Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[bendan]

7 hours ago, MixuFruit said:

Where would the kids have gone if their parents were at work?

Loads of people were working from home by mid March, and few people went on furlough on the day the schools closed (I didn't go on until mid April). Schools have stayed open for kids of essential workers - same could have happened for the small number of kids who were too young to be alone and with no-one to look after them.

[madwullie]

4 hours ago, Am Featha *****h Nan Clach said:

From the brief pictures I've seen of the beaches/protests, even though there were huge numbers on the beaches it did look like there was some social distancing between groups. There seemed like far less distancing at the protests.

Also, when the slogan is 'black lives matter', having mass gatherings which have a disproportionate number of black people during a pandemic that disproportionately kills black people just seems stupid.  

Black people know that and have taken it into consideration when deciding to march. They calculate of the two things (in the US) that are currently killing them disproportionately, police brutality is the trump 

[bendan]

6 hours ago, Mr Tourette said:

 

I think the SG were caught in the headlights at the start of this. It’s great in hindsight to suggest what they should have done, but they would have been very conscious that had they pursued a different track from WM and it had turned to shit, then the strong position of the SNP in Scotland that has been built up over many years could have been trashed

Had they gone a different way and things turned out better than they have, then that wouldn’t necessarily have made their position that much stronger. The Wee Nippy brigade would still be the same proportion of the electorate

So as long as they didn’t make a bigger c**t of it than WM then nothing is lost

 

That's probably true, but the fact is the SG have been afraid to make any kind of meaningful decision throughout. Cautious about going into lockdown, cautious about coming out.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

1 hour ago, pandarilla said:

Yeah definitely this.

You get elected, and then you govern. The two are not connected (sadly).

And in terms of the dems winning and the suffering a difficult 4 years - we simply can't afford this c**t being in the job any longer. He's a complete nut-job, and that job is simply too important. I'd hate to see if him he got really desperate and reckless - which could happen if the economy slumps in the long term.

And as the Tories are hell-bent on pursuing a No-Deal Brexit it's imperative that the Trump circus has departed Washington in November.

Edited June 6, 2020 by O'Kelly Isley III

[trainspotter]

16 minutes ago, bendan said:

That's probably true, but the fact is the SG have been afraid to make any kind of meaningful decision throughout. Cautious about going into lockdown, cautious about coming out.

Vague promises of an “adult conversation” seem to have been replaced with a much clearer “gonnae no dae that” as well.

[The Naitch]

17 minutes ago, bendan said:

That's probably true, but the fact is the SG have been afraid to make any kind of meaningful decision throughout. Cautious about going into lockdown, cautious about coming out.

Being wrong about cautiously going into lockdown doesn't mean they're wrong about being cautious coming out of lockdown. While they've clearly got things to learn iit's better to be safe than sorry as we start to ease things off.

[Todd_is_God]

5 minutes ago, bendan said:

That's probably true, but the fact is the SG have been afraid to make any kind of meaningful decision throughout. Cautious about going into lockdown, cautious about coming out.

Agreed. They want to convince people they can lead Scotland into and beyond independence but even now, despite quite clearly being ahead of England in this infection curve, the MO is wait and see what England do then do it here.

NS is head and shoulders above BJ when it comes to communicating. That's not even a debate. But it's the same message.

At least the WM press conferences have slides each day that show the progression of the pandemic. These visual aids are seemingly deemed unnecessary by the SG. Instead, up here, we get the Police guy talking like he's in a primary school saying "please don't do x because it's really, really dangerous"

It's a strange period up here because the restrictions seem to be too tight for the numbers that are being reported. The briefings are now a repetition of restrictions which i'm pretty sure no one talking about them actually believes are needed any more. Essentially, unless the SG decides f**k it, we dont need to wait the full 3 weeks here, we are in limbo until the 18th of June.

[bendan]

9 minutes ago, The Naitch said:

Being wrong about cautiously going into lockdown doesn't mean they're wrong about being cautious coming out of lockdown. While they've clearly got things to learn iit's better to be safe than sorry as we start to ease things off.

Being cautious coming out isn't such a bad thing, but one of the measures of success in managing this is about the timing going in and the timing of coming out. It's easy to be 'successful' in suppressing the virus if you have the longest lockdown in Europe, but what are the consequences?

[The Naitch]

9 minutes ago, bendan said:

Being cautious coming out isn't such a bad thing, but one of the measures of success in managing this is about the timing going in and the timing of coming out. It's easy to be 'successful' in suppressing the virus if you have the longest lockdown in Europe, but what are the consequences?

I agree with that point. That's the balance every government has to reach regardless of how good/bad they've done in applying the lockdown in the first place. I don't envy the SG in that sense.

[welshbairn]

15 minutes ago, bendan said:

Being cautious coming out isn't such a bad thing, but one of the measures of success in managing this is about the timing going in and the timing of coming out. It's easy to be 'successful' in suppressing the virus if you have the longest lockdown in Europe, but what are the consequences?

Laughing our heads off if the Germans go to R4?

