LOCKDOWN 2 - the November experience

[cromwell]

Well, my brother rang me up yesterday to say that his leeks have the thrip. So he has dug them up and wants to bring them to my allotment to burn. His driving is ok on the motorways but he is a bit nervous of London, so his idea is to stop the car, strap the half hundredweight of leeks to his bike and pedal the last fifteen or so miles to my place.

My brother is 78 years old and last year he had a heart attack, but his only fear is that I might forget to put the gin in the fridge as he can't drink the stuff warm.

I reckon the one disease that kills more than anything else is worry.

Has he reminded you to buy some matches?

[BeElBeeBub]

I notice that when I suggest that Beely put his hand in his pocket he changes the subject.

mate, I've already paid out several grand to either suppliers or tenants so far.

We carried on paying some of our regular contractors (cleaners etc) 100% through the lockdown and offered an on demand 25% rent reduction program for those that needed it in early March.

So I think I stuck my hand in my pocket fairly deeply.  I'd like to not have to do it again because idiots watch a YouTube video from ex-plaster Dave aka "UnmaskedFreedomFighter38596" and suddenly think they know more about statistics and epidemics than statisticians and epidemiologists.

I note that sadly some posters here have friends and relatives who have been diagnosed with cancer.

Lockdowns don't stop cancer diagnosis and treatment. 
Having a virus that is dangerous to immune compromised people endemic in the community stops cancer diagnosis and treatment.
Having hospitals full of CV patients stops cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Lockdowns are the result of the UK's inept government failing to use the time we all bought them with our sacrifices earlier in the year to do anything productive, instead using it to bung cash at their mates.

[BeElBeeBub]

The additional problem not recorded in those figures is the degree to which they represent the population of each country that actually has the disease. The problem is clearly seen with the CDC figures for seasonal flu 2018. The CDC admit they have figures for deaths, figures for ICU treatments,figures for hospital admissions and figures for people who felt so Ill they called a doctor (and incurred a charge). They have NO reliable idea how many felt like shit but laughed it off and how many had no issue.

the true number of infections will always be an estimate.

But flu has been circulating for decades and they have a pretty good handle on it's fatality, somewhere below 0.25% (often well below that)

You can only make that figure higher if you assume less people got it than thought, which seems unlikely.  If you assume more people got it (people who as you say "felt like shit but laughed it off and how many had no issue") that makes flu even less deadly.

On the other hand we know that the maximum number of cases in NYC is 8.4m, because that is the population.  There can be no more cases than that.

So even if we assume the (very implausible) scenario that everyone in NY had CV and 19k died of it, we still get the least that the IFR can be as 0.2.

So in order to believe that CV is no worse than flu we have to believe

a) The CDC managed to count every single flu infection (even the asymptomatic ones)
b) All 8.4m New Yorkers have already caught CV.

If the CDC under count flu cases the flu becomes less deadly.  If not every New Yorker got CV then CV becomes more deadly.

Without RELIABLE information how can we trust these numbers.


And that's before I chuck two more spanners, the fact the Covid test is now admitted to over report positives (a fair course of action preferable to the alternative) in declaring as positive people who have inert viral RNA in their nasal passages weeks after they recovered.

This is a super common claim.

A false positive is an instance where somebody who didn't have CV gets a positive result.

Over the summer we were conducting somewhere around 100-125k tests a day, with around 500 positive results.

That's a rate of around 0.5% (I'm using round figures for ease).

Now the false positive rate can never exceed the actual positive rate.  That is to say the worst case scenario is that every single positive result is a false positive.

So if we assume (again unlikely) that every single positive result over the summer was false, you get a false positive rate of 0.5% at most.

We are now seeing positive rates of over 5% so the majority of cases are in fact real and the case count is going up.

You mention people with inert RNA in their nasal passages.  It's possible tests are picking up old infections that are no longer infectious.  That is an issue if we are then asking the (now non-infectious) person to isolate.

However from the case count perspective and old infection is still an infection.  If we had caught it when it was live it would simply have been in the count last week or last month.

And then of course there's the NHS England stats SNAFU of saying you died of COVID if you were run d byown by a bus 59 days after a positive test you laughed off in a week.


To make me take these numbers seriously you need to seriously address these issues not ignore them as the sage millionaires to be are doing

The count released daily is deaths within 28 days of a CV positive result.

It's true that it would catch the hypothetical asymptomatic, recovered patient hit by a bus 27 days after their positive test.

However it would also miss the healthy 38 year old who died 29 days after their test.  As we get better at testing people earlier (before they even get symptoms in some cases) and better at keeping people alive this type of under count can become an issue.

This exact question was examined by professional actuaries who concluded that the number of people hospitalised "with" rather than "from" CV was less than 1 in 7 (https://www.covid-arg.com/bulletins)

The "gold" standard for CV deaths is the ONS study which examines death certificates.  These contain the train of events that caused death eg Cardiac Arrest caused by Hypoxia caused by CV Pneumonia

This excludes your hypothetical bus victim in the same way he wouldn't be classed as dying from HIV if he had that.

The weight of evidence from across the sectors and across the world all points to the fact that CV is significantly more fatal than seasonal influenza.

[Borchester]

Apart from Thomas and Borchesters humour, which the Smurf will answer with some carp or another, nobody dies of lockdown? classic.

