Coronavirus

[Wolfie]

3 hours ago, BIllyD said:

The number of people waiting more than 12 months to start hospital treatment in England was 224,205 in December

It's the highest for any calendar month since April 2008, and compares with 1,467 in December 2019.

Going to take some time to get them numbers back down.

@G STAR RAMThis is why hospitals haven't been overwhelmed. Those 220 odd thousand people should have been in hospital beds taken up with covid patients.

[1of4]

38 minutes ago, rammieib said:

Close the borders forever then?

This risk is always there isn’t it so what’s the solution?

We (Our cabinet) have said for a year vaccines are our way out of this and now they’re not?

As I was pointing out in the earlier post it may not be down to us, on who is or isn't allowed to travel to and from the UK. That could be decided by other countries banning our citizens entering their country, while stopping their citizens coming here. 

[G STAR RAM]

8 hours ago, Wolfie said:

@G STAR RAMThis is why hospitals haven't been overwhelmed. Those 220 odd thousand people should have been in hospital beds taken up with covid patients.

Yeah I agree that there is an obvious knock on effect, although these numbers are the same as in 2008 when there were more hospital beds and no pandemic from memory.

Also the NHS bed occupancy rates I posted the other day do not indicate all beds being taken up by Covid patients, more a lot of beds being left empty ready for a major influx that never happened in the first wave.

I understand that there has has to be a lot of reorganisation of beds but it looks like poor planning if over 30% of NHS beds were not being utilised.

The Nightingale Hospitals also should have been utilised better in my opinion. 

I heard someone discussing a report the other day that said despite the NHS being lauded throughout, its performance during the pandemic has not been great. Obviously you're very unlikely to hear or see this in the MSM!

 

[BIllyD]

31 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Yeah I agree that there is an obvious knock on effect, although these numbers are the same as in 2008 when there were more hospital beds and no pandemic from memory.

Also the NHS bed occupancy rates I posted the other day do not indicate all beds being taken up by Covid patients, more a lot of beds being left empty ready for a major influx that never happened in the first wave.

I understand that there has has to be a lot of reorganisation of beds but it looks like poor planning if over 30% of NHS beds were not being utilised.

The Nightingale Hospitals also should have been utilised better in my opinion. 

I heard someone discussing a report the other day that said despite the NHS being lauded throughout, its performance during the pandemic has not been great. Obviously you're very unlikely to hear or see this in the MSM!

 

Anything else happen in 2008 though from your memory that may have been the reason for the higher number in that year ?

Not sure I get the 30% free comment, it's clear if they only had a few ICU beds and thousands waiting that they managed the number of patients to ensure they could cope with the numbers.
 

Simple maths tells you that there is / was not enough beds to cope with the requirements of patients, does it not ? Even more so, had the numbers been higher, which was the message at the time and why action was needed.
Nightingale hospitals is a good point, but if you haven't got enough staff to operate, how would you do that as a matter of interest?

As for the report, come on, your telling me that someone has discussed a NHS report condemning their performance throughout this pandemic, that suddenly backs up your opinion, that no one from the MSM would have seen. Call me skeptical for some reason ?

 

[G STAR RAM]

5 minutes ago, BIllyD said:

Anything else happen in 2008 though from your memory that may have been the reason for the higher number in that year ?

Not sure I get the 30% free comment, it's clear if they only had a few ICU beds and thousands waiting that they managed the number of patients to ensure they could cope with the numbers.
 

Simple maths tells you that there is / was not enough beds to cope with the requirements of patients, does it not ? Even more so, had the numbers been higher, which was the message at the time and why action was needed.
Nightingale hospitals is a good point, but if you haven't got enough staff to operate, how would you do that as a matter of interest?

As for the report, come on, your telling me that someone has discussed a NHS report condemning their performance throughout this pandemic, that suddenly backs up your opinion, that no one from the MSM would have seen. Call me skeptical for some reason ?

 

Actually think 2008 was swine flu year, so my original comment re no pandemic is wrong. 

Simple maths tells me that if we have managed to cope with 20,000 extra Covid patients during the second wave then there was probably excess capacity during the first wave.

Re the Nightingale hospitals, why were they not used to isolate Covid patients with staff being transferred there from NHS hospitals?

