Corona Virus

[algy]

Obs, I am not getting into political debate as that and the attitude of another member is what drove me away from this forum before, I shall post my honest opinions and leave it to others that purport to understand the politics of this sad world to debate the why's and wherefores of my posts.😉

[Bill]

Getting drawn into political or religious debates was something I was always taught to avoid in order to retain friends and it’s a lesson that I think has worked well for me for most of my life. That said, it’s hard to avoid in some places, a bit like visiting the local labour or conservative club. But if you respect the fact that everyone has their own opinions and aren’t too outspoken, then it’s we should all be able to co-exist and share the facilities. Anyway Algy, don’t let the natives keep you away as I always regarded you as being the voice of reason when things here in the past got a bit heated.

As for the pint, that would be fantastic, providing of course I don’t end up being tea total due to a beer shortage.

Take care and as they say these days stay safe!

 

Bill 😊

[algy]

😅😅

[Stallard12]

Great to hear from you old man.

[Stallard12]

The US economy is set to start to crank up again at Easter, everyone back to work as soon as possible, restaurants and bars back in business.

Its what I have always believed, this crisis has to be a balance between medical death and economic death.  If the economy, including all small businesses crater completely there will start to be deaths from suicide and starvation.  A socialist dictator destroyed the economy  in Venezuela  and they are eating pets and zoo animals.  Dictator or virus the result would be the same.  

There will be new standards of hygiene applied to all businesses, washing hands, maybe wearing masks, distancing wherever possible etc, .  The Worlds engine has to crank up before the economic tipping point irregardless of the virus, or as Algy said, whether by design or accident, the Chinese win.

[Observer II]

Sounds pretty much like herd immunisation theory Tex.  😉     Sounds like the pronouncement of that Luit Gov of Texas, who seems prepared to write off the elderly and infirm, in favour of the economy.   😷

[Stallard12]

That's below you Obs, these guys are working night and day to find solutions, non of which are palatable.  They are not sat at home pontificating from an armchair for fun.  There is more heart in Texas than you will ever witness.

[Observer II]

Sorry Tex, but I was a fan of Donald, but he's completely out of his depth on this one - he's more concerned with the economy, as a buoyant economy will be his key selling point in November; but I think that's now stitched.  Problem is of course, the alternative is equally clueless with Biden - so catch 22.  Choice is, you either let this disease have it's way and run rampant in the community and accept the loss of life or you take the economic hit caused by trying to combat it's worst effects, and stop folk dying earlier than they otherwise would.. 😷

[asperity]

Who is the Luit Gov of Texas?

[algy]

3 hours ago, Stallard12 said:

Great to hear from you old man.

Thank's Stallard and you, stay safe my friend.

Don't get drawn into a scrap on here there have always been a couple of fisherman on here casting a bait out with the hope of someone taking the line and love to play them until they land on the bank!.

[Davy51]

I am a bit bemused by claims that this virus will peak on whatever date  "an expert" decides. If this virus has come randomly from who knows where , how can anyone predict its demise unless that will be decided when the vulnerable in society are no more.

I am also curious as to why ,if this virus has come from the  fauna of China, why the infected animals can't be identified in order for the best scientists in the world to provide a suitable antidote.

[Stallard12]

Asp, he's the second in command to the Govenor of Texas, -  elected leader of thirty million people.  But we should have known that he couldn't possibly be as smart as  Obs.  Some things never change.

[Observer II]

It's called opinion Tex,  the same thing millions of voters will apply in November !    😉

[Observer II]

54 minutes ago, Davy51 said:

I am a bit bemused by claims that this virus will peak on whatever date  "an expert" decides. If this virus has come randomly from who knows where , how can anyone predict its demise unless that will be decided when the vulnerable in society are no more.

I am also curious as to why ,if this virus has come from the  fauna of China, why the infected animals can't be identified in order for the best scientists in the world to provide a suitable antidote.

According to the perpetual stream of information on TV Dave -  the peak they worry about is if the number affected exceeds the capacity of the NHS to deal with casualties; the lock down is intended to lower that peak to a manageble level, by reducing the rate of spread.  The herd immunity theory suggests that most folk will get it then become immune;  so leaving the old and infirm to die;  however this appears to be a myth, as youngsters are now dying of it.    Depending on what folk wish to believe -  it seems there is a biological warfare lab in the Wuhan area, and the conspiracy theorists are suggesting that it escaped from there. This may take hold as the Chinese don't appear to have explained the detail behind the cause of the outbreak.   Like other viruses, it's presence will continue indefinitely, until natural immunity or a vaccine kicks in.         😷

[Confused52]

Well I will go with the flavour of the moment and you can take this as my opinion. Nice to see you back Algy.

The source of the infection is known to be Bats, the similarities in the sequence of the RNA in the virus to SARS-v1 (Covid-19 is caused by what the scientific literature calls SARS-v2) suggest that this is true and the information is not from the Chinese. There is now an understanding of how it attacks the lower respiratory system in the literature and it may explain why older folks suffer more, but to be frank my understanding is not sufficient. However it is also the case that some younger folks will have the characteristics that can encourage attack. The disease is not able to target age, it looks for concentration of available proteins that it uses as its attack vector.

When no one has immunity there is a mathematical model that describes accurately how the disease progresses. The Reproduction number R0 (how many people each infected person infects as secondary cases)  and the mean time from infection to infectiousness, which Canadian research says in 5.5 days, as well as the duration of infectiousness let the progress be calculated. Knowing how many people will have bad enough symptoms to die is based on comparing medical condition of populations and I suspect guesswork.

Social Distancing in the models from Imperial College being used by the NHS is intended to reduce the value of R0 to a much lower value, it is based on the number of new non-immune people you meet at a close enough distance to receive infected material so less than 2m. The fraction of people assumed to be going to work is clear in the model and all this stuff is published.

