COVID-19

[individualmember]

Annoyingly I can no longer disguise my indifference to earning a living as self isolating, since I’ve been offered work next week (and frankly I ought to try and earn some cash).

Ho hum, a week of commuting to Waterloo on public transport, here we go.

Incidentally, I’ve had steroid injected into my knee and the improvement is such that I don’t need my three foot of rosewood with a brass knob on one end for walking at the moment, but I did come to realise that by using it I was touching surfaces on the underground much less than I used to so I think I’ll carry on with the affectation. I don’t know whether it’ll make any difference to my chance of picking up a virus, but it has got me a seat on a crowded train many times in the last few months.

[headshot]

Question: If there are going to be so many mild or asymptomatic cases thus creating herd immunity, but no general testing to see if you have it, how on earth does one make a decent judgment on when one is able to safely recirculate in the population without too much fear that you will get it??

How will we know who’s immune, when??

[TimW]

As the name suggests, it's a fairly normal yoga class, but in a room that also contains lots of goats.

That's not what the name suggests, to be honest.

Meanwhile I'm just back from our local big Sainsbury's and it's like there's a war on. Empty shelves all over the place. I got the last packet of Wheat Crunchies though, that's the main thing.

[bjn]

I thought we were still waiting for anti-body tests to be developed, but we've had several since February. The Koreans have one that works in 10 minutes, the Taiwanese another that works in 15-20. From what I can see the UK is still performing lab based testing, does anyone know?

[bjn]

My sister, what is a doctor, just told me that they are no longer intubating people above 60 in Milan. f.ck. I have elderly relatives in Milan. That's war level triage. Expect the Italian death rate to jump.

[Bird on a Fire]

Question: If there are going to be so many mild or asymptomatic cases thus creating herd immunity, but no general testing to see if you have it, how on earth does one make a decent judgment on when one is able to safely recirculate in the population without too much fear that you will get it??

How will we know who’s immune, when??

Especially if people are able to get infected multiple times, as seems to be the case.

[Bird on a Fire]

So, UK police to be given powers to detain anyone they suspect of being infected.

Meanwhile, schools are to be forced to remain open.

These are the UK government's plans for Emergency Laws, to be pushed through parliament by the end of the month and to remain in place for two years, according to The Times (paywalled). https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/coro ... -b65fp7fvm

[shpalman]

My sister, what is a doctor, just told me that they are no longer intubating people above 60 in Milan. f.ck. I have elderly relatives in Milan. That's war level triage. Expect the Italian death rate to jump.

It's already higher than everyone else.

This is with about 10000 cases in Lombardy (5000 in hospital, 650 in intensive care). This in the UK's future, 10 days from now.

[Woodchopper]

Question: If there are going to be so many mild or asymptomatic cases thus creating herd immunity, but no general testing to see if you have it, how on earth does one make a decent judgment on when one is able to safely recirculate in the population without too much fear that you will get it??

How will we know who’s immune, when??

It’ll be possible to get a population wide assessment through random testing. So if 90% of the population were immune then you could assume that the chances of being infected were low.

Though as BOAF mentioned, that only applies if people are immune for long periods.

[FlammableFlower]

"During the pandemic of 2020, the average age of a COVID sufferer was 69. C-c-c-c-covid-19...19"
Probably quite a niche 80s earworm...

[headshot]

My sister, what is a doctor, just told me that they are no longer intubating people above 60 in Milan. f.ck. I have elderly relatives in Milan. That's war level triage. Expect the Italian death rate to jump.

60?! f.ck.

[mikeh]

So, thanks BOAF for the suggestion a page or few back, I have set up a Medium account, and may when I find time add further coronavirus related posts on there as and when I can be bothered/find the time

For now, the post about the UK response is at the original google drive link, but also at https://medium.com/@michael.g.head/uk-r ... 5d748b2c16

As a general point around this, I'd urge pinches-of-salt-aplenty when there are protestations from shouty people.

Professor Neil Ferguson, from Imperial College, was on the Today programme. He is awesome generally, and gave an excellent interview about the intricacies and nuance around the modelling, and why understanding behaviour is important and difficult to adequately incorporate (he is leading work that will try to do exactly that). And he also pointed out, when you have numbers, you need appropriate interpretation, which needs pragmatism. If you take the piss out of the behavioural scientists, you do so from an ignorant standpoint. With that in mind...
.

armchairexpert.jpg (53.45 KiB) Viewed 3744 times

[bjn]

My sister, what is a doctor, just told me that they are no longer intubating people above 60 in Milan. f.ck. I have elderly relatives in Milan. That's war level triage. Expect the Italian death rate to jump.

60?! f.ck.

Linky

They’re deciding who to intubate and who to let die': Italian doctors
Doctors in Italy have described hospitals struggling to cope with coronavirus patients, where the number of ICU beds have tripled and GPs are being called into wards to help out.

ICU
"All the resuscitation bays are full. They’re having to triage, deciding who to intubate and who to let die," says one doctor in a recording sent to UK news site, ITV.

In one hospital, pressure on resources means anyone over 60 is not being intubated, and there have been many cases of “horrible pneumonias” in young people with no comorbidities, the unnamed doctor says.

Italy has been the worst hit country outside of China, with cases increasing from 322 to 12,000 in just over two weeks, including 827 deaths.

One of the doctors on the recordings was named as Martina. ITV believed her to be Dr Martina Crivellari, an intensive care cardiac anaesthestist at the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan.

Follow the rest of the coronavirus coverage here

She said the ICUs had many patients who were younger, including a 38-year-old with no comorbidities.

"A lot of patients need help with breathing, but there are not enough ventilators,” a translation of the recording of the doctor stated.