Well, my brother rang me up yesterday to say that his leeks have the thrip. So he has dug them up and wants to bring them to my allotment to burn. His driving is ok on the motorways but he is a bit nervous of London, so his idea is to stop the car, strap the half hundredweight of leeks to his bike and pedal the last fifteen or so miles to my place.

My brother is 78 years old and last year he had a heart attack, but his only fear is that I might forget to put the gin in the fridge as he can't drink the stuff warm.

I reckon the one disease that kills more than anything else is worry.

[johnofgwent]

That will be me then. Plus my mate with the terminal cancer diagnosis not treated thanks to covid, the mate whose stent op after a heart attack was done a month late because he was too scared to go in...


There is a school of lockdown lovers who seem more than swift to denounce all who question what is being done as putting money before public health.


The next arsehole who says that to my face is going to have a set of virgin pliers inserted rectally and opened to full stretch and his agonies livestreamed on arsebook.


It won't prevent my mate's funeral but it will give said lockdown lover an inkling of how effing painful NOT having intravenous antibiotic treatment available was for me.

And you can add another cancer diagnosis to that list. My mate with the late stent was wondering why his missus was under the weather ... lung cancer ... Thank You NHS ...

[Sheepy]

Apart from Thomas and Borchesters humour, which the Smurf will answer with some carp or another, nobody dies of lockdown? classic.

[Thomas]

Apparently, you go down to the Lizard and look out for the door with the red cross on it 

Two dyslexics in a car on the way down to pappys.
One says ' Can you smell petrol ?'
The other replies
'feck off, I cant even smell my own name'

[papasmurf]

Apparently, you go down to the Lizard and look out for the door with the red cross on it 

You won't find any door marked like that locally.

[Borchester]

Another stupid comment, no-one visits me, they don't know where I live

Apparently, you go down to the Lizard and look out for the door with the red cross on it 

[papasmurf]

The problem is that regardless of the rules and regulations that the government push, no one is taking much notice. In my part of the world only about a third of the population wear masks and that is only when they are getting on buses or visiting Pappy.

Another stupid comment, no-one visits me, they don't know where I live and I like it that way. The only real problem locally is the madding crowds of frankly uncivilised tourists ignoring Covid-19 regulations and they also appear never to have passed a driving test.
Hopefully they will all go back next Thursday, and the normal for November peace, quiet, and lack of traffic will return.
(That will still leave the local bad drivers.)

[cromwell]

Well at the outset there were people who thought the lockdown was required in one camp ( me being one) then there were the it's just the sniffles camp in the other.

There is no doubt it is a dangerous virus but in hindsight perhaps the main part of the economy should've stayed open,people in the vulnerable group should've been given guaranteed food and other essentials deliveries,regulated areas to take excercise away from the general population the same with medical care,sounds like a form of apartheid and expensive but I think not as expensive as where we are.

Bit late now but things known now but not known at the outset.

[Barry]

Group four  .Old bastards , Concerned for public welfare but think the cure (lockdown ? ) is more damaging than the decease so sway to group one

[johnofgwent]

Group four  .Old bastards , Concerned for public welfare but think the cure (lockdown ? ) is more damaging than the decease so sway to group one

That will be me then. Plus my mate with the terminal cancer diagnosis not treated thanks to covid, the mate whose stent op after a heart attack was done a month late because he was too scared to go in...


There is a school of lockdown lovers who seem more than swift to denounce all who question what is being done as putting money before public health.


The next arsehole who says that to my face is going to have a set of virgin pliers inserted rectally and opened to full stretch and his agonies livestreamed on arsebook.


It won't prevent my mate's funeral but it will give said lockdown lover an inkling of how effing painful NOT having intravenous antibiotic treatment available was for me.

[Streetwalker]

The problem is that regardless of the rules and regulations that the government push, no one is taking much notice. In my part of the world only about a third of the population wear masks and that is only when they are getting on buses or visiting Pappy.

As far as I can see there are three main groups.

Group one consists of selfish old bastards like me who have no intention of putting themselves out for anyone.

Group two which is made up of Beely and Duckie and who are concerned with the public welfare.

Group three which is made up of folk such as Tommy and Deppity whose main concern is hanging onto their jobs and feeding their families.

I think that the best approach would be for Group 1 to be left to fend for themselves and if they contract the Yellow Peril the world can say ha bloody ha. Meanwhile the decent sorts in Group 2 should pay extra tax to support any lose of earnings for those in Group 3

Group four  .Old bastards , Concerned for public welfare but think the cure (lockdown ? ) is more damaging than the decease so sway to group one

Anyway the construction industry is having it right off . Not only have most of the lads worked right through the virus they have had their wages topped up with corona  self employed payments . Ive only just gone back myself as most of you know but feck me the guys are well happy with the government handouts . I thought Id get a month or two in to see me through the winter but I need not have bothered .
Rishi  rich  now wants to pay me 40% 0f my earnings through till April , Ive never earned 40% of my wages through the winter in my life . What a result ,earning and getting the covid payment .
OK its all taxable and some will be getting a shock when they do their tax returns but a bird in the hand and all that .......Hang on the news just said its up to 80% now !

Feck me , happy days

[Borchester]

i notice none of the "it's just the flu" gang have commented on the actual figures.

I notice that when I suggest that Beely put his hand in his pocket he changes the subject.

Tommy has a growing family and Deppity some expensive bookies to support so I think that the only decent thing is that Beely and his friends offer to make up their lost earnings.