Coincidentally just looking at the numbers killed and imprisoned journalists worldwide for just trying to do their jobs after reading about Okenschitt.
2022
533 imprisoned
57. killed
Matt Hancock rejected COVID test care home advice
- Thread starter WeeGord
- Start date
Coincidentally just looking at the numbers killed and imprisoned journalists worldwide for just trying to do their jobs after reading about Okenschitt.
2022
533 imprisoned
57. killed
Andy_W
Well-known member
PHE, the NHS and DHSC actively encouraged (they saw it as the only option) to discharge patients into care homes up to mid-April too. Not long after the government changed tact on that when PHE, the NHS and DHSC did (15th April). They all only changed tact as we locked down, and curbed infections which freed up tests, as well as gaining testing capacity.
In mid april 20 we were only doing ~15k tests per day, UK wide, and had ~2.5k admissions per day and probably getting north of 100k infections per day. That's not going to leave many tests over to test people who are leaving hospital and have no symptoms, not when you factor in that we have to test NHS staff (over 700k of those), as well as have tests for those who are more likely to have covid (those who haven't had it). The test positivity rate then peaked at 40%.
I 100% agree that it was a bad choice, but what were the good choices, pre mid-April? Go against PHE, the NHS and DHSC? Take tests off the staff working all over the hospital with people more at risk than those in care homes, and those who were regularly visiting care homes?
There wasn't the testing capacity, we didn't have time to keep people in beds whilst we waited on negative tests for people with no symptoms. We didn't have enough beds, the covid wards were full etc.
Laughing
Well-known member
The good choice was multi-factored Andy. But what tests were available should have been used to protect the most vulnerable.
What the government did was stick their head in the sand and call on the Dunkirk spirit.
Andy_W
Well-known member
Yeah, things changed mid april (PHE and NHS changed their advice, and the govt changed policy), but we were passed the peak then, and had been locked down for three weeks. Peak deaths for that wave was about 8th April, so peak infections maybe two weeks before that. Things were changing very quickly.
28th of April isn't March-Mid April though, we were doing less than 10k tests per day up to April 1st, and by April 28th that was still <30k per day (7 day av) etc. On the 27th all sites, total across the UK only conducted 27k, and the 26th it was 15k, for example.
Ultimately the biggest problem was lack of capacity/ flexibility within the NHS (Tories caused that), but even this could have been negated if we had locked down sooner (again Tories), as in the two weeks earlier, like we should have done, when we seen what was happening in Italy and Spain. BJ dealt the bad hands, lots of them, nobody got a good hand.
Andy_W
Well-known member
Yup the BJ ones are absolutely bonkers, what an absolute moron.
I knew he was a moron, but he still didn't know what the IFR rate was in August 20! He thought a P 0.01 - 0.04 meant the chance of death was 0.01 - 0.04% the absolute imbecile, until Cummings, Valance and the others corrected him and said it was 1-4%, depending on level of healthcare. How on earth did he not know this IFR already, it was probably one of the most discussed talking points at any meetings they had, absolutely crazy.
JonnyHistory
Well-known member
Lets be honest here, yes he had tough decisions but he literally used the elderly as cannon fodder.
From the November-March prior to us locking down the first time all the reports from Italy especially how it was ripping through nursing homes specifically. This was a conscience decision and they knew the repercussions.
From the November-March prior to us locking down the first time all the reports from Italy especially how it was ripping through nursing homes specifically. This was a conscience decision and they knew the repercussions.
Andy_W
Well-known member
10k tests per day isn't enough to protect the most vulnerable, we have ~10m people aged over 70, they're not all in care homes (0.5m in care homes). We had ~2.5k admissions per day, which is probably more like 10k really ill people per day, 100k infections, living with other people, a lot of them old etc. You can't butter a loaf of bread with a teaspoon of butter, you won't even get passed the second slice.
Tests were used on staff working in hospitals (like people working on covid wards, intensive care etc), so they could confirm they were not infected, or test to prove infection so they could still actually go to work and treat people who would die without them, and not infect other people who were still in hospital (usually old and unwell people).
We didn't have the beds to keep them in hospital, and didn't have the tests for those coming in the door, never mind those going out, and the 48 hour turnaround doesn't help either.
Testing wasn't much of a weapon, not then, not up to mid April, it was like a pea shooter, the only weapon we had was locking down, and doing that late sealed our fate. The two-week delay probably 10x'd our cases per day, we could have done a lot more with those tests if we had curbed infection, and this would have also not maxed capacity which forced the discharge of patients.
Andy_W
Well-known member
Of course they were cannon fodder, IFR for those in care homes was about 5% for those infected, but there was always going to be some cannon fodder, because of the other decisions made prior. My point is we couldn't stop the cannons from being fired at that point.
The cannon fodder was either those in care homes (being around discharged people with no symptoms, which was the advice), those actually in hospital, those working in the hospitals (critical as they treat the most ill) or those in care at home, or the elderly living with working folk etc. I wish we had enough over the lot, but we didn't, it's sickening that we got put in that position.
I'm not sure what they did about isolating those who were discharged into those, but I bet the care homes struggled with that due to a lack of resources also (thanks Tories).
Laughing
Well-known member
So leave them to die. Go it.
It was a disgraceful decision not to use what we had to protect those in care homes. Those most likely to die, and they did in their thousands.
Andy_W
Well-known member
Leave who to die, those who couldn't get admitted, and who couldn't breathe, due to the bed blockers, and those who decided how many beds we should have flexible? Those most likely to die were those in hospital with covid, or those who needed to be admitted to hospital as they either had or probably had covid. There would have been even more of them if we were using up tests on people with no symptoms, even considering some don't have symptoms. Most covid patients would have died if there were no staff to treat them, or their risk gone up 2-10x with reduced staffing, and the risk for non covid areas would have gone up too, as staffing levels reduced or got diverted.
They probably looked at it like probability/ a flow chart:
Has the person had covid?
If so, when?
When did they last show symptoms?
Was that > 5-10 days ago?
Yes = You have to let them out, to free up a bed for the next guy who needs the bed
No = Keep them in the hospital, as per guidance
Upon arrival quarantine the person as best as possible, if required.
The chance of them coming out with covid, and still being transmissible with the early strain was still relatively low, especially if taking precautions, or probably similar risk to anyone else who went in the care home untested (loads of people, every single day). Then the chance of them passing that on, if they had it, could have been low. Then even if others did get it, it probably increased their risk at that time 2x, to maybe 4%. But lets be honest, it's not like this risk wasn't going up anyway though, over the course of the next 8 months, until the vaccine came. There was still loads of risk of exposure in that previous and next month, never mind the next 8 months. Should we have tested every person in and going into the care home too, every day, which area do you take those tests from?
It's not like they couldn't not test the people going into hospital, as they needed to determine what ward they could go on, and couldn't mix the wards obviously. Same with staff too, had to test those working in intensive care or any other higher risk areas as if one of them got it, and exposed 100 on deaths door, already sick, then it would have been much, much worse.
In an ideal world we would have had more beds so we didn't need to kick people out, a covid outpatients area of the hospital, a none covid outpatients area of the hospital, a receiving area for ex covid inpatients to the care homes, a receiving area for no covid inpatients to the care homes, and much more testing. 99% of that damage is a resource problem, which was baked in by the preceding 10 years of Tory govt. I don't think they could have done much more about increasing testing capacity, they actually did ok with that, being realistic.
As much as Hancock's a tosser, he's not a patch on what his government did for the 10 years prior, or how BJ didn't handle the problems, was too slow to react, and extremely incompetent with the numbers.