Life in isolation. The thread

[Sarfrin]

Because they don’t classify a death by, for example, pneumonia caused by coronavirus as a death from coronavirus - rather a death from pneumonia. And that’s the vast bulk of coronavirus deaths. Only where it’s direct like an uncontrollable fever does it appear that they call it that (and those are rare). This may have changed but it was certainly how it was initially. Whereas other people do it different ways, but pretty much all of them count anyone who tested positive for coronavirus, then died, as a death from coronavirus. Complicating the issue, some countries do post-mortem testing, and so retroactively count deaths they didn’t know were coronavirus as it, but don’t. And others still are just inconsistent.

So in truth it’s just a huge mess. But testing more people and having more intensive care available are going to reduce the mortality rate and give you a better estimate of what it really is, and we’re worse at both of those things than Germany.

[Zephro]

If it wasn’t quite bad enough having to listen to anyone going “Well my sister is a nurse and she says it’s going to last 2 years and the government is lying to us actually 10,000 people have died already” blah blah blah. Like everyone is now suddenly an epidemiologist, a conspiracy nut or Reverend Lovejoy’s wife.

Broadband engineers threatened due to 5G coronavirus conspiracies

Birmingham saw all that and demanded we hold their beer so they can set fire to 5G masts as it’s all a Chinese conspiracy to mask people getting killed by the evil 5G Chinese microwaves. Jesus wept.

[LexW]

So in truth it’s just a huge mess. But testing more people and having more intensive care available are going to reduce the mortality rate and give you a better estimate of what it really is, and we’re worse at both of those things than Germany.

Britain definitely needs to test massively more and it’s hard to understand why we haven’t been. It can’t be money because they’re basically giving that out to all and sundry, and it’s not that expensive. It’s not been capacity because private and university labs weren’t being used. So it can really only be idiocy/disorganization, which is somehow how worse than cheapness.

It is worth noting though, that, depending on who you ask, we should probably only be testing people who are symptomatic at this point, because all the tests I’m aware of are somewhat unreliable on people who are asymptomatic (things are moving fast and maybe a country has a reliable test for that, but I’m not aware of it). This has been a big issue. You can literally test negative one day (this is the antigen test, the proper one, not the “did you have it?” antibody test), and have significant symptoms the next day, and that test and associated effort was effectively wasted.

And yes once the virus reaches a certain level, more ICU beds and ventilators will inevitably lead to better outcomes.

[Zephro]

Yeah the testing thing seems far more complex.

Also on ICU beds.

Nightingale emergency coronavirus hospital may not be needed as urgently as...

As we’re not going to 100% know the right calls till after the fact. So maybe with enough lead time you can scramble to make emergency ICU beds so the mistake wasn’t there but in having a big enough stockpile of face masks and ventilators? Or the fucking staffing levels in the NHS already being under massive strain due to cut. I mean there is a global shortage of ventilators but getting ventilators built is a damn sight faster process than training doctors and nurses.

So afterwards you’ll maybe end up with something going “Well with 1 month notice…” “With 1 week notice…” etc.

[LexW]

I think the big issues caused directly by the Tories are:

1. Staffing levels in the NHS lower than they should have been, especially with Brexit. No quick fix possible, either.

2. General state of NHS hospitals significantly worse and amount of ICU beds lower than it should have been (unclear by how much - certainly they were too low from the regular stories every winter of people in corridors etc. - probably not 5x too low though).

3. Totally ignored advice re: stockpiling equipment for a pandemic despite commissioning the study themselves.

4. Initial response was Dominic Cummings-driven social-darwinist-psychopath approach of “herd immunity” and letting the disease spread. Even if spun was “Britain’s fine liberal traditions blah blah” or whatever, they should have locked things down 1-2 weeks before they actually did. This is entirely on Cummings and Johnson. Multiple reports from people at meetings that Cummings blocked or attempted to block suggestions to go harder (and No. 10 denials are wholly unconvincing - indeed they add fuel to the fire). Johnson is PM and should have shot him down, and Cummings should not even have been at those meetings to say that. He has no qualifications and no experience suitable to such a position. No accident Cummings has been in hiding even before he got it. It’s literally like they put the right-wing (and ugly, and bald) version of me into those meetings. Which would be a terrible idea. Even me-me would be a bad idea.