As previously mentioned, something like 1 in 5 Covid patients actually caught it in hospital. 

Ive just Googled about the report and to be fair cannot find it, I will try and see if I can find who did it from the article I saw yesterday. Not saying the MSM haven't seen it, sayig even if they had there is no way on earth they would report it, the NHS is untouchable right now.

[BIllyD]

34 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Actually think 2008 was swine flu year, so my original comment re no pandemic is wrong. 

Simple maths tells me that if we have managed to cope with 20,000 extra Covid patients during the second wave then there was probably excess capacity during the first wave.

Re the Nightingale hospitals, why were they not used to isolate Covid patients with staff being transferred there from NHS hospitals?

As previously mentioned, something like 1 in 5 Covid patients actually caught it in hospital. 

Ive just Googled about the report and to be fair cannot find it, I will try and see if I can find who did it from the article I saw yesterday. Not saying the MSM haven't seen it, sayig even if they had there is no way on earth they would report it, the NHS is untouchable right now.

Yup, nightingale I don't get, there has been no official narrative to why these weren't used. My personal opinion is they couldn't be operationally manned and the government made a mistake, but I have nothing to back that up.

The MSM love a good story, especially if it includes bad news. I just find it difficult to believe that a complete review of our NHS has been done for their performance in the pandemic, may be wrong but that's a higher task. I have no doubt they could have done things differently, but to say their performance is poor, is a big statement that if it's official I don't beleive would go unreported.

[G STAR RAM]

38 minutes ago, BIllyD said:

Yup, nightingale I don't get, there has been no official narrative to why these weren't used. My personal opinion is they couldn't be operationally manned and the government made a mistake, but I have nothing to back that up.

The MSM love a good story, especially if it includes bad news. I just find it difficult to believe that a complete review of our NHS has been done for their performance in the pandemic, may be wrong but that's a higher task. I have no doubt they could have done things differently, but to say their performance is poor, is a big statement that if it's official I don't beleive would go unreported.

I dont see the logic behind saying Nightingale hospitals could not have been manned, although guess I'm being very simplistic in assuming it would be possible to completely move whole departments from NHS hospitals to the Nightingale hospitals.

It certainly was not an official NHS report and I don't believe I said that, sorry if that is how it came across. I also didn't say the findings were that their performance was poor. The general gist was that many mistakes have been made but it is what has been reflected in health services across the world, and it was more aimed at management level rather than frontline workers.

[Eddie]

2 hours ago, G STAR RAM said:

Actually think 2008 was swine flu year, so my original comment re no pandemic is wrong. 

2009 was the Swine Flu epidemic, and my only experience of being on the machine that goes 'pinggg'.

[BIllyD]

53 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

I dont see the logic behind saying Nightingale hospitals could not have been manned, although guess I'm being very simplistic in assuming it would be possible to completely move whole departments from NHS hospitals to the Nightingale hospitals.

It certainly was not an official NHS report and I don't believe I said that, sorry if that is how it came across. I also didn't say the findings were that their performance was poor. The general gist was that many mistakes have been made but it is what has been reflected in health services across the world, and it was more aimed at management level rather than frontline workers.

Im just trying to find some rationale for not opening them, it certainly is a strange one. I still don't necessarily connect the NHS being under no extra pressure compared to previous years and then not opening, based on I think that bed capacity is only one KPI and the pandemic brought different pressures that would have brought it to its knees had no action been taken. 
 

You didn't say it was official, that was an assumption on my part, as was thinking "performance not being great" equated to poor performance. I wouldn't be surprised if mistakes have been made, I'd be amazed to find anyone who could have foreseen 12 months ago which direction this pandemic has gone, in any industry or sector and wouldn't say given my time again I'd do something different.

[Bald Eagle's Barmy Army]

Are any of you who keeps posting in this topic dizzy? You just keep going round and round and round the same things. 

[G STAR RAM]

52 minutes ago, Eddie said:

2009 was the Swine Flu epidemic, and my only experience of being on the machine that goes 'pinggg'.

Thank you, knew it was sometime round about there.

[G STAR RAM]

14 minutes ago, BIllyD said:

Im just trying to find some rationale for not opening them, it certainly is a strange one. I still don't necessarily connect the NHS being under no extra pressure compared to previous years and then not opening, based on I think that bed capacity is only one KPI and the pandemic brought different pressures that would have brought it to its knees had no action been taken. 
 

