Are people dying of Covid, or with Covid?

[lightand]

As they are different things.

Does anyone actually know?

There will always be people dying with Covid, as the elderly, especially, die, and some of them, like the rest of us, will always die whilst having Covid.

So could 180 per day per winter be an average number going forward, forever now? [and the NHS should well be into the process of gearing up for that?]

@FlorenciaFlora

Nope as I as I posted

Are you saying you think theyre lying about their concerns? Even though parliament and other organisations share those concerns?

Well obviously, all their reports and blog posts are full of misinformation designed to further their COVID-denying agenda.

If there are other, legitimate, sources reporting the same claims then fine. But I suspect you will see when you did down into it - other reliable organisations may have a viewpoint regarding the issue but they're not claiming what HART is.

[quote Bizawit]@leafyygreens if you read the thread you might understand the context of that comment[/quote]
Also Im not sure that the statistics don’t support it. My understanding is that The spring / summer of 2020 was generally an incredibly quiet time for the nhs mostly because they cancelled everything!

It also might interest you to know that the claims that people aren't dying of COVID - they're being "euthanised" with midozolam instead to further some unspecified agenda by the governement, was originally shared by David Icke.

Also Im not sure that the statistics don’t support it. My understanding is that The spring / summer of 2020 was generally an incredibly quiet time for the nhs mostly because they cancelled everything!

You specifically said your friend "working on a COVID ward" said it was the quitest it's ever been in his career @Bizawit?

Not your friend working on an outpatient/elective surgery ward where things were most definitely quiter due to cancellations and distancing policies.

@leafyygreens

Also Im not sure that the statistics don’t support it. My understanding is that The spring / summer of 2020 was generally an incredibly quiet time for the nhs mostly because they cancelled everything!

You specifically said your friend "working on a COVID ward" said it was the quitest it's ever been in his career @Bizawit?

Not your friend working on an outpatient/elective surgery ward where things were most definitely quiter due to cancellations and distancing policies.

Yea because all wards in the hospital were turned into Covid wards and Covid rates were incredibly low. Hence nothing for said friend to do. He’s a junior doctor.

@FlorenciaFlora

HART are discredited now. They appear to be a bunch of badly intentioned crackpots with no integrity? Maybe that is why the BBC aren't reporting their ideas?

I agree that there are civil liberties issues; there was also a need to keep hospitals /healthcare etc running in the pandemic, as I have said. I was quietly involved in a bit of the latter.

I don't have very much immediate personal knowledge about what was happening in care homes so I genuinely don't have a lot to say about that.

I also very much doubt that the organisations you quote are all saying exactly the same thing. So if we are going to discuss this, you need to look at who is saying what, maybe?

It isn't true for example that "the Government" agrees with HART's concerns.

One MP (in your quote) asked a question of Matt Hancock - a very reasonable question - about care homes. Yes, there were problems with how the Government managed that, in my opinion. (tBJ & co might or might not agree with that)

Even so, doesn't mean that "the Government" agrees with all of HART's concerns. And so on.

I think you will get a lot further with this discussion if you just leave HART out of it, quoting them really won't help your argument.

If there are other, legitimate, sources reporting the same claims then fine. But I suspect you will see when you did down into it - other reliable organisations may have a viewpoint regarding the issue but they're not claiming what HART is

Yes they are. In fact HARTs claims don’t even really scratch the surface.

www.cqc.org.uk/sites/default/files/20201204%20DNACPR%20Interim%20Report%20-%20FINAL.pdf

www.amnesty.org.uk/files/2020-10/Care%20Homes%20Report.pdf

committees.parliament.uk/oralevidence/2318/html/

I think it’s quite obvious that there has been a really serious problem in care homes.

There is no justification for elderly people who develop a sniffle being given fatal doses of medications without any discussion or any examination by a gp.

No wonder gps wanted to be granted indemnity.

