Controversial Covid post

You only need to look around us in Europe to see where we are going. This is no surprise unfortunately.

Full lockdown was what dramatically reduced the spread last time and it is the only thing which will do it this time.

It will arguably be too late, the impact on the healthcare system may well show us that.

The damage to the economy and individual livelihoods going forward is a very frightening thought but we will be left with no other option.

The King Canutes will gradually become quieter.

Yep, I get all that.
In fact I’ve argued quite loudly and frequently on this forum against the let it run through the young approach, and that while lockdown has its flaws it’s probably our best option, but it needs a discussion, and I’ve debated with @RandySavage and @Alvez_48 and @T_A_D and @1finny about the reasons why the lack of lockdown measures might overwhelm the NHS etc and why the Sweden model might not work here etc etc. Sometimes I disagreed with them and sometimes I didn’t. But it remained fairly civil and polite on the whole and I did listen to them and consider their points.

But all of that means nothing if I just look at things that only conform to my view.
So some people, many competent scientists much smarter than you and me, have had questions about the PCR tests for a long time, and the impact on the figures, right the way through to deaths.

Then the government release a guide for health professionals about interpreting PCR test results and it seems, pretty clearly, to throw up some pretty huge questions. It opens the door to questioning the majority of test results, does it not?
that’s not to say those results are all wrong, but it is saying that they cannot be taken to be right, either, without clinical context and evaluation of the person.

Yet nobody is interested? It’s not in the media, and nobody, absolutely nobody on here has a comment on it? No matter which side of the debate you sit on, surely you can acknowledge that this is interesting? Why is this ignored, given the potential implications of what it says?
Why does it all have to be so black and white - you believe everything and question nothing and you are a good citizen
OR
- you have some questions or want to understand the course of the pandemic and listen to all sides of the debate then you are a covid denying tin foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist nutjob who therefore must be breaking all the rules and contributing to the situation, and you should be pointed at and laughed at and ridiculed.

So again, what do people make of the advice distributed by the government? @bear66 @Statto1 @MolteniArcore
 
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Oh @FabioPorkpie welcome! You're now officially going to be called a right wing tin foil hat loon. 😉

Read that entire article and it felt very much like it came straight from the Cummings desk @Jostler .

'the Cummings'.... Sounds like a bad reality show about wanting to be a porn star. 🤣
 
Yep, I’ve no doubt a lockdown is incoming, or maybe tier 3 nationally?
The narrative of fear has been ramped up to the max in the mainstream media in the last couple of days which is possibly the governments attempt to ensure compliance by fear.
That tactic worked on me in April. It won't again. 🤓
 

It doesn’t make good reading.
Not sure how accurate it is though.
Smarter people than me have managed to pull it to bits in a short time frame.
Not saying it’s wrong but maybe it’s being a bit economical with the data it presents.
The full thread of tweets below looks at it and identifies some.....issues

File under tin hat nut job, if you like 😉
 
It doesn’t make good reading.
Not sure how accurate it is though.
Smarter people than me have managed to pull it to bits in a short time frame.
Not saying it’s wrong but maybe it’s being a bit economical with the data it presents.
The full thread of tweets below looks at it and identifies some.....issues

File under tin hat nut job, if you like 😉
It's a good point about the sensitivity assumption, but, if the sensitivity was 100% they would be finding a huge numbers of (false) positives that would make the findings far worse so I'd like to see the maths that comes up with 36,000 cases a day. It would have made sense to do a sensitivity / specifity adjustment to show the consequences of the assumption.
 
It's a good point about the sensitivity assumption, but, if the sensitivity was 100% they would be finding a huge numbers of (false) positives that would make the findings far worse so I'd like to see the maths that comes up with 36,000 cases a day. It would have made sense to do a sensitivity / specifity adjustment to show the consequences of the assumption.

