Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Szamo's_Ammo]

Cases of coronavirus have increased by over 500% since the schools went back.

It's great and very fortunate that children appear to be less likely to transmit the virus as God knows what the numbers would be like if they were transmitting it at the same rate as older people!

[Marshmallo]

5 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

The rapid spike in infections amongst the age group most likely to have kids at school looked significant to me on the face of it. This was a good while after the pubs opened.

Prove it

[Steven W]

10 minutes ago, Paco said:

 

Any anxiety on this is understandable but like a lot of things, this is a resource issue. If 50 school kids test positive on any given day, then immediately ~1500 school kids need tested as they’ve been in close proximity to a known positive. Plus there’s any additional parents/grandparents/childminders to throw on top. That’d be somewhere in the region of 20% of the testing capacity swallowed by 50 positives.

Get a test if there’s symptoms. You could be a good P&B case study given the discussion of kids and whether they’re common carriers.

 

Wise words. I get that there's not an infinte capacity to the amount of tests we can do, but I'd have hoped by now direct contacts to positive cases would be a madatory 'Get a Test'.

He was last in contact with the childminder Friday morning, and so far so good. But I'm well aware its early days

[Steven W]

4 minutes ago, G_Man1985 said:

Covid-19 dogs started their work today at the Helsinki Airport at arrival hall 2B. Dogs have been trained to detect the coronavirus from the test wipes given by the testperson. Service is voluntary and primarily targeted for passengers arriving from abroad. 

The P&B Coronavirus Thread's arch enemy, Proffesor Karol Sikora was going on about this months and months ago.

[renton]

1 minute ago, welshbairn said:

The rapid spike in infections amongst the age group most likely to have kids at school looked significant to me on the face of it. This was a good while after the pubs opened.

Is it not likely though that the underlying trends of infection have been there for a while, slowly multiplying until they began to be seen over the noise of the varying daily trend. Like any exponential trend, nothing seems to happen until everything happens at once, but that doesn't mean the trend only started at the knee point of the graph. It's inherently non linear so care has to be taken when correlating to causation.

There is a general scientific opinion, that I can see, anyway, that kids are less susceptible. There is a debate as to how infectious asymptomatic  or lightly symptomatic people are, relative to fully symptomatic people and how THAT effect varies with age. But if it's true that kids catch it less and pass it on less when they do catch it, it means kids mixing on schools is not a huge driver for younger age groups (albeit when you get to older school kids and Uni students then maybe they need treated like adults)

I believe that if school kids really were driving the spike in infections, that schools would close. Indeed, it'd be an easier decision for governments to make to pay lip service to children's education while running an open economy. As it is, the track and trace teams are reporting indoors social mixing as driving the infections. 

[DeeTillEhDeh]

Is it not likely though that the underlying trends of infection have been there for a while, slowly multiplying until they began to be seen over the noise of the varying daily trend. Like any exponential trend, nothing seems to happen until everything happens at once, but that doesn't mean the trend only started at the knee point of the graph. It's inherently non linear so care has to be taken when correlating to causation.
There is a general scientific opinion, that I can see, anyway, that kids are less susceptible. There is a debate as to how infectious asymptomatic  or lightly symptomatic people are, relative to fully symptomatic people and how THAT effect varies with age. But if it's true that kids catch it less and pass it on less when they do catch it, it means kids mixing on schools is not a huge driver for younger age groups (albeit when you get to older school kids and Uni students then maybe they need treated like adults)
I believe that if school kids really were driving the spike in infections, that schools would close. Indeed, it'd be an easier decision for governments to make to pay lip service to children's education while running an open economy. As it is, the track and trace teams are reporting indoors social mixing as driving the infections. 

You would also think there would be a proportionate rise across the country in infections but that does not seem to be the case. Of the 486 new cases today 224 and in Greater Glasgow and 107 in Lanarkshire - that is 68% of new infections. If you add in Lothian (57 new cases) that is almost 80% of new cases in those 3 health board areas.

I just wonder how much travelling to and from work is having an influence on infection rates.

[renton]

2 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

You would also think there would be a proportionate rise across the country in infections but that does not seem to be the case. Of the 486 new cases today 224 and in Greater Glasgow and 107 in Lanarkshire - that is 68% of new infections. If you add in Lothian (57 new cases) that is almost 80% of new cases in those 3 health board areas.

I just wonder how much travelling to and from work is having an influence on infection rates.

It could well be that Edinburgh infections haven't quite taken off like Glasgow thanks to the large office based workforce. The main routes in and out are still pretty empty around what used to be rush hour and Lothian Buses are all pretty empty.

Edited September 23, 2020 by renton

[welshbairn]

23 minutes ago, Marshmallo said:

Prove it

[Have some faith in Magic]

Following the science.

If we insist that all schools and Universities stay in the class then we need to get all kids to start smoking the infection rates should start to decrease quite quickly. 

