Covid - coming out of Lockdown 3 - no politics, less opinion and more facts and information.

[woodenhead]

Just now, Nick C said:

Which is exactly what today's announcement will cause!

It's been coming for months, it's not a surprise, it's just 4 weeks longer than expected.

 

The world will be no different between the 18th and 19th July except you'll be able to walk up to the bar and say 'Marjorie, a pint of your best please' and when my dentist speaks to me she won't be wearing quite so many layers of masks and visors than I cannot understand a word she said.

 

All we've had since January is positive messaging from Government about the need and success of being vaccinated, if we don't open up then what has it all been for, to just remain cowed and scared forever more. 

[Nearholmer]

Observed some very interesting differences in mask-wearing culture today.

 

I cycled from a very prosperous part of South Bucks, down through the back of Slough(*), the back of Windsor and out through Windsor Park into leafy Surrey.

 

In Bucks and Surrey, barely any mask wearing outdoors; in Slough, nearly everyone wearing a mask outdoors, in the parks, everywhere.

 

So, that’s because Slough has a really high Covid rate, and the leafy places don’t, right? Er, no ….. the leafy part of Bucks has a rate double that of Slough. My surmise is that Slough had a really very bad winter indeed, and everyone is terrified.

 

(*) The back of Slough is a series of linked parks, with a good set of cycleways that run down to the Thames. John Betjeman and David Brent must have missed these bits.

[Andy Hayter]

1 hour ago, John M Upton said:

Boris is scrapping all restrictions,  masks etc yet expects new cases and deaths to double by the end of the month?!?

 

Seems we are being thrown under the bus here...

 

 

I think the real issue is this:

 

Lockdowns slow down the rate of infection.  This allows health services to function rather than become completely overwhelmed.  On their own they do nothing else.

 

Along comes vaccination.  This allows you to inject a high degree of immunity into the population.

 

But once everyone who will be vaccinated is vaccinated, what then?  Well lockdowns and restrictions only slow down the rate of infection again.  

 

Options:

Enforced vaccination of the laggards.

expand vaccination to other groups (12-17 year olds).

Both would improve the situation but would to a greater or lesser extent unacceptable to the voting classes.

So the alternative is indeed do nothing more and throw everyone to the lions.   It could be done differently and I think at this stage of vaccination should be done differently but at the end mask wearing, demanding vaccination certification, banning those without negative tests etc.  eventually just slows down the inevitable.  

[adb968008]

The 4 week lockdown was supposed to enable more to be vaccinated, but the last 4 weeks the pace of vaccination has slowed considerably… av combined 300k a day versus 500k the last few months….. have we missed a trick ? Run out of vaccines ?

[Hobby]

Or the groups being vaccinated being less bothered about getting it... 

[Hal Nail]

18 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

The 4 week lockdown was supposed to enable more to be vaccinated

And to give them time to find out if the vaccine means that less people get ill, even if they still catch it.

 

 

[Hobby]

Exactly. 

[Bulleidboy100]

2 hours ago, woodenhead said:

One thought that did cross my mind - if you are on a train to Scotland from England on the 19th July and you are not required to wear a mask, at what point would you have to put the mask on - the first Scottish stop or on the border?

I don't know about others, but if I were on that train, the mask would have gone on as soon as I boarded in London or wherever.

[Steamport Southport]

I would ask what the Scottish were doing.

 

Seemed alright for 20,000 of them to come down here wearing no masks two weeks ago.....

 

[Dunsignalling]

4 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

Allow me to summarise the Prime Minister’s statement today:

 

”That’s it - you’re on your own”...

 

So it’s herd immunity from this point on, then.

Trouble is herd immunity is only reckoned to kick in when over 80% of the TOTAL population are vaccinated or have been infected recently enough to have residual immunity. The last figures I saw suggested that it will be early October before 80% of OVER 18s will have had two jabs. However, the recently infected cohort should have grown significantly by then!

 

Next lockdown? My entry for the sweepstake is Bonfire Night.

 

John

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, Bulleidboy100 said:

I don't know about others, but if I were on that train, the mask would have gone on as soon as I boarded in London or wherever.

I'd have cut a sixty foot length out of all lines where they cross the border!

 

John

[Nearholmer]

I’m coming to think that I feel uncomfortable with the way things are going to be for probably the next month or two, very high prevalence of Covid, because it’s difficult to square in my mind an approach that probably does deliver “ the least harm to the greatest number” with individual risk to me and mine over that period.

 

To explain a bit:

 

Allowing the bug essentially free rein in the short-term should get us to herd immunity fairly rapidly, by allowing the vaccine-reluctant to acquire antibodies by natural means, hopefully over the summer, well in advance of the flu season.

 

But, during that period we will all be existing in a “Covid rich” environment, and some of us will catch the blasted thing despite being double-jabbed, and many (most?) children will catch it. All fine and dandy, except that of those needing hospital treatment c8%  have been double-jabbed, and some are children, and I don’t want my good lady, or my children, or me for that matter, to be among them.

