Coronavirus

[i-Ram]

1 hour ago, Norman said:

Funny trend in this thread. Your opinion is an opinion. Someone else's is a conspiracy theory. You've done it in the same post, too. 

Mind you, you are typing all of this upside down. So I will let you off. 

Hadn't thought of it too now, but perhaps that is why Australia and New Zealand are doing so well. Whilst cough and sneeze particulates over here quickly fall and settle on to humans and surfaces, down under it falls into the sky. 

[ariotofmyown]

3 hours ago, Chester40 said:

No agenda, genuine question. 

What do you make of - both with regards to 'intention' and to 'outcome' - the fact we seem to have let Covid burn through the student /University population? 

As an aside, it feels slightly reminiscent of the Care home situation but with a different outcome? The government then clearly were most worried about a lack of hospital beds (maybe having seen the scenes in Italy) and so to me it appears in their haste, they dumped a load of infected OAPs into care homes without considering the risk..akin to a farmer expecting a storm opening the hen house door before locking the fox in with the chickens. Unbelievably poor form, and something the powers that be, largely seem to be avoiding admitting. 

This time, they appear to have encouraged huge groups of young people to spend a week or two mixing and getting drunk...then to live on top of one another. Clearly Covid was going to rip through these communities..and has done..and by any stretch of the imagination it has shown that young people (bar the incredibly isolated incident) have suffered no real ill health. Why? I would have thought it would have been used to say 'look young people are fine'...but actually it feels more like its being used to boost positive tests to show we need a lockdown. I genuinely don't understand it, why do it? Was it just like the care homes...just a side effect of their main concern (keeping kids in school) they should have expected but were too lazy to consider? 

I think your final sentence is correct, perhaps with the added imperative to get students to pay for their accommodation and not let them do their online courses from home. 

[Albert]

3 hours ago, Chester40 said:

No agenda, genuine question. 

What do you make of - both with regards to 'intention' and to 'outcome' - the fact we seem to have let Covid burn through the student /University population? 

I think the government overestimated how well the virus was controlled prior, given the increase in hospitalisations, etc, this surely was not an intended outcome. 

3 hours ago, Chester40 said:

As an aside, it feels slightly reminiscent of the Care home situation but with a different outcome? The government then clearly were most worried about a lack of hospital beds (maybe having seen the scenes in Italy) and so to me it appears in their haste, they dumped a load of infected OAPs into care homes without considering the risk..akin to a farmer expecting a storm opening the hen house door before locking the fox in with the chickens. Unbelievably poor form, and something the powers that be, largely seem to be avoiding admitting. 

A few countries have dropped the ball on aged care, the issue is that usually it's come from institutional issues that are much longer term, and had been ignored until then. 

3 hours ago, Chester40 said:

This time, they appear to have encouraged huge groups of young people to spend a week or two mixing and getting drunk...then to live on top of one another. Clearly Covid was going to rip through these communities..and has done..and by any stretch of the imagination it has shown that young people (bar the incredibly isolated incident) have suffered no real ill health. Why? I would have thought it would have been used to say 'look young people are fine'...but actually it feels more like its being used to boost positive tests to show we need a lockdown. I genuinely don't understand it, why do it? Was it just like the care homes...just a side effect of their main concern (keeping kids in school) they should have expected but were too lazy to consider? 

The increase in hospitalisations suggests that this narrative that 'no one is getting sick' is a bit misplaced. Yes, young people don't immediately get sick, but we do know that even people who are asymptomatic can have lasting effects from the disease, what we don't know is the prevalence and have long term these will be. Equally, these young people are interacting constantly with older people, and in an environment full of them, the Universities themselves. 

Honestly, I suspect they didn't anticipate this, and are now desperately trying to get that back under control. 

2 hours ago, Norman said:

Funny trend in this thread. Your opinion is an opinion. Someone else's is a conspiracy theory. You've done it in the same post, too. 

Mind you, you are typing all of this upside down. So I will let you off. 

