How do you think Boris has handled it so far ?

[Mr Bridger]

We can't compare with Sweden - their population density is nothing like ours - maybe they can get away with it, I doubt it though. What they have done up to this point is no worse than our approach though.

The ballsup on herd immunity in this country was a very simple one that even the most basic mental arithmetic revealed - the number of people that would have ended up needing hospital treatment way exceeded the NHS's capacity to deal with it. It didn't need modelling, all you needed was the % of people hospitalised and it was abundantly clear.

As I said a few pages back when I was ignored talking about 'measures of success,' I think it is reasonable to compare us to France and Germany, similar sized populations, similar economic strengths. I think the disadvantage of having a higher population density is offset by the extra time we had to prepare.

The respective trajectories now suggest that we will exceed both France and Germany's deaths (both France and Germany are a couple of weeks ahead of us) It's also likely looking at the graphs at the moment that we will exceed Italy's death toll.

There is also a longer term economic question that won't be answered for 6, 12, 18 months.

What would you say the measures of success are? And how are we performing against those measures currently?

I don’t think you can compare the UK accurately with one country to another. Some have referenced on here how well Korea and China have dealt with it, and they’ve dealt with it with complete lockdown, CCTV, face recognition and mobile phone tracking, that wouldn’t happen here, but that’s how they kept the death rate low, well that and China bullshitting.

Every country has seen it coming and every country has been caught out as they’ve all dealt with it in their own way. Has Sweden got it right and the rest of got it wrong?

It remains to be seen if we exceed the deaths in France and Germany, I don’t know what restrictions they have in place or whether they are being adhered to, you only have to look at Richmond Park this weekend to see that people are still ignoring our lockdown.
There are so many variables involved that any stress test wouldn’t prepare us or any country for whats actually happening at the moment.
I hear Today Starmer wants an exit strategy from the government in writing, as if they or he knows what’s going to happen in the next few weeks , months. This is unprecedented , how can that be possible at this stage? You tell me what the answer is ?
There will be the time for questions to be answered , and people held to account, mistakes have been made and must be learnt from.
The real question is , will the world be ready the next time?

 

[Bakero]

I don’t think you can compare the UK accurately with one country to another. Some have referenced on here how well Korea and China have dealt with it, and they’ve dealt with it with complete lockdown, CCTV, face recognition and mobile phone tracking, that wouldn’t happen here, but that’s how they kept the death rate low, well that and China bullshitting.

Every country has seen it coming and every country has been caught out as they’ve all dealt with it in their own way. Has Sweden got it right and the rest of got it wrong?

It remains to be seen if we exceed the deaths in France and Germany, I don’t know what restrictions they have in place or whether they are being adhered to, you only have to look at Richmond Park this weekend to see that people are still ignoring our lockdown.
There are so many variables involved that any stress test wouldn’t prepare us or any country for whats actually happening at the moment.
I hear Today Starmer wants an exit strategy from the government in writing, as if they or he knows what’s going to happen in the next few weeks , months. This is unprecedented , how can that be possible at this stage? You tell me what the answer is ?
There will be the time for questions to be answered , and people held to account, mistakes have been made and must be learnt from.
The real question is , will the world be ready the next time?

It seems like you have no idea what happened in South Korea.

 

[spring hall convert]

I don’t think you can compare the UK accurately with one country to another. Some have referenced on here how well Korea and China have dealt with it, and they’ve dealt with it with complete lockdown, CCTV, face recognition and mobile phone tracking, that wouldn’t happen here, but that’s how they kept the death rate low, well that and China bullshitting.

Every country has seen it coming and every country has been caught out as they’ve all dealt with it in their own way. Has Sweden got it right and the rest of got it wrong?

It remains to be seen if we exceed the deaths in France and Germany, I don’t know what restrictions they have in place or whether they are being adhered to, you only have to look at Richmond Park this weekend to see that people are still ignoring our lockdown.
There are so many variables involved that any stress test wouldn’t prepare us or any country for whats actually happening at the moment.
I hear Today Starmer wants an exit strategy from the government in writing, as if they or he knows what’s going to happen in the next few weeks , months. This is unprecedented , how can that be possible at this stage? You tell me what the answer is ?
There will be the time for questions to be answered , and people held to account, mistakes have been made and must be learnt from.
The real question is , will the world be ready the next time?

