Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Discussions about serious topics, for serious people
Post Reply

Will the UK achieve unlockdown by the Summer Solstice?

Yes, easy peasy
1
2%
Yes, but only because the govt won't want to u-turn
19
42%
There or thereabouts, might be pushed back a couple of weeks
5
11%
No, the numbers won't allow it, and each stage will be delayed adding up to a couple more months of measures
9
20%
No, not a chance, the virus will have another serious wave and relockdown will be required
11
24%
 
Total votes: 45

User avatar
Tessa K
Light of Blast
Posts: 4707
Joined: Tue Nov 12, 2019 5:07 pm
Location: Closer than you'd like

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Tessa K » Thu Aug 05, 2021 11:20 am

Severe acute cases in the US are not the same as long Covid here, which is what we were talking about. The US has handled the whole pandemic even worse than us so there's little point comparing.

Herainestold
After Pie
Posts: 2029
Joined: Mon Nov 25, 2019 1:23 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Herainestold » Thu Aug 05, 2021 2:05 pm

Tessa K wrote:
Thu Aug 05, 2021 11:20 am
Severe acute cases in the US are not the same as long Covid here, which is what we were talking about. The US has handled the whole pandemic even worse than us so there's little point comparing.
The point is that it disproves the contention that covid is relatively harmless to children. Even now serious illness in children is less than in adults, but the Delta wave is infecting more children and making them sicker than previous covid strains.
Masking forever
Putin is a monster.
Russian socialism will rise again

User avatar
Woodchopper
Princess POW
Posts: 7057
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2019 9:05 am

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Woodchopper » Fri Aug 06, 2021 10:38 am

From a few days ago
Surprise dip in UK COVID cases baffles researchers
Daily recorded infections have more than halved since mid-July. Few researchers anticipated such a sharp decline, and they are now struggling to interpret it.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02125-1

User avatar
Woodchopper
Princess POW
Posts: 7057
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2019 9:05 am

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Woodchopper » Sun Aug 08, 2021 6:14 pm

England, Scotland and Wales now show drops in cases in the ONS survey.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulation ... august2021

KAJ
Fuzzable
Posts: 310
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 5:05 pm
Location: UK

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by KAJ » Sun Aug 08, 2021 7:07 pm

Woodchopper wrote:
Sun Aug 08, 2021 6:14 pm
England, Scotland and Wales now show drops in cases in the ONS survey.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulation ... august2021
That's for data up to 31 July. On 4 August in the COVID-19 thread I (tentatively) suggested the drop had slowed. I think the evidence is now stronger.

Here's my routine plot of cases by specimen date (the red line is 7 day moving average, the black line is a regression fit).
(Please let's avoid going down the plot details rabbit hole, this plot is really only intended for me. The data is at coronavirus.data.gov.uk if you prefer another analysis or presentation.)
SpecCases.png
SpecCases.png (43.54 KiB) Viewed 2315 times
In the regression fit the latest 5 data are zero weighted as being "incomplete", they can be confidently expected to increase.

The regression fit is worsening as each day's data comes in.

Code: Select all

Coefficients:
                Estimate Std. Error t value Pr(>|t|)    
(Intercept)     9.982951   0.058133 171.727  < 2e-16 ***
poly(date, 2)1  0.405377   0.183947   2.204 0.034627 *  
poly(date, 2)2 -2.299162   0.184872 -12.437 5.29e-14 ***
dayMon          0.338866   0.080546   4.207 0.000186 ***
dayTue          0.312758   0.080613   3.880 0.000473 ***
dayWed          0.328606   0.080716   4.071 0.000275 ***
dayThu          0.285785   0.080854   3.535 0.001233 ** 
dayFri          0.190567   0.081027   2.352 0.024798 *  
daySat          0.006005   0.081243   0.074 0.941526    
---
Signif. codes:  0 ‘***’ 0.001 ‘**’ 0.01 ‘*’ 0.05 ‘.’ 0.1 ‘ ’ 1

Residual standard error: 0.1395 on 33 degrees of freedom
Multiple R-squared:  0.8889
I find the residuals plot even more suggestive...
Resids.png
Resids.png (11.47 KiB) Viewed 2315 times
I think the drop began on 16 July and lasted not much more than a fortnight.