What they're pushing is a literal conspiracy theory. What I provided there was just statements of points that are easily demonstrable. Not sure what you're bringing into here that is about opinions here, but this is a common tactic to muddy the waters. 

[Albert]

1 hour ago, EtoileSportiveDeDerby said:

Some bits i dont quite get so folks on here might help...

We are getting into flu and cold season, granted, however not as we know it. I have not heard a single report which says that since we are asked to social distance, wash hands wear masks, stay in, it may not be as bad as previous years.

Deprived, crowded area worst affected. Saw a graph on beeb site of how continents are affected, Africa is doing best, How can that be ? Got a friend teaching in Cairo and when i saw him in the summer he told me given the lack of hygiene compared to say Europe or US generally their immune systems are stronger. Again not really seen this mentionned anywhere.

China no sign of a second wave afaik, how did that happen ? We, in Europe kind of knew as soon as 1st wave was over that 2nd wave was on the cards and right on cue delivered.

China has had a kind of second wave, but it was a lot earlier, and better controlled. Targeted, brutal lockdowns was their tool of choice. That said, there is some controversies surrounding the numbers of their first wave. There are really any suggestions that the same is true later. 

In terms of not having one at all, you could argue that's been the case in New Zealand, having had a single cluster. Here in South Australia it's been similar, with only a small cluster since the first wave ended around 6 months ago. 

As to Africa, be cautious of the numbers, as there hasn't been as much testing, and we likely do not have accurate death figures. We tend not to have the full picture in developing nations until after such passes through. That said, I'd expect that most African countries will likely have a lower number of deaths comparatively, as their countries have vastly different age distributions. 

The CDC's IFR estimates by age can be used to determine an 'expected IFR' for the whole population of a country. For the UK, this comes out as about 0.650%, but for Nigeria, this is 0.120%. You can reverse engineer these in a sense to get a feel for how many cases you'd expect to see the number of reported deaths, which for Nigeria is 1,115. This would be ~910,000 cases; they have reported 60,266. That's very hand wavey of course, but only really meant to give an idea of some of the problems around estimating. 

[WhiteHorseRam]

1 hour ago, Gaspode said:

Reports this morning that the new 'traffic light' system being unveiled this evening will have three levels: Medium; High; and Very High. Yet the Track & Trace app already includes a 3 tier score for 'your local area' which is graded as: Low; Medium; and High.

I wonder if Boris or Hancock know anyone who could organise a booze-up in a brewery as it seems quite clear that they can't.....

You are quite correct.

But there will be qualifying factors -

your height

whether your birthday is on a Tuesday

if you like marzipan.

[GboroRam]

4 minutes ago, WhiteHorseRam said:

You are quite correct.

But there will be qualifying factors -

your height

whether your birthday is on a Tuesday

if you like marzipan.

My birthday is on a Tuesday around 1/7th of the time. What does that mean for me?

[Eddie]

4 hours ago, Chester40 said:

What do you make of - both with regards to 'intention' and to 'outcome' - the fact we seem to have let Covid burn through the student /University population? 

A couple of thousand students have caught it recently. There are over 2 million university students.

[Eddie]

4 minutes ago, GboroRam said:

My birthday is on a Tuesday around 1/7th of the time. What does that mean for me?

Leave one seventh of the birthday cake alone, or at least peel off the marzipan?

[Ghost of Clough]

5 minutes ago, Eddie said:

A couple of thousand students have caught it recently. There are over 2 million university students.

A couple of thousand will only just cover Newcastle. 3 days ago 1003 was the confirmed number for Newcastle Uni, with it was 770 for Nothumbria Uni 10 days ago. I'm sure the numbers will have continued to rise in the last week. [Total number of students in those two universities is about 55,000].
It's hardly surprising that Newcastle appears to be the worst hit student city giving the drinking culture there has got to be by far the worst in the entire country

[Chester40]

14 minutes ago, Eddie said:

A couple of thousand students have caught it recently. There are over 2 million university students.

I read nearly 1500 have tested postive at University of Manchester alone. 

[WhiteHorseRam]

18 minutes ago, GboroRam said:

My birthday is on a Tuesday around 1/7th of the time. What does that mean for me?

