Randy
Well-known member
Yeah I didn't mean all Brits I was referring to a select group of society that we all know will kick off if it goes on longer after these next 3 weeks.
Corona virus data analysis. A fascinating read.
- Thread starter borolad259
- Start date
If there's "no such thing <as herd immunity> with any Coronavirus, and talk of a vaccine is fantasy.... then what real benefit is serological testing for antibodies anyway? (Edit: I suppose it would help with knowing how bad second/third/fourth waves of infection might be in the general population, if you eased lockdown).
Also, I'm not sure what you said about vaccines is totally true is it? I thought that a vaccine for MERS CoV was developed, and found to be effective, but by the time it was ready for production, MERS had basically run its course, so it never got rolled out.
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Again, everything I've read implies that aerosol droplets going directly from person to person are the primary method although it's believed that transmission can also take place via infected surfaces.
This is from livescience.com, for example:
CoVid-19 transmission routes
From another source (Harvard Health):
CoVid-19 basics
The other main method mentioned in many articles is physical contact with an infected person, such as shaking hands. Getting it from a surface is also possible, but is not the primary route as far as I can tell from my reading.
Incidentally, I'm sure you know that in the US at least, the advice is now to wear masks:
bear66
Well-known member
I think it would be the advice in the UK as well from yesterday's press briefing if there were enough masks. Khan aging for government to act on London public transport mask wearing as well. I've worn a face covering near people for a month now. I don't look so good now others are doing it. The government should be grown up and suggest face covering rather than masks to protect the NHS supply. But even yesterday they were saying it would only be a small benefit. Countries used to wearing masks (for pollution and disease) seem to have fared better than us.
That's just not true (at least in terms of the coronavirus). Ferguson presented a couple of different models in his original paper but for some reason everyone only mentions the one that had the 550k figure. But in actual fact, that was only:
In the very same paper, there was a different model, where with a:
As I say, only the 550k model seems to get mentioned and the 5,600 model is totally ignored by everybody.
Later on of course, he published another model based on a revised reproductive number (R0) of 3 and allowing for the Government's social distancing policies, which reflects the fact that:
So unsurprisingly, three different models based on three different sets of assumptions, gave three different potential outcomes. Ferguson didn't say any one of them was "the truth" and inevitable, only that this is what the numbers could be, if certain things happened.
Neil Ferguson projections of CoVid-19 deaths
Alvez_48
Well-known member
So what you're saying is.. he put loads of guesses in on which the government acted.
He also guessed at 200,000,000 bird flu deaths, enforced the absolute destruction of all livestock for foot and mouth and suggested we should close all schools for swine flu.
There is good evidence emerging that the lockdown was put in place to have any effect on the outcome based on the contagiousness of the disease.
Infact Oxford university (the rival to Dr Ferguson) said as much in their paper weeks ago but it was ignored by the press
Redwurzel
Well-known member
At one point these 2607 weekly excess deaths probably from the consequences of the lock down will exceed those dying from the Virus. In fact the longer the delay the more deaths will increase as people put off medical treatment or that treatment is not available for longer and longer. People's health will also suffer from lack of money as many incomes have fallen. It is all very sad I am sorry to say.
The amount that people travelled around in 1918/19 was considerably less than it is today. As such, I expect that you could effectively gain herd immunity with a much lower % of the population being infected.
motownjunk
Well-known member
The Spanish flu was spread during the end of the first world war. A lot of people moving around the world then. No ones knows how many carry spanish flu with no symptoms. Most people are suggesting 60 to 90% of people need to catch it to provide herd immunity. We don't even know if you get immunity from catching covid 19 or if so how long. The only real way of gaining herd immunity is via vaccination. Natural herd immunity is likely to take years and the death toll would be huge.
bear66
Well-known member
I found some interesting comparisons of how different US cities responded. Those that locked down early had few deaths (Pittsburgh) and those that didn't were badly hit (Philly). A lesson lost in the mist of time.
The problem with those that locked down early is that they still have to deal with the virus when they come out of lockdown, which is what Tegnell keeps saying. You need healthy people, who are most likely to survive the virus, to go out and get it, whilst trying to protect the vulnerable. The measure of success will only come down the line .... if countries like Denmark have a prolonged battle because they locked down early, then Sweden's strategy won't look as outlandish as it seems to be regarded now.
spanishman
Well-known member
The point you keep seeming to miss on this thread is that the Swedish approach would have been less likely to have been successful in some other countries.
