Daily numbers, graphs, analysis thread 22

[BigChocFrenzy]

Welcome to thread 22 of the daily updates

Resource links:

Uk dashboard deaths, cases, hospitals, tests - 4 nations, English regions & LAs
R estimates UK & English regions
Imperial UK weekly LAs, cases / 100k, table, map, hotspots
School statistics Attendance
Modelling real number of UK infections February to date
NHS England Hospital activity
NHs England Daily deaths
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
PHE Surveillance reports & LA Local Watchlist Maps by LSOA
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 GB test positivity etc, DIY country graphs
FT DIY graphs compare deaths, cases, raw / million pop
Alama Personal COVID risk assessment
Local Mobility Reports for countries
UK Highstreet Tracker for cities & large towns Footfall, spend index, workers, visitors, economic recovery

⏭ Our STUDIES Corner ⏮

We welcome factual, data driven and analytical contributions
Please try to keep discussion focused on these
📈 📉 📊 👍

“Protect the vulnerable and let everyone else live their lives” is completely impossible. Care homes cost a thousand pounds a week because they employ a vast number of staff on a 24-hour schedule who are in close contact with the residents. In addition to that they normally rely on hours of support from some of the family members who come in and feed/care for/entertain their relatives so that the staff have more time to give care to other residents which goes beyond the bare minimum.

In addition to that there are an army of in-home carers, both professional and family, feeding and washing vulnerable people in their own home.

Most of those carers (80%+ being women) have partners who have jobs, and children who attend school and nursery. They may even, god forbid, have a social life and other jobs of their own. It’s a huge interconnected network of millions which cannot possibly be separated from “the rest of us”.

And that’s before we get to the younger independent ECV people. They can technically sequester themselves from the world if the government is prepared to pay them enough to live on (in the absence of a WFH job) but again they have households. Will the government replace their spouse’s salary so they can also stay in the house full time? Will it provide suitable home schooling for their children indefinitely?

@Timeforanotherusername

I think Boris Johnson was quite clear in his speech s few weeks ago. One of the few times I agree with him.

It is simply not possible to separate out the vulnerable and elderly.

We need to find a way to manage this by ticking along, limiting the destruction of the economy, keeping the kids in school and letting people have enough freedoms to make the sacrifices acceptable, and saving as many lives as possible.

On sky News yesterday Professor Gupta was saying that we should just protect the vulnerable but when the other scientist on (sorry cant remember his name) asked for some indication of a methodology for doing that she has no answer at all.

People who make the argument about 'protecting the vulnerable' and letting sars-cov-2 rip on the rest of the population never seem to address how practically you'd do it when we're so interconnected. Which makes me suspect that some of them are really saying just 'let it rip' and let the vulnerable die.

Surely it would cost a huge amount of money to be done properly? You would need to isolate the vulnerable somehow in facilities / hotels. Possibly it would cost far more than measures to suppress the virus (social distancing, masks, working from home, for example).

What about people who are borderline vulnerable (you know, a bit old a bit fat)? Or people who become vulnerable (e.g. those who develop diabetes in pregnancy?).

I find it quite disturbing that such an inhumane approach is something so many seem to enthusiastically embrace.

Other countries have had mass graves with this. Undertakers overwhelmed. It's not as if this is impossible here.

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/indian-state-offers-150-coronavirus-funerals-videos-expose-mass/

Does anyone know what R0 is thought to be? I had a quick google and there didn't seem anything upto date and anywhere between 2 and 4+

The latest Government figure was last Friday and was 1.3-1.6. Obviously we've found some cases down the back of the sofa since then, so may change tomorrow. However, Tim Spector said it had fallen from ( I think) 1.4 to 1.2 in England.

www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk

Is that R0 or RT though?

Does anyone know when the next local lockdown restrictions are likely to be announced? I thought it was usually on a Thursday but I'm unsure now.

I'm in Nottinghamshire so expecting the worst.

I'm always confused as to how the R is worked out. Surely if cases have risen as much as they have, that would mean the R has too?

