Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[tsubaki]

Well, there hasn't been a pandemic for a 100 years. So, it's kind of unprecedented.

Other countries with more experience dealt with it better, and Aus and NZ - due to their geographical location - were able to follow the SARS model and isolate/suppress the virus.

There’s not been a full pandemic for a hundred years, but we’ve come close several times (SARS, MERS) and there’s been “bad flu years” that killed hundreds of thousands worldwide.

The risk these things pose though is so serious that we should be properly prepared; I hate to recycle a quote used earlier on the thread but Lord Beresford said more than a hundred years ago “battleships are cheaper than battles”, and he was right.

Protecting the country effectively against these sorts of things requires understanding from us all and proper resources. Get that in place, in advance of when it happens, and we’ll be much better off.

 

[BlueToff]

There’s not been a full pandemic for a hundred years, but we’ve come close several times (SARS, MERS) and there’s been “bad flu years” that killed hundreds of thousands worldwide.

The risk these things pose though is so serious that we should be properly prepared; I hate to recycle a quote used earlier on the thread but Lord Beresford said more than a hundred years ago “battleships are cheaper than battles”, and he was right.

Protecting the country effectively against these sorts of things requires understanding from us all and proper resources. Get that in place, in advance of when it happens, and we’ll be much better off.

Okay, I don't disagree. I'm just not sure on the application of it. I'm sure we'll see a system, I just don't think it'll really work as you describe, but we'll see.

Can we tackle the wet markets, too, while we're at it.

Or, get the world's second-largest economy to tackle the ones in their country?

 

[Tubey]

Tubey we won’t be picking things up almost instantaneously under that proposal - with this, people had to get ill enough to require hospital admission. That was days after they’d been infected.

That meant it had probably by that point infected rather more people, who’d had the opportunity to infect others, as had the people who’d been ill but not badly enough to be admitted.

The biggest problem with just doing this on hospital admissions though is that doesn’t negate the requirement for testing, tracing and isolation, it just makes it more difficult.

If you pick a new virus up by a hospital admission that poses a threat, then you still have to chase down where it came from - but it’s days after the infection, and given you’ve based your system on hospital admissions who are you going to get to do the tracing, isolations etc anyway?

Once a variant of concern is identified, you can then mass test in areas, 'spot check' isolation basically and open a public awareness campaign to test if symptoms of COVID occur.

But doing that nationally, all the time, before a variant of concern is detected, just on the off chance one turns up, is just a ludicrous suggestion because it ignores the reality of everyday life. People get runny noses and carry on with their day; that isn't going to change. Someone isn't going to cough a few times and take two weeks off, with they and their other working members of their household taking SSP, stopping kids going to school etc. etc. etc.

Bare in mind around 80% of all symptomatic COVID cases are 'mild'. 1 in 3 are asymptomatic. No matter what we do, we'll be 'late' in identifying variants - that's just a given. We will therefore see 'flare ups', but the turnaround time of booster vaccinations will prevent it being anything other than that.

I maintain that the odds of a mutation of COVID completely evading the immune response of the vaccines we have is slim. There is a phenomenon called 'Antibody-Dependent Enhancement', where a virus 'piggybacks' on the immune response to create illness, but that's when you have a mediocre immune response - the vaccines we have aren't doing that. It's extremely likely that regardless of variants discovered, we're not going to see anything like the last 12 months again.

 

[Goat]

Okay, I don't disagree. I'm just not sure on the application of it. I'm sure we'll see a system, I just don't think it'll really work as you describe, but we'll see.

Can we tackle the wet markets, too, while we're at it.

Or, get the world's second-largest economy to tackle the ones in their country?

This again.

Why not focus on the barbaric practices that our own country uses regarding animals first?

 

[Deleted member 48881]

 

[whiteshadow]

Some interesting data from the UK, risk of death in over 80s more than halved 14 days after first Pfizer shot. 90% decrease in cases 7 days after second shot.

In a way it’s not telling us anything we don’t know, your still on the ropes at one dose with a 50% decrease, but really two doses in the gold standard of protection.

You are still only receiving the protection from the first dose 7 days after the 2nd dose has been given as it takes the body around 2+3 weeks before it gains any extra protection from the 2nd dose.

The first dose is giving the over 90% protection.

When full protection is built up from the first dose it gives between 85% to 92% protection depending on which of the vaccines it is.

The first dose gives a very high level of protection, the only question mark is how long that protection lasts for but most scientists think it will last longer than 12 weeks.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Major rise in public support for COVID vaccine – Oxford study | University of Oxford

More than three quarters of people in the UK now say they are ’very likely’ to have the vaccine – up from 50% among the same group of survey respondents five months ago –according to a two-wave Oxford University survey published today.

www.ox.ac.uk

 

[BlueToff]

This again.