As the Swedish situation seems to be that their medical infrastructural capacity appears to not have been exceeded.
Many weeks ago now I was sobbed my eyes out watching a video of a doctor in Madrid. Having to let people die based on their age (with a cut-off age of 65). Due to the lack of ventilators. Plus the army having to be called in to remove bodies from care homes in Madrid.
I believe that this would have happened even more without a lock down here in Spain. Thus causing more unnecessary deaths in the first phase.
We will have to live with secondary and tertiary flare ups later this year in Spain. Hopefully none of these will exceed our available capacity of medical facilities. So the number of deaths can be minimised. Particularly unnecessary deaths.
bear66
Well-known member
Unlike the Spanish Flu, we didn't need to lockdown. We could have tested, isolated, tracked and isolated as successful countries did. The key was doing it early. We're still going to have to do it to stop a second wave but we wouldn't have had to follow the general pattern of the Western world.
A link to how different cities faired:
Link
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Oh I do get that Sweden is fortunate in that regard, though they too are making tough decisions about who gets the ventillators (not on age, but on likelihood of survival). Actually, the biggest difference between the two countries is the difficulty with protecting the elderly, who, in Sweden tend not to live with their families. In Spain and Italy, the elderly relatives often do live with the younger generations. But in those cases, lockdown is not going to help them at all because the younger people are likely to bring the virus into the home and it will infect everybody in that home. This also increases the likelihood of heavy viral load within the home. Whilst Sweden doesn't have "lockdown", they do have rules "don't visit the elderly ... at all". They can safely tell the kids to go to school and to play sports because they are absolutely not going to go and see Grannie.
spanishman
Well-known member
We have a gran living in the flat above us. She used to look after the grandkids on a regular basis before the lock down. She is now on the phone (or video or whatever) to them almost non-stop. From the terrace of her apartment.
Luckily we part soundproofed the apartment before we moved back in to it around 7 years ago. So we did not hear much noise when the kids were upstairs indoors. We probably get more noise now as she is out on the terrace talking to them from afar.
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Redwurzel
Well-known member
Spanish Flu was more widespread than CV19 - people still travelled a lot in 1918/19 possibly more than now because of troop movements.
The facts from US cities report suggest a lock down of 6 weeks or more will help reduce total death by spreading the deaths over a longer period and not putting as much pressure on medical services in short bursts. Some of the UK have now been in lock down for 32 days now and by May 7th it will be 51 days. May 8th feels like the right time to me to start reducing the lock down.
Reports on Wikipedia suggest infection rates of around 30% not 60-90%. for Spanish Flu. If the rates had been 90% over say a 24 week period the British Army would have not been able to function in battle conditions would it? as the high point seemed to September 1918 for the flu just as the British army was advancing after nearly 4 years of stalemate. Army life must have also a great breeding ground for the virus and if you had Spanish flu you knew as it symptoms generally showed unlike CV19 where at least 50% of infections are undetected by the host person. Some say 90% of the infections are not severe enough to make you feel ill such as the author of the report at the beginning of this thread.
Ref herd immunity - I have had not heard of people catching it twice, which suggests there is some immunity as surely some people have been re exposed by now. Although it is not certain at present.
Ref Sweden - my experience of working with Swedes when I worked for Ericsson were that they are very nice people, but they were less sociable that the average Brit. A famous Swedish actress named Greta Garbo made some great films and then stopped mid career and said "I want to be alone" which many Swedes can fully understand. Their standard of living was higher than ours so they would likely have more properties where say people could isolate within a property, say by having as many bathrooms as people in a property. The country was more spread out with more detached properties than the UK and more rural settings. Most Brits live in urban conurbations. I suspect their medical services are much better resourced per person that ours too. I can understand Sweden not locking down and going for herd immunity over a relatively short period and avoiding all the negative economic consequences etc
Ref death rates - those rates of US cities in 1918 are much higher than current death rates. For CV19 death rates are predicted to be 45 to 60 per 100,000 after 24 weeks. In US cities in 1918 it looks like an average of 500 per 100,000.
