Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[BlueToff]

Yeah my missus had 2 (or 3) negative lateral flow before a positive PCR, and I, rather harshly as it turns out, put it down to her probably not taking the sample correctly. That graph from LLs post is a great explainer of what’s actually happening in terms of the immune response.

Mrs AMW defo has the omicron, as the symptom set is pretty different to Delta, she’s been ill now for 4/5 days, but pretty mild, and I think over the worst. She’s kicking herself for going to her Xmas party where a load of them caught it, as if I now get symptoms in the next couple of days, that’s our Xmas and Boxing Day plans out the window.

Hopefully you don't mate! Everything crossed for you.

On the plus side, given I guess you'll both be boosted or already boosted soon, you'll have great levels of immunity and the trade off will be a bad cold.

It was mad the difference between my LFs on Wednesday (when I was fine) to the one I did on Thursday afternoon after I'd started feeling crap.

I was in the middle of a longish bike ride when I started to feel badly so I did a test straight away when I got back. And, not to disgust you, but the mucus I collected from the sample from where my tonsils would be was horrendous. Compare that to Wednesday when there was nothing but normal saliva on the bud. And then today it was back to normalish after some kind of mucusy stuff (but not as bad as Thursday) yesterday. Really weird.

I'm feeling so much better today mind, and all four tests negative... will be doing one tomorrow too.

 

[mill]

We’ll have to agree to disagree mate - as long as it is clear when the cases were from I don’t see anything sketchy in that.

Obviously it would be great if data comes in a timely fashion but putting myself in the shoes of someone working in a lab I can understand why a sudden surge of 3000 cases would cause reporting delays especially if some of your own staff are among those impacted.

It’s also not really relevant. As it implies the previous days’ cases were under represented and so we are further along the curve than we thought.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

stuff like this is really the way forward isn't it?
Look after yourself, exercise, eat better, give free access to vitamin D (they've rescinded this for some reason) to immuno-compromised people especially in winter. And work on treatments other than vaccines for COVID - i think me and @Amw79 spoke about this the other day.

It's heavily reductive, but we do tend to focus much more on increasing supply rather than reducing demand, but that is incredibly difficult, as we've seen in this thread as some folk are blatantly unwilling to make any changes to their own lifestyle and just expect the NHS to always be there to pick up the pieces.

 

[BlueToff]

This is mainly anecdotal but it seems that so so many people have got it here. It deffo feels more prevalent.

Not anecdotal at all mate - it's everywhere and has been a little while too. Omicron is so, so much more infectious. And we really can stop saying we don't know if it's milder now or not - it's definitely milder. Whether the reasons for that are because of immunity in the population doesn't matter for the UK, as it is milder for us and that's what matters right here and now.

That being said it's just how the hospitalisations grow. They will do, and soon, but it's to what number they grow.

 

[BlueToff]

It's heavily reductive, but we do tend to focus much more on increasing supply rather than reducing demand, but that is incredibly difficult, as we've seen in this thread as some folk are blatantly unwilling to make any changes to their own lifestyle and just expect the NHS to always be there to pick up the pieces.

well it depends mate

I think anyone who lives a sedentary lifestyle is asking for trouble.

But I don't think people being concerned about lockdowns and shutting down businesses etc are to be confused with people who refuse to wear a mask to go to the shop...

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Not anecdotal at all mate - it's everywhere and has been a little while too. Omicron is so, so much more infectious. And we really can stop saying we don't know if it's milder now or not - it's definitely milder. Whether the reasons for that are because of immunity in the population doesn't matter for the UK, as it is milder for us and that's what matters right here and now.

That being said it's just how the hospitalisations grow. They will do, and soon, but it's to what number they grow.

It's a heuristic, of course, but Ferguson was saying on the radio this morning that it's quite probable that around 3x as many cases exist as those confirmed by tests as well.

 

[LinekersLegs]

Sunak was in California recently meeting with American healthcare firms Joking aside though, people talk about "increasing capacity" like it's a straightforward thing. We saw with the Nightingales that it's easy peasy to build new beds, but if you've got no one to staff them then they're kinda useless. That's kind of the problem because healthcare in its current form succumbs to Baumol's disease, and so is heavily dependent upon the staff levels.

