COVID19

[Sandydragon]

Lying cunts.

Here Eug, what should I be thinking about this then... Scottish Govt emergency legislation to suspend trial by jury and treble FOI request time limit to 60 days.



Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

FOI, meh. Civil Service is unlikely to have capacity to deal with anything at the moment anyway.

Is that all trials by jury? If so that's mental. In England there's just an acceptance that you have to delay. That might mean many defendants stay in custody for longer, but at least that's unconvicted.

FOIs are the bane of my life at the best of times, at the moment they are diverting resource away from actually getting stuff done.

[paddy no 11]

Is there any clarity as to when the "soon to be available antibody testing kits" will actually be available

Given millions need to be produced its months rather than weeks?

[Sandydragon]

From today's Times.

Coronavirus was judged a “moderate risk” to Britain by the government’s scientific advisers five weeks ago as cases began to surge in Italy, The Times has learnt.

Scientists on a government committee, including the key pandemic modeller Neil Ferguson, met on February 21 and discussed the Covid-19 threat level.

Recently released minutes show that the experts and Whitehall observers raised “no objections” to holding the risk level at moderate despite alarming figures from China.


The advisers on the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag) were given the latest global data on the outbreak showing 75,465 confirmed cases of the virus in China with 2,236 fatalities.

Small numbers of deaths had also occurred in Iran, France, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea and the crisis on the Diamond Princess cruise ship was at its height.


Nervtag concluded that the official risk assessment should remain unchanged: “Current PHE risk assessment of the disease is moderate. The PHE risk assessment to the UK population is also moderate. This is a composite of what is known about transmission and the impact on public health globally and in the UK.”

The disclosure of the minutes offers a glimpse of scientific thinking as the outbreak emerged and raises questions about the speed of the response.

On the day that the advisers met, Italy recorded its first coronavirus death and two days later schools in the north of the country were closed.

The February 21 meeting was conducted by teleconference with observers from PHE and the Department of Health and Social Care. There was extensive discussion of the risk assessment.

“Some members commented that there may be sustained transmission outside mainland China. Others commented that there is plenty of scope for escalation in the UK and this would be an argument to keep the assessment as moderate rather than high at this time,” the minutes recorded.

The group’s chairman, Peter Horby of Oxford University, asked if anyone thought the risk assessment should change but “no objections were raised”.

After the meeting, one scientist emailed to say he disagreed with the assessment but because of technical problems had been unable to intervene in the discussion. John Edmunds, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, sent a message saying “the risk to the UK population [in the PHE risk assessment] should be high, as there is evidence of ongoing transmission in Korea, Japan and Singapore, as well as in China”.

As the experts debated the risks, sport and entertainment events continued. Schools were not closed until March 18, pubs and gyms followed, and a full lockdown was put in place on March 23.

Jonathan Ball, professor of virology at Nottingham University, said that the slow reaction to coronavirus in the early stages meant the UK “has been playing catch up ever since”.

He said: “It was clear by late February that the virus was transmitting easily and extensively. This was evident not only from data from China, but what was already happening in Italy. In the outbreak weeks’ if not days’ delay have proven to be crucial, and the risk to the UK population was already evident.”

He said that the composition of Nervtag was a matter for concern because a number of academic institutions seemed to be over-represented. “It is difficult to see how an environment of necessary constructive challenge could be easily established.”

The gov.uk website states that “the risk to the UK has been raised to high” but does not say when that level was fixed. PHE said the decision was the responsibility of the chief medical officer.

[Donny osmond]

Here Eug, what should I be thinking about this then... Scottish Govt emergency legislation to suspend trial by jury and treble FOI request time limit to 60 days.



Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

FOI, meh. Civil Service is unlikely to have capacity to deal with anything at the moment anyway.

Is that all trials by jury? If so that's mental. In England there's just an acceptance that you have to delay. That might mean many defendants stay in custody for longer, but at least that's unconvicted.

FOIs are the bane of my life at the best of times, at the moment they are diverting resource away from actually getting stuff done.

Tobylerone has a point, albeit one that you would prob only know about if you're inside the Scottish bubble. In the last year it has come to light that the Scot govt are using ministers and spin doctors to redact politically sensitive FOI responses. They have been held to task several times by the ICO for deliberately incomplete or inaccurate responses. From outside the FOI extension looks, as Eug says, a bit meh, but from within Scotland it's part of a pattern that is starting to be troubling.

Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

[Donny osmond]

Lying cunts.

Here Eug, what should I be thinking about this then... Scottish Govt emergency legislation to suspend trial by jury and treble FOI request time limit to 60 days.



Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

FOI, meh. Civil Service is unlikely to have capacity to deal with anything at the moment anyway.

Is that all trials by jury? If so that's mental. In England there's just an acceptance that you have to delay. That might mean many defendants stay in custody for longer, but at least that's unconvicted.

Well it's been dropped now anyway.

Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

[Eugene Wrayburn]

Here Eug, what should I be thinking about this then... Scottish Govt emergency legislation to suspend trial by jury and treble FOI request time limit to 60 days.



Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

FOI, meh. Civil Service is unlikely to have capacity to deal with anything at the moment anyway.