5. Moved slowly on getting more ventilators as a result of the above. Germany and China were inherently better positioned as they have significantly more manufacturing, but the UK didn’t even use what it did have.

In the final analysis I expect 4 is actually going to be the biggest issue.

I’m not sure I agree with Sarfrin that all deaths are on them, but I do think it’s fair to say most/all deaths of NHS workers are on them, and a significant proportion of others. When the final tally is made, I think the majority of UK deaths will be attitribute-able to the last ten years of Tory rule.

[Zephro]

Yeah I’d go with all of that. Though the stockpiling thing I guess it’d be hard to work out the exact level that decision was made, e.g. civil servant or minister in cabinet.

I’d add a 6. though. Which is the fucking idiotic re-organisation they did in 2012. As they tried off loading the blame by devolving power and cutting costs at the same time. Which is the same bullshit they played with the railways, now and in the 80s/90s, local government in the last 10 years and education under Gove. As they’ve basically created a system where the Secretary of State doesn’t have direct levers to pull to crack heads and get shit done in an emergency, but as demonstrated by this thread is still directly taking the blame anyway. Which is probably an incredibly wonkish analysis.

[BillButNotBen]

Now the US is impounding masks destined for the German police, I wonder how the supermarkets will get them.

Japan has had a custom of wearing masks for decades, which all foreigners have laughed at as we were told they weren’t effective. Now the US and other countries are changing their tune… so we feel a bit silly.
That said, Japan has a huge shortage of masks, and the prime minister just promised to send out 2 cloth masks to every family… at a cost of millions… which has provoked a mass of critical memes.

It seems somewhat common sense that masks might be somewhat beneficial in reducing spread… but then again common sense is often wrong. The problem is that if everyone wears them it might mean a shortage for medics who really need them.

I’m also slightly suspicious that the other countries are looking at Japan’s face masks and low numbers and extrapolating from that… but lack of testing and olympics-related-politics might mean those low numbers aren’t reliable.

No idea if it’s true, but there was a news report a few days ago saying that Tokyo has a lot less ICU beds than the UK.

One weird side effect of the Coronavirus panic here has been that the number of flu cases is dramatically down, so I’m not sure how much an increase in Corona related deaths would show up against a decrease in flu deaths.

[Similar]

Now the US is impounding masks destined for the German police, I wonder how the supermarkets will get them.

Apparently France is doing it with masks intended for Sweden which is not really something I had expected.

It seems somewhat common sense that masks might be somewhat beneficial in reducing spread… but then again common sense is often wrong. The problem is that if everyone wears them it might mean a shortage for medics who really need them.

Ed Yong wrote a pretty good article:

Everyone Thinks They’re Right About Masks

Mostly it just underlines how much we don’t know for certain. Which really is a lot.

[LexW]

Ed Yong wrote a pretty good article:

lol Ed is one of my mates, I only see him about once a year though - he does write excellent articles.

[BillButNotBen]

Good article.

I’m undecided on the face touching effect of masks. from my personal experience, they stop you doing things like touching your nose or mouth directly, but you tend to have to constantly touch the mask to pull it back into place.
(I suspect this may be more so for men, as my stubble tends to create friction that pulls it down).
15% of the people I see wearing masks have their nose out.

Having lived in 2 different countries/cultures, it’s weird how you see both present their accepted science as fact, even though they often differ. Every year in flu season I’ve been watching experts and doctors on Japanese tv explain how masks are effective, and simultaneously watching doctors and experts on British tv explain how they aren’t effective.

My main worry about masks here is that they seem to create a false(?) sense of security. People are much more likely to go to work sick, or go to crowded places sick, just because ‘it’s ok, I’m wearing a mask’.

