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

Jeez, I hope you'll recover swiftly.

Thanks Ed. So far it pretty much feels like flu but with no symptoms other than being a bit snotty (apart from for the first few days) so I'm pretty hopeful.

I came out of hospital after a fairly major spine op five weeks ago today so I was being very very careful - seeing people outside when I did, wearing an FFP2 mask when I had to get transport (still can't ride yet), washing hands lots etc. So presuming the PCR comes back positive it just shows how transmissible it is.

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Sorry to hear about your op. Hope recovery is going well.

Don't be, best thing that happened to me for ages - over a year of unbearable sciatic pain went away pretty much overnight!

The surgeon found a hole in the lining around my spinal cord though which had been made by one of the discs entering the spinal canal and puncturing a hole in the lining. So that had to be patched up (with 'paper and glue' in his words, lol) then I had five nights of flat bed rest which was about as much fun as it sounds.

He also had to take that disc out, untangle the nerve from around it then put it back in again 😬

I'm very lucky I had such a skilled surgeon. Recovery was going great until I got covid! I was told at the post-op I was on track to recover as if the hole and bed rest stuff had never happened. I'd been walking an average of five miles a day since the operation and had built up to doing half an hour of pilates physio exercises for core strength too.

I'd been doing this for a month so was actually fitter than I'd been for ages (given I basically had to stop exercising) and I've lost 2kg since the op.

I reckon this is all helping now with the covid - the thing I'm most bothered about right now is that I can't leave the house for a walk for another eight days...

Main covid symptoms in the double vaxxed are basically cold symptoms so I bet loads of people have read that and decided they've just got a cold...

Still no PCR test results from 10am Friday :/

Sounds like epic surgery. Awesome that it seems to have done the trick.

Time will tell but it seems to have done. Really looking forward to finally getting back on a bike!

Got bored of waiting for our PCR test results and went to get tested again tonight.

Turns out the the answer to this

Went to get PCR tested with my partner and because I managed to accidentally leave him off the booking he booked separately. When we got there we were given two of those grey bags at the same time. They then scanned our barcodes after, but we can't work out how each testing kit will be allocated to the right person - any ideas?

Is that they're meant to rescan the bar code on your phone before scanning the test kit barcode at the end.

Except when we went on Friday they didn't do this, so those results are never going to arrive.

Seeing as they scan the bar code on your phone when you arrive, an obvious improvement would be linking a test kit to your at this point before they give you the test kit, no?

Then they'd only have to scan your bar code once too.

Oh and if you follow the instructions to follow up on a test result and call 119, when you press whatever to chase up a test result it basically says

We're too busy to follow up on test results at the moment, now bugger off

Then terminates the call.

So that's good.

I came out of hospital after a fairly major spine op five weeks ago today.

I remember, it sound like a horrifying ordeal on top of getting positive.

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Most densely populated = we’ve all had it by now or been vaccinated or both.

Hospital rates in London dropping quickly too

children coughing

Schools just went back and children are germ factories.

Really nasty cold going round school in the last week or two. Mine both had it, eldest missed a day of school.

Positive LFT from the buddy of my youngest yesterday evening, arranging a PCR at the moment. They spent the day in class together. Last year that would have meant the whole year group were sent home. This year seems to be nothing happens. They get their jab on Thursday.

I don't want to over egg the pudding, I'm pretty good at operations and all the doctors and nurses loved telling me how healthy I am (which I then proved by getting straight out of bed without the walker as soon as I was allowed and climbing some stairs, much to my physio and surgeon's delight).

The most horrifying bit was the bedpan if I'm honest.

I can't prove this but based on the number of people I see not wearing masks and how quiet Covid test centres are at the moment I think a lot of people aren't getting tested when they should be.

Which I'd presume would mean lots of unidentified cases.

They get their jab on Thursday.

I think you have to wait 28 days for the vaccine after symptoms/testing positive so hope that PCR is clear.

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Everywhere I go I seem to encounter children coughing. Has the common cold displaced covid?

Very few people got colds/flu/norovirus last year due to distancing, improved cleaning, lockdowns, masks etc. Likely to run riot this year as everyone gets more exposed to them again.

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Well if the unreported cases are amongst double vaxxed people it could, no?

Worth remembering that cases nationally are still through the roof - 37.5k yesterday.

I hadn't thought of that. Could be.

To be fair it is very much my own cod science theory. I'm just bitter because I was so so careful but still seem to have ended up getting it.

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