Is that all trials by jury? If so that's mental. In England there's just an acceptance that you have to delay. That might mean many defendants stay in custody for longer, but at least that's unconvicted.

Well it's been dropped now anyway.

Sent from my CPH1951 using Tapatalk

It hasn't. It is shelved until later this month.

[Mellsblue]

From today's Times.

Coronavirus was judged a “moderate risk” to Britain by the government’s scientific advisers five weeks ago as cases began to surge in Italy, The Times has learnt..

If you read the New Statesmen link I put up this morning it explains in some detail why.

[Eugene Wrayburn]

From today's Times.

Coronavirus was judged a “moderate risk” to Britain by the government’s scientific advisers five weeks ago as cases began to surge in Italy, The Times has learnt.

Scientists on a government committee, including the key pandemic modeller Neil Ferguson, met on February 21 and discussed the Covid-19 threat level.

Recently released minutes show that the experts and Whitehall observers raised “no objections” to holding the risk level at moderate despite alarming figures from China.


The advisers on the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag) were given the latest global data on the outbreak showing 75,465 confirmed cases of the virus in China with 2,236 fatalities.

Small numbers of deaths had also occurred in Iran, France, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea and the crisis on the Diamond Princess cruise ship was at its height.


Nervtag concluded that the official risk assessment should remain unchanged: “Current PHE risk assessment of the disease is moderate. The PHE risk assessment to the UK population is also moderate. This is a composite of what is known about transmission and the impact on public health globally and in the UK.”

The disclosure of the minutes offers a glimpse of scientific thinking as the outbreak emerged and raises questions about the speed of the response.

On the day that the advisers met, Italy recorded its first coronavirus death and two days later schools in the north of the country were closed.

The February 21 meeting was conducted by teleconference with observers from PHE and the Department of Health and Social Care. There was extensive discussion of the risk assessment.

“Some members commented that there may be sustained transmission outside mainland China. Others commented that there is plenty of scope for escalation in the UK and this would be an argument to keep the assessment as moderate rather than high at this time,” the minutes recorded.

The group’s chairman, Peter Horby of Oxford University, asked if anyone thought the risk assessment should change but “no objections were raised”.

After the meeting, one scientist emailed to say he disagreed with the assessment but because of technical problems had been unable to intervene in the discussion. John Edmunds, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, sent a message saying “the risk to the UK population [in the PHE risk assessment] should be high, as there is evidence of ongoing transmission in Korea, Japan and Singapore, as well as in China”.

As the experts debated the risks, sport and entertainment events continued. Schools were not closed until March 18, pubs and gyms followed, and a full lockdown was put in place on March 23.

Jonathan Ball, professor of virology at Nottingham University, said that the slow reaction to coronavirus in the early stages meant the UK “has been playing catch up ever since”.

He said: “It was clear by late February that the virus was transmitting easily and extensively. This was evident not only from data from China, but what was already happening in Italy. In the outbreak weeks’ if not days’ delay have proven to be crucial, and the risk to the UK population was already evident.”

He said that the composition of Nervtag was a matter for concern because a number of academic institutions seemed to be over-represented. “It is difficult to see how an environment of necessary constructive challenge could be easily established.”

The gov.uk website states that “the risk to the UK has been raised to high” but does not say when that level was fixed. PHE said the decision was the responsibility of the chief medical officer.

Classic bit of political smoke and mirrors to shift blame onto the scientists. What do these labels actually mean? There will be a technical meaning somewhere which hasn't been provided and therefore almost certainly doesn't row the government out at all. In a pandemic disease consequence scale which SHOULD include at its top "most of the human population dead, widespread disorder and the fall of most governments", moderate might be about right, even at 500k deaths.

[Mellsblue]

This builds on the previous article I linked:

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/u ... -abandoned

[Sandydragon]

Id like to think that the assessment used was based on a number of criteria:

Numbers of citizens dead,
UK reputation,
Financial loss,
etc

Whilst there are more dangerous viruses than COVID19, this is a huge spreader and if the political appetite for deaths is set pretty low, then that should base the potential response. Its one of those where the likelihood of deaths probably was moderate, but the potential for high disruption and political damage would have pushed the assessment higher. AS with any risk assessment, first set your appetite. In this case, how many people are you prepared to let die?

[Banquo]

Today's figures make very grim reading.

[Eugene Wrayburn]

Another interesting read:

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/u ... t-we-ready

I hadn't read this in error. It's actually vital and explains a lot.

I confess that my own view when this started was that it was inevitable that the vast majority of people would get it. The remarkable (and unmatched) feat of South Korea seems to suggest that I was wrong - I'm currently discounting China because I suspect that either they are lying or the means they have used to trace the infection and therefore stop it just aren't available to us, eg total information about themovements of the population through hacking of phones etc. Maybe South Korea is a special case for some reason. Maybe their pain is yet to come.

Finally, the fact it as believed that everyone was going to get it is and was no excuse for failing to actually mitigate the effects. This government did NOTHING to actually mitigate the effects of the widespread outbreak. They didn't increase production of ventilators or PPE until beyond the very last minute. They did not prepare the population for what was coming. They didn't factor in the loss of nurses as a result of Brexit. Literally nothing.