Raises taxes and keeps the virus at bay. Job done. 

 

Edited September 23, 2020 by Have some faith in Magic

[Hedgecutter]

9 minutes ago, Have some faith in Magic said:

Following the science.

If we insist that all schools and Universities stay in the class then we need to get all kids to start smoking the infection rates should start to decrease quite quickly. 

Raises taxes and keeps the virus at bay. Job done. 

Tackling a severe acute respiratory syndrome through the uptake of smoking is certainly worth a punt.

[Michael W]

47 minutes ago, renton said:

It could well be that Edinburgh infections haven't quite taken off like Glasgow thanks to the large office based workforce. The main routes in and out are still pretty empty around what used to be rush hour and Lothian Buses are all pretty empty.

I imagine this is a similar situation in England. The North West a disaster zone whilst the South East and East of England are currently well below the national average. 

[craigkillie]

25 minutes ago, Have some faith in Magic said:

Following the science.

If we insist that all schools and Universities stay in the class then we need to get all kids to start smoking the infection rates should start to decrease quite quickly. 

Raises taxes and keeps the virus at bay. Job done. 

 

University students, by and large, aren't in classes, though it varies from institution to institution. The University of Glasgow has almost all of its teaching online in Semester 1 and seems to be planning for the same in Semester 2. Edinburgh seems to have slightly more in person classes but is mainly online, and St Andrews looks like they are still planning for a decent number of in person but all large classes will be online. I assume all the other jumped up colleges and polytechnics around Scotland will be somewhere in between.

[welshbairn]

24 minutes ago, Hedgecutter said:

Tackling a severe acute respiratory syndrome through the uptake of smoking is certainly worth a punt.

There are some possibly dodgy small sample studies showing smokers are less likely to catch Covid than non smokers, but much more likely to die if they do. So swings and roundabouts.

[welshbairn]

What are they like? FFS.

Quote

Chauffeur-driven cars will be exempt from new laws forcing passengers to wear masks in taxis to slow the spread of coronavirus, Downing Street has said. As PA Media report, Boris Johnson announced that passengers in licensed vehicles would have to wear coverings under new restrictions in England aimed at preventing a resurgence of Covid-19. But No 10 said the measure, to come into force on Thursday, would not include passengers in chauffeur-driven cars, though the driver’s employer would have to ensure they could work safely.

 

[Beans on Toast]

2 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

What are they like? FFS.

 

Horrible excuses for humans? Next step, if you earn over x amount you don't have to wear a face mask and can stay in pubs past 10.

[Jacksgranda]

1 hour ago, welshbairn said:

The rapid spike in infections amongst the age group most likely to have kids at school looked significant to me on the face of it. This was a good while after the pubs opened.

Maybe you were a wee bit drunk when you looked at the figures...

[s_dog]

2 hours ago, Steven W said:

I don't understand what the deal is with testing (lab capacity?), but no matter, after six months we should be seeing testing increasing rather decreasing.

My son's childminder has tested positive, so we (me, wife and son) are isolating at home (although to be honest my son is the only one who actually has to isolate). Until any one of us develops symptoms though, we are not entitled to a test, which I find odd. Particularly in my son's case as he's been in close proximity with a positive case for several hours at a time.

Fortunately no symptoms from the three of us so far though.

I think it decreased from 10-12k per day a few weeks back because a) there was an early rush of tests from all the kids going back to school and catching colds, so lots of testing as people were playing safe plus being advised by the schools to get a test and it's since tailed off, and b) there then started to be issues with the lab capacity. Not sure why if it's still down to capacity issues in the labs that the test numbers are still falling or not. People in Scotland generally seem to be able to get tests, problem is, while in theory it makes sense for you and your family to get tested, you'd really need tested every day or two for 7-10 days as it could take that long for you to be infected. And there's certainly not the capacity for that.

 

2 hours ago, Have some faith in Magic said:

119 of the 383 cases in Scotland yesterday were in the 19 or under age category. 

155 of today's 486 cases are in the 15-19 age range, which ties in with them saying the jump in cases in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde area are pointing towards a significant cluster at Glasgow University. There's only 20 in the U14 age range today and although today's big jump in the 15-19 range means they are now catching up, it's still those between 25-64 that have the highest numbers.

 

Edited September 23, 2020 by s_dog

[s_dog]

Not correct, but still 

[Granny Danger]

The test and trace system in England is under the control of a person whose only qualifications are her support for the Conservative Party.

The NHS should not take any flak for the failures of the system as it is being run by private sector contractors.  It would not surprise me if said contractors (or their parent companies/financial backers) are Tory donors.

In Scotland I would introduce jail sentences for people who blatantly broke the rules.  Cùnts that organise house parties and the like should get at least 12 months.  This should apply whether they are 18 or 80.

 

 

[Granny Danger]

4 minutes ago, s_dog said:

Not correct, but still 

Told you all!