User avatar
Woodchopper
Princess POW
Posts: 7057
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2019 9:05 am

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Woodchopper » Sun Aug 08, 2021 7:41 pm

I agree, it looks like cases have plateaued, possibly along with hospital admissions.

User avatar
Sciolus
Dorkwood
Posts: 1313
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 6:42 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Sciolus » Sun Aug 08, 2021 8:06 pm

OffTheRock wrote:
Sun Jul 25, 2021 4:10 pm
It doesn't explain the confusing group of people who voluntarily wear a mask on the bus, but under their chin. I kind of get the not covering the nose thing. That group of people have always existed. Up until now I'd always assumed the the 'under the chin' group of people were just breaking the rules because they didn't want to wear a mask. But now they don't have to wear a mask and their are still wearing it under their chin anyway.
I was sitting in a cafe earlier, and watched as a woman came in, sat down, took a mask from her bag, looped it over her ears, and carefully tucked it under her chin. She still had it like that when I left.

Mask wearing has definitely reduced over the last couple of weeks.

User avatar
lpm
Junior Mod
Posts: 5944
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 1:05 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by lpm » Sun Aug 08, 2021 9:14 pm

Thanks KAJ. A plateau at 30,000 would be a great result, particularly as it's so weighted to 18-30. We had feared a plateau at 100,000.

Could all go downhill fast in September.
⭐ Awarded gold star 4 November 2021

User avatar
shpalman
Princess POW
Posts: 8241
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 12:53 pm
Location: One step beyond
Contact:

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by shpalman » Mon Aug 09, 2021 5:43 am

That seems to me to be a confusing use of "plateau" in the sense that cases have just gone through a local minimum, not maximum.
having that swing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it meaning a thing
@shpalman@mastodon.me.uk

User avatar
bob sterman
Dorkwood
Posts: 1123
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 10:25 pm
Location: Location Location

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by bob sterman » Mon Aug 09, 2021 7:11 am

shpalman wrote:
Mon Aug 09, 2021 5:43 am
That seems to me to be a confusing use of "plateau" in the sense that cases have just gone through a local minimum, not maximum.
Plateau = "a period during which there are no large changes" or "a relatively stable level, period, or condition" or "to reach a particular level and then stay the same."

As in "I'd been losing about a pound a week on my diet, but recently I've plateaued and haven't lost an ounce" (e.g. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictio ... sh/plateau)

User avatar
shpalman
Princess POW
Posts: 8241
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 12:53 pm
Location: One step beyond
Contact:

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by shpalman » Mon Aug 09, 2021 8:05 am

lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 08, 2021 9:14 pm
A plateau at 30,000 would be a great result, particularly as it's so weighted to 18-30. We had feared a plateau at 100,000.

Could all go downhill fast in September.
A plateau at 30,000 when that's the minimum is not a great result, it could still go downhill up to 100,000.
having that swing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it meaning a thing
@shpalman@mastodon.me.uk

User avatar
Sciolus
Dorkwood
Posts: 1313
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 6:42 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Sciolus » Mon Aug 09, 2021 10:10 am

shpalman wrote:
Mon Aug 09, 2021 8:05 am
lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 08, 2021 9:14 pm
A plateau at 30,000 would be a great result, particularly as it's so weighted to 18-30. We had feared a plateau at 100,000.

Could all go downhill fast in September.
A plateau at 30,000 when that's the minimum is not a great result, it could still go downhill up to 100,000.
Yeah, that would be negative.

User avatar
shpalman
Princess POW
Posts: 8241
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 12:53 pm
Location: One step beyond
Contact:

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by shpalman » Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:08 pm

Prof. Christina Pagel on Twitter has some graphs
Most regions are flat, but NE continuing to decline a lot from its large peak and some regions Yorks, E Midlands, SW) are going up slightly.
Cases are now very concentrated in young adults. Cases in under 15s have dropped a lot since end of term - partly fewer cases and partly less testing.