There may not be a next time. The likely lesson here will be that no matter how much money and resource you throw at it once the shit hits the fan, you can't keep a public health service is a state of constant crisis and get away with it indefinitely.

This was pretty interesting on Germany - a country who do appear to have got this right, despite having all the same excuses as we do for being unprepared. https://apnews.com/03d48eb93fa6cb66...r9RaRDpOa4pIIqFudOtgXs2CiuvCHXR4loJqZet9PaewU .

 

[Mr Bridger]

It seems like you have no idea what happened in South Korea.

Well don’t stop there, please enlighten me.

 

[Bakero]

Well don’t stop there, please enlighten me.

Testing. They identified and isolated from the off, quickly developing the capacity to do thousands of tests a day.

 

[abc]

Was Boris Johnson joking about shaking Coronavirus patients hands a month ago "superb"?
Was it superb that until 13 March the Government was still pursuing herd immunity despite anyone capable of the most basic mental arithmetic being able to work out that there was no conceivable way the NHS could cope with that?
Is it "superb" that healthcare professionals are STILL being asked to work without PPE?
Is it "superb" that non-essential businesses are STILL making people go to work because the instruction is STILL unclear and unenforceable?
Is it "superb" that we are STILL talking about "ramping up" testing rather than getting on with it?
Is it "superb" that we have absolutely no idea what the plan is to get out of lockdown, presumably because in order to get out of lockdown we are going to need to have a proper testing system?
Is it "superb" that our number of deaths is climbing at a rate that is now comparable with Spain at the same stage? Ahead of France, ahead of Germany.

They've been caught completely with their pants down because a) the NHS had been allowed to degenerate into a state of permacrisis as a result of 10 years of underfunding b) they ignored and suppressed the awful results of their own stress test of the NHS to cope with a pandemic in 2016 c) they approached the early days of the crisis more concerned with how we stay open for business rather than how we save lives - despite having the luxury of a head start on China, Italy & Spain d) even when they conceded that we had a serious problem, the path to lockdown was slow and vague, the effects of which we are seeing in the numbers of deaths right now.

We are now in a place where we are still having conversations about PPE and testing, things that should have been sorted a month / six weeks ago (in the case of PPE we've had since 2016 to get this right.) Surely the knowledge that the NHS had failed the pandemic stress test in 2016 would have got their arses in gear in late Feb/early March at least?

The conversations we should be having now are about a) what the path to getting out of lockdown is b) how we ensure we don't have to go back into lockdown once we are out c) the eventual immunisation program - but we can't because we are miles behind where we should be.

The only way you can classify our response "superb" is in comparison to America's. That's a pretty low bar.

My first reaction to your post was 'yep, you've proved my point'. But that's unfair because you obviously have all the answers and would have ignored the medical advice and done amazing things off your own bat, would have solved the WORLD shortage of testing chemicals, PPE etc and told the likes of Italy, Spain, Iran, the Netherlands and so on, who are in a far worse position than the UK, exactly what to do BEFORE the crisis started. I get that, you're brilliant.

However I would like to ask you this: I have learned in life that there are doers and those that snipe and criticise from the sidelines and just make it harder for everyone else. You are coming across to me as the latter, so tell me, what have you done to contribute to help get us through this crisis? You're obviously not the PM so I don't mean on a national scale but I mean you yourself in the realm of what is possible. I am assuming little because of my earlier comment about snipers but maybe I am wrong. If I am, I will genuinely apologise but I, like thousands of others, are trying to hold a business, family and everything else together and I am heartily pi**ed off with people who criticise rather than contribute. Again, apologies If I have got you wrong and if I am just taking my angst on you rather than the virus

 

[spring hall convert]

My first reaction to your post was 'yep, you've proved my point'. But that's unfair because you obviously have all the answers and would have ignored the medical advice and done amazing things off your own bat, would have solved the WORLD shortage of testing chemicals, PPE etc and told the likes of Italy, Spain, Iran, the Netherlands and so on, who are in a far worse position than the UK, exactly what to do BEFORE the crisis started. I get that, you're brilliant.