[twitchy]

[Eugene Wrayburn]

Well that's certain to help...

[morepork]

Yeah. I'm thinking the world would benefit from a bit of diversity in leadership at the moment. How much more of this inherited wealth hard man bravado can the world take?

[Sandydragon]

Can I assume that they have no covid19 confirmed cases then? Its one way to stay at the bottom of the league table I suppose.

[Sandydragon]

Today's figures make very grim reading.

Shit. Thats a bit of a jump, although you can still argue that those who are dying today caught the illness prior to the lockdown.

[Banquo]

Today's figures make very grim reading.

Shit. Thats a bit of a jump, although you can still argue that those who are dying today caught the illness prior to the lockdown.

also suspect they are recording out of hospital deaths finally. Infections obviously growing in line with acceleration in testing.

In other news, its weird that no regional strategies are that apparent. Currently in the East of England, still lowish infection rates, hospitals eerily quiet, PPE coming out of our ears, staff who have been deployed by me and others into acutes and integrated community teams not hugely busy; whether its the calm before the storm, or whether the NHS should have been deploying into areas of need, time will tell. Its ridiculous that the supply chain of say PPE is so badly managed.

[canta_brian]

Seems the Germans are just cleverer than is in the UK.

They are testing loads more people by pooling testing. They test 10 people’s samples with a single test.
If negative they have saved 9 tests. If positive they have to test all 10 which means 11 tests for 10 people, but overall it seems to be saving them thousands of tests.

[Banquo]

Seems the Germans are just cleverer than is in the UK.

They are testing loads more people by pooling testing. They test 10 people’s samples with a single test.
If negative they have saved 9 tests. If positive they have to test all 10 which means 11 tests for 10 people, but overall it seems to be saving them thousands of tests.

That is smart, you'd think that someone might have noticed or passed it on!

[Digby]

Seems the Germans are just cleverer than is in the UK.

They are testing loads more people by pooling testing. They test 10 people’s samples with a single test.
If negative they have saved 9 tests. If positive they have to test all 10 which means 11 tests for 10 people, but overall it seems to be saving them thousands of tests.

That is smart, you'd think that someone might have noticed or passed it on!

What the Germans have done is foolishly assumed competency elsewhere, will they never learn!

[Donny osmond]

Today's figures make very grim reading.

Shit. Thats a bit of a jump, although you can still argue that those who are dying today caught the illness prior to the lockdown.

also suspect they are recording out of hospital deaths finally. Infections obviously growing in line with acceleration in testing.

In other news, its weird that no regional strategies are that apparent. Currently in the East of England, still lowish infection rates, hospitals eerily quiet, PPE coming out of our ears, staff who have been deployed by me and others into acutes and integrated community teams not hugely busy; whether its the calm before the storm, or whether the NHS should have been deploying into areas of need, time will tell. Its ridiculous that the supply chain of say PPE is so badly managed.

The fatality figures from Scotland took a massive jump overnight, again due to reporting changes. Can't remember the exact details but I think the figures from some regions(s) had basically been unreported/got lost in the post/some other bullshit.

[Donny osmond]

https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m13 ... aign=usage

The overall death rate from covid-19 has been estimated at 0.66%, rising sharply to 7.8% in people aged over 80 and declining to 0.0016% in children aged 9 and under.

The estimates, calculated by researchers in the UK, used aggregate data on cases and deaths in mainland China. Unlike other estimates, however, they adjusted for undiagnosed cases and the number of people in each age group of a population.

The team found that nearly one in five people over 80 infected with covid-19 would probably require hospital admission, compared with around 1% of people under 30.

before anyone starts about Chinese figures, these are corroborated (by others, not BMJ) with figures from Italy. Again those figures are probs unreliable, but they're unlikely to be accidentally unreliable in parallel.

[Mellsblue]

https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m13 ... aign=usage

The overall death rate from covid-19 has been estimated at 0.66%, rising sharply to 7.8% in people aged over 80 and declining to 0.0016% in children aged 9 and under.

The estimates, calculated by researchers in the UK, used aggregate data on cases and deaths in mainland China. Unlike other estimates, however, they adjusted for undiagnosed cases and the number of people in each age group of a population.

The team found that nearly one in five people over 80 infected with covid-19 would probably require hospital admission, compared with around 1% of people under 30.

before anyone starts about Chinese figures, these are corroborated (by others, not BMJ) with figures from Italy. Again those figures are probs unreliable, but they're unlikely to be accidentally unreliable in parallel.

It’s those Kings College geeks again. They’ll come out this smelling of roses or sh!t as a lot of weight seems to be put on their modelling.

[Mellsblue]

Seems the Germans are just cleverer than is in the UK.

They are testing loads more people by pooling testing. They test 10 people’s samples with a single test.
If negative they have saved 9 tests. If positive they have to test all 10 which means 11 tests for 10 people, but overall it seems to be saving them thousands of tests.

That is smart, you'd think that someone might have noticed or passed it on!

Fark me that is clever. Not mention bloody simple to put in place. You’ve got to hand it to them.....again.