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

But then we look worse on the global stage. Better off doing little to no testing to reduce the number of cases

Ha, true. But the headlines are worth it. Long live plague island!

I don't know what there is in my posting on LFGSS in the last 10ish years which makes you think I was being entirely 100% there.

Long live plague island!

Speaking of which:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/12/army-helicopters-may-be-sent-to-evacuate-covid-patients-from-isle-of-wight-amid-surge

Haringey was also a kit and an instruction poster and a folding table with a grotty makeup mirror and you just handed it over at the end.

No - you're right - I can see that - soz

Daily cases seemed to have dropped again - restrictions finally kicking in?

Or just less people testing? Seems to have dropped off since the festivities.

Cases down a bit, deaths at 1200. Hmm.

Looks like testing has been increasing daily to me according to the data. And test positivity is going down.

The problem is when people treat a negative test as a green light to do stuff (eg see their family).

Vaccine plan TL;DR from Conservatives mailing list:

We are on track to offer the vaccine to all the most vulnerable groups by the middle of February – and the plan sets out how we will ensure every adult gets access to the vaccine.

So far, our Plan has allowed us to vaccinate over 2.3 million people – more than the rest of Europe combined.

Vaccines Delivery Plan

206 active hospital sites
50 large vaccination centres
1,200 local vaccination sites

we can commit to the following timetable:

1) End of January – all residents and staff in over 10,000 care homes across the country will be offered a vaccine.

2) February 15th – all those in the top four priority groups, who account for 88% of fatalities, will be offered a first dose.

3) Spring – all nine high-risk groups for phase one of the programme (32 million people accounting for 99% of deaths) will be vaccinated.

4) Autumn – All UK adults will have been offered a vaccine.

more than the rest of Europe combined.

Always with the culture war, mainly because they have fuck all to offer that is constructive.

2) February 15th – all those in the top four priority groups, who account for 88% of fatalities, will be offered a first dose.

If they manage this I'll be impressed.

Firefighters will be driving ambulances in the south east soon due to crew shortages.

Deaths by day (the actual day they occurred, not the reporting day) are rising though. The numbers for the 4th and 5th of Jan are already the highest numbers since the 1st peak and the 7 day trend is angling up nastily.

Patients admitted is rising sharply too.

Deaths lag behind patient admission numbers by 3-4 weeks.

Patient admission numbers lag behind positive test numbers by 1-2 weeks.

That suggests we're 4-6 weeks away from the end of the 2nd peak.

Cases down a bit, deaths at 1200. Hmm.

Timely reminder that the 1200 figure isn't a figure for deaths that happened today.

EDIT: Cross post with @Greenbank

A colleague of mine, who's husband is a firefighter in London, is already doing it as of this week.

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Always with the culture war, mainly because they have fuck all to offer that is constructive.

My parents (my own personal bellweather of the effect of govt. comms) talked about this on the phone recently - apparently it's a point of national pride, possibly even a Brexit benefit as we don't have to negotiate with 27 other countries.

Firstly, get a grip. What a mental statistic to take national pride from. Secondly, give it a couple of weeks and compare our numbers to Germany's and I wouldn't bet on ours being the better.

apparently it's a point of national pride, possibly even a Brexit benefit as we don't have to negotiate with 27 other countries.

At what point does this badly affect them before?

Vaccination is one area where I think the EU is doing some odd shit. Luxembourg has to take way more vaccine than needed due to some stupid group purchasing deal where we have to take a certain percentage of a buy. That means we have enough vaccine coming to do the two doses for 1.2M people... which... is twice the population. So either we're setting up refugee camps for Brexit fleeing Brits or the scheme is a bit messed up.

Also the Groupon deal means that it's actually taking longer to get the vaccine than if the country did a deal direct.

That said, perhaps too much vaccine isn't that bad a thing to have if we need topups later.

The EU vaccination buying scheme isn't mandatory, is it? Did any EU countries opt out?

Of course being part of a large group means less agility, it is the same in business.
While going it alone means more agility, but a lot less protection.

Local countries have some issues but that's local policies, NL is very slow as the IT system to track vaccinations had to be improved (UK solution, just have lots of unused appointments in some areas atm...) and France is trying to keep anti vaxxers happy by a slower rollout, which is not a choice that makes sense to me.

I think it is mandatory or they at least all signed up for it, that's why you now have Ursula von der Leyen making it clear that it is legally binding and countries should not be undertaking parallel negotiations for vaccine delivery (Germany) which is a breach of the terms. and in bad faith. Was a good piece on it last night on Newsnight. Seems the EU have blundered on this, they turned down an offer from Pfizer for 500m doses at the time the UK was approving it, then went back and placed an order for 200m and another later for 100m but were now much further down the queue and will be delayed in receiving doses.

Tx!

Yeah that's not a good move there, had they moved faster and more flexible then a mass buy would be good.

Pretty annoying as brexit is a predictable shitshow otherwise, so they will just use this to hide the damage.

Like some patients no longer getting specialised cannabis meds from the Netherlands, cos the UK government left it all waaaaay too late to negotiate something. (Hopefully if gets sorted before meds run out)

Pretty annoying as brexit is a predictable shitshow otherwise, so they will just use this to hide the damage.

Yep. If the vaccination plan is a success it will probably save Boris Johnson too, which is incredibly frustrating, especially when the UK's vaccine savvy (or supply at least) is actually all down to the much maligned Kate Bingham.