,000. It’s crazy 0.02%. You’d think it was ripping through the island killing everyone

Portugal isn't an island...*

Oh do shut up, we've all had enough of experts.

@Alex50 Oh and the symptoms above are now..during the worst part, it was a couple of months of rocketing heart rate, high anxiety, crying hysterically to my dp and not knowing why, just an overwhelming feeling I was going to die and leave my dd, 2. Vibrations in my head and chest, numbness in my mouth and face, tingling all through my body, being woken from sleep four times per night gasping for breath, bizarre nightmares..
I was tested for 30 odd things in blood tests, had a ct head scan (I thought I had a brain tumor or ms, I couldn’t hold anything or see straight) chest x rays etc etc
it was hell and lots and lots of people are suffering/have suffered the same and still have no idea how they will be or when this will pass.

Long COVID

The best answer now is that it is not known, but the full extent will probably be underestimated at the moment.

www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m2815

"The Royal College of General Practitioners says it expects GPs to see an influx of patients with “long covid”"

"Writing in JAMA, a team of researchers from Italy reported that nearly nine in 10 patients (87%) discharged from a Rome hospital after recovering from covid-19 were still experiencing at least one symptom 60 days after onset. They found that 13% of the 143 people were completely free of any symptoms, while 32% had one or two symptoms, and 55% had three or more.3 Although none of the patients had fever or any signs or symptoms of acute illness, many still reported fatigue (53%), dyspnoea (43%), joint pain (27%), and chest pain (22%). Two fifths of patients reported a worsened quality of life."

"NHS England is set to launch an online portal later this month where people who are suffering long term effects of covid-19 (not just patients who were admitted to hospital) can communicate with nurses, physiotherapists, and mental health specialists"

“Evidence shows that many of those survivors are likely to have significant ongoing health problems, including breathing difficulties, enduring tiredness, reduced muscle function, impaired ability to perform vital everyday tasks, and mental health problems such as post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, and depression,”

Few might be dying but people have long term health complications that we are only starting to see now and might have even longer term implications. There is talk of infertility in males, there are things we won't know for a long time. Dying is the worst, but there are a lot of other very bad side effects that cannot be discounted. It isn't just dying of covid or recovering from covid, there are a hundred things inbetween.

There are a few suggestions of percentages around, eg:
"The Zoe Covid Symptom Study has produced figures suggesting that 10% of people who contracted Covid-19 are still unwell after three weeks, and that 5% may continue to be sick for months. "
www.longcovidsos.org/
www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m2815?

"Around 10% of patients who have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 virus remain unwell beyond three weeks, and a smaller proportion for months. This is based on the UK COVID Symptom Study, in which people enter their ongoing symptoms on a smartphone app."
www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m3026

[quote Ori82]@AlecTrevelyan006

some things are more important than death

My death is pretty fucking important to me. I’d probably say it trumps my top ten list of Important Things[/quote]
and so it should

but on a global scale, you and I are pretty insignificant.

as a society that are lots of deaths that we could eradicate fairly easily, but we choose not to because to do so would be to the detriment of those that are living

we don't openly acknowledge that choice, but all of us make it

consciously, or subconsciously as individuals and as a society we try to find a balance between living at all costs and living a life worth living.

It's not always an easy or obvious choice but we make it nonetheless.

Why would we expect to see much data on long COVID when it didn't exist here nine months ago and most people who have had it and survived are only now working out if they're still affected? GPs are still telling any people to wait 12 weeks - they're not referring those patients on necessarily. The patients who aren't critically ill but nevertheless not recovering will take time to get in front of doctors and into clinical research data.

You can't seriously think a lack of data is reason to be reassured? It's clearly an emerging picture - the clue is in the name.

any people complaining of long-term symptoms

Portugal isn't an island...

With any luck... It's 2020...
www.goodreads.com/book/show/29565.The_Stone_Raft

@MrsPerrywinkle

I have no wish to exaggerate Covid, and have challenged people when they do so. Far too many young, healthy people are disproportionately worried and their risk statistically is very low indeed.

However, that doesn’t mean it can’t be minimised, and the irony of you stating “The misinformation on this thread is spectacular”, quickly followed by “The majority, vast majority people infected have no symptoms” was striking!

Although there is a range of asymptomatic rates from different studies, with some not distinguishing clearly from pre-symptomatic cases complicating matters, most settle in the 40-50% range, which isn’t a majority, and certainly not a “vast majority”.

@Whiskyinajar

Figures are very low at the moment and this is a good thing.

We've all played a part in getting them to these low levels.

I'll be following what the public health people say (those with access to the real raw data).

I don't think we are necessarily out of the woods as yet and I suspect there will be a second wave in time for winter.

Life however seems largely to have returned to normal locally. Businesses are still open and the only one we lost was a big company store who were always empty before lockdown.
Am amazed they didn't close before.

Look at the data and they are rising, every area round mine was the lowest number of cases a few days ago, now they are nearly all the highest. Each person who dies is somebody special to someone. If it's your relative then the death rate doesn't matter.

There is also evidence that COVID is more likely (than other viruses) to trigger ADEM (a sometimes fatal autoimmune reaction). Neurologists reporting on this noted that it is particularly good at triggering the immune system. That would indicate, on a purely speculative level, that other autoimmune conditions such as POTS are not wholly surprising.