My Suggestion To Solve Lockdown

[Javert]

I think it's not a competition and if it is treated as one there are no winners.

Not a competition at all no, but if you look around the world, you can very quickly see which countries have the lowest death and infection rates per capita, and then compare their strategy to the UK government strategy.



I think it will become very clear that the UK government's initial attempt to initiate "herd immunity" and insistence that large scale mass gatherings continued well into mid March, resulted in thousands of unnecessary deaths in the short term.  Think about that - UK government ministers making decisions that result in thousands of people dying within weeks.  It's incredible that nobody seems to think that even the possibility of this should be seriously investigated even if it turns out not to be true.  Very soon, the death tool will surpass the entire NI troubles death toll.  It has already well surpassed the UK death toll for any other conflict or disaster since the second world war.



Whether this is was because of unforgivable political interference, or the result of incorrect science advice, will need to be looked at seriously - the government will attempt to brush it under the carpet or blame others, but there needs to be an independent inquiry.



This is a not a party political point in the sense that I have no idea whether other parties if in government would have done better - this is an issue where lessons need to be learned, and if ministers or the PM made political decisions that resulted in thousands of additional deaths in the short term, they should be made to justify those decisions.  Possibly they can try to justify them by claiming that more lives would be lost in a second wave if they had not done that, but again we will see that by what happens in other countries.

[Nalaar]

Yesterday 980 deaths were reported in hospitals.

Today the figure is down to 918, with the total of deaths now 9,875.



The peak does seem to be coming as predicted.

To quote yourself from the 'Covid is no longer a high consequence infectious disease' thread on April 6th

I believe today was 439 which is the lowest figure since the end of March. Well down from the 708 peak which is good news.

A single day of lower deaths is good news, but it means nothing until we see a consistent trend.

[Barry]

I think it's not a competition and if it is treated as one there are no winners.

[Javert]

Yesterday 980 deaths were reported in hospitals.

Today the figure is down to 918, with the total of deaths now 9,875.



The peak does seem to be coming as predicted. The graph for the UK is much the same as other European countries when counted as deaths per million. I know it's not a competition, but some people will politicise anything.

It's more likely that yesterday was random variation.  Unusually I agree with Borchester - the real peak of deaths is still about 10 days away.



It's also a sad indictment of our media in this country, that when Italy was reporting 1000 deaths a day a few weeks ago, they were reporting in horror at how the Italians had got this wrong and we must never do that.



 Well, now we are reporting higher daily death rates than Italy (do you think it's a coincidence that the government presents the total cumulative deaths in their graph against other countries and not daily deaths - lies, damned lies and.....)  - however the media on the day we reported the highest death toll of any country in Europe, and the highest known per capita death toll anywhere in the world , chose to report that Boris Johnson has been able to watch Love Actually (a movie about a Prime Minister who knocks on women's doors looking for a shag - quite apt) in bed and was able to walk to the toilet and that this made this a jolly good Friday.

[Borchester]

Yesterday 980 deaths were reported in hospitals.

Today the figure is down to 918, with the total of deaths now 9,875.



The peak does seem to be coming as predicted. The graph for the UK is much the same as other European countries when counted as deaths per million. I know it's not a competition, but some people will politicise anything.

I am sure we are all doing our best but as mentioned earlier, some of us are afraid to report sick for fear of being worked to death.



I have been following the course of this bug with gruesome interest and reckon that it will start to flatline within a couple of weeks. Sunday seems a little optimistic if for no better reason than that weekend stats always seem a bit wonky. But we shall see. I imagine the real clue will be when Boris comes to the door of Number 10 and cries something cheerfully idiotic about the defeat of the Big C.

[Barry]

Yesterday 980 deaths were reported in hospitals.

Today the figure is down to 918, with the total of deaths now 9,875.



The peak does seem to be coming as predicted. The graph for the UK is much the same as other European countries when counted as deaths per million. I know it's not a competition, but some people will politicise anything.

[Javert]

If this report is correct the government will consider removing the lockdown sector by sector, starting to get manufacturing go again first

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/apr/09/uk-lockdown-could-end-with-sector-by-sector-plan-for-firms">//https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/apr/09/uk-lockdown-could-end-with-sector-by-sector-plan-for-firms

The Guardian like most papers publishes a lot of speculation and "off the record" stuff without really knowing if it's a true thing.



They also claim "exclusive" on a story that the death toll in care homes is not included in the official number at the daily press briefing.  This is not an exclusive - it's been mentioned several times in the briefings before, to which Guardian journalists were invited, and it's been covered in multiple other news outlets including the BBC for example.

[Barry]

I read on an official email that the peak is expected on or around 12th April. I presume this means the peak numbers of deaths per day.

[Barry]

If this report is correct the government will consider removing the lockdown sector by sector, starting to get manufacturing go again first

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/apr/09/uk-lockdown-could-end-with-sector-by-sector-plan-for-firms">//https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/apr/09/uk-lockdown-could-end-with-sector-by-sector-plan-for-firms

[johnofgwent]

In 15 minutes I find if I need to transfer to the plague pit to have i/v antibiotics.



