Chat about Novel Coronavirus - 2019-nCoV - COVID-19

Your experience of the world isn't necessarily the world.

Chance of being a troll is high: Recently registered, nearly all posts in one thread, irrationally argumentative from very early in the posting history.

Don't feed the trolls.

Indeed. Recently registered. Doesn't bother with a proper username. Dived straight into a contentious thread in a contentious manner. Only posts in that thread - apart from token post in the picture association thread, oddly another magnet for trolls.

Bingpot.

I love it when ministers get asked about the specific restrictions, you can see them sweating trying to remember what they are.

They should just make it up on the fly. 'If you live upstairs, you have to slide down the handrail. You must have the windscreen wipers on your car on all the time. You have to complete three rosaries outside the supermarket before you're allowed to go in. If you smell any COVID, call the cops.'

I mean, they're ministers, they're supposed to carry any brief with aplomb.

Gove makes it up on the spot then has to correct them. He did it again yesterday.

I think you may have some reading comprehension issues.

Would you say self-awareness is one of your virtues?

As per Velocio’s post

Don't feed the trolls.

A proper username? Like yours? Okay........

Yeah, @brommers why DON'T you have a username that includes your first name and, umm, stuff?

well you named yourself after a piece of brewing equipment and you don't even drink

Uriah SERgovich, born 12-03-63. Perfectly legitimate username I’m sure.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-54792017

"Re-opening Northern Ireland's hospitality industry next week would be "an act of careless vandalism", according to the chair of the British Medical Association (BMA)."

Shots fired!

"Mr Neill said Hospitality Ulster has suggested the creation of a "Covid-secure hospitality standard", similar to the Scores on the Doors system for food hygiene inspections.

"We as an industry have led from the front, saying 'Give us legally enforceable standards', Mr Neill told the BBC's Nolan Show. "

I'd be happy if that is possible, so that I can support my local pub (they only have Sunday takeaway atm) I'd imagine they will need to buy special airco systems to generate a lot of clean airflow though.

Whitty and Valence currently taking questions in a select committee if that's your bag:
https://parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/8bbb6325-cbfe-4025-9be9-5f50bc220c73

Quite entertaining.

Also interesting to see how completely out of their depth some of the MPs are.

It was quite enlightening to see Hunt (for it is he) ask how it was possible that there could be up to 4,000 deaths a day given that the new treatments have reduced the morbidity rate by 50%. The answer (of course) was "Well, if deaths are doubling every n days then if you've halved the morbidity rate with medical advances then it only takes n days for that work to be undone as the deaths will just double, and this doubling just continues." I still don't think Hunt got it (which is depressing for a former health secretary).

Also the very young MP (Gavin?) who was trying to pin Whitty down to providing a false negative and false positive number for the various tests, despite it being mostly irrelevant to the modelling they've been doing.

Whitty and Valance have amazing patience.

Just messaged a friend the saying the same thing, the level of patience they demonstrate is incredible. Seem's worrying how few of the MP's understand what SAGE's remit is and who does what. They seem to think SAGE should be doing a full cost benefit of national impact for every intervention and not understanding they don't choose the policies that land up getting implemented.

It just seems that many MPs are just there to try and trip them up on something. Amazingly childish.

It seems to me that this is what UK politics has become, trying to tear down instead of build up. A race to the bottom.

First ten minutes I heard appeared to be some long winded set of traps being laid that had zero pay off as there was nothing to catch them out about as they appear to be diligent professionals trying to do their best in a difficult situation and have no problem saying when they were wrong and demonstrating how they have implemented changes.

Wasn't sage overtaken by Cummings et al?

U-turn to allow pubs to sell takeaway beer:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-54803070

(Still a bit limiting if you can only meet up with one other person outside during the new lockdown.)

It seems to me that this is what UK politics has become, trying to tear down instead of build up. A race to the bottom.

We've had a Tory government for the last decade, what do you expect?

Whitty and Valance have amazing patience.

I used to work in public affairs and I don't think your typical member of the public realises how thick a lot of MPs are.

The post-Cameron crop of Tory MPs are particularly 'special'. I wouldn't trust a lot of them to run a corner shop, never mind a constituency.

Re: broadband on Italy, I didn't want to weigh in given an Italian obviously has more lived experience of it than me. But the reason mobile broadband takeup is so high is that loads of people still don't have fixed broadband because it's often still prohibitively expensive or difficult to get.

Anecdotal, but when I lived in Verona the only internet in my flat was through my landlady's mobile phone because she said broadband was too expensive. I was lucky in that if I put my laptop in one corner of the room I could connect to a Vodafone public Wi-Fi network. I had to pay them €29.95 a month for the privilege though.

Am I being thick here, or are there no rules this time on excersise?

What can I do In terms of taking my kid to the park?

If the gates are open, spend all day there if you like.