Coronavirus

It's just a false economy though. Getting the punters in at any price means they'll end up being forced to close again when things get out of control. If they opened up their establishments safely then it would be sustainable and no need to close down, ergo more money in the long term...

Couldnt agree more mate.
Just checked the BACTA guidelines, not one of the four piers I visited this weekend complied with them regarding tracing, nobody was asked for a contact number, at all.

Alsty said:

It's just a false economy though. Getting the punters in at any price means they'll end up being forced to close again when things get out of control. If they opened up their establishments safely then it would be sustainable and no need to close down, ergo more money in the long term...

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I agree. But that's looking at the situation as a whole.
For each individual business they know that if they put in tighter restrictions it doesn't necessarily stop them being forced to close if all their competitors don't. Then it's a lose lose situation. That's why they'd rather risk making more money while they can.
I don't agree with it but understand why it happens.

So the new regulations, to force people in the northwest back into "semi lockdown", meaning many hundreds of thousands of local people could not see family over the eid celebrations, are not enforceable, and people are free to ignore them (at their peril) because, five whole days later, they have not been made law.
The country seems to be run by a bunch of absolute morons and naughty people who can tell us what to do, with no legal basis.
I would speak my mind fully, but we are in Corner Coffee and not the Tavern.

I’ve got to the point of actively avoiding their announcements as much as possible now. Every time I accidentally catch one of them, I feel an even greater desire to emigrate.

My mum was presented with a plaque and bottle of champers last week after her work announced that they are to start producing the vaccine for AstraZaneca! I'm proud as punch that she will be playing a key part in the fight against Coronavirus



I'm hopefully doing my part as I'm due to donate Plasma and Antibodies next week. So happy to be doing my bit as well.

If anyone here has had COVID and is willing to donate Plasma or blood for research purposes head to the donation website and sign up. I think they say 1 pint of blood can save 3 lives, plus a free tea and biscuits . So definitely worth doing if you're up to it.

So France and the Netherlands are coming back off the quarantine exemption list from Saturday as cases start to rise again. Things have been looking bad in France for the last couple of weeks so I think it was inevitable it would happen sooner rather than later.

Europe managed to suppress Coronavirus but now risks it getting out of control again. Perhaps the route back to normality is being taken too quickly or with too much complacency.

I was looking at some data prepared by the EU which shows 14-day cumulative infections per 100k population. Although we don't know the criteria the government uses for their travel corridors, perhaps these figures gives clues which countries may be likely to go back on the quarantine list next. Here are some examples:

Cumulative 14-day infections per 100k population
Luxembourg 124
Spain 100
Malta 75
Belgium 58
Netherlands 40
Sweden 35
France 32 <-- seems to be the approx cutoff
Iceland 31
Czechia 28
Cyprus 24
Denmark 24
UK 18
Germany 14
Italy 8

German cases have increased rapidly over the last few weeks...spanish holidays being highlighted as the probable reason...spanish nightclubs havent been following the guidelines, young clubbers going home to kill granny.
Allegedly.

Two weeks ago the government said the cases were too high to relax lockdown further, and Prof. Chris Whitty said we might be at the limit of what we can safely unlock. Therefore it's completely logical that from tomorrow the government will relax the lockdown, despite cases being higher than two weeks ago...

From Saturday the following will be allowed in England:

• beauty treatments,
  
• small wedding receptions,
• live indoor performances,
• bowling alleys,
• casinos, and
• soft play centres.

Alsty said:

Two weeks ago the government said the cases were too high to relax lockdown further, and Prof. Chris Whitty said we might be at the limit of what we can safely unlock. Therefore it's completely logical that from tomorrow the government will relax the lockdown, despite cases being higher than two weeks ago...

From Saturday the following will be allowed in England:

• beauty treatments,
  
• small wedding receptions,
• live indoor performances,
• bowling alleys,
• casinos, and
• soft play centres.

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To be honest some of those make more sense than general pubs being open. Bowling alleys are generally nicely distanced and you can have one group per two lanes etc.

If casinos and similar aren't allowed to be open, then pubs shouldn't be either. Also it feels like having a singer or comedian in a pub with socially distanced tables is better than just having the pub open as people are less likely to get up, move around and shout at others.
Again I think for most of these things it should be all or nothing, either you can go bowling, watch a singer in a pub and go for a drink in a pub, or you can't have bars/pubs open at all.

According to the ONS, cases are now levelling off again, despite the small increase during July: https://apple.news/ABGtv2M9iSdq7o1N1fmRQrw

Matt N said:

According to the ONS, cases are now levelling off again, despite the small increase during July: https://apple.news/ABGtv2M9iSdq7o1N1fmRQrw

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Since the lockdown has been easing, I've been following the daily figures to see when it is safe for Jess and I to venture out, I don't trust the government at the moment. I can tell you the new daily cases are rising and have been since lockdown. They say the rise in numbers is due to increase in testing. However hospital admissions and deaths usual follow the case numbers by a good 3 to 6 weeks. Over the last few days, the increase in new daily figures have exceeded 1000 new cases per day, and these are the official figures which don't take in account those that are A symptomatic and haven't been tested.

I personally feel more safe once those daily figures have been reduced to double or even better single numbers. Other countries have gone back into strict lockdown with new daily cases lower than ours.

To be fair the article Matt provided uses "may" and "appears" too much for my liking.