There’s also the thing where coughing into masks seems to have trained the entire population to ignore their coughs, so if they cough when not wearing a mask then they just cough directly in your face without any attempt to cover their mouth.
(A fact which may also affect studies in different countries, as it you’re comparing ‘masks vs coughing in faces’ you might get a different result to comparing ‘masks vs coughing into elbow’. )

[Similar]

lol Ed is one of my mates, I only see him about once a year though - he does write excellent articles.

Nice. I only know him from Twitter, but he seems like a pleasant person (very careful to give credit to everyone who’s helped with his articles, for one thing) and he writes about interesting things. It’s often a bit over my head, but judging from the comments he gets from other scientists, he is very good at doing his research too.

[Similar]

Having lived in 2 different countries/cultures, it’s weird how you see both present their accepted science as fact, even though they often differ. Every year in flu season I’ve been watching experts and doctors on Japanese tv explain how masks are effective, and simultaneously watching doctors and experts on British tv explain how they aren’t effective.

My main worry about masks here is that they seem to create a false(?) sense of security. People are much more likely to go to work sick, or go to crowded places sick, just because ‘it’s ok, I’m wearing a mask’.

I’ve never seen anyone wear a mask here (I haven’t been out much during the virus, but I don’t see anyone on the street wearing them when I look out of my windows now either. And I live in Copenhagen), so it’s all a bit … foreign to me, but as long as they’re made properly and worn correctly, I can’t see how masks can not help. It just needs to be understood that it’s far from 100% protection and that other measures are needed too.
And those surgical masks you most often see in the media apparently aren’t so great either.

[Hanimalle]

Apparently France is doing it with masks intended for Sweden which is not really something I had expected.

I’ve read about this as well, it’s made even worse by the fact that they were apparently intended for Italy and Spain. Though from what I’ve read, it’s because my country has put severe restrictions on the export of masks and they decided to requisition the stock and means of production on the national territory. Any exception has to be done on a case by case basis which is probably why this took so long to fix.

Still, overall, my country’s politicians haven’t really dealt with this crisis particularly well either, even if this is unprecedented for them. Maintaining the first round of mayoral elections while the virus was already starting to spread was but one of the many examples ( admittedly a big one ) that comes to mind.

[Similar]

I’ve read about this as well, it’s made even worse by the fact that they were apparently intended for Italy and Spain. Though from what I’ve read, it’s because my country has put severe restrictions on the export of masks and they decided to requisition the stock and means of production on the national territory. Any exception has to be done on a case by case basis which is probably why this took so long to fix.

ah. The article I read made it sound like it was a shipment just passing through France that had been stopped, but the news site it was on doesn’t always have the best writing.

Still, overall, my country’s politicians haven’t really dealt with this crisis particularly well either, even if this is unprecedented for them. Maintaining the first round of mayoral elections while the virus was already starting to spread was but one of the many examples ( admittedly a big one ) that comes to mind.

It’s kind of confusing here. The political parties really came together at first, and it was nice to see them behave like adults for once. Now things are getting a bit more messy, but in a weird way. Some of the center-left parties have agreed on some rather right wing measures, while some of the right wing parties have suggested some fairly left wing measures. So … I’m not sure what is going on.

They’re already talking far too much about reopening the country, though, and I’m worried they’ll do it too quickly (they do seem to be careful, but the messages to the public are a bit too optimistic, I think, and that alone will make people take things less seriously too soon).
As far as I can see, even if more widespread testing is finally getting in gear, we’re still not doing nearly enough of it to have much of an idea how things are actually going.

[Hanimalle]

ah. The article I read made it sound like it was a shipment just passing through France that had been stopped, but the news site it was on doesn’t always have the best writing.

Well, to be fair, even on French news sites, you will find different versions of that story and so you don’t know for sure what the truth is. Still, I’m inclined to believe this was a stupid mistake rather than born from malice, as the saying goes. What is certain however is that there’s a lot going on behind the scenes and most likely a fair bit of backroom dealing when it comes to buying these masks.