[renton]

34 minutes ago, Todd_is_God said:

Agreed. They want to convince people they can lead Scotland into and beyond independence but even now, despite quite clearly being ahead of England in this infection curve, the MO is wait and see what England do then do it here.

NS is head and shoulders above BJ when it comes to communicating. That's not even a debate. But it's the same message.

At least the WM press conferences have slides each day that show the progression of the pandemic. These visual aids are seemingly deemed unnecessary by the SG. Instead, up here, we get the Police guy talking like he's in a primary school saying "please don't do x because it's really, really dangerous"

It's a strange period up here because the restrictions seem to be too tight for the numbers that are being reported. The briefings are now a repetition of restrictions which i'm pretty sure no one talking about them actually believes are needed any more. Essentially, unless the SG decides f**k it, we dont need to wait the full 3 weeks here, we are in limbo until the 18th of June.

My guess is that the Scot Gov approach is intrinsically cautious as opposed to opportunistic fence sitting, waiting on England.

The fact is that the lower the number of infections you have, the harder it is for the R number to get back above one for any given tranche of measures designed to ease lockdown.

You could well argue that stamping down the infection rate until it is non existent before pursuing lockdown exit is the optimal solution from a pure health point of view. I think some of the other small nations did so before full exit.

It may also be the case that with a permanently open border with England, currently far more relaxed in terms of lockdown, and showing way more per capita infections still, that there is extra burden placed on test and protect. Starting from the minimal base of infections is surely prudent then.

[bendan]

9 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Laughing our heads off if the Germans go to R4?

Most countries know that you can't stay in a full on lockdown for any length of time without suffering consequences much greater in magnitude than the problem you're suppressing. It's why the Danes had kids back in school in late April. It hasn't stopped them (successfully) trying to keep R down by various measures.

 

[Am Featha Taigh Nan Clach]

1 hour ago, madwullie said:

Black people know that and have taken it into consideration when deciding to march. They calculate of the two things (in the US) that are currently killing them disproportionately, police brutality is the trump 

It's statistically likely that somewhere along the line, the friend, relative (or someone) unknown to them will die as a result of these gatherings. 

That doesn't sit well with me, despite how much I agree with their message.  

[welshbairn]

2 minutes ago, bendan said:

Most countries know that you can't stay in a full on lockdown for any length of time without suffering consequences much greater in magnitude than the problem you're suppressing. It's why the Danes had kids back in school in late April. It hasn't stopped them (successfully) trying to keep R down by various measures.

 

We're behind the rest of Europe on nearly every criteria mainly because we started our half arsed dysfunctional lockdown late and are still in the global premier league of the grim reaper. Now wouldn't be the best time to rush imo. I very much wish all the best for our German cousins, it was a joke.

https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=usa&areas=gbr&areasRegional=usny&areasRegional=usnj&cumulative=0&logScale=1&perMillion=0&values=deaths

[vikingTON]

20 minutes ago, renton said:

My guess is that the Scot Gov approach is intrinsically cautious as opposed to opportunistic fence sitting, waiting on England.

The fact is that the lower the number of infections you have, the harder it is for the R number to get back above one for any given tranche of measures designed to ease lockdown.

You could well argue that stamping down the infection rate until it is non existent before pursuing lockdown exit is the optimal solution from a pure health point of view. I think some of the other small nations did so before full exit.

It may also be the case that with a permanently open border with England, currently far more relaxed in terms of lockdown, and showing way more per capita infections still, that there is extra burden placed on test and protect. Starting from the minimal base of infections is surely prudent then.

The outbreak became far too widespread and well-entrenched for suppression to be a credible strategy in the UK some time ago. The specific goal when a three week lockdown was announced was to prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed. That's not going to happen any time soon but the SG has since shifted the goalposts to 'keeping R well below 1': an aim that few would have signed up for if all the medium term disruption to do so had been spelled out in March. 

Given the difficulty and enormous personal, societal and fiscal costs involved in suppression we should now be willing to accept a linear infection curve while opening things up from this point on. 

Edited June 6, 2020 by vikingTON

[DeeTillEhDeh]

The R number rising across the UK simply isn't reflected in the daily cases being recorded. So either it's wrong, regional data is being utilised further than it should be or the initial R estimates were an underestimate. The estimate is based on data from two weeks ago but the number of cases diagnosed continues on a downward trend. 
I think we all know that confirmed cases are an understatement, but if more people are catching it these should also be rising. Alternatively, maybe people are indeed being infected and are not bothering to get tested or are experiencing mild/symptomatic cases. 

Or that it's fallen in the big urban areas like London and Birmingham because they were hit first.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

Don't think we know yet whether it was kicking the bedblockers into care homes when they thought the hospitals could be about to be swamped with Covid patients, or visitors and staff allowed to come in and out of the care homes without PPE or proper procedures for far too long.

Or private care home bosses using the same staff in multiple homes.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

Other than 4000 lives and counting as well as a decade's worth of lost prosperity paying for this shite.

It never ceases to amaze that hindsight turns everyone into fucking experts.

[HeartsOfficialMoaner]

pick up the pieces?

[HTG]

Excellent read. 

https://mobile.twitter.com/RussInCheshire/status/1269260314547273729