He’s since gone on to acknowledge the issue with Saying circa 100% sensitivity-

h

In response he said ‘

‘Fair enough, but even Ref 6 in the paper itself quotes 97.2%. 20 days maybe a bit bullish but a hard cutoff at 10 days seems dubious to me. Equally important is the discord with all other data sources, e.g. ZOE, ONS, national testing programme with N = 2,773,328 over 10 days...’

(for some reason I can’t upload that tweet - it goes back to the full tweet thread)
 
This Steve Brown twitter thread is for me what is wring with this whole debate. Can I explain in a few points:

We are back on the test results. AGAIN - Steve Brown (who even is he?) is doubting the accuracy again and he reels off a load of science sounding 'proof' that's designed to make us question what the REACT report concludes - very hard for laypeople (including myself) so make head nor tail of what he is saying and what he is even showing us. Ultimately what he is saying doesn't really matter for us because...

We can see that hospital admissions are going up
We can see that deaths are going up


Let's just look at this from a really basic point of view, and try and use logic:

Based on the rise in hospital admissions and deaths logic would suggest that Coronavirus is coming back.
When we look back at the last wave it was widely accepted that the harder your measures the quicker you stop cases increasing.
There is no alternative plan.
As cases are rising now just doing nothing would let them continue to rise and then they would fill the hospitals - we can't have that..... So you lock down.
Tiers 1, 2 & 3 aren't a lockdown, and the Gib's own advisors have said they aren't hard enough and won't work.

I don't like this Government or Johnson. The Tier system doesn't work. The only thing that has worked was a lockdown. Maybe that's all we can do. Yes, it's kicking the can down the road, but it's kicking it down the road until April when we hopefully will have a vaccine. This also gives the Government, as incompetent as they are, time to AGAIN try to sort track n trace and make some kind of alternative plan in case there is no vaccine.

What I can remember from right back in March was the Government scientists categorically saying that we need to lock down FAST and HARD to have the biggest impact. Then when we have driven down the R we use a track and trace system to keep it low. If we released too EARLY it would cause a 2ND WAVE which would be MORE DAMAGING TO BOTH THE ECONOMY AND LIVES. Boris released too early and fluffed the track n trace and if now persevering with half measures. Exactly the opposite of what was recommended.

We need to get this right a 2nd time around and arguing over how effective a PCR test is detracting from the real issue - the virus is out of control and we need to do *something* about it.
 
This Steve Brown twitter thread is for me what is wring with this whole debate. Can I explain in a few points:

We are back on the test results. AGAIN - Steve Brown (who even is he?) is doubting the accuracy again and he reels off a load of science sounding 'proof' that's designed to make us question what the REACT report concludes - very hard for laypeople (including myself) so make head nor tail of what he is saying and what he is even showing us. Ultimately what he is saying doesn't really matter for us because...

We can see that hospital admissions are going up
We can see that deaths are going up


Let's just look at this from a really basic point of view, and try and use logic:

Based on the rise in hospital admissions and deaths logic would suggest that Coronavirus is coming back.
When we look back at the last wave it was widely accepted that the harder your measures the quicker you stop cases increasing.
There is no alternative plan.
As cases are rising now just doing nothing would let them continue to rise and then they would fill the hospitals - we can't have that..... So you lock down.
Tiers 1, 2 & 3 aren't a lockdown, and the Gib's own advisors have said they aren't hard enough and won't work.

I don't like this Government or Johnson. The Tier system doesn't work. The only thing that has worked was a lockdown. Maybe that's all we can do. Yes, it's kicking the can down the road, but it's kicking it down the road until April when we hopefully will have a vaccine. This also gives the Government, as incompetent as they are, time to AGAIN try to sort track n trace and make some kind of alternative plan in case there is no vaccine.

What I can remember from right back in March was the Government scientists categorically saying that we need to lock down FAST and HARD to have the biggest impact. Then when we have driven down the R we use a track and trace system to keep it low. If we released too EARLY it would cause a 2ND WAVE which would be MORE DAMAGING TO BOTH THE ECONOMY AND LIVES. Boris released too early and fluffed the track n trace and if now persevering with half measures. Exactly the opposite of what was recommended.