You will be fine as long as you eat 200g of mini eggs daily and buy a 2021 Carol Vorderman calendar

[G STAR RAM]

7 hours ago, Albert said:

Yes, and states itself as such. The NHS reports figures for each separately daily, you can look at those if you prefer. You're basically trying to create a conspiracy out of nothing here. 

Wonder why they would post a graph showing both together? Covid is nothing like flu remember? Why not do a joint graph with cancer?

The fact that there are more new cases per day than people in hospital. Just a minor point, I know. 

Ok so we will ignore the fact that many people are actually catching it in hospital.

Yes, there are plenty of misguided people in the World, and that is indeed dangerous. It is, arguably, a big part of the reason that the UK and USA are doing so badly in the fight against this virus.

Agreed. In which case you should possibly stop posting things as fact all the time. Maybe the experience of the virus where you live is completely different to where we live.

Maybe actually read what you post in future. What they said is that under freedom of information they are not required to create such to respond to such questions. You've confused that with them not being able to. They release influenza reports quite regularly, including the annual reports which provide such numbers for those interested. I highly recommend spending more time actually doing research into the data available, and less time trying to craft  conspiracy theories through little more than innuendo based on lack of comprehension of what you're posting. 

"Unfortunately, we would be unable to provide a breakdown of deaths from influenza in 2020 so far..."

Are you sure it is my reading that is the problem? Maybe it is you should read things before trying to convince us that you are the Oracle on this subject?

 

[Anon]

2 hours ago, EtoileSportiveDeDerby said:

Some bits i dont quite get so folks on here might help...

We are getting into flu and cold season, granted, however not as we know it. I have not heard a single report which says that since we are asked to social distance, wash hands wear masks, stay in, it may not be as bad as previous years.

Deprived, crowded area worst affected. Saw a graph on beeb site of how continents are affected, Africa is doing best, How can that be ? Got a friend teaching in Cairo and when i saw him in the summer he told me given the lack of hygiene compared to say Europe or US generally their immune systems are stronger. Again not really seen this mentionned anywhere.

China no sign of a second wave afaik, how did that happen ? We, in Europe kind of knew as soon as 1st wave was over that 2nd wave was on the cards and right on cue delivered.

Africa, I would put down to far less testing and the fact that the main at risk groups are already dead. Life expectancy is lower in general and most people don't have access to the drugs and/or equipment needed to live with other serious health conditions.

China lie about their figures. We don't even need to compare them to Europe. A direct comparison with their neighbours India, shows that the Chinese government is full of poo.

[Chester40]

4 minutes ago, Anon said:

Africa, I would put down to far less testing and the fact that the main at risk groups are already dead. Life expectancy is lower in general and most people don't have access to the drugs and/or equipment needed to live with other serious health conditions.

China lie about their figures. We don't even need to compare them to Europe. A direct comparison with their neighbours India, shows that the Chinese government is full of poo.

Think we need the 'eyes roll' emoji. This was a genuine laugh but especially in this thread I am aware it is easily interpreted as a sarcastic laugh/disparaging grunt. 

[Eddie]

40 minutes ago, Chester40 said:

I read nearly 1500 have tested postive at University of Manchester alone. 

Yes, my numbers were pure guesswork based upon news reports from a few days ago.

Taking Nottingham as an example, being the city with the highest number of cases per 100,000 in the population, the figures for w/e Friday, 9 October, there were a total number of positive tests as follows:

• 523 students in halls
• 310 students in purpose-built student accommodation
• 677 students in private accommodation
• 20 staff members

For context, there are 35000 students and 10000 staff at Nottingham University.

 

 

[Chester40]

3 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Yes, my numbers were pure guesswork based upon news reports from a few days ago.

Taking Nottingham as an example, being the city with the highest number of cases per 100,000 in the population, the figures for w/e Friday, 9 October, there were a total number of positive tests as follows:

• 523 students in halls
• 310 students in purpose-built student accommodation
• 677 students in private accommodation
• 20 staff members

For context, there are 35000 students and 10000 staff at Nottingham University.