Cases dropping older adults too but more slowly than in children.
I don’t think anyone predicted just how much a pool of infection school kids were.
having that swing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it meaning a thing
@shpalman@mastodon.me.uk

User avatar
Tessa K
Light of Blast
Posts: 4707
Joined: Tue Nov 12, 2019 5:07 pm
Location: Closer than you'd like

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by Tessa K » Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:17 pm

shpalman wrote:
Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:08 pm
Prof. Christina Pagel on Twitter has some graphs
Most regions are flat, but NE continuing to decline a lot from its large peak and some regions Yorks, E Midlands, SW) are going up slightly.
Cases are now very concentrated in young adults. Cases in under 15s have dropped a lot since end of term - partly fewer cases and partly less testing.

Cases dropping older adults too but more slowly than in children.
I don’t think anyone predicted just how much a pool of infection school kids were.
The biggest drops were in 15-29 year olds so that includes students as well as school kids plus younger adults who, hopefully, are now getting vaccinated. Although much less in London than the rest of the country. I've always thought kids were germ bags.

User avatar
shpalman
Princess POW
Posts: 8241
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 12:53 pm
Location: One step beyond
Contact:

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by shpalman » Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:28 pm

First dose uptake in the 18-24 age range in England has increased from 48.5% on the 1st of July to 61.4% on the 1st of August (and second dose uptake has gone from 15 to 20%)...

... so I don't see how this is changing fast enough to make a difference to the case rate. You can't really spin the latter as a big relative increase [(.2-.15)/.15] because you have to look at how much susceptible population is left.

England has slowed to fewer than 30,000 first doses per day.

I too flagged up how "children don't tend to suffer badly from covid ≠ children don't catch and spread covid".
having that swing is a necessary but not sufficient condition for it meaning a thing
@shpalman@mastodon.me.uk

raven
Catbabel
Posts: 645
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 8:58 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by raven » Sat Aug 14, 2021 9:06 pm

shpalman wrote:
Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:28 pm
... so I don't see how this is changing fast enough to make a difference to the case rate. You can't really spin the latter as a big relative increase [(.2-.15)/.15] because you have to look at how much susceptible population is left.
What concerns me is that we've still got a fair chunk of people in their 50s & 40s unvaccinated according to this PHE graphic - (which I prefer to the heat map because all the white space really emphasises how far we have to go.) There's no change in those age groups, presumably because those who haven't come forward by now aren't going to.
Screenshot 2021-08-14 at 21-33-49 Weekly Flu and COVID-19 report_w32 - second doses pdf.png
Screenshot 2021-08-14 at 21-33-49 Weekly Flu and COVID-19 report_w32 - second doses pdf.png (32.83 KiB) Viewed 2064 times
shpalman wrote:
Mon Aug 09, 2021 2:28 pm
I too flagged up how "children don't tend to suffer badly from covid ≠ children don't catch and spread covid".
Yes, I don't see how we can really squash transmission without extending vaccination down into at least secondary age kids. 16-17yrs olds is a start, but from this graph there's a lot of transmission in the younger secondary cohorts too.
Screenshot 2021-08-14 at 22-03-05 PHE Influenza Surveillance graphs 5 August 2021 - secondary cohorts[...].png
Screenshot 2021-08-14 at 22-03-05 PHE Influenza Surveillance graphs 5 August 2021 - secondary cohorts[...].png (125.28 KiB) Viewed 2064 times

temptar
Fuzzable
Posts: 282
Joined: Sun May 10, 2020 6:19 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by temptar » Sun Aug 15, 2021 5:32 pm

raven wrote:
Sat Aug 14, 2021 9:06 pm
Yes, I don't see how we can really squash transmission without extending vaccination down into at least secondary age kids. 16-17yrs olds is a start, but from this graph there's a lot of transmission in the younger secondary cohorts too.
Are you guys not vaccinating teenagers yet?

User avatar
lpm
Junior Mod
Posts: 5944
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 1:05 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by lpm » Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:42 pm

Only 16-18.

According to the experts the benefits to 12-16 year olds are extremely low and the extremely low risks could be higher. It's unethical of countries to vaccine children to benefit adults.
⭐ Awarded gold star 4 November 2021

OffTheRock
Fuzzable
Posts: 272
Joined: Mon Dec 02, 2019 6:52 pm

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by OffTheRock » Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm

And we're only giving them one dose if they are not CEV. We might give them a second dose, but haven't decided when yet. Maybe within 12 weeks of the first.