At least its not UHW. I am the only member er of my family to have walked out of that after in patient admission and I do not think it is a miracle I can repeat.



I shall bear your kind words in mind.



Any tips for some light reading before oblivion ??



I'll put them on my kindle before I go in...

[cromwell]

As I have pointed out more than once...



Tory arrogance incompetence and dogma destroyed my chosen career ruined my brothers hopes of a career of any kind and caused me to lose a tax tribunal in which and i quote 'bed and breakfast accommodation cannot be considered a legitimate business expense because you are not using the facility for any business purpose.'



The case in front of mine was lost by twenty barristers whose claim that their formal and ridiculously so, business dress worn in court under their robes was an allowable business expense was kicked out because it could be worn as a business suit outside of the court  and their disinclination to do so did not amount to it being a uniform....



The case after me was lost on similar grounds.



These were the patterns of tory attitude to me.



They also permitted me to tender for government classified work and maintain my clearance with the client



And they allowed my company to earn me a tax paid  lifestyle from 1990 to 1999 equivalent to that acquired by a salary of £150,000 pa in today's money.



Then Tony Blair arrived.



He destroyed the little guy in my sector and specifically removed the right of the little guy to hold clearance via a client.



My company could no longer tender in this area.



He removed the right of small company directors employing and / or giving shares and dividends to wives by implementing S660 while of course MPs were free to employ friends and family at public expense and do not get me started on IR35



It took about six years for my business to actually tank, but when it did, the cataracts kicked in too. Oh joy.



Welsh Labour had run the NHS into the f**king ground so it took several years during which I could not work, nor would the bastards give me any state benefits, and the jobcentre scum actually laughed in my face when I said I could not register online as unemployed as the cataracts inward waiting for the NHS to remove meand I was unable to.use a computer



I had to use every f**king penny I had to keep the house and now I earn £35000 pa, have done without a pay rise for five years, probably wont earn anything this coming year, and Browns f**ked my pension. And Yours too.



And dont, DONT get me started on Blair letting the f**king immigrants including the one with AIDS who raped my daughter get in here. Just DONT.



I'm sure our resident Cornish Tory hater will be dancing with glee if he receives news of Boris being put on a ventilator and will be drunk as a skunk for a month if they switch it off ...



For me though, he and his kind have committed only the crime of being total arse holes.



The ones I want to hear are in a COVID morgue all carry labour party member cards. Apart from one who used to be a lib dem.



But I wont celebrate if I hear any are toe tagged in that fashion. That would be ungentlemanly. It will, however, become necessary to revise my current status as an agnostic.



EDIT:



Oh yeah one more thing



Dad, and Grandad before him used the same business model to register their clearance to tender for classified work. Admittedly grandad started as an employee, but was his own man when Chamberlain said he had received no such undertaking.



If Churchill, Heath and Wilson had the same attitude to the little guy that Blair had, most of you reading this wouldn't be here at all, anyone older than me down to maybe ten years younger would be replying in the same german language I would be writing it because the RAF would not have Grandads radar experiments to count on and without his bolt on bits you might have seen the luftwaffe coming after they finished the blitz but youd never have stopped them, and the rest would be speaking Russian because Suez would never have happened,  IBM would never have made the 6400 and Dad would never have weaponized it for our nuclear force..... so when the Yanks failed to deliver on their promised missile for the Vulcan we'd have had sod all.

Never mind John old Bliar has all the answers read for yourself https://institute.global/policy/economic-policy-response-covid-19">//https://institute.global/policy/economic-policy-response-covid-19perhaps not  ::

[Javert]

@johnofgwent it's good to hear your stories and experiences, but I do sometimes wonder whether there are certain elements omitted, which, if the other side of the disputes were allowed to put their side, might make it sound slightly less unjust.



Just one query for example - business accommodation that's required whilst staying far away from your place of residence, that is needed in order to provide a legitimate business service, as far as I know is an allowable business expense - we treat it as a valid tax exempt expense in my company and I have never received a personal tax bill relating to accommodation that I used whilst on a business trip.  I'm not aware of any auditor ever challenging this in the last 25 years.  As such, either the court made a wrong decision that should have been appealed, or, there is more to your story than what you've revealed up to now.



If you are saying that when you are a sole trader operating either as self employed, or as a one person legal entity, it's not allowable - I'm pretty surprised by that.  For self employed perhaps, but then everyone is in the same boat and has to incorporate those additional costs into their rates.



That's just one question - there are many others in your myriad stories but I'll save those for another day.

[papasmurf]

I mean dishonest and subject to corruption.

That as well.

[Scott777]

You mean slimy untrustworthy bastard.

I mean dishonest and subject to corruption.

[Scott777]

The Spanish health authorities are saying that for every recorded infection in their country, there are 15 others no recorded.

Great news.