My Grandparents are itching to get out after shielding for soo long. So we'll be taking Nain and Taid for a drive on Sunday just so that they can get out, it'll only be a lap around the local park and possibly a look at the lake. Not sure how they've managed not to decline mentally in Lockdown. I hope you and Jess are doing well Roy and don't blame you for taking precautions, take care

Of course I appreciate that vulnerable people and those who care for/are close to vulnerable people will still take a lot of precautions; the disease is still out there, and will be until a vaccine is approved or we find some other way of controlling the disease, and I think that is an important thing to remember. I will still be trying to follow the social distancing regulations and other regulations where possible, personally.

However, I’m only going off of what the ONS says, and on that front, it looks promising. There’s no surefire way to tell the prevalence of COVID short of testing the entire population of the UK once a week, which just isn’t feasible. But surely if this percentage reflects a levelling off in COVID prevalence, then it must provide some indication of what the full country is like, within a reasonable margin of error?

Just wanted to put my sympathy out there for anyone who got their A-Level results in the past couple of days and had their predicted/mock grades downgraded because of an algorithm.

To put a lot of hard work in over a couple of years and then not being able to take the exam through absolutely no fault of their own and then having an algorithm decide that they shouldn't get the results that they were expected to get judging on their past work only because they went to a certain school/college absolutely stinks.

I know that there is an argument that there was no perfect solution to the problem but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have reacted well to such a bombshell. I probably would have gone into a spiral of self-destruction or something. I mean, if you actually fail at something yourself you can come to terms with it but how do you come to terms with for all intents and purposes being failed due to an algorithm that probably punishes you for having the audacity to already be at the disadvantage of being at a poorer school.

I'm well into adulthood so this almost certainly has absolutely no impact on me at all but I just needed to say that I think you've been badly wronged and it's not correct. This can and will impact peoples futures unfairly. I've heard multiple stories of people being downgraded from BBB to DDD etc etc. Ridiculous.

The increase in numbers here is mostly down to increased testing, the government can be knocked for many things but testing is not now one of them.
I go for a test once a week now as I work in the food industry and that is seriously high risk currently but the testing is a brilliant service, you turn up, do the test yourself, hand it back over and get the result the next morning, absolutely spot on.

I also read an interesting article from a doctor earlier this week where he said he doesn’t see a second wave as hospital emissions are going down all of the time still, he even said there are signs the virus is weakening, here’s hoping..

For the metric of cases, I think an interesting thing to do would be to compare the number of positive tests per 1,000 tests. That would cancel out the increase in testing and give everything a level playing field.

I’ve found the reported 7-day averages for 1st June, 1st July and 1st August for both cases and testing, and they are as follows:

• 1st June: 1,905 cases, 112,000 tests = 17 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st July: 711 cases, 137,000 tests = 5.2 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st August: 802 cases, 172,000 tests = 4.7 cases per 1,000 tests

So it would seem that the proportion of positive tests (aka average prevalence of COVID in the community) is still going down by this metric, albeit at a reduced rate. When you see increased case numbers, @BigT is right in saying that that is mostly down to testing, as the estimated prevalence of COVID in the community is still decreasing if you look at it through the lens of percentage of tests which are showing up positive.

Matt N said:

For the metric of cases, I think an interesting thing to do would be to compare the number of positive tests per 1,000 tests. That would cancel out the increase in testing and give everything a level playing field.

I’ve found the reported 7-day averages for 1st June, 1st July and 1st August for both cases and testing, and they are as follows:

• 1st June: 1,905 cases, 112,000 tests = 17 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st July: 711 cases, 137,000 tests = 5.2 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st August: 802 cases, 172,000 tests = 4.7 cases per 1,000 tests

So it would seem that the proportion of positive tests (aka average prevalence of COVID in the community) is still going down by this metric, albeit at a reduced rate. When you see increased case numbers, @BigT is right in saying that that is mostly down to testing, as the estimated prevalence of COVID in the community is still decreasing if you look at it through the lens of percentage of tests which are showing up positive.

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Even those figures aren't entirely accurate as there are more tests done in known hot zones. It's quite possible we are doing even better then ^ would make it appear.

Matt N said:

For the metric of cases, I think an interesting thing to do would be to compare the number of positive tests per 1,000 tests. That would cancel out the increase in testing and give everything a level playing field.

I’ve found the reported 7-day averages for 1st June, 1st July and 1st August for both cases and testing, and they are as follows:

• 1st June: 1,905 cases, 112,000 tests = 17 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st July: 711 cases, 137,000 tests = 5.2 cases per 1,000 tests
• 1st August: 802 cases, 172,000 tests = 4.7 cases per 1,000 tests

So it would seem that the proportion of positive tests (aka average prevalence of COVID in the community) is still going down by this metric, albeit at a reduced rate. When you see increased case numbers, @BigT is right in saying that that is mostly down to testing, as the estimated prevalence of COVID in the community is still decreasing if you look at it through the lens of percentage of tests which are showing up positive.

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This is the most sensible comparison really, and supports more controlled opening.

The stand out one for me though is the reopening of casinos. By their very nature you have to move around as the various games don't come to you. The nature of the games forces people into clusters around each table. Most games have a shared equipment to touch between staff and customers such as cards and chips.

I really don't see how it'll be possible for most casino activities to resume following the current guidelines.

Amusement arcades on the coast have been packed out for a month, zero distancing, zero track and trace.
Casinos are nothing in comparison!