Not that the maybe part has been well communicated to the 16 year olds getting the jab who seem to be being told they aren't getting a second.

KAJ
Fuzzable
Posts: 310
Joined: Thu Nov 14, 2019 5:05 pm
Location: UK

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by KAJ » Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm

lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:42 pm
Only 16-18.

According to the experts the benefits to 12-16 year olds are extremely low and the extremely low risks could be higher. It's unethical of countries to vaccine children to benefit adults.
Rubella vaccination?

User avatar
jdc
Hilda Ogden
Posts: 1925
Joined: Wed Sep 25, 2019 4:31 pm
Location: Your Mum

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by jdc » Sun Aug 15, 2021 7:59 pm

KAJ wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm
lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:42 pm
Only 16-18.

According to the experts the benefits to 12-16 year olds are extremely low and the extremely low risks could be higher. It's unethical of countries to vaccine children to benefit adults.
Rubella vaccination?
Possibly. I'd assumed we gave children that vaccine primarily to protect pregnant women and their unborn children. [eta - this is mentioned in the green book chapter I linked to.]

Although the risks of rubella include "thrombocytopaenia (the rate may be as high as one in 3000 infections) and post-infectious encephalitis (one in 6000 cases)" while the risks of MMR vaccine include "febrile convulsion (risk 1 in 3,000 doses)" which is mainly from the measles part and "the risk of thrombocytopenia following MMR vaccination is 1 in 30 000 to 1 in 40 000 vaccinated children" which is undetermined but probably from either the measles or rubella component. If the risks from the vaccine are due to the measles component and/or lower than the risk from rubella infection then maybe the rubella vaccine would be worth giving to children to protect them even if the risks to pregnant women and the fetus weren't considered.


https://assets.publishing.service.gov.u ... 8-v2_0.pdf

https://www.who.int/vaccine_safety/init ... _sheet.pdf

User avatar
headshot
Dorkwood
Posts: 1414
Joined: Tue Nov 12, 2019 9:40 am

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by headshot » Sun Aug 15, 2021 8:20 pm

Ignore me…wrong post.

User avatar
bob sterman
Dorkwood
Posts: 1123
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 10:25 pm
Location: Location Location

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by bob sterman » Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:08 pm

KAJ wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm
lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:42 pm
Only 16-18.

According to the experts the benefits to 12-16 year olds are extremely low and the extremely low risks could be higher. It's unethical of countries to vaccine children to benefit adults.
Rubella vaccination?
HPV vaccination for adolescent boys. Main benefit is preventing cervical cancer.

User avatar
headshot
Dorkwood
Posts: 1414
Joined: Tue Nov 12, 2019 9:40 am

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by headshot » Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:17 pm

bob sterman wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:08 pm
KAJ wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm
lpm wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:42 pm
Only 16-18.

According to the experts the benefits to 12-16 year olds are extremely low and the extremely low risks could be higher. It's unethical of countries to vaccine children to benefit adults.
Rubella vaccination?
HPV vaccination for adolescent boys. Main benefit is preventing cervical cancer.
Hah! That’s what I posted…the thought “wait, that’s surely not helping adults”

Vaccinating them for when they become adults I guess!

User avatar
bob sterman
Dorkwood
Posts: 1123
Joined: Mon Nov 11, 2019 10:25 pm
Location: Location Location

Re: Summer Solstice Unlockdown

Post by bob sterman » Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:51 pm

headshot wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:17 pm
bob sterman wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 9:08 pm
KAJ wrote:
Sun Aug 15, 2021 6:59 pm

Rubella vaccination?
HPV vaccination for adolescent boys. Main benefit is preventing cervical cancer.
Hah! That’s what I posted…the thought “wait, that’s surely not helping adults”

Vaccinating them for when they become adults I guess!
Vaccinating the boys - to protect the the girls (when they all become adults).

Main thing is - the direct benefits to the boys are not as substantial (prevention of some HPV related cancers that are much less common than cervical cancer).

Post Reply