We need to get this right a 2nd time around and arguing over how effective a PCR test is detracting from the real issue - the virus is out of control and we need to do *something* about it.
Lockdowns work? Exactly how? The entire world locked down and the virus still spread whilst it was.

Liken it to putting a lid on a boiling pan of water. It's going to blow the lid off of the pan eventually. Leave the pan lid off a little bit (current social distancing measures and masks) and the pan will eventually boil dry.
 
Lockdowns work? Exactly how? The entire world locked down and the virus still spread whilst it was.

Liken it to putting a lid on a boiling pan of water. It's going to blow the lid off of the pan eventually. Leave the pan lid off a little bit (current social distancing measures and masks) and the pan will eventually boil dry.

You have just lived through a period that showed how a lockdown worked.

We locked down, the virus reduced, we released measures, the virus came back.

I agree with your pan analogy kind of - problem is we have taken the lid off the pan too far and as it boils it's getting the work surfaces too wet. We need to pop the lid back on for a bit to dry it then move the lid off again gently to avoid it exploding.

Unless you don't believe reports that hospitals like Leeds are filling up then you can see yourself that the current measures and masks aren't as effective as they currently need to be.
 
You have just lived through a period that showed how a lockdown worked.

We locked down, the virus reduced, we released measures, the virus came back.

But you can't lock down forever and that's your plan. May as well just put a shotgun in people's mouths.
 
Lockdowns work? Exactly how? The entire world locked down and the virus still spread whilst it was.

Liken it to putting a lid on a boiling pan of water. It's going to blow the lid off of the pan eventually. Leave the pan lid off a little bit (current social distancing measures and masks) and the pan will eventually boil dry.

Lockdowns just buy you time. In that time you have to have put in an effective Track and Trace system. The Government failed miserably to use the time in the last lockdown to establish one and we are paying the consequences.
 
Lockdowns just buy you time. In that time you have to have put in an effective Track and Trace system. The Government failed miserably to use the time in the last lockdown to establish one and we are paying the consequences.
The Germans had a **** hot track and trace system and look what's happened there.
 
L
Lockdowns work? Exactly how? The entire world locked down and the virus still spread whilst it was.

Liken it to putting a lid on a boiling pan of water. It's going to blow the lid off of the pan eventually. Leave the pan lid off a little bit (current social distancing measures and masks) and the pan will eventually boil dry.
lockdowns slow transmission they don’t eradicate it. They can eventually but when it’s as rife as it is it’s pretty impossible.
 
Lockdowns work? Exactly how? The entire world locked down and the virus still spread whilst it was.

Liken it to putting a lid on a boiling pan of water. It's going to blow the lid off of the pan eventually. Leave the pan lid off a little bit (current social distancing measures and masks) and the pan will eventually boil dry.
Very few countries locked down. Sweden had one of the highest 'lockdowns' in terms of social distancing, but even there 15% of people ignored social distancing guidelines.

Lockdowns shouldn't have even been necessary as Taiwan showed. But once the virus is prevalent, stopping people contact is the only way of preventing transmission. Once you get down to low levels, you test and trace your way out of trouble (South Korea, New Zealand).

Germany got it right then opened up social contact too much, but they will do better than us by taking early action
 
The Germans had a **** hot track and trace system and look what's happened there.

Yes, they have half the rates that we do. They are seeing it increase so they are taking decisive and strong action to reduce the rate again. This is only for 4 weeks and then they will hope to reopen.

Germany were more open that we were, and earlier. That's what a strong initial lockdown coupled with a good track and trace can do. Their economy hasn't suffered as badly as ours and they haven't had as many deaths as us.

This isn't because the policy is wrong, it was the UK's implementation of the policy. Johnson messed it right up by reacting too late and not having a decent track n trace.
 
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