Edit : Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the government also changed their tune when it comes to wearing masks outside. At first, they were adamant that it serves no purpose if you’re not sick ( despite the fact that they already knew some people were asymptomatic ) because they wanted to make sure that the people who really needed them, health professionals, would not lose access to them. So it was a lie told for a good cause but perhaps not ideal. And now they’re actively recommending us to wear them when venturing outside which is confusing some people as you can imagine…

[LexW]

So it was a lie told for a good cause but perhaps not ideal. And now they’re actively recommending us to wear them when venturing outside which is confusing some people as you can imagine…

I don’t think it’s a lie at all (at least not in the English language meaning of lie). There’s no good scientific evidence which supports wearing a mask when you’re just out and about as having any benefit in protecting you. There’s none in Asia either. And it’s not like people haven’t studied it. They have, a lot. It’s just a cultural thing, like “fan death” in South Korea - they can find professors who claim that’s a real thing and put them on TV, but it’s a ridiculous urban myth.

Fan death

This is obviously less ridiculous, and if you’re going to be in close proximity or sustained contacted with infected people, masks do offer a modicum of protection, which is part of why healthcare people wear them. Though as Ed notes, basic surgical masks may offer little protection here. N95 masks seem to be more useful. You’d think they might benefit people shoving in to trains and stuff, but AFAIK the rates of stuff like flu are the same in mask-wearing nations as non-mask-wearing ones (Bill speculates this is partly because people used to masks are incautious when unmasked and behave worse about coughing/sneezing, but I don’t think anyone actually knows why).

However, masks do protect other people, and at this point, an awful lot of people out there are walking around infected but either asymptomatic, or with mild symptoms, or even non-mild symptoms. So it makes sense for them to ask people generally to wear masks, because then you potentially get more infected people wearing masks.

Another example of irrational-seeming behaviour is China (and other countries) using vast amounts of supposedly anti-viral (but that’s questionable) “disinfectant” to hose down entire cities. There is, as far as I know, not even a shred of evidence to suggest this does a damn thing. Nor would it make much scientific sense for it to. But significant resources are expended on it. It’s one thing to spray specific indoor or confined areas where infected people have been for some time, and other people will be going, but streets and stuff? Um. Not really.

[BillButNotBen]

I had to provide lots of evidence about 8 years ago to convince my other half that we could use the fan at night in ridiculously high temperatures.

The mask thing is unclear, but it wasn’t really a lie. For one thing, the understanding of how the virus spreads has changed in the meantime. The article LexW linked to a few posts up is a good in-depth explanation.

I think people do underestimate how much many experts take for granted. They might be an expert, but they haven’t experienced everything first hand, so a lot of their views will be based on ‘accepted wisdom’. Which can differ from country to country, or sometimes turn out to be wrong. (that’s science!).

[Similar]

The national health department here is going to start a project for the study of the effectiveness of masks.
Unfortunately, they’ve had to delay it in order to ensure that health workers get the masks they need (we apparently don’t have a lack of masks right now, so the delay is just to make absolutely sure there’s no risk of the project taking resources from health workers. Which seems like a very sane approach).

Still, it should be going ahead soon, with a planned group of 6000 people (50% control group) with a projected result in May.
It seems like a good idea, though there must be so many factors involved that I wonder how reliable a conclusion you can reach.

[ToomuchFluffy]

This is a little confusing. I just went to the supermarket and we are apparently now supposed to use a cart or equivalent for shopping. I hadn’t heard anything about that anywhere before. It’s apparently supposed to force a minimal distance and to make it easier for them to prevent panic-buying… According to some of what I’ve read at least. Not sure if this is a resonable measure to be honest. And at the moment it just seems to be something that has spilled over from Germany (Hofer being part of Aldi, Billa/Rewe and so on). All of the reporting I could find is from german websites and regarding Germany only. But even in Germany it seems to be something that supermarket-chains have decided on randomly.

[Hanimalle]

I don’t think it’s a lie at all (at least not in the English language meaning of lie).

You and BillButNotBen are absolutely right, I shouldn’t have used the word lie, that was not the right word for this, I think you guys would say something like they did a complete U-turn ? I guess what I was trying to say is that my government lacked transparency at the beginning of this crisis and, given that’s one of the things they like to boast about, it was a bit of a letdown.