 

So, while I wouldn’t argue against what appears to be the strategy:

 

- it would be deeply dishonourable of HMG to deploy such a strategy without being overt about it; and,

 

- I shall be pretty cautious during what could well turn out to be “peak Covid”, outdoors in uncrowded places fine, indoors in busy places, ideally not.

[Gibbo675]

21 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

I'd have cut a sixty foot length out of all lines where they cross the border!

 

John

Why stop there, I would have hoped for a similar length of tarmac to be dug up also as the virus may have a driving license as well as the ability to purchase railway tickets.

[MJI]

The Moderna son is now OK, took 2 days to get over it, he realises that the disease would have hit him worse. Moderna hit our neighbour bad as well.

 

I checked our local paper website today (just to see if any piccies from the open jabbing son went to) and they had a letter from a covidiot naming themselves getting VERY angry with repeated letters and texts to go and get vaccinated.

 

They do not want the vaccine, but decide to publicise it. They had 1 supporter (possibly themselves) and a LOT of telling off.

[andyman7]

23 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Trouble is herd immunity is only reckoned to kick in when over 80% of the TOTAL population are vaccinated or have been infected recently enough to have residual immunity. The last figures I saw suggested that it will be early October before 80% of OVER 18s will have had two jabs. However, the recently infected cohort should have grown significantly by then!

 

Next lockdown? My entry for the sweepstake is Bonfire Night.

 

John

Lockdown #1 was to stop everything whilst we figured out what was going on. Lockdown #2 was to supress a bow wave of infections ahead of vaccination. Lockdown #3 was to buy time during vaccine rollout whilst Kent variant wave was working its way through. 

 

Even if things are bad this winter (and I hope not but let's face it, enforced isolation of the population means there is likely to be more flu and other bugs as well as Covid) just what will the point of Lockdown #4 be? And who will pay for everyone to sit at home indefinitely?

[Dunsignalling]

1 minute ago, andyman7 said:

Lockdown #1 was to stop everything whilst we figured out what was going on. Lockdown #2 was to supress a bow wave of infections ahead of vaccination. Lockdown #3 was to buy time during vaccine rollout whilst Kent variant wave was working its way through. 

 

Even if things are bad this winter (and I hope not but let's face it, enforced isolation of the population means there is likely to be more flu and other bugs as well as Covid) just what will the point of Lockdown #4 be? And who will pay for everyone to sit at home indefinitely?

There's a perfectly arguable case that they should have just let it rip from day one, not hospitalised Covid sufferers to preserve the NHS, and picked up the pieces once herd immunity had been reached.

 

There are more than enough would-be immigrants dreaming of rubber dinghies as I type to replace the two or three  million we might have lost to the virus.

 

John

[adb968008]

I think whats missing is the choice for parents to get kids vaccinated.

 

Opening up, allowing unrestricted spread in schools just exposes parents / grandparents to unnecessary risk against their will and against their human rights, as school is mandatory for their kids, making exposure to covid compulsory & unavoidable. Parents are being forced to face covid, from their kids, regardless any other precautions they take.

 

Doubtless transport workers are quite rightly going to see this coerced exposure, exactly the same way…less than 1 in 2 are actually vaccinated in the population, so on this one, I wouldnt blame the unions for doubling down and refusing to work without continuing to have enforced public protection.

 

If parents had the option to vaccinate kids, its their risk and choice.

it also would push up that herd immunity, which at just 33mn double vaccinated is less than 50% of the whole population, regardless how its being spun on the news… as the vaccine numbers tonight were the lowest since it began in January, under 100k 1st doses.

 

Edited July 5, 2021 by adb968008

[monkeysarefun]

In contrast, the strategy here has alwaysbeen   a zero tolerance one, meaning any community case is dealt with via isolation, tracing and then lockdowns if there is an outbreak that hasn't been stopped at one or two cases.

 

Consequently Sydney is spending week two locked down, and although daily case totals are hovering in the 20 to 30 new cases range (thats raw numbers, not per 100,000 or whatever), with the majority of these already in isolation or close contacts of existing cases, the daily 3 or 4 cases of unknown origin are enough to keep us locked out of the rest of the country and New Zealand.

 

Our vaccination rate is pretty poor, partly due to the EU blocking vaccines initially, then bad press about the AZ one, then the government announcing the AZ would be limited to over 60's, then not being able to source enough  alternative vaccines for the under 60's.

 

One thing through it all though is the government message has been constant and everyone knows what the plan is  at least, and big fines that are actually enforced means almost everyone does the right thing, except Rugby League footballers who are bred for size, not brains.

 

Even the deputy Prime minister copped a $180 fine last week for going in to pay for petrol without a mask.