There are indeed many questions to be answered about the cull of vulnerable care home residents. And the govt that sanctioned it will be needing to ask Lady MacBeth what stain remover she uses, but it's not the Covid denying, anti vaccine Hart group (some of whom are much closer to the govt than you might think if you haven't read widely about them. Let's not forget the JCVI sociology lecturer (was it?) member on gardening leave after his retweeting of Hart anti-vax propaganda)

@Bizawit - I don’t think your junior doctor friend who was only on a covid ward because other wards had been made covid wards is a very good source of evidence of how busy or overwhelmed the NHS as a whole actually was. If operations have to be cancelled because itu beds must be available post-operation, and itu beds are taken up by covid patients who are likely to be hogging those beds for weeks, it doesn’t take much imagination to realise that some people will be exhausted and overrun and others less busy than usual, with little that can be done about that in reality. Surgery is not just about space in operating theatres, it requires all sorts of available support services and supplies around it before it can safely go ahead. The same applies to an awful lot of other areas of modern medicine - deficits in one area have a knock on effect everywhere else. So even if the extra beds made available for covid patients to languish in were not all filled, the NHS was not actually in a position to fill those beds with tonnes of other patients, either.

In the meantime, covid sufferers who should have been admitted to hospital and put on oxygen were being left at home with oxygen starvation and thus getting long term organ damage, so it’s not even as if hospitals were treating all the covid patients they should have been in a more ideal situation. Oxygen was being rationed, PPE was being rationed, care for everyone, including those sick with covid, was being rationed, because health services were not in a position to cope with any of it in any way other than desperate firefighting. If that’s your idea of not being overwhelmed, I don’t know what is.

[quote Walkaround]@Bizawit - I don’t think your junior doctor friend who was only on a covid ward because other wards had been made covid wards is a very good source of evidence of how busy or overwhelmed the NHS as a whole actually was. If operations have to be cancelled because itu beds must be available post-operation, and itu beds are taken up by covid patients who are likely to be hogging those beds for weeks, it doesn’t take much imagination to realise that some people will be exhausted and overrun and others less busy than usual, with little that can be done about that in reality. Surgery is not just about space in operating theatres, it requires all sorts of available support services and supplies around it before it can safely go ahead. The same applies to an awful lot of other areas of modern medicine - deficits in one area have a knock on effect everywhere else. So even if the extra beds made available for covid patients to languish in were not all filled, the NHS was not actually in a position to fill those beds with tonnes of other patients, either.

In the meantime, covid sufferers who should have been admitted to hospital and put on oxygen were being left at home with oxygen starvation and thus getting long term organ damage, so it’s not even as if hospitals were treating all the covid patients they should have been in a more ideal situation. Oxygen was being rationed, PPE was being rationed, care for everyone, including those sick with covid, was being rationed, because health services were not in a position to cope with any of it in any way other than desperate firefighting. If that’s your idea of not being overwhelmed, I don’t know what is.[/quote]
That’s an interesting theory, but not what happened in this case. What happened was the hospital planned for the worst case scenario and then some, and what transpired was nothing approaching what they had expected. Hence the hospital was working much under capacity for a fairly extended period of time, meanwhile a lot of people were denied the healthcare they needed.

Except that there was a major problem with opening elective surgery and outpatients in the pandemic for logistical reasons (and no one knew how the rates were going to pan out in different places).

Everything suddenly took up a lot more time and space because staff were working in covid and non covid areas , clinical staff had to work in PPE, patients (when they returned to outpatients) had to wear masks and have temperature tests etc.

There were also shortages of medical staff in some areas as people got ill / isolated and so on.

Cracking on as normal was never an option; but it was very frustrating for junior staff, I can see that.

@Bizawit

My friend who worked on a Covid ward throughout the spring / summer of 2020 said it was some of the most relaxing weeks of his career!

Which hospital was this at?

I know from friends and acquaintances who are medics it was far from quiet in any of their wards, let alone the Covid wards. Must be a different area than here.

One MP (in your quote) asked a question of Matt Hancock - a very reasonable question - about care homes. Yes, there were problems with how the Government managed that, in my opinion. (tBJ & co might or might not agree with that)

If you read that report, and frankly I suspect you have, you’ll see that many MPS raised various concerns with Hancock. I’m not going to spoon feed you quotes from that report so you can pick holes in them.