The facts from US cities report suggest a lock down of 6 weeks or more will help reduce total death by spreading the deaths over a longer period and not putting as much pressure on medical services in short bursts. Some of the UK have now been in lock down for 32 days now and by May 7th it will be 51 days. May 8th feels like the right time to me to start reducing the lock down.
Reports on Wikipedia suggest infection rates of around 30% not 60-90%. for Spanish Flu. If the rates had been 90% over say a 24 week period the British Army would have not been able to function in battle conditions would it? as the high point seemed to September 1918 for the flu just as the British army was advancing after nearly 4 years of stalemate. Army life must have also a great breeding ground for the virus and if you had Spanish flu you knew as it symptoms generally showed unlike CV19 where at least 50% of infections are undetected by the host person. Some say 90% of the infections are not severe enough to make you feel ill such as the author of the report at the beginning of this thread.
Ref herd immunity - I have had not heard of people catching it twice, which suggests there is some immunity as surely some people have been re exposed by now. Although it is not certain at present.
Ref Sweden - my experience of working with Swedes when I worked for Ericsson were that they are very nice people, but they were less sociable that the average Brit. A famous Swedish actress named Greta Garbo made some great films and then stopped mid career and said "I want to be alone" which many Swedes can fully understand. Their standard of living was higher than ours so they would likely have more properties where say people could isolate within a property, say by having as many bathrooms as people in a property. The country was more spread out with more detached properties than the UK and more rural settings. Most Brits live in urban conurbations. I suspect their medical services are much better resourced per person that ours too. I can understand Sweden not locking down and going for herd immunity over a relatively short period and avoiding all the negative economic consequences etc
Ref death rates - those rates of US cities in 1918 are much higher than current death rates. For CV19 death rates are predicted to be 45 to 60 per 100,000 after 24 weeks. In US cities in 1918 it looks like an average of 500 per 100,000.
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I think it was SARS-CoV that vaccine development got the furthest for but it never got into human clinical trials because, as you say, the virus had run out of steam by then. MERS-CoV is actually still ongoing and continues to kill hundreds of people every year but the numbers are pretty steady and it's not really spreading much outside the Middle East so it's probably not seen as a major threat.
Potential vaccines for SARS and MERS have actually been used as the basis for at least one (possibly more, I'm not sure) of the candidate vaccines currently under development for SARS-CoV-2, so the efforts weren't completely wasted.
Also, I don't think you can just point to the lack of a previous vaccine for any coronavirus and say that therefore we're unlikely to get one for this. Vaccines are expensive and time-consuming. We were never likely to get one for the coronaviruses that cause the common cold because colds are just not deadly enough and coronaviruses only represent about 25 - 30% of colds anyway. For SARS and MERS they were either too short-lived or not seen as enough of a global threat.
With SARS-CoV-2, we're looking at a totally different scenario in terms of lethality and global reach, so I think there's more of a chance of them seeing a vaccine through to completion this time.
Actually, one of the reasons they may need to keep going with this, is precisely because infection with a coronavirus will normally only confer resistance, not complete and lifelong immunity, so if this thing doesn't go away completely (as many think it won't) then we will have an ongoing need for a vaccine to keep the death toll down in any potential future resurgences.
Based on everything I'm reading (which is a lot of stuff) I'm cautiously optimistic that they will come up with a vaccine this time. There are currently 115 different vaccine development efforts either already underway or in proposal and one of the teams involved think they may have a vaccine ready for possible "compassionate use" for high risk groups such as health workers as early as this autumn. Then there's the UK team saying they could have a vaccine ready for mass production by September. In both cases, things would gave to go absolutely perfectly to achieve those accelerated timelines.
In the video below, a research scientist talks about one of these candidate vaccines, including why a vaccine may still be needed even after a lot of people have been exposed and recovered, since naturally-acquired immunity may not necessarily be very strong or long-lived.
More data showing the scale of asymptomatic cases. Notably, most fail to develop symptoms at all. This is a significantly larger sample than the icelandic data.
https://fortune.com/2020/04/15/china-most-asymptomatic-coronavirus-carriers-never-get-sick/
https://fortune.com/2020/04/15/china-most-asymptomatic-coronavirus-carriers-never-get-sick/
bear66
Well-known member
Very worrying isn't it? We have no idea how to come out of a lockdown if thats the case.