School Closure Covid insanity

So, the local school has sent home an entire class due to one positive case. There are 29 more children, which means if they are to quarantine for two weeks for every positive case they could potentially be off for 58 weeks and lose an entire school year. It’s pathetic. Why not rub them all together so they all test positive at the same time so they only have to be off for a fortnight…

Numerous studies have now been published in medical journals demonstrating that school closures across the world have had very little impact on viral spread.

The disproportionate response to a virus that impacts an easily identifiable group of people (average age of 84) at the expense of education, jobs, health and mental health continues.

You cite the extremely unlikely worst case scenario regarding quarantine, but then make no mention of the extremely unlikely worst case scenario for a child contracting covid. One is designed to stop the other.

Children contracting covid are unlikely to even show any symptoms. And the chances off a child dying from covid is so infinitesimally small tat we’d be better off equipping them with anti-lightning hats to protect them from the greater chance of being hit by it.

We need to find some stoicism, backbone and character.

6 children have died from covid in the UK all of whom had severe existing health conditions. SIX!

I actually thought it was for more than one case.

Whilst this scenario is unlikely (each week closed), I think there is a large possibility pupils might be off for considerable amounts of time, either due to entire class or school lockdowns, or individuals with symptoms. I’m currently studying something which has to be onsite and not remote, and has exams, and I was speaking to another parent on the course (a part-time primary teacher) and we both thought we would be very luck to attend most of the course. That’s not a criticism, just the likely reality with kids in school and testing where it is.

Well there did used to be the idea of chicken pox parties, but not sure if this was myth as I never actually heard of anyone actually doing one. Anyway, disregarding the possibility of potentially getting infected twice, increasing the infection rate is not something I expect will gather much support, assuming we don’t look at the heard immunity route again.

I do remember hearing some bits on this, but then I thought there was assumed to be an effect. Do you have any links, would be interested to