Of course, you "could" try and reorient things and focus more on prevention, keeping people well, which is not only cheaper but also requires less qualified staff than fixing us when we're sick, but it's next to impossible to meaningfully change the NHS when it's in constant fire-fighting mode, so it lumbers on from crisis to crisis, while at the same time the population is aging, the number of people with chronic conditions caused by poor lifestyles grows ever greater, and we have a government hell-bent on reducing immigration so that people don't feel uneasy hearing Polish in the milk aisle.

One idea I really liked (from Japan iirc) was a proactive approach to those vulnerable to severe disease.

Once they tested positive they brought them into low level care for a couple of days for monitoring bloodpressure/oxygen saturation etc and meant that at the earliest sign of going downhill they could be on supplemental oxygen and drugs which seemed to help to avoid a rapid escalation and requiring more intensive/skilled treatment.

Whereas we (Europe and US) seem to mostly wait until someone turns up at ER before doing much.

 

[mill]

Not anecdotal at all mate - it's everywhere and has been a little while too. Omicron is so, so much more infectious. And we really can stop saying we don't know if it's milder now or not - it's definitely milder. Whether the reasons for that are because of immunity in the population doesn't matter for the UK, as it is milder for us and that's what matters right here and now.

That being said it's just how the hospitalisations grow. They will do, and soon, but it's to what number they grow.

Sorry by anecdotal I’m talking from my own perspective and from conversations with my family and friends down here.

The other thing I’ve noticed is the amount of people who have colds but have tested negative. I don’t really have too much faith in self administered tests. And now we are seeing data regarding delay between symptoms and testing positive I wonder if a few more might have it and not realise.

 

[Amw79]

Sunak was in California recently meeting with American healthcare firms Joking aside though, people talk about "increasing capacity" like it's a straightforward thing. We saw with the Nightingales that it's easy peasy to build new beds, but if you've got no one to staff them then they're kinda useless. That's kind of the problem because healthcare in its current form succumbs to Baumol's disease, and so is heavily dependent upon the staff levels.

Of course, you "could" try and reorient things and focus more on prevention, keeping people well, which is not only cheaper but also requires less qualified staff than fixing us when we're sick, but it's next to impossible to meaningfully change the NHS when it's in constant fire-fighting mode, so it lumbers on from crisis to crisis, while at the same time the population is aging, the number of people with chronic conditions caused by poor lifestyles grows ever greater, and we have a government hell-bent on reducing immigration so that people don't feel uneasy hearing Polish in the milk aisle.

Oh, I defo agree with looking at prevention, without a doubt, although as you mention in the follow up post, trying to get people on board is difficult. But increasing capacity, although not straightforward, is not impossible. It just takes will and investment, but we have a government with no will, and a public generally unwilling to pay to invest.

 

[peteblue]

Rates are going up, they are not doubling, deaths are coming down. We did 9.3 million tests over the last 7 days, I think we’ve had 1 death to omicron. I know those with a medical background may say different, but this doesn’t feel right and I think we are overreacting, as the South Africans keep saying….

 

[LinekersLegs]

 

[spectateur]

Covid is now a "Major Incident" in London today. 26000 cases, but the massive issue isnt just that, its the number of emergency services staff with it. So the fire brigade have limited means to help with driving ambulances, for example.

So many people sick and away from work is bound to be dangerous especially when it incudes the carers and emergency services.
Makes it difficult to believe that thousands of people are reportedly marching in London, protesting against the anti Covid measures.
what is it with these people.

 

[BlueToff]

You're right about one thing. There's a lot of fear mongering in this thread, lads claiming we'll be locked down every year based on nothing but their own frustration

Well we'll see mate won't we...

It's based on the fact that COVID is definitely going to be here next year, and it's definitely going to keep changing, and that health systems are always under more pressure in the winter.

I don't know how you can be so dismissive of it tbh

 

[Walken]

No it isn’t.

That statement is just not true. The last coronavirus lasted 6 years and 10 waves but is now benign.

That was before vaccines.

The virus is likely mutate into more benign versions of itself and each year we can develop boosters that provide immunity for newer variants.

We are at the beginning of a cycle.

Well said, the statement that we will never be more protected than we are now is the antithesis of logic

 

[BlueToff]

But she's kind of playing up a bit there too...

What about all the people who are catching COVID just going about their daily lives?