R0 is the value if the virus is left to spread naturally without interventions. There will be an error interval on it, but it shouldn't change unless new evidence comes up about rate of natural spread.
RT is the current rate of transmission in our actual situation with the measures we have in place. This varies according to how well the virus is under control and is the R value people mean when they talk about keeping it under 1.

Yes sorry, that'll teach me to skim read!! The R0 is thought to be around 3, as you say the WHO put it in the range of 2-4.

There are actually several reputable scientists / medical professionals who now start questioning whether “protecting the vulnerable” (i.e. true vulnerable, not the initial “shielding population“ identified back in March when we knew much less about the virus) is indeed a better strategy. They are absolutely not suggesting that we drop SD (that would be utter madness!) but they are advocating for a more balanced approach.

The two names I would recommend on twitter are: (i) Francois Balloux, epidemiologist and (ii) Ron Daniels, the ICU consultant from Birmingham and the founder of the UK Sepsis trust. I have been following them for a while and their opinions have indeed shifted.

If you look up Ron Daniels, you will see that during the first wave he called COVID hospitals a “war zone”, fully supported the lockdown and pleaded people to take the virus seriously. He worked extended shifts and ended up catching COVID himself.

If you check out his most recent tweets, a lot of them are about sepsis, not COVID. He is now seeing people who refuse to seek medical help for much more serious and deadly diseases (including sepsis!) because of COVID fears and he is indeed worried that “stay at home” mantra (that remains engrained in some people’s memories) might end up killing more people over time that it was meant to save.

There are fields turned into massive graveyards in Brazil too. America's death total from Covid already exceeds that of the last 5 years flu deaths combined - and it's heading towards 6.

One of the reasons people are finding this so far is the refusal to see the light at the end of the tunnel. not helped by the government not making much of this. There will be other people working on monoclonal antibodies, there is also this www.uhs.nhs.uk/ClinicalResearchinSouthampton/Research/News-and-updates/Articles/Inhaled-drug-prevents-COVID-19-patients-getting-worse-in-Southampton-trial.aspx

The virus doesnt like summer. A lot of restrictions can be lifted then and there is a reasonable prospect of more treatments being in widespread use before then. Rapid testing would also contain spread better and therefore allow more activities involving groups if they were tested in advance. By next winter we will be in a much better position, we wont have the same restrictions then.

One day this will be like flu, or possibly less often fatal.

people are finding this difficult

The recovery trial has started testing regneron. www.recoverytrial.net/news/recovery-covid-19-phase-3-trial-to-evaluate-regeneron2019s-regn-cov2-investigational-antibody-cocktail-in-the-uk

That trial will be progressing faster now hospitalisations are increasing.

Thanks for that detailed unpicking MRex : really food for thought.

downloads.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/english/covid-19_proposed_social_distancing_framework_briefing_aid.pdf

I know this is a leak and a draft, but I’m intrigued by the wording on the level 3 rules which says “no social contact outside your household in any setting [replaces alert level 2 restriction]”. In level 2 it specifically mentions support bubbles, does this mean support / childcare bubbles would be abolished in level 3 do we think?

I’m actually in favour of that as I think the current childcare bubbles are driving a lot of household mixing, and if that is the primary place of transmission that’s what needs focussing on

I can't see the logic in abolishing support/childcare bubbles and allowing schools to stay open.

Places of worship can remain open, but not sports facilities is utterly disgusting religious pandering bullshit, that is the most angry I've possibly been about any proposed change, the complete lack of published evidence for any of these restrictions is completely out of order.

Places of worship are really important, they are of course vital connections to the community for so many people, but that is equally true to sports and other clubs, I can see no reason for them to be treated differently - if you can safely access an indoor church, you can safely access an outdoor running group.

Evidence for restrictions needs to be published.

[quote IloveJKRowling]People who make the argument about 'protecting the vulnerable' and letting sars-cov-2 rip on the rest of the population never seem to address how practically you'd do it when we're so interconnected. Which makes me suspect that some of them are really saying just 'let it rip' and let the vulnerable die.

Surely it would cost a huge amount of money to be done properly? You would need to isolate the vulnerable somehow in facilities / hotels. Possibly it would cost far more than measures to suppress the virus (social distancing, masks, working from home, for example).

