Theresa May on Variants

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twitter.com/AkkadSecretary/status/1403269206737629184

Could not agree more with Theresa May, never thought I'd say it.

Sorry for Twitter link, all news links behind paywalls.

strangeshapedpotato herd immunity and elimination are not the same thing. Herd immunity leads to endemicity which generally sees a mutating virus like this circulating against a backdrop of previously infected / vaccinated individuals who are mostly not susceptible to it but may become so as their immune systems degrade with age and ill health. The AZ vaccine is quoted as 60% effective in a healthy population and likely much lower in older / co-morbid cohorts against Delta variants. Even before Delta it was only around 70% in the healthy. This is not enough for an elimination strategy.

This is very different from all the childhood diseases we have sought to eradicate through vaccination. The classic example is measles. The approach is working because almost all people were already immune before vaccines were introduced - prior infection gives lifelong immunity. Vaccines were only ever dealing with the newborn naive pool.
For comparison the measles component of the MMR vaccine is thought to be over 95% effective in the vaccine population and probably lifelong (they are still measuring beyond 30 years since introduction).

We have only had widespread flu vaccines for around 10 years. Already there is evidence of them becoming less effective in older cohorts on repeat vaccination such that increased dose vaccines and pneumonia vaccines are have been developed.

Disappointing.

We need to get to the point where it is an inconvenient illness not one that puts you in hospital or kills you

That has always been the case for the vast majority of people and will never be the case for 100% of people.

I always felt for her. I am not a Tory by any stretch of the imagination (hate the self serving pricks). But she had no respect, no support, she was always the sacrificial lamb and was treated appallingly by her “colleagues”.

my cats could have handled the pandemic better then Johnson and Hancock grin

Yes, as they tend to be more solitary creatures than humans 🙂

The delta variant has managed to get into the closed borders of Australia. It was unavoidable www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/australias-victoria-posts-slight-rise-covid-19-cases-2021-06-03/

@EvilPea

I always felt for her. I am not a Tory by any stretch of the imagination (hate the self serving pricks). But she had no respect, no support, she was always the sacrificial lamb and was treated appallingly by her “colleagues”.

Spot on - I thought she was great and did what she genuinely thought was the best for the public and not her own self interest. But due to lack of support within her party she was setup to fail from the start.

@EvilPea

I always felt for her. I am not a Tory by any stretch of the imagination (hate the self serving pricks). But she had no respect, no support, she was always the sacrificial lamb and was treated appallingly by her “colleagues”.

I've always felt the same about her. She was well and truly stitched up.

What's 'disappointing' @SonnetForSpring?

Disappointing that she is painting the situation as black and white. I think she is being misunderstood here.

[quote GiveMeNovocain]The delta variant has managed to get into the closed borders of Australia. It was unavoidable www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/australias-victoria-posts-slight-rise-covid-19-cases-2021-06-03/[/quote]
Or did it just spontaneously arise in Australia because it is inherent to the virus?

How refreshing to hear

Ooh Theresa! I agree.

She is right but why are we here, facing keeping current restrictions until vaccinations catch up??

Johnson chose to allow Delta into the UK because he didn't want to upset Modi and he fancied a holiday.

Still way ahead in the polls too.

They are only delaying it slightly to get more people double jabbed. I think it’s sensible given how the numbers are shooting up. Short term pain for long term gain.

I think Teresa May would have handled this so much better, she was well and truly stitched up by her party. Interesting in recent years to see how Hunt has changed as well, I would support him as a party leader (albeit I would never vote Tory).

She’s absolutely right, and as a PP said, what exactly is the end game?

For a year we’ve been told it’s about protecting the NHS.

Well due to the delayed treatments over the last year, the NHS is now well and truly fucked. It’s never going to catch up with the missed diagnosis, the delayed treatments etc, the waiting lists. Add in the fatigue from staff, it’s now decimated.

It’s been known for years that it was just one bad flu season from being at risk of being overwhelmed due to the continual lack of funding from this government. And this isn’t our collective responsibility to fix (other than not voting for a party that hates the NHS) This is down to exceptionally bad management for decades.

What’s interesting to me, is the fact that we could see this coming from India. We saw what was happening, yet Boris still waited for ages before designating India a red country. With the lack of border controls, surely this constitutes criminal negligence?

We all know what Hunt and May are like - over Brexit and Junior Docs pay.

However, almost anyone could have handled CV better, a report out last week on excess deaths puts the UK just behind the USA, based on a years worth of data, both countries way out in front, with Brazil in 3rd.

I agree with May but its her party leadership that has made CV so much worse than it should have been.

I agree with what she says

But people talking about delta variant did you mean not let that one in but do next?

I still agree with her though

How can you disagree?

I wholeheartedly agree with her

@Twoforthree

They are only delaying it slightly to get more people double jabbed. I think it’s sensible given how the numbers are shooting up. Short term pain for long term gain.

yeah - three weeks to save the NHS!

Hearing her speak so well makes me wish she was still the PM. She had no support from her party. They mocked her and showed no solidarity. Look what we got. Boris instead.

Apparently, it can get a lot worse with the vaccines always being behind the virus curve. We need effective therapeutics as much as the vaccines.

www.bbc.com/news/health-57431420

Due to the delayed treatments over the last year, the NHS is now well and truly fucked. It’s never going to catch up with the missed diagnosis, the delayed treatments etc, the waiting lists. Add in the fatigue from staff, it’s now decimated

Yes, it is ... which could perhaps be why some are saying that the real aim behind all this is to privatise it more thoroughly, with all that could mean for the cronies

I'm pretty confident though that some will produce "the backlog" as the latest reason for restrictions, even if Covid could have been got down to nil. After all, if folk go out and have accidents that could overburden a fragile NHS too

Just to add to the BBC article the higher the RO the higher the herd immunity threshold. An estimated RO of 8 puts HIT at close to 100%. Add in mutations and anything other than mitigation looks improbable.

I agree with her as well