Most people have a smallish group of contacts they meet in person other than the health service etc. That means that unlimited pool of non-immune people will not last forever so it will slow down.  So we will see changes for a long time in the way shopping, health care, social care etc where the people change rapidly. Those are needed to keep the pool of uninfected folks away from those who may be infected. None of these systematic changes are well understood yet but public facing staff will need testing regularly for a long time after the lock-downs ( yes the model predicts more than one) have stopped. However the Armageddon forecast by Obs can and will be avoided by having courage and trusting in the science, as well as following the rules. The Government is totally following scientific advice from some of the worlds leading epidemiologists.

[Milky]

14 hours ago, asperity said:

Do you think the various Police forces around the country rely on the government to procure new uniforms and notebooks for their bobbies? Or the various fire brigades for replacement hoses and helmets? Do local councils wait for central government to procure the yellow coats for their binmen (sorry, domestic refuse operatives)? The list is endless of the things that central government doesn't get involved in the day to day running of. That is why the likes of the NHS have devolved management.

No, but maybe they should for standard things.

Business will normally have a central procurement  dept.

[Milky]

15 hours ago, algy said:

In 1348 the plague came to our shores from China and by 1349 it had killed 20 -40% of the population of this country, yet again these lunatics have released another terrible virus on the West, if they can't conquer the world by trade or military means perhaps they think that they can weaken us sufficiently so as to reduce our ability to defend our borders by decimating the population of the Western world. Perhaps it may be a far fetched theory but so is "A bucket of S**t from China"!.

I was going to post something similar. Wasn't China responsible for Bird and Swine flu too.

Maybe the world should demand compensation from Chima for the cost of dealing with this flu.

[Observer II]

6 hours ago, Confused52 said:

 However the Armageddon forecast by Obs can and will be avoided by having courage and trusting in the science, as well as following the rules. The Government is totally following scientific advice from some of the worlds leading epidemiologists.

Where do you get the idea I'm "forecasting Armageddon";   I'm not "forecasting"  anything of the sort.  The forecasts from the experts (as reported on TV news) are from an optimistic 20,000  UK deaths to top end 500,000;  none of which matches the 1918 flu pandemic, or comes near the 7 billion global population. So far from "Armageddon".   However, the toll to those individuals who lose a loved one might seem like it.  

[algy]

12 hours ago, Confused52 said:

Well I will go with the flavour of the moment and you can take this as my opinion. Nice to see you back Algy.

The source of the infection is known to be Bats, the similarities in the sequence of the RNA in the virus to SARS-v1 (Covid-19 is caused by what the scientific literature calls SARS-v2) suggest that this is true and the information is not from the Chinese. There is now an understanding of how it attacks the lower respiratory system in the literature and it may explain why older folks suffer more, but to be frank my understanding is not sufficient. However it is also the case that some younger folks will have the characteristics that can encourage attack. The disease is not able to target age, it looks for concentration of available proteins that it uses as its attack vector.

 

Thanks Confused52.

Yours is the most sensible and interesting post I have read on the subject and really does explain a great deal, well to me anyway as I am a simple soul.

[Bill]

Some interesting stuff on sky news last night that I couldn't quite get my head around. Apparently there is a theory being put forward that many more people have been infected than previously thought but with symptoms so mild that people didn't even notice and these people theoretically are now immune and can't spread the virus. I think they suggested that currently, over fifty percent of the population might have already been infected but this can only be proved by doing a mass blood test checking for corona antibodies.

If this is correct, then it's thought that the peak of infections will occur slightly sooner than the numbers currently suggest and the time that the crisis will run for will also be less. I just hope this theory is correct.

 

Bill  

[algy]

According to this mornings news the infection and death rate in the UK is flatting off with someone predicting it could be in decline by Easter.

[Bill]

Algy

I think it’s a bit too early to draw any conclusions because the effectiveness of this shutdown won’t show itself until 14 days has elapsed.

The thing that they said last night is that we only have two accurate sets of numbers to work on, infected and deaths and a complete guess at the number of unreported cases. Until now, this guess was about ten times the confirmed cases, but the suggestion was that this is way off the mark and that far more had had the virus with little or no effect.

I’m no expert but if this turns out to be the case, then the virus was a lot more contagious than we thought, and with fewer people able to be infected, the rate of spread may slow down naturally and hopefully quicker.

 

Bill

[Evil Sid]

What irks me about all this is the lack of care that the younger people seem to show.

Police having to break up kids hanging about on the street despite there being warnings on tv every half hour or so and updates on the latest rate of spread.

A present they can only caution them and give them a warning about the spread of infection.

Personally i would like to see them marched off to a quarantine area for three weeks with no facilities or visitors and basic food supplies. (but then i am a bit of a softy.)

[Bill]

I know Sid I've just been for a walk out with the wife, said hello to the few we did see out but everyone kept their distance. On Newcut Lane though, we came across a group of five bike riders probably in their early twenties that met up just as we approached but I guess they'd never heard of social distancing. Even if people like this never watch the news channels, it's hard to believe they hadn't had the message but clearly they didn't think it applied to them.

 

Bill

[Confused52]

5 hours ago, algy said:

According to this mornings news the infection and death rate in the UK is flatting off with someone predicting it could be in decline by Easter.

The numbers for yesterday were not like for like because they are taking longer to process at the Health Department and in future the numbers will be published later in the day ( Source - Health Department via Guido Fawkes). Yesterday was not a full 24 hours of infections or deaths, tomorrow will cover 24 then they get reliable again the day after that.  Bill is exactly right about there being only two numbers that are reliable and neither were yesterday. FYI the positive tests were about the same as the previous day but could be low for the reason stated earlier.