Are we ahead of Europe or are they ahead of us?

[1990butfeel21]

Can't work it but I am filled with dread

Sweden are doing well yes. Because they’ve avoided the merry go round of lockdowns.

Lockdown, artificially suppress cases, unlock watch cases shoot up. Fortunately we’ve stepped off that ride...we’re doing the right thing finally. Not listening to those who are screaming for more endless restrictions.

Basically no one knows, it’s all speculation as usual. It’s a bit like running round a circular track! Who is ahead and who is behind? 😳😂 We will just have to hope the booster roll out will make a difference and that the continuing new medicines ( anti virals) keep improving and bringing down serious cases.

How are Swedens hospitals looking?

Just looked at Sweden. 237 people hospitalised in the week to 14th Nov. 37 in intensive care. So think they’re coping ok. Could do with upping vaccinations and boosters probably.

Obviously Sweden are not seeing the dramatic increases that neighbouring countries are either. They’ve been pretty flat since the summer.

Thats good

@sirfredfredgeorge

I forgot some people think they know more than the CMO not sure why though

The CMO was the one recommending people go swimming and join exercise classes to get fit during the middle of full lockdown with every swimming pool and gym in the country closed, and you unable to meet more than one person outdoors. Even I can know more than him that that is impossible, so I have almost no faith in his abilities.

But in terms of flattening in the curve, I think it was clearly a good idea to have infections released as we have, in fact, I think it's possibly been a bit too slow as protection has waned faster than thought in the vaccinated, so we're a bit behind in boosters and it would've been good in retrospect to have had more kids infected with the protection there - but certainly the expectation that the vaccines were this poor against infection (possibly as much to do with delta as to waning) wasn't in the early data.

No faith in his abilities due to that seems extreme. Exercise in lockdown was a good idea though given how bad it was for many increasing in weight. Shame he said classes not just go out and do it - which I pretty much did throughout and it helped.

But anyway who do you rate as someone to listen to?

@Delatron

Sweden are doing well yes. Because they’ve avoided the merry go round of lockdowns.

Lockdown, artificially suppress cases, unlock watch cases shoot up. Fortunately we’ve stepped off that ride...we’re doing the right thing finally. Not listening to those who are screaming for more endless restrictions.

Absolutely. The hysteria has to stop.

@PrincessNutNuts

Some of the posts on this thread are not going to age well...

My posts on covid haven't been widely off the mark.

I don't expect them to be in the next six weeks, given the data we already have. Our trend just isn't right for that.

We know that case levels have a certain 'locked in' factor - so you can do a reasonable min/max prediction with a degree of certainty so many weeks in advance. Thats roughly about 3 to 4 weeks. So we have a fortnight before we can have a bloody good idea of where we will be for Christmas week. It was bloody obvious last year that certain areas of the UK were going to have a major problem for Christmas despite what the government were saying, even by the first week in December.

That on top of the fact that quite simply if your pool of people who can catch covid in the next six weeks is smaller than other places, you are not going to see the same level of cases happening this side of Christmas - thus Christmas lockdown aren't likely in the UK.

As it stands we currently have a trend of falling cases (and this is being reflected in hospital admissions and deaths so we know its not a reduction in testing) even though we have no restrictions. Its likely we may see a certain amount of an upward trend amongst those who are unvaccinated (mainly primary age kids) before Christmas but there's a limit to how much of a surge this can be. The numbers and data simply don't support a large pre-Christmas surge in the UK as a realistic possibility.

And no 'another variant' isn't a likely scenario either, because of how much we are monitoring this now, and we'd have a fair idea about a problematic incoming new variant (we know Alpha emerged some time before it became a problem - it originated in September 2020. Delta was first detected in India in October 2020 and they had real issues in March/April 2021 to give you an idea of timescales).

If we do have real issues with covid again, its likely to become apparent in January - possibly driven by older people not getting their boosters before Christmas and then mixing with grandkids who are liable to be most at risk of catching it. Thats one of the reasons there is going to be a big push on boosters over the next fortnight.

Even SAGE officials are now saying we are extremely unlikely to have a lockdown before Christmas now.

What happens at the end of Jan/beginning of Feb is another matter entirely, especially given how the NHS is usually stretched to the limit at this point anyway. I don't rule out restrictions incoming at that point - once businesses have had their crucial Christmas Quarter.

For the most part, we are doing ok, our trend is flat which is the key thing to watch. Thats very different from places having a problem.
You can see it here

Wow, some big medical egos here, and without a single qualification 😄!

It doesnt matter because we are all just going round in circles

@Duckrace

Wow, some big medical egos here, and without a single qualification 😄!

Tbf its not about medical qualifications. Its about statistics, understanding statistics and the ability to understand what that means.

