Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 18

[BigChocFrenzy]

Welcome to thread 18 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Uk dashboard deaths, cases, hospitals, tests - 4 nations, English regions & LAs
Imperial UK weekly LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots
MSAO Map of English cases
Cases Tracker England Local Government
ONS MSAO Map English deaths
CovidMessenger live update by council district in England
Scot gov Daily data
Scotland TravellingTabby LAs, care homes, hospitals, tests, t&t
PH Wales LAs, tests, ONS deaths
NI Dashboard
Zoe Uk data
UK govt pressers Slides & data
ICNRC Intensive Care National Audit & Research reports
NHS t&t England & UK testing Weekly stats
R estimates UK & English regions
PHE Surveillance report infections & watchlists each Thursday
ONS England infection surveillance report each Friday
Datasets for ONS surveillance reports
ONS Roundup deaths, infections & economic reports
ECDC rolling 14-day incidence EEA & UK
Worldometer UK page
Our World in Data test positivity etc, DIY graphs
FT DIY graphs compare deaths, cases, raw / million pop
Covidly.com world summary & graphs
Alama Personal COVID risk assessment

==> Our STUDIES Corner

@NeurotrashWarrior

Jenny harries said masks are not necessary in the classroom because of students sitting side by side. You would think a top scientist would understand that the human being has a... Neck? Which can be used to talk to people at the side?

Best and most scientifically accurate post on the thread!

Well given what I've hear in the last hour about cases in schools is anything to go by, I'll be amazed if there are schools open in some places in about a fortnight.

Its hard to see any way out of that and being able to reopen them without the problem just repeating over and over again until its burnt through the population now.

I've also seen a lot of people get the whole family tested.

Which seems completely and utterly daft. Yes worthwhile of Positive test. But not before.

The wish expressed often by some MN posters is to solve this problem by "following Sweden"
i.e. keeping schools open regardless of how many infections and too bad about the vulnerable

That works a lot better in a country with 1/12 the UK population density, but is still quite ruthless

Hello, popping in from Italy - I found the original Italian article about the 13,000 teachers/school staff They have tested positive for Covid itself so now won't be cleared to return to work until they've had two subsequent negative tests.
The article is in the ilsole24 newspaper.

There is a woman on my local FB page complaining that she hasn't been able to get tested today and how it's a shambles. She later revealed she found out that someone she works with has tested positive, and as she is doing a workshop tomorrow she wanted "to be responsible" and check she isn't positive before running her (socially distanced) workshop. She was shocked to be told that even if she could get tested the results would probably not be available by tomorrow morning.
About ten people in the response string had children with a mild sore throat or runny nose whose schools would not let any family member back to school without a negative test.

There needs to be much greater clarity about what is, and what isn't, appropriate grounds for testing.

Spain

Don't issue daily updates over the weekend, but have stated:

27,404 new cases since Friday
making 116,464 new cases over the last 2 weeks

207 deaths over the last 7 days.

To be more exact, Spain's daily updates, when issued, seem subject to considerable revision later

I'm also beginning to think should we be doing lots of testing in places like Bolton.

We know there is an issue there. We CV is endemic. A local 'lockdown' is in place to try and reduce the number of cases.

So should the test capacity there be focused on
areas where the virus is beginning to take hold?

Its not ideal I know but test and Dido Hardings version of trace is not really going to make a difference when the problem is endemic.

The only thing that will make a difference now is peoples behaviour changing.

Get it focused on places like Warrington mentioned upthread?

I know that won't be popular but we don't need a PM that needs to be everyone's friend........

Germany: American accused of ignoring Covid-19 quarantine to go on Bavaria bar crawl

This is how major local outbreaks can begin - with one selfish fuckwit
Allegedly failed to quarantine that evening while awaiting test results which came the next morning.
Potentially very high penalties in Germany though

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/14/american-accused-of-ignoring-covid-19-quarantine-to-go-on-bavaria-bar-crawl

In Bavaria fines of up to €2,000 can be applied to individuals who break quarantine rules.
However, lawyers have confirmed that the woman could in theory also face both civil and criminal proceedings carrying a prison sentence of between six months and 10 years,
as well as compensation claims from businesses affected.

news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-testing-centre-worker-we-tested-fewer-than-20-people-a-day-we-have-capacity-for-200-12072040
Coronavirus testing centre worker: 'We tested fewer than 20 people a day, we have capacity for 200'

Director of public health for Cheshire West and Chester, Ian Ashworth, said: "Additional testing capacity is essential to help prevent further spread of the virus in Cheshire and Merseyside but also the North West.