It also might interest you to know that the claims that people aren't dying of COVID - they're being "euthanised" with midozolam instead to further some unspecified agenda by the governement, was originally shared by David Icke

I didn’t mention midozolam at all but I think you know much more about this than you initially implied.

I have never read anything from David Icke, but it’s clear that there are concerns from Amnesty and the CQC about how people were treated.

I’m happy to chat about the subject but I suspect this is not a good faith conversation. I have posted links containing factual information from amnesty and the CQC.

You seem much more invested in picking holes and talking about conspiracy’s than discussing the concerns in those reports.

What are your thoughts about the claims in those reports that some people were given end of life drugs that were not needed?

I think even The Sun ran a report on overuse of that drug in care homes. It's not exactly off the radar - but it's not currently part of the national narrative.

Agree OP

[quote FlorenciaFlora]www.hartgroup.org/midazolam-prescriptions/[/quote]
I didn’t mention midozolam at all but I think you know much more about this than you initially implied.

What are you talking about @FlorenciaFlora? It's literally there is your original post from psuedoscience group HART.

I hadn't heard of the specific medication either until I read the article you linked

HART are discredited now. They appear to be a bunch of badly intentioned crackpots with no integrity? Maybe that is why the BBC aren't reporting their ideas?

I have not said the BBC should report HARPS concerns. I’ve raised the issue that it’s not been reported at all.

So instead of keep talking about HARP perhaps you could tell us why reports from reputable organisations are not deemed newsworthy.

What you’re trying to do here is really transparent. You’ve nit picked every post I’ve linked to. You implied the gov.uk committee link I posted wasn’t worth reading by suggesting that just one measly mp asked a question. We both know that’s not the case which is why you’ve suggested it’s not worth bothering with.

I also think you know damn well about the concerns about midazalam . I actually think you were worried I was going to mention it which is why you mentioned it first and linked it to David Icke. We all know he’s controversial to put it politely. And we all know anything linked to him is quickly dismissed.

Quite frankly I feel you’re implying I’m some sort of nut as well as implying the links I’ve posted are nuts. Is there a particular reason you don’t want people to read those reputable links?

If I was involved in any aspect of healthcare during this pandemic I would very much want to read the committee reports and the CQC report. It’s obvious you have read it yet you are implying other people shouldn’t waste their time.

You are conflating several things at once @FlorenciaFlora

You seem much more invested in picking holes and talking about conspiracy’s than discussing the concerns in those reports.

Nope you - and HART - make the claims that the eldery aren't dying of COVID, they're dying of drug overdoses. They are using this to further their COVID-minimising agenda which leads into the idea that supression measures and vaccines aren't necessary.

This is vastly different from the very real issues raised by other reptutable bodies about the travesty in care homes. This is the difference you don't seem to understand.

I’m happy to chat about the subject but I suspect this is not a good faith conversation. I have posted links containing factual information from amnesty and the CQC.

At no point have I said these reports are problematic - it's the claims from HART that are.

Weird how you immediately accuse me of posting not in "good faith though"

Yes, and Flora you are confusing different posters as well.

I think you have a good point with respect to the current Government's failure to protect care homes, and I have said that.

A lot of people on here would agree with that bit, I think.

At no point have I said these reports are problematic - it's the claims from HART that are.

Ok. We can go through it and maybe I’ve misunderstood.

HARP seem to be saying that midazalam is a valid drug and is used at end of life care. They seem to be saying that some people are concerned it’s been over used during the pandemic and there should be an investigation if only to reassure people. Would you agree with that?

Amnesty seem to be saying something similar along with the CQC report that some staff have misinterpreted the DNRs and some people are concerned that some patients could have been put on end of life care prematurely.

It seems to me that they are saying the same thing although in different ways. What is it specifically you disagree with?

I have confused posters yes, apologies.

HARP seem to be saying that midazalam is a valid drug and is used at end of life care.

Yes (it's midazolam and HART )

They seem to be saying that some people are concerned it’s been over used during the pandemic and there should be an investigation if only to reassure people. Would you agree with that?