 

This will probably be the way of life here  until our vaccination gets up to majority vaccinated at minimum. It has its upsides, last night due to no moon and the cold wintry air  I saw more stars than I've ever seen in my life before, the milky way was a bright band of silver right across the sky, like in fancy pictures, the Magellan clouds were two clear  bright patches too.  I guess air travel bans  and lockdowns have really helped the air quality.

 

Edited July 5, 2021 by monkeysarefun

[Nearholmer]

20 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

I think whats missing is the choice for parents to get kids vaccinated.

Whether or not to vaccinate children is a very difficult issue, because it doesn’t appear to be crystal clear yet whether or not it would be to their net benefit.

 

If it is to their net disbenefit, it shouldn’t happen, irrespective of the risk that poses to us parents.

[adb968008]

7 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Whether or not to vaccinate children is a very difficult issue, because it doesn’t appear to be crystal clear yet whether or not it would be to their net benefit.

 

If it is to their net disbenefit, it shouldn’t happen, irrespective of the risk that poses to us parents.

How is that different to any other vaccine for any other situation ?

Every medication comes with a health warning.

It has to be taken on merit.

 

The UK is very quickly finding itself in a minority on this one, Netherlands just joined the list of vaccinating kids tonight, but then when it comes to adopting the lets create a Covid paradise option, we are totally alone in that too…

I hope it does peak before hospitalisations rise too high, as the math seems to be cases in relation to hospitalisation… I hope they are putting a factor weighting to differences in volume of daily testing then/now in that calculation.

Edited July 5, 2021 by adb968008

[Andy Hayter]

1 hour ago, Dunsignalling said:

Trouble is herd immunity is only reckoned to kick in when over 80% of the TOTAL population are vaccinated or have been infected recently enough to have residual immunity. The last figures I saw suggested that it will be early October before 80% of OVER 18s will have had two jabs. However, the recently infected cohort should have grown significantly by then!

 

Next lockdown? My entry for the sweepstake is Bonfire Night.

 

John

Herd immunity is a myth.

 

If you think that x% of the population having antibodies means the rest cannot get it, then you are right - but only when x=100%.

 

80% just means the chances of transmission are reduced.  In no way does reduced = zero.

 

I have posted this before but with measles the vaccine is above 99% effective.  Portugal has the highest measles vaccination level in the world at over 99%.  Herd immunity must surely apply, mustn't it?

2018/9 they had an outbreak with 40 cases near Oporto.

[John M Upton]

Apparently none of these relaxations and or scrapping of restrictions has been signed off yet, the final decision will be made on 12th of July so still plenty of time for Boris's bandwagon to pull the handbrake and perform yet another last minute U-Turn which will have the benefit of really annoying the Daily Mail which is always fun....

[Nearholmer]

6 hours ago, adb968008 said:

How is that different to any other vaccine for any other situation ?

The crucial difference is that with these vaccines, the outcomes, benefits and risks, aren’t yet properly known for children. The trials aren’t complete, or even very far progressed, yet.

 

If those trials reveal risks that outweigh the benefits to children, no go. That is a tough test to pass in this case, because the risks from Covid to children are very low - it’s not like most diseases against which children are vaccinated, where the risks from the disease are substantial, so removing  or substantially reducing that outweighs a few minor side-effects.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 6, 2021 by Nearholmer

[hayfield]

9 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

Herd immunity is a myth.

 

If you think that x% of the population having antibodies means the rest cannot get it, then you are right - but only when x=100%.

 

80% just means the chances of transmission are reduced.  In no way does reduced = zero.

 

I have posted this before but with measles the vaccine is above 99% effective.  Portugal has the highest measles vaccination level in the world at over 99%.  Herd immunity must surely apply, mustn't it?

2018/9 they had an outbreak with 40 cases near Oporto.

 

Its all down to how you view the information/statistics 

 

From what I have gleaned, on medical grounds there is little benefit vaccinating children / young adults. Except where the line is drawn 12 - 14 - 16 - 18

But as far as education is concerned there is a massive benefit to prevent absenteeism

Plus enterprising children finding a way to fool the test into making a false positive to skip/disrupt school 

 

How many of the children off school actually need to be off ?

 

On the other hand it may be much safer to let the virus do its thing for a month or so within the younger population to give schools a clear run next term. One local pub has closed for a week due to some staff in quarantine, plus local infections shot up from 2 or less to 10 in the past 7 days

[beast66606]

9 hours ago, John M Upton said:

Apparently none of these relaxations and or scrapping of restrictions has been signed off yet, the final decision will be made on 12th of July so still plenty of time for Boris's bandwagon to pull the handbrake and perform yet another last minute U-Turn which will have the benefit of really annoying the Daily Mail which is always fun....

 

Jeez - do you ever stop ? - one minute you moan about the "free for all" the next minute when BJ states things may change if circumstances dictate you moan about another U turn.