However I would like to ask you this: I have learned in life that there are doers and those that snipe and criticise from the sidelines and just make it harder for everyone else. You are coming across to me as the latter, so tell me, what have you done to contribute to help get us through this crisis? You're obviously not the PM so I don't mean on a national scale but I mean you yourself in the realm of what is possible. I am assuming little because of my earlier comment about snipers but maybe I am wrong. If I am, I will genuinely apologise but I, like thousands of others, are trying to hold a business, family and everything else together and I am heartily pi**ed off with people who criticise rather than contribute. Again, apologies If I have got you wrong and if I am just taking my angst on you rather than the virus

- Moved my wife who works as an HCA in the NHS to another house so that she can continue working rather than quit her job because she was so terrified she was going to infect and kill her own mother who lives with us.
- Looked after her whilst she has self-isolated with Covid-19 contracted as a result of being made to work without PPE.
- Also looked after said mother in law over period where she has been self-isolating as a result of being in the at-risk group.
- Continued to work well over full-time (from home luckily) in a job that has gone absolutely bananas over this period. And funnily enough the majority of that time has been spent doing my best to support people trying to hold their businesses together over this period.

 

[spring hall convert]

But yes, you are right - a Government that has knowingly contributed to the deaths of healthcare workers by pressurising them to work without the correct PPE is really doing a "superb" job.

 

[spring hall convert]

My first reaction to your post was 'yep, you've proved my point'. But that's unfair because you obviously have all the answers and would have ignored the medical advice and done amazing things off your own bat, would have solved the WORLD shortage of testing chemicals, PPE etc and told the likes of Italy, Spain, Iran, the Netherlands and so on, who are in a far worse position than the UK, exactly what to do BEFORE the crisis started. I get that, you're brilliant.

And just to pick this up briefly - you saw that the 'herd immunity' plan was based on a 13 year old study about the flu didn't you? It was just an excuse for Cumming's eugenic fantasies. They went for the 'advice' that suited their pre-conceived ideas of what should be done.
According to the Matt Hancock there is no PPE shortage. It's just a case of logistics apparently.
I have some sympathy on testing - though the Germans felt which way the wind was blowing a full 2 months before Johnson was still making jokes about shaking Cornavirus patients hands. https://apnews.com/03d48eb93fa6cb66...r9RaRDpOa4pIIqFudOtgXs2CiuvCHXR4loJqZet9PaewU

 

[Mr Bridger]

Testing. They identified and isolated from the off, quickly developing the capacity to do thousands of tests a day.

And CCTV, mobile phone apps, GPS data as I said.
They also got caught out with the MERS outbreak, like we are now with covid 19 but have learnt from it.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/theconversation.com/amp/coronavirus-south-koreas-success-in-controlling-disease-is-due-to-its-acceptance-of-surveillance-134068

South Korea has been widely praised for its management of the outbreak and spread of the coronavirus disease COVID-19. The focus has largely been on South Korea’s enormous virus testing programme.

What hasn’t been so widely reported is the country’s heavy use of surveillance technology, notably CCTV and the tracking of bank card and mobile phone usage, to identify who to test in the first place. And this is an important lesson for more liberal countries that might be less tolerant of such privacy invading measures but are hoping to emulate South Korea’s success.
While Taiwan and Singapore have excelled in containing the coronavirus, South Korea and China arguably provide the best models for stopping outbreaks when large numbers of people have been infected. China quarantined confirmed and potential patients, and restricted citizens’ movements as well as international travel. But South Korea accomplished a similar level of control and a low fatality rate (currently 1%) without resorting to such authoritarian measures. This certainly looks like the standard for liberal democratic nations.

The most conspicuous part of the South Korean strategy is simple enough: test, test and test some more. The country has learned from the 2015 outbreak of MERS and reorganised its disease control system. It has a good, large-capacity healthcare system and a sophisticated biotech industry that can produce test kits quickly.
These factors enable the country to carry out 15,000 tests per day, making it second only to China in absolute numbers and third in the world for per person testing. But because COVID-19 is a mild disease for most people, only a small fraction of patients tend to contact health authorities for testing based on their symptoms or known contact with infected people. Many patients with mild symptoms, especially younger ones, don’t realise they are ill and infecting others.