From here

fullfact.org/online/david-icke-midazolam/

and here

health-desk.org/articles/how-is-midazolam-being-used-for-covid-19-is-it-dangerous

"Recent articles from website like The Daily Expose suggest that Midazolam has been used in the United Kingdom to "prematurely end the lives of thousands upon thousands of people" whom the public was told died from COVID-19. There is no evidence to suggest that the drug was used to end the life of any patients.

Rather, Midazolam was ... used on ventilated patients with COVID-19. It is one of the two most commonly used benzodiazepine medications for sedation in the ICU. This medication is frequently used in critically ill patients to keep them calm, allow their bodies to recover through rest, and ease discomfort and other physical symptoms."

and "There is no evidence that midazolam was being used with the intention of ending care home residents’ lives, or that this was a formal policy. "

This seems quite politically loaded.

We were encouraged to use midazolam as part of a palliative care pathway for very unwell covid patients on my hospital ward.

The patients for whom it was written up generally recovered pretty well.

We as NHS hospital staff were certainly not trying to hasten the end of their lives. Quite the opposite (......I would struggle to find the words, how much we were trying to get our patients through this).

Looking at these articles, it looks as though midazolam has been seized on by people in the US and UK who want to suggest that there was a conspiracy to bring forward the deaths of people in care homes. On the face of it, this seems very unlikely.

It seems reasonable for this to be addressed, as this must be very distressing to hear for the relatives of people who died.

In the same way, at a post mortem, the usual practice in my experience has been for families to get time to ask the doctor any question they want about their relative's care. These questions sometimes have quite a straightforward answer or explanation, that can help the bereaved a lot.

It doesn't seem likely to me either, that doctors and staff at care homes were actively conspiring with the state to use midazolam to end people's lives early.

I would agree with you though, that there are a range of questions for the Governement to answer, about care homes but I think these might be slightly different questions and probably wouldn't focus on this particular medication.

Amnesty and CQC both have concerns or reports that end of life drugs were used in cases where it was perhaps not warranted. They don’t seem to focus on any particular drug whereas HART rightly or wrongly suggest it is one particular drug. Apart from naming the drug I think all these reports seem to share similar concerns.

I don’t think for one moment that staff were involved in an evil conspiracy. I think, like the reports state that there was a lack of understanding about policy’s and presumptions might have been made about who might be covid positive or who should or should not receive end of life care.

I’m extremely disturbed that some relatives say they requested a gp visit for a minor issue and the gp prescribed end of life medication over the phone without examining their relative or having any discussion.I personally don’t feel it matters which drug it was, but I do find it odd that Matt Hancock stated on the telly that he had ordered 2 years worth of that particular drug so people could have a “good death”. Looking at that video now, alongside the concerns, it does seem rather sinister and very stupid.

Whatever has happened here I agree there needs to be an investigation into this and several other things.

We’ve been shown images of dead bodies in the streets, frightened to death by images of nightingale hospitals and bombarded with images of death and disease. Then we’ve had Hancock’s statement about the drugs and having good deaths and images of grinning dancing nurses. No wonder people are confused or concerned.

My own thoughts are (and I hope I’m wrong) is that there will be an investigation and individual staff will be blamed and scapegoated. It won’t be the government’s fault in any way.I suspect it will be used to turn the public against the nhs so it can be privatised. I can’t be the only one who found the sudden hero worshipping of nhs staff by the government very uncharacteristic.

@opalplumstead

Agree OP

Thank you.

Since I started this thread several days ago, I am watching how the media reports deaths with or of covid.

The media is playing fast and loose with it's wording.
It does nothing it seems, to alert people to the difference. And for those not paying much attention[and who has time to pay much attention to absolutely everything they read], you would think that everyone does die of it. Which is far from the truth.

To that end, I shall be doing my bit, when out and about in real life, to point out the difference. Particularly to those who are still shielding, and are anxious about the whole thing. Part of their fear is groundless.
Media and government induced fear.

I will also start another thread, in a few weeks, to start to pick apart their fears, so start to help them feel at least a little less anxious, hopefully.

@lightand You mean to spread more disinformation? That's a shame,