Westminstenders: Following the EU lead

[RedToothBrush]

Coronavirus poses a particularly Irish shaped question. How the UK responds to Irish plans for ending lockdown and whether Arlene continues to back an all Ireland plan will be fascinating to watch and see justified regardless of which way we go.

The UK for all its new found independence is looking very closely to the success / failure of EU strategies before making our own plan public. Mainly because we've yet to write one.

Johnson hasn't led much. He's delegated. Yet he gets all the praise for doing the sum total of fuck all and never being the bad guy. There always another fall guy to blame.

Economically we are stuffed and promises of a very quick bounce back don't look likely based on public confidence and willingness to return to places like pubs restaurants and shops.

Our ability to adapt to new conditions at short notice has been tested and businesses can not afford to do this again soon.

This is the background to which we go into talks. Both sides need an extension to serve their best interests. Johnson is determined to cut our nose of to spite our face for the sake of his legacy and to keep those paying the back handers and dodging tax happy.

BigChoc - my chronic condition isn’t ‘urgent’ but I do have to be seen every 6 months and be treated or the condition will deteriorate and become a much bigger problem for me and the NHS.

All outpatients appointments are cancelled for the foreseeable future and I dread to think how long the back log will be.

I’m currently self treating (not very well and in an improvised sort of way) and most likely I’m making the condition worse.

I think they could manage this by separating Covid hospitals from non Covid.

But there seems to be no attempt to deal with the issue at all.

Those opposed to lockdown are inventing fanatasies about large numbers dying because they can't go to hospital

If that was directed at me, then may I assure you I wasn't.

@DGR, in my case, essentially, what could I usefully bring to any discussion? I am not from or in the UK.

Don't worry, you'd easily make up for posters who are in the UK and haven't got a clue.

If nothing else, you can cut and paste from different sources .

Mathanxiety
The Test / Trace / test / trace system comes with
one a household has tested positive, it is locked down and supported and re tested until its clear
That way those who are at risk have food and safety
those who are not at risk are making sure there is food in the shops etc

The Article was about South Korea - which has never done a lockdown and managed to run a face to face election without a surge in cases

and YYY to pontypridds point about separating Covid from others by building

Its one of the crass failings of Tory health policy

• Private healthcare hospitals have always been able to exclude and ignore infectious people
• Tory MPs use private hospitals
• infection control in the NHS / care home / care providers has NEVER been a priority

hopefully that will change long term

I've been getting angrier and more exasperated the last few days, reading the details of Operation Cygnus.

The Guardian have published the 'secret' report here;

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/07/revealed-the-secret-report-that-gave-ministers-warning-of-care-home-coronavirus-crisis

Guardian: "The exercise included four dummy meetings of Cobra, the government’s emergency response system, over three days, as ministers and officials were tasked with imagining the UK was facing the peak of infections."

I notice that none of the dummy Cobra meetings in the exercise (2016) were chaired by the prime minister.

Just read the report quickly. Unfortunately it refers to excess deaths quite a lot - worst case scenario 200-400,000 in the UK. Population triage, likelihood of the medical profession complying with this step and likely ethical issues that might arise also discussed.

Scenario Assumptions on page 45 include:

June - Virus emerges in Thailand
...
...
26 Sep WHO declares pandemic
26 Sep Ordering arrangements in place for respirators and PPE

School closures -
Government advice is for schools to remain open.
250 schools (1%) across England have taken the decision to close.

Patients avoiding their GP in the Republic of Ireland as well;

Yesterday -
"GP referrals for patients with suspected cancers drop by 50%."
"Doctor says figure is ‘very worrying’ and people shouldn’t be afraid to contact their GP."

www.irishtimes.com/news/health/gp-referrals-for-patients-with-suspected-cancers-drop-by-50-1.4247217

Patients avoiding their GP in the Republic of Ireland as well

So: as long as other countries have problems, the UK doesn't deserve better.

Is one way to interpret a post like that.

DG Nope, wasn't directed at you, you conceited thing !

Ponty One of the many problems with COVID is the great difficulty of seperating non-COVID patients

The NHS took a long time to test all patient on entry and staff too,
but even that doesn't stop hospital infections, because of the % of false negatives especially in the early phase before symptoms

Even the most efficient and well-resourced hospital / health systems in Europe have assessed significant risk of patients acquiring infection in hospitals

and even when patients are prepared to accept the risk,
the doctors may still judge it too high for themselves / patient / other staff / the most urgent patients ....