Why not focus on the barbaric practices that our own country uses regarding animals first?

I think we should do. But, those practices haven't resulted in a global pandemic, or increased the risks of global pandemics in the same way the wet markets have.

I don't agree with battery farming etc. I think it's horrible. But it hasn't started any pandemics recently.

The general point is people keep insisting the world must change its ways because of this. Well, I'd argue that if that's the case, then we should probably start with trying to tackle the likely source.

 

[Deleted member 48881]

All is well doe

 

[tsubaki]

Once a variant of concern is identified, you can then mass test in areas, 'spot check' isolation basically and open a public awareness campaign to test if symptoms of COVID occur.

But doing that nationally, all the time, before a variant of concern is detected, just on the off chance one turns up, is just a ludicrous suggestion because it ignores the reality of everyday life. People get runny noses and carry on with their day; that isn't going to change. Someone isn't going to cough a few times and take two weeks off, with they and their other working members of their household taking SSP, stopping kids going to school etc. etc. etc.

Bare in mind around 80% of all symptomatic COVID cases are 'mild'. 1 in 3 are asymptomatic. No matter what we do, we'll be 'late' in identifying variants - that's just a given. We will therefore see 'flare ups', but the turnaround time of booster vaccinations will prevent it being anything other than that.

I maintain that the odds of a mutation of COVID completely evading the immune response of the vaccines we have is slim. There is a phenomenon called 'Antibody-Dependent Enhancement', where a virus 'piggybacks' on the immune response to create illness, but that's when you have a mediocre immune response - the vaccines we have aren't doing that. It's extremely likely that regardless of variants discovered, we're not going to see anything like the last 12 months again.

I think you’re reading some other persons posts Tubey - I’ve said (repeatedly) already that people would only be told to isolate if they’ve got something that poses a risk, the vast majority would either have nothing or nothing serious (so your two weeks for a cough point is wrong).

The most important thing with any system that has to detect problems is that it can do so quickly enough to try and fix them.

If we are going to have a system that can pick up illnesses like this quickly, it’s going to have to rely on people reporting symptoms.

 

[grandjoeblue]

I think you’re reading some other persons posts Tubey - I’ve said (repeatedly) already that people would only be told to isolate if they’ve got something that poses a risk, the vast majority would either have nothing or nothing serious (so your two weeks for a cough point is wrong).

The most important thing with any system that has to detect problems is that it can do so quickly enough to try and fix them.

If we are going to have a system that can pick up illnesses like this quickly, it’s going to have to rely on people reporting symptoms.

I do sort of agree with what you suggest in a best case scenario but unfortunately we live in a country were the poor are getting poorer and sick pay in many roles is extremely low.

In the coming years the poor are really going to struggle due to the economic impact of COVID.

Sick pay hasn't really been massively improved during a pandemic so the chances of it improving after the pandemic is slim.

 

[Blues Harp]

I do sort of agree with what you suggest in a best case scenario but unfortunately we live in a country were the poor are getting poorer and sick pay in many roles is extremely low.

In the coming years the poor are really going to struggle due to the economic impact of COVID.

Sick pay hasn't really been massively improved during a pandemic so the chances of it improving after the pandemic is slim.

The poor in this country have been struggling for quite some time prior to the pandemic due to the appalling austerity policies of the Tories and their ilk. Cost of the pandemic and Brexit will be used as a smokescreen to impose further further pain on those who can least afford it.

 

[grandjoeblue]

The poor in this country have been struggling for quite some time prior to the pandemic due to the appalling austerity policies of the Tories and their ilk. Cost of the pandemic and Brexit will be used as a smokescreen to impose further further pain on those who can least afford it.

Exactly its awful. The spending during the pandemic has highlighted how disgraceful austerity was.

Why are the rich so greedy?

 

[Neiler]

You are still only receiving the protection from the first dose 7 days after the 2nd dose has been given as it takes the body around 2+3 weeks before it gains any extra protection from the 2nd dose.

The first dose is giving the over 90% protection.

When full protection is built up from the first dose it gives between 85% to 92% protection depending on which of the vaccines it is.

The first dose gives a very high level of protection, the only question mark is how long that protection lasts for but most scientists think it will last longer than 12 weeks.

That data I posted mate from public health England says 55% after 21 days.

 

[tsubaki]

I do sort of agree with what you suggest in a best case scenario but unfortunately we live in a country were the poor are getting poorer and sick pay in many roles is extremely low.

In the coming years the poor are really going to struggle due to the economic impact of COVID.

Sick pay hasn't really been massively improved during a pandemic so the chances of it improving after the pandemic is slim.

Indeed, and that needs to be fixed too - the impact on death rates of poverty are obvious.