 

 

That is a lot then.... 

[Albert]

40 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Wonder why they would post a graph showing both together? Covid is nothing like flu remember? Why not do a joint graph with cancer?

Both are infectious diseases that can lead to hospitalisation. The concern at this time is overloading the hospitals. 

40 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Ok so we will ignore the fact that many people are actually catching it in hospital.

As noted, there are risks of people catching anything in hospitals. It's not a large driver of new infections, however, and you have no actual data to suggest that this is a significant concern at this time. 

40 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Agreed. In which case you should possibly stop posting things as fact all the time. Maybe the experience of the virus where you live is completely different to where we live.

Yes, because the government here is competent, and the people are sane and have listened to advice readily without whinging. Ironically, the spirit of the blitz is most certainly not alive in the current UK, yet is elsewhere. That said, the government's messaging certainly hasn't helped things. 

Equally, what I've been posting is just data for the most part. If you have concerns about it, we can discuss that. You can't just say "but it's not in line with my opinion" and then just flat out reject what we know about this virus, and the data we have on harnd. 

40 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

"Unfortunately, we would be unable to provide a breakdown of deaths from influenza in 2020 so far..."

Are you sure it is my reading that is the problem? Maybe it is you should read things before trying to convince us that you are the Oracle on this subject?

I thought you'd not double down on this, truly bizarre choice of hill to die on. Anyhow, this is the text of what you posted, I'll bold your quote:

Quote

We are responsible for producing mortality statistics for England and Wales, this is driven by information collected from the death certificate at death registration. National Records Scotland (NSR) and Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) are responsible for statistics pertaining to Scotland and Northern Ireland. They can be contacted at foi@nrscotland.gov.uk and info@nirsa.gov.uk respectively. 

Unfortunately, we would be unable to provide you with a breakdown of number of deaths from influenza in 2020 so far. In order to fulfil this request, we would need to use a high level of statistical skill and judgement in order to create this analysis for you. Under Freedom of Information Act 2000, Public Authorities are not obligated to create information in order to respond to requests. We therefore consider this [cut off here]"

From the bit I can see, this could be 'to be information not held', or something to that effect. 

They have told you why they won't respond to the request, as it is not covered by the act for these purposes. It's not that they lack the statistical skill to do the analysis, it's that freedom of information pertains to documents that already exist, and they are under zero obligation to produce new documents in response to requests. It's not hard to understand, and it's been explained in the original piece you've quoted. 

[rammieib]

7 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Yes, my numbers were pure guesswork based upon news reports from a few days ago.

Taking Nottingham as an example, being the city with the highest number of cases per 100,000 in the population, the figures for w/e Friday, 9 October, there were a total number of positive tests as follows:

• 523 students in halls
• 310 students in purpose-built student accommodation
• 677 students in private accommodation
• 20 staff members

For context, there are 35000 students and 10000 staff at Nottingham University.

 

 

Eddie - I look at the case data day by day (lower Level Health Authorities) - I saw circa 1500 cases per day for three consecutive days in the Nottingham areas where the students tend to live. Of course - this doesn't guarantee they are students but it was a seriously higher number than those numbers.

Out of interest - where did you numbers come from as they are very precise. I assume the university has provided them?

[Norman]

9 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Yes, my numbers were pure guesswork based upon news reports from a few days ago.

Taking Nottingham as an example, being the city with the highest number of cases per 100,000 in the population, the figures for w/e Friday, 9 October, there were a total number of positive tests as follows:

• 523 students in halls
• 310 students in purpose-built student accommodation
• 677 students in private accommodation
• 20 staff members

For context, there are 35000 students and 10000 staff at Nottingham University.

 

 

I do wish you would stop pushing these conspiracy theories that there are hardly any cases in the student population. 

It really doesn't help.

Maybe you're the reason why New Zealand and Australia are doing better than the UK. 

[Eddie]

Manchester (40,000 students, 12,500 staff)

Again, it's going to take a while to 'burn through' the population.