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

And just to pick this up briefly - you saw that the 'herd immunity' plan was based on a 13 year old study about the flu didn't you? It was just an excuse for Cumming's eugenic fantasies. They went for the 'advice' that suited their pre-conceived ideas of what should be done.
According to the Matt Hancock there is no PPE shortage. It's just a case of logistics apparently.
I have some sympathy on testing - though the Germans felt which way the wind was blowing a full 2 months before Johnson was still making jokes about shaking Cornavirus patients hands. https://apnews.com/03d48eb93fa6cb66...r9RaRDpOa4pIIqFudOtgXs2CiuvCHXR4loJqZet9PaewU

And who can forget the classic "Operation Last Gasp" quip.

 

[Bakero]

And CCTV, mobile phone apps, GPS data as I said.
They also got caught out with the MERS outbreak, like we are now with covid 19 but have learnt from it.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/theconversation.com/amp/coronavirus-south-koreas-success-in-controlling-disease-is-due-to-its-acceptance-of-surveillance-134068

South Korea has been widely praised for its management of the outbreak and spread of the coronavirus disease COVID-19. The focus has largely been on South Korea’s enormous virus testing programme.

What hasn’t been so widely reported is the country’s heavy use of surveillance technology, notably CCTV and the tracking of bank card and mobile phone usage, to identify who to test in the first place. And this is an important lesson for more liberal countries that might be less tolerant of such privacy invading measures but are hoping to emulate South Korea’s success.
While Taiwan and Singapore have excelled in containing the coronavirus, South Korea and China arguably provide the best models for stopping outbreaks when large numbers of people have been infected. China quarantined confirmed and potential patients, and restricted citizens’ movements as well as international travel. But South Korea accomplished a similar level of control and a low fatality rate (currently 1%) without resorting to such authoritarian measures. This certainly looks like the standard for liberal democratic nations.

The most conspicuous part of the South Korean strategy is simple enough: test, test and test some more. The country has learned from the 2015 outbreak of MERS and reorganised its disease control system. It has a good, large-capacity healthcare system and a sophisticated biotech industry that can produce test kits quickly.
These factors enable the country to carry out 15,000 tests per day, making it second only to China in absolute numbers and third in the world for per person testing. But because COVID-19 is a mild disease for most people, only a small fraction of patients tend to contact health authorities for testing based on their symptoms or known contact with infected people. Many patients with mild symptoms, especially younger ones, don’t realise they are ill and infecting others.

Your original post equated the Chinese and South Korean approaches. The article you've shared doesn't back that up.

 

[Mr Bridger]

Your original post equated the Chinese and South Korean approaches. The article you've shared doesn't back that up.

Err yes it does.

 

[Bakero]

Err yes it does.

Yes, both countries used tech. Of course they did. But China's lockdown was more severe. As your article points out, testing was key in South Korea.

 

[vegster]

And who can forget the classic "Operation Last Gasp" quip.

Johnson might be regretting that quip now... I'm sure he will take it on the chin though.

 

[Mr Bridger]

Yes, both countries used tech. Of course they did. But China's lockdown was more severe. As your article points out, testing was key in South Korea.

And about using tech to follow up, can’t see what your problem is? part of the I know better brigade I suppose.

 

[Bakero]

And about using tech to follow up, can’t see what your problem is? part of the I know better brigade I suppose.

Ok, mate, I must have misinterpreted your original post.

 

[The Clamp]

Returned home from shift this morning to find my Boris letter on the mat. Don’t think it really stresses that we are REQUIRED to stay indoors as much as humanly possible.
Just quite a lot of Boris bluff and bluster about “we can beat this” “British spirit” etc alongside a pamphlet that is useless to sensible people and will be ignored by morons.

Yes, it’s good for reinforce the message but a one page leaflet with a sterner and clearer warning would have been better imo.

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

Is Zoom actually secure? You'd think Microsoft teams would have been a safer bet..

https://www.ft.com/content/bdedc70b-e559-489e-bfa0-445b9c882f7b

Of course it doesn't help when you publish your zoom ID....

No.

It seems Zoom roots its encryption key requests through a server in China.



Might as well just let the Chinese security services dial into the meeting.

 

[Wozza]

From The Sunday Times...