What about people who are borderline vulnerable (you know, a bit old a bit fat)? Or people who become vulnerable (e.g. those who develop diabetes in pregnancy?).

I find it quite disturbing that such an inhumane approach is something so many seem to enthusiastically embrace.

Other countries have had mass graves with this. Undertakers overwhelmed. It's not as if this is impossible here.

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/indian-state-offers-150-coronavirus-funerals-videos-expose-mass/[/quote]
Exactly. It would be far, far cheaper and easier to go for full eradication than try to run parallel societies.

Sweden has in total 5-12 x deaths per million compared to its Scansi neighbours with similar very low population density & culture

It is almost impossible for any 2nd or 3rd waves in its neighbours to come anywhere near equalising those numbers,

especially with the much improved treatments and testing, track & trace systems that countries have now

Always best to concentrate on squashing the 1st wave of any "novel" virus,
until scientists and doctors know how to treat patients and how to limit the number of cases

The UK death curves before lockdown were not following Scandinavia, they were following Italy, where the health services in the North were being overwhelmed and young doctors dying

Multiples of Italy would have rendered the NHS completely helpless, unable to treat patients
Carnage

Only could be suggested by ruthless people who call the NHS the last bastion of communism (Prof Sikora )
Social Darwinists who want to let the strong have their fun while the weak go to the wall

Usual leak to see the response.

1. There is no justification in the east of england and south west for forcing venues to close at 10p.m, it isnt helping but I suspect all areas would be put in level 1.

1. levels probably not enough, why not 4? We need as much as possible running so finer distinctions.

1. places of worship can stay open - but what restrictions are on them? No place of worship in the north west should have more than a few people inside at a time.

1. Restricting weddings is tough. 15 people could be just 4 households. If people are outdoors in a marque they could make this larger for those resident in low risk areas.

In a theoretical model,
they can input the condition that no one vulnerable ever gets exposed to the young / middle-aged infected

In the real world, none of them have any plan how to do that, because it is of course impossible

All their articles and interviews lack any credible means of carrying out their theoretical ideas

So in the real world,
all countries can do is continue with their own chosen balance of SD protecting everyone while keeping work & schools open as much as possible

i.e. in the adult world, instead of the immature dream world

All their articles and interviews lack any credible means of carrying out their theoretical ideas

But unfortunately they are picked up by dangerous people who are experts at manipulating people.

Fred I agree that I think some outside sports should be able to continue, but I don't think it's helpful to start saying "that's open therefor that should be open."

Round here if the churches have opened, they're not singing, very limited on numbers (capacities are about 10-25% of normal size) with prebooking required and the chairs are placed a distance apart/pews are taped off to make sure social distancing is happening as much as they can.

But the local running club is still running round the streets in a bunched group of about 10-20, and how the rugby club is managing socially distancing in their matches I'm not quite sure.

There's such a difference between sports, that I don't think they should be counted as one item. A huge difference between football (and I can tell you the spectators of the children's matches round here aren't socially distancing at all, even though there would be plenty of space to) and golf for example, both in terms of numbers involved in any game and in the social distancing possible when playing.

It's not a race to the bottom.

And all this is is a leaked document. We don't know it's real, and we don't know what alterations they will make.
There's a few awkward parts such as "Childcare bubbles (for under-15s/years 9 and 10) " Children turn 15yo in year 10. So I'd expect that to say "year 9 and below", which makes me wonder how authentic it is.

If you check out his most recent tweets, a lot of them are about sepsis, not COVID. He is now seeing people who refuse to seek medical help for much more serious and deadly diseases (including sepsis!) because of COVID fears and he is indeed worried that “stay at home” mantra (that remains engrained in some people’s memories) might end up killing more people over time that it was meant to save.

Then we need better public education. Covid-19 cannot be ignored because it's potentially less significant than, eg, sepsis. We can and should be treating all conditions. If Covid takes off to even half of March/April levels we will struggle. Education is key - to both getting sick people to seek medical help and to keeping Covid levels as low as possible. We also desperately need a functioning (localised) test and trace system.

Sorry - I know this is supposed to be a data thread but it's nonsense to ignore Covid because other illnesses are worse. Or did I miss the point