You can't get to X level of cases without a certain amount of time to pass. Transmission of a dominant variant doesn't suddenly change overnight. Waning of vaccines doesn't just happen with no consistent pattern. Numbers of people booked in for boosters / eligible for boosters over the next few weeks is not a computer generated random number.

The problem in The Netherlands and Austria is numbers have been going up at a steady pace indicating the R is above 1 for some time and are now considerably higher than the UK (which has always 'run hot'). Thats not a place you want your trend to be coming into Christmas. Our trend seems to suggest things are hovering around R1 fairly consistently. Unless we see a significant shift in the UK in the next fortnight or so, we should be pretty ok until the New Year at least. Cos there isn't enough time for things to go tits up too much before then.

Lots of people don't grasp statistics....

Duckrace

You'd do well to listen to Redtoothbrush she really knows her stuff on many topics if you'd followed her over many years.

Another fan of @RedToothBrush - common sense and stats and no fearmongering!

Important thing I'd stress:

If I had relatives 60+ who hadn't had their booster by Mid December and I had unvaccinated kids who haven't had a positive covid test this side of half term, I would NOT be spending Christmas Day with them.

It is still a combination that is a recipe for disaster.

@Claudethecat

Scotland and Wales are both considering upping existing measures ( not sure about NI), so I think there is some concern that things could get worse here in the UK too. England seems to just be hoping it all goes away!

NS can fek right off. We're all still wearing masks!

@CraftyGin

I just heard on the radio that lockdowns in Europe are due to them just getting the Delta variation now. We got it in June.

I think it very much depends on where you are in Europe.

In France’s case Delta has been the predominant variant for quite some time..the only data/graphs I have quick access to ATM go back to early summer and show France’s first delta wave starting mid summer..that peaked in mid August when we had not far short of 25k recorded cases a day about 90% of which were Delta.

Then a dip, now we are into wave number whatever…about 10k cases on average a day over the last week but rising, 97% of which are delta.

Lots of data here for those interested.

covidtracker.fr/covidtracker-france/

That should be “14k cases a day”

@Theplantisgrowing

How are Swedens hospitals looking?

I've just checked the figures for my health authority for you. We currently have 45 people in hospital with covid, 6 of them in intensive care. That's spread over 8 hospitals.

Think our pattern is very different to most of Europe as we've high but relatively stable numbers for a while.

Our Christmas is safe - my mum and OH both recently had their boosters and the kids have all either had their vaccine/s and/or had positive Covid test within last six months so feel pretty confident.

Most people I know have had (mild) Covid recently so there's still a high level of natural immunity around.

mmm hmm

Our area has had an increase of over 50% in the past week, so locally our cases are not stable (the BBC website had the increase as 94%, not sure how they made it that).

As regards what will happen over Christmas, I don't think anyone can really say for sure yet.

I don't see the point of making predictions that can't be substantiated, on inadequate evidence.

I do think we are in a much better position than last year, because of the vaccinations and boosters.

I will continue to wear my medical grade mask and hope for the best. We are going to have a quiet Christmas.

We do have careful plans (which will bear rearrangement) to see family and the kids have provisional arrangements for Christmas concerts and so on which is lovely (we have had boosters and they are as vaccinated as they can be). I'm sure that it will go to outdoors services and Nativity etc like last year if needed, but that was ok in fact,

@RedToothBrush

My posts on covid haven't been widely off the mark.

I'm curious, do you still think it was wise to wait until schools went back before children aged 12-15 got any protection from vaccination?

Or do you now think it would have been a good idea to vaccinate these children before schools started? in the light of how things panned out over the past few months?

Actually, I'll change that to "offer vaccination to these children/ families" - as that was what I meant, sorry.

[quote herecomesthsun]@RedToothBrush

My posts on covid haven't been widely off the mark.

I'm curious, do you still think it was wise to wait until schools went back before children aged 12-15 got any protection from vaccination?

Or do you now think it would have been a good idea to vaccinate these children before schools started? in the light of how things panned out over the past few months?[/quote]
I still think they had to wait in terms of being ethical. Thats a separate but equally important question.

I have more issue with how the roll out was handled and done logistically than the delay til the Autumn term.

A friend was telling me at half term that her high school had only had 300 jabs available for over 2000 kids and thats what was holding back things. The school had significantly more kids who wanted the jab but couldn't get it. Diverting kids to walk in clincs after half term instead smacked of craziness and favored the well off kids who have parents able to take them.

We shouldn't vaccinate kids for the benefit of older people if its to the detriment of the kids health unfortunately.

So I think you are asking the wrong question.

Vaccinating in schools could have and should have been quicker and smoother once the decision had been made - thats the problem more than the delay over the summer for ethical reasons.

So yeah I stick by saying we were right to wait for data for ethical reasons.