You didn't say it was official, that was an assumption on my part, as was thinking "performance not being great" equated to poor performance. I wouldn't be surprised if mistakes have been made, I'd be amazed to find anyone who could have foreseen 12 months ago which direction this pandemic has gone, in any industry or sector and wouldn't say given my time again I'd do something different.

I think the official rationale used is the one you have set out.

The every day man or woman in the street of course would have no idea how this pandemic would play out but the Government and NHS I am sure pay people large amounts of money for planning for events like this.

[Stive Pesley]

5 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

the Government and NHS I am sure pay people large amounts of money for planning for events like this.

Wasn't there a pandemic planning strategy done fairly recently that got ignored, like it was a home emergency insurance policy or something?  Sure I read that somewhere but can't find it now

[rammieib]

13 hours ago, 1of4 said:

As I was pointing out in the earlier post it may not be down to us, on who is or isn't allowed to travel to and from the UK. That could be decided by other countries banning our citizens entering their country, while stopping their citizens coming here. 

Agree with that. Although can the Spanish afford to turn down our 5 Million (vaccinated) tourists and their money?

[G STAR RAM]

54 minutes ago, Stive Pesley said:

Wasn't there a pandemic planning strategy done fairly recently that got ignored, like it was a home emergency insurance policy or something?  Sure I read that somewhere but can't find it now

Exercise Cygnus in 2016?

Also there was the simulation that @Archiedposted up, although to be fair that was not a British Government or NHS exercise.

[BIllyD]

54 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

I think the official rationale used is the one you have set out.

The every day man or woman in the street of course would have no idea how this pandemic would play out but the Government and NHS I am sure pay people large amounts of money for planning for events like this.

I have no doubt they do, I also have no doubt there has been momentous fook ups as the result of wrong decisions. My own personal views are though that there was a lot of unknowns and had someone else been in charge although I'd agree the same mistakes wouldn't have been made, I do think other ones would have been. Given where we are against other countries though, it's hard to argue though that it wouldn't have been as bad.

Anyway we digress, for me the NHS based on the problematic issues COVID has brought with it, has done extremely well to manage this difficult period and I do believe without the actions taken would have resulted in more deaths. Not something that we will agree on though and I think we have exhausted most discussion points by now ? 

 

[G STAR RAM]

21 minutes ago, BIllyD said:

I have no doubt they do, I also have no doubt there has been momentous fook ups as the result of wrong decisions. My own personal views are though that there was a lot of unknowns and had someone else been in charge although I'd agree the same mistakes wouldn't have been made, I do think other ones would have been. Given where we are against other countries though, it's hard to argue though that it wouldn't have been as bad.

Anyway we digress, for me the NHS based on the problematic issues COVID has brought with it, has done extremely well to manage this difficult period and I do believe without the actions taken would have resulted in more deaths. Not something that we will agree on though and I think we have exhausted most discussion points by now ? 

 

Can I just pick up one point you make?

What actions do you think the NHS have taken that have saved lives (above and beyond normal operation).

 

[Spanish]

1 hour ago, rammieib said:

Agree with that. Although can the Spanish afford to turn down our 5 Million (vaccinated) tourists and their money?

I'm not turning that down where do I send my account details to

[BIllyD]

38 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Can I just pick up one point you make?

What actions do you think the NHS have taken that have saved lives (above and beyond normal operation).

 

NHS, wouldn't know. I was talking about the government.

[Norman]

5 hours ago, G STAR RAM said:

Actually think 2008 was swine flu year, so my original comment re no pandemic is wrong. 

Simple maths tells me that if we have managed to cope with 20,000 extra Covid patients during the second wave then there was probably excess capacity during the first wave.

Re the Nightingale hospitals, why were they not used to isolate Covid patients with staff being transferred there from NHS hospitals?

As previously mentioned, something like 1 in 5 Covid patients actually caught it in hospital. 

Ive just Googled about the report and to be fair cannot find it, I will try and see if I can find who did it from the article I saw yesterday. Not saying the MSM haven't seen it, sayig even if they had there is no way on earth they would report it, the NHS is untouchable right now.

It was in the Daily Mail sometime last week.