"Currently the North West region has 25% of the COVID-19 national cases and yet has access to only 15% of the national testing capacity."

Council leaders in Sefton, Merseyside, and in Bury, Greater Manchester, have made similar pleas.

Why does this not surprise me?

And we are wondering why the number of cases in the NW is going up fastest?

The government don't care. Its Northern.

All that talk of great catch up programmes and the importance of children being in school is bullshit if kids are spending two weeks at home every time they get a virus which may very well present with similar symptoms as Covid in children.And then the class going home again for two weeks because there's been a case or two

Yes, and we've been told that if one sibling has a covid symptom, the other(s) should stay home until a negative test is received. Which makes sense if you want to stop covid spreading. But if you can't get a test - say it takes a few days to get a test then a few days to get a result - then that means the well child is off for say 4 days. Then they catch whatever it is, so have to stay off (by which time the other child is better but has to stay off until their sibling is tested...).

The answer is not to throw our hands in the air and let it rip through our population.

The answer is to improve testing.

AND

fund schools to implement social distancing.

DD1 was in for 4 weeks full time in a small class June/July with 2m between desks - no illness in her class, not one over 4 WEEKS. They did this with extra staff, no extra buildings. They had money. DD's school could do this if given the money RIGHT NOW.

One week back with almost triple the class size and no SD - 7 kids are off today.

It's not bloody rocket science. They're telling us we can't meet up with 6 people elsewhere - and even then we have to have 2m between us or wear masks NONE of which is happening in schools.

I bet DD's school is not alone in only needing money to be able to do this.

If schools had SD in place, the number of kids with viruses would reduce and the number of kids needing tests would reduce.

And everyone going on about lockdown and how hard it was - my DD1 was in tears today thinking about how many times she's going to be yo-yo-ing in and out of school.

And how the teachers are supposed to teach a class where 7 kids are out at a time, then come back at different times, then another 7 kids are off and they've all missed different bits at different times. It's going to be way worse than remote or blended, or any other option which would be less disruptive.

I'm not sure what the solution is, but the schools threads on here seem to be full of people trying to get tests (sometimes for the entire family) because one child has cold/flu symptoms.

I know a woman who was furious as her gp refused to send her and her children for tests - a child in her son's year group had been sent home with a headache and been referred for a test but the results hadn't yet come back. She was insisting that it meant that every child in the school, and everyone they lived with, should be tested.

The gp told her to ring back if test and trace told her to test, or if the school told her the other child tested positive. I presume in the UK she could have booked tests herself, so that's five tests. If half this schoolchilld's year group had done the same, that would have been 5 x 75 or 375 (unnecessary according to the gp) tests - the numbers really add up.

I find the Spanish figures these days at best confusing. If I was a cynical person I'd suspect they were bollocks.

To be fair, maybe they are trying to separate out "deaths from Covid" from "deaths with Covid", but the figures are all over the place so it's not inspiring confidence.

Well I don't know anyone who's doing that - when you try and book a test it tells you over and over and over again not to book unless you actually have symptoms.

All the people I know who are trying to get tests have children with symptoms.

What did they expect when they cram children back into too small classrooms sitting right next to each other, with their pesky necks that move? There's a load of viruses circulating. And probably covid too. Several schools near us have positive cases.

@OrangeGeckoWithBlackSpots

I find the Spanish figures these days at best confusing. If I was a cynical person I'd suspect they were bollocks.

To be fair, maybe they are trying to separate out "deaths from Covid" from "deaths with Covid", but the figures are all over the place so it's not inspiring confidence.

... The international standard is to count all deaths within 28 days of a positive test

ONS figures show that 28 days in fact UNDERcounts

• because some COVID deaths are only certified by a doctor post-mortem after tests - while the 60 days OVERcounts

I'd expect similar for other European countries

ONS state > 57,000 died with Covid
and the > 65,000 excess deaths, over the 3 peak months especially, confirm that most died "of" COVID and wouldn't have "died anyway"

I know we don't want people 'unnecessarily' having test but there is no doubt many many children have very mild or different symptoms and we are not picking them up at all. Any mass testing is always very revealing of how much it is indeed circulating. My main concern as a teacher in an overcrowded school in lack of testing, not too much!