"They've told us that, starting from now, we'll have to choose who to intubate — priority will go to the young or those without comorbidities.

"At Niguarda, the other big hospital in Milan, they are not intubating anyone over 60, which is really, really young."

Another doctor on the recording, an unidentified male doctor working at Niguarda Hospital in Milan, said GPs had been called in to work on hospital wards.

"You have no idea how many young people are here. I mean even 20-year-olds with no underlying conditions in need of assisted breathing because of horrible pneumonia,” he said.

"All operations have been cancelled. GP surgeries are closed so that the GPs can come in and be ward doctors.

"All the resuscitation bays are full. They’re having to triage, deciding who to intubate and who to let die."

He also said doctors were at risk because many patients with coronavirus were almost impossible to identify before formal tests had been carried out.

"There aren’t the resources to screen doctors for COVID-19 anymore; they’re just telling them 'stay home if you have symptoms, otherwise come to work'."

[headshot]

Christ.

[Bird on a Fire]

Holy f.ck.

[shpalman]

Listening to UK's Chief Scientific Adviser defending the current approach to coronavirus on Best of Today.

Jeremy Hunt isn't convinced and would like to see the modelling which says that people would get fed-up of containment measures.

He says that there's more likely to be transmission between a few people in close proximity, such as a pub, rather than lots of people at a big sporting event. (It's interesting that sporting events are being called off because of positive results amongst the participants...)

He mentions self-isolating if you have symptoms. (Of course there's currently no way of knowing if you're an asymptomatic shedder, evidence suggests being infectious 1-2 days before symptoms develop.)

He mentions most people's infections are mild and self-limiting after about a week (the results I re-linked above suggested that this wasn't the case in Wuhan; of course you'll have plenty of undetected infections if you don't look for them).

He wants to flatten the peak, and if infection doesn't give immunity to the virus in the future, well, he's hoping future mutations of the virus will make it less severe. (We already had a paper about this which has been retracted, right?)

(Italy is desperately trying to flatten the peak, having been too late and too relaxed about it; if the UK has 4 times more ICU beds than Italy that gains you one or two weeks of extra time before you have to leave anyone over the age of 60 to die.)

He's treating the medical complications which result as over-reactions of the immune system rather than a direct result of the virus (an anti-inflammatory indicated for rheumatoid arthritis is being trialled in Naples, to limit lung damage in the most severe cases).

[gosling]

Today's figures

As of 9am on 14 March 2020, 37,746 people have been tested in the UK, of which 36,606 were confirmed negative and 1,140 were confirmed as positive. 21 patients who tested positive for COVID-19 have died.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but it's practically doubled in two days - 590 reported on the 12th.

[Lew Dolby]

Official advice in France now is "don't take anti-inflammatories like ibuprufen. They seem to make C-19 / fever worse. Take paracetemol"

<forgive my spelling, if nec>.

[bjn]

More on the situation in Milan.

That's the UK in 2-3 weeks.

[Bird on a Fire]

My mum runs a sheltered housing scheme for auld c.nts back in the UK (goat yoga is just a hobby).

Her company's guidance is just "follow NHS guidance", so she's continuing to have face-to-face contact with all residents on a regular basis, and there are no restrictions on posties, delivery people, guests etc.

Every single person in her building is vulnerable due to their age and/or health. Am I alone in thinking that this is a bit inadequate?

The cleaner has at least agreed to disinfect communal surfaces every day, but more for resident's peace of mind.

[shpalman]

More on the situation in Milan.

That's the UK in 2-3 weeks.

That's Milan 3 days ago, there have been 2500 more positives in Lombardy since then. Well, probably more by now, I'm going on yesterday evening's numbers. Nearly 700 hundred more hospital admissions, but only about 90 more cases in the ICU.

They're trying to set up an emergency field hospital at the Fiera di Milano.

Actually it's Bergamo which is a serious hot spot right now. They're starting to see patients my age (40-45) needing to be admitted.

Still I'm sure you can flatten the curve at the right moment so that people don't get too bored about there not being any football.

[sTeamTraen]

My sister, what is a doctor, just told me that they are no longer intubating people above 60 in Milan. f.ck. I have elderly relatives in Milan. That's war level triage. Expect the Italian death rate to jump.

60?! f.ck.

If they take me into hospital here in Spain (where we're probably about 5-6 days behind Italy) I shall be pointing out that I was born in *November* 1960. Have to get ill this year, though, I suppose.

[Opti]

Drove back to the Costa from Sevilla today. Cafés closed, petrol paid for through a hole in the wall ... but the loos! They were being continually scrubbed to within an inch of their lives by hazmat suited people. We're not even under lockdown in Andalucia, but it's being taken very seriously by the people and businesses. Except supermarkets, pharmacies, bakers, fishmongers, butchers, greengrocers, tobacconists and newsagents.
Beaches in the popular areas are closed too.
Still, we got stuff (wine, vodka, tonic, herb) so we'll be ok for now
And we got an empty beach to ourselves

[sTeamTraen]

A serious point: A lot has been made of R0, the number of person each infected person infects in turn. Surely this is hugely culture/country specific? If you have 5 kids and live in Singapore you will have more people to infect than if you are a typical inhabitant of Sweden. Or do R0 statistics just compare between illnesses in the same country?

[lpm]

Today's figures

As of 9am on 14 March 2020, 37,746 people have been tested in the UK, of which 36,606 were confirmed negative and 1,140 were confirmed as positive. 21 patients who tested positive for COVID-19 have died.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but it's practically doubled in two days - 590 reported on the 12th. :shock:

The claim that we are 4 weeks behind Italy seems so wrong. We always thought 13-14 days.

But the CMO said 4 weeks and we are not to question it.