Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Todd_is_God]

A comparison between the timelime of the SARS pandemic and Covid-19

[Turkmenbashi]

15 minutes ago, pandarilla said:

I don't know the details of how these tests are purchased, and the processes needed to build capacity - but in pretty certain its a complex issue.

I think there's been too much criticism on this specific issue, as both governments would clearly love to get testing ramped up but it's clearly not possible to do that straight away.

It's not exactly policy to drag their heels on testing.

There is equipment in existing laboratories both public and private sector used for other purposes that could have been taken for covid testing. This did not happen in Scotland, in fact in one such laboratory NHS England approached them first, this being well into April.

[Paco]

I don't know the details of how these tests are purchased, and the processes needed to build capacity - but in pretty certain its a complex issue.

I think there's been too much criticism on this specific issue, as both governments would clearly love to get testing ramped up but it's clearly not possible to do that straight away.

It's not exactly policy to drag their heels on testing.

It was the stated aim of the UK Government to effectively give up on testing anyone who didn’t clearly have it and was very ill in hospital at the end of March. This was backed up by mouthpieces like the deputy CMO for England who argued testing was a ‘side issue’ as recently as April 1st.

The testing picture is now much better in England, but only after significant media pressure with even the Telegraph front page (‘Questions without Answers’, 2nd April) sticking the boot in. Hence the ridiculous 100k target and the cheating to “sort of” get there. In Scotland it’s reasonable in terms of capacity, and will be pretty good this week if we get over 10k a day as stated by Sturgeon. But we’re only getting to 4000 tests or so completed a day at a maximum, with even less people tested since many are done twice. That isn’t anywhere near enough to understand the R rate.

For a while Scottish testing was slightly ahead of UK rates per head and I think the Scottish Government were quite happy to coast along at that. Plenty of the criticism levelled at the UK Government applies here too.

[pandarilla]

Yeah, they re-structured the wards quickly but I posted before that they had a delivery of PPE and made an announcement that all staff could collect it from a central point. By the time the nurses got there it had been snapped up by canteen workers, office staff, porters and even joiners & electricians who happened to be doing jobs on site when the announcement was made. There was nothing left for nurses. Then a middle manager cancelled an emergency delivery of PPE because it didn't fit with his "action plan", leaving them short over a weekend. My sister told me that incident led to senior management taking direct control and cutting a whole layer of management out of the loop. You would like to think permanently but the nature of bureacracies is the chiefs accumulate indians as status symbols.

Aye the nhs is full of 'bullshit jobs'. Where no-one would even bat an eye lid if they didn't exist anymore.

[pandarilla]

It was the stated aim of the UK Government to effectively give up on testing anyone who didn’t clearly have it and was very ill in hospital at the end of March. This was backed up by mouthpieces like the deputy CMO for England who argued testing was a ‘side issue’ as recently as April 1st.

The testing picture is now much better in England, but only after significant media pressure with even the Telegraph front page (‘Questions without Answers’, 2nd April) sticking the boot in. Hence the ridiculous 100k target and the cheating to “sort of” get there. In Scotland it’s reasonable in terms of capacity, and will be pretty good this week if we get over 10k a day as stated by Sturgeon. But we’re only getting to 4000 tests or so completed a day at a maximum, with even less people tested since many are done twice. That isn’t anywhere near enough to understand the R rate.

For a while Scottish testing was slightly ahead of UK rates per head and I think the Scottish Government were quite happy to coast along at that. Plenty of the criticism levelled at the UK Government applies here too.

So is the main accusation here that politicians and those in top positions were incompetent?

The sheer weight of pressure from the media suggests that's not the case. If it was easy to fix as turkmenbashi suggests then even the most inept politician would get it done.

There is equipment in existing laboratories both public and private sector used for other purposes that could have been taken for covid testing. This did not happen in Scotland, in fact in one such laboratory NHS England approached them first, this being well into April.

[throbber]

If Piers Morgan tests positive today then the country is in serious trouble.

[bennett]

2 minutes ago, throbber said:

If Piers Morgan tests positive today then the country is in serious trouble.

Wasn't he complaining when other celebrities were getting tested?

[Silverton End]

[bennett]

Just now, Silverton End said:

I hope she doesn't decide to take up running.

[Paco]

So is the main accusation here that politicians and those in top positions were incompetent?  The sheer weight of pressure from the media suggests that's not the case. If it was easy to fix as turkmenbashi suggests then even the most inept politician would get it done.