For JeSuisPoulet and her bright dyslexic DD - I have a bright dyslexic DS who at the age of 28 has just got a place at medical school after a long hard haul to get there. Trying to teach him at home never really helped but what did him was learning to touch type from a fun children’s course and more recently audiobooks. He has a fantastic vocabulary and very wide interests but no thanks to school. It took him a long time to get over ingrained feelings of failure from not being neurotypical. Could you substitute a typing course for some of her school work? It’s a really helpful way of improving her communication skills and will help with exams in future

and YYY to pontypridds point about separating Covid from others by building

Impossible given the asymptomatic carriers. You only need one and you don’t have a covid-free zone.

Italian research showed the asymptomatic are key to the spread. German research found that 50% of people who passed it on were not symptomatic at the time.

The people I know who have had it, other than doctors, have no idea who/where they caught it from.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/08/lockdown-boris-johnson#comment-140473837

'The prime minister’s former business adviser Andrew Griffith – elected as an MP in December –
has warned that every day the UK economy is in lockdown, and its competitors aren’t, means lost business.'

< This is a direct consequence of the govt choosing to delay lockdown.
One reason was to gain advantage against other countries - e.g. most of Europe - who chose to shut down earlier

They - and the UK - lost the gamble:
a delayed lockdown takes longer to work.
The UK will likely suffer more than was necessary wrt both the virus and the economy >

We are able to make medical appointments again. DH is seeing his neurologist this month and I need to get my wrist checked.

I think the risk here is as low as it's going to be until we have a vaccine, as the first wave didn't really hit us. So I think the most risk-averse approach for us is to get any medical appointments done as soon as possible, before a possible second wave.

I'm waiting to see if the cases die down over summer, as some have predicted

• no evidence that COVID actually is seasonal, btw - but at least I feel at my fittest in summer and it also gives still more time for doctors to find better meds and techniques for treating the virus

They - and the UK - lost the gamble:
a delayed lockdown takes longer to work

YY to this - feels like we’re all part of an experiment that they’re gambling on rather than you know, plan, prepare, listen to experts.

Reminds me of that poster Remain produced of key Brexiters Johnson, Gove etc. at the gambling table. I believe it didn’t run because Cameron vetoed it. Another gamble where we’re all the losers.

^I'm waiting to see if the cases die down over summer, as some have predicted - no evidence that COVID actually is seasonal, btw -
but at least I feel at my fittest in summer and it also gives still more time for doctors to find better meds and techniques for treating the virus^

Also, hasn't the history of pandemics generally show that for some reason there is a loss of virulence as time goes on ? (Mechanism as yet unknown).

I'm not pushing a wishful thinking angle, just wondering what history tells us.

Or to reverse the telescope: whatever happened to Spanish flu ?

Doncha just love making a comment through headlines ?

So: as long as other countries have problems, the UK doesn't deserve better.

It's a squirrel which is racing-to-the-bottom.

MERS spread in Saudi in August, so it can obviously survive hot seasons.

Mistigri I've been wondering about that. I need to see the dentist and have an eye test. The latter is way overdue and I think my contacts are really not adequate, while my emergency backup specs are so old they got damaged when I fell asleep BFing DS2 and slipped down and got squashed. DS2 has just turned 11...
If I can get an appointment (v unlikely), I'd rather go in the next month than wait till Sept.
There have been v few cases around here and in the département more generally (though I think the stats are unclear because some ill people were taken to Marseille, in a different dépt. and may have been counted there. And there was a lack of data from the Marseille area for weeks, due to some glitch the nature whereof escapes me...)

UK may ditch NHS contact-tracing app for Apple and Google model

I still want simpler checks as well / instead, such as staff taking temperature before allowing entry to work, shops, restaurants, gym etc

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/may/07/uk-may-ditch-nhs-contact-tracing-app-for-apple-and-google-model

UK may ditch NHS contact-tracing app for Apple and Google model

... but someone has made a truckload of case from it, so that's OK then. See also: shit PPE kit from Turkey.

UK may ditch NHS contact-tracing app for Apple and Google model

Similar from Germany -

"German U-turn over coronavirus tracking app sparks backlash."

www.ft.com/content/16cf73d0-2bbe-45d0-b4f9-ffa6115877bb