Absence has definitely increased. 6 people off in one year 10 class yesterday. In my year 11, one medically vulnerable girl has not returned and in year 10, two students are off with anxiety. It's all a big hot mess.

If only someone could have predicted that, and warned people in advance, eh Piggy?

The Zoe app sends anyone with a sore throat for a test , I’ve had two due to that. I’ve actually stopped doing it now as I didn’t want to be told again to be tested unless it’s pretty obvious I need to be ! I’ve also decided it’s not something that is particularly healthy to be logging into on a daily basis, some days it’s important to step back from this whole thing.

Thank you for highlighting the concerns about Warrington. I have very close friends who love there and they had no idea. Apparently it hasn’t been on local news.

@tootyfruitypickle

The Zoe app sends anyone with a sore throat for a test , I’ve had two due to that. I’ve actually stopped doing it now as I didn’t want to be told again to be tested unless it’s pretty obvious I need to be ! I’ve also decided it’s not something that is particularly healthy to be logging into on a daily basis, some days it’s important to step back from this whole thing.

The Zoe app does seem very sensitive to symptoms and advises testing often.

I am also very confused by Spain. When I search media about their new cases, I read that the case numbers are growing, e.g.:
www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/covid-19-spain-reports-27-000-cases-over-weekend/1973346
However, their graph on Worldometers appears to show that their peak is over and cases are falling significantly.

@Bifflepants

I am also very confused by Spain. When I search media about their new cases, I read that the case numbers are growing, e.g.: www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/covid-19-spain-reports-27-000-cases-over-weekend/1973346 However, their graph on Worldometers appears to show that their peak is over and cases are falling significantly.

If you scroll down to the bottom of the Worldometers page for Spain, it reads

"From Sept. 7 onward, figures for daily new cases only include cases already validated by the Ministry of Health in the daily PDF report. Since the validation process takes time to complete, additional cases are expected to be added retroactively once the weekly historical dataset revision is released by the Ministry of Health on Friday, Sept. 18."

So the figures appear to be falling on the graph at the moment because the data is incomplete, and will be revised in a few days.

@conkersarebonkers - Spain has been posting a similar message for I think about 4 weeks now, they are always running their cases 8 days late for "checking".

Can the data for 60 days still be found somewhere rather than the current 28 day that the government share daily? The numbers seem very low since the reporting method went to 28.

@IloveJKRowling

All that talk of great catch up programmes and the importance of children being in school is bullshit if kids are spending two weeks at home every time they get a virus which may very well present with similar symptoms as Covid in children.And then the class going home again for two weeks because there's been a case or two

Yes, and we've been told that if one sibling has a covid symptom, the other(s) should stay home until a negative test is received. Which makes sense if you want to stop covid spreading. But if you can't get a test - say it takes a few days to get a test then a few days to get a result - then that means the well child is off for say 4 days. Then they catch whatever it is, so have to stay off (by which time the other child is better but has to stay off until their sibling is tested...).

The answer is not to throw our hands in the air and let it rip through our population.

The answer is to improve testing.

AND

fund schools to implement social distancing.

DD1 was in for 4 weeks full time in a small class June/July with 2m between desks - no illness in her class, not one over 4 WEEKS. They did this with extra staff, no extra buildings. They had money. DD's school could do this if given the money RIGHT NOW.

One week back with almost triple the class size and no SD - 7 kids are off today.

It's not bloody rocket science. They're telling us we can't meet up with 6 people elsewhere - and even then we have to have 2m between us or wear masks NONE of which is happening in schools.

I bet DD's school is not alone in only needing money to be able to do this.

If schools had SD in place, the number of kids with viruses would reduce and the number of kids needing tests would reduce.

And everyone going on about lockdown and how hard it was - my DD1 was in tears today thinking about how many times she's going to be yo-yo-ing in and out of school.

And how the teachers are supposed to teach a class where 7 kids are out at a time, then come back at different times, then another 7 kids are off and they've all missed different bits at different times. It's going to be way worse than remote or blended, or any other option which would be less disruptive.

Totally agree. Switch to part time or remote learning over autumn/winter. Less disruption, less illness, less spread and consistent teaching. Those vulnerable then can be protected unlike the current situation.