 

 

 

 

In Scotland? I’d suggest a complacency that ‘better than England’ was good enough was partially to blame, I’ve often argued that’s pretty much our general approach to healthcare to the ire of many on here.  

 

At this stage the capacity in Scotland is reasonable but it isn’t being used above about 50%, and many people take two tests. So either we’ve not extended testing to enough people, people don’t know how to go about getting a test or the testing centres are too difficult to reach for many - maybe even a combination of all three. These things are all very much under the control of the Scottish government and aren’t remotely affected by issues like supply of cotton buds or lack of lab space. You can’t understand how the virus is affecting your population as a whole by testing 0.08% of them a day. 

 

 

 

 

[throbber]

4 minutes ago, bennett said:

Wasn't he complaining when other celebrities were getting tested?

Yeah he said he had mild symptoms and being tested was precautionary so he’s not at work today, needless to say he’s being called a hypocrite.

Edited May 4, 2020 by throbber

[Melanius Mullarkey]

4 minutes ago, MixuFixit said:

 

Mmm don't really agree. You'd have a point if the UK was the first place it began spreading. The thing is by the time Cheltenham, Stereophonics gig etc were happening we had no reason to doubt the UK would follow the trends of Italy, Spain, France because every scientist around was explaining over and over what an exponential function is, and so it came to pass.

 

This.  It was likely happening early to middling of the spreading shit show, shortly before the death shit show kicked in.  I look at the timeline tells us that. 

[welshbairn]

11 minutes ago, throbber said:

If Piers Morgan tests positive today then the country is in serious trouble.

I'm sure we'll cope with you missing out on your morning w**k.

[Jacksgranda]

17 hours ago, Monkey Tennis said:

I wasn't commenting on the wisdom or otherwise of the decision.

I was commenting on the (admittedly facetious) suggestion that it would be desirable for church goers to die in big numbers from the virus.

It wasn't facetious, imo.

[Jacksgranda]

17 hours ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

 

 

Like i said yesterday alot of people don’t have much understanding or experience of risk management.

The people who have been posting the meme I pasted below are themselves falling into the “ elf & safety gawn maad “ category.

Literally everything in life can kill you including staying in the house and doing nothing for prolonged periods . Everything from the comon and obvious road traffic accidents to less frequent lightning strikes , industrial accidents, slips and falls, electrical appliances and even trousers. Yes people really do die each year getting dressed.

Obviously we simply can’t avoid anything hazardous as everything is hazardous to one extent or another so what we do is take a calculated risk when we do something , usually subconsciously.

This disease for most people is not deadly, but it is contagious and without some measures it will find its way to the vulnerable and kill them .

The measures we are using at the moment are very knee jerk, like evacuating a burning building. Now that we’re out of the fire we need to move to the next phase as we can’t stand outside in the cold in our pants until the house is rebuilt

 

"love ones". Who are these illiterates, who write and post this shite?

[Marshmallo]

1 hour ago, Todd_is_God said:

When Cheltenham started the UK had 300 recorded cases, and 3 deaths.

Let's not pretend that the festival kicked off in the middle of a shit show.

Very true and I don't think there is a single person who could have foreseen this virus worsening in the UK at that stage

[Granny Danger]

In anticipation of restarting work in the coming weeks I have been trying to buy wall mounted hand sanitiser dispensers.  The kind that have sensors so you don’t need to touch them.

They're out of stock everywhere.  The only one I could find in stock has none of the filler cartridges in stock!

I imagine many small businesses will be having the same problem.

[The OP]

Despite his indefatigable confidence on the subject, I continue to suspect that Todd is God is not an epidemiologist.

[Granny Danger]

2 minutes ago, The OP said:

Despite his indefatigable confidence on the subject, I continue to suspect that Todd is God is not an epidemiologist.

Then he should leave the discussion to those of us who are...

[Jacksgranda]

15 hours ago, Thereisalight.. said:

A poll on one of the Scottish news sites asking if people think lockdown measures should start to be lifted after Thur. Suprised that only 22% think they should be. With daily death rates falling dramatically it’s clear they’re buying into the original scaremongering regarding it

The death rate is kind of irrelevant (unless it's a relative/friend), it's the number of hospital admissions that's important and more critically the use of ICU beds. As has been explained countless times the lockdown is to stop the NHS getting overwhelmed by this highly contagious - but not particularly lethal (unless the hospitals are swamped) - disease.

Edited May 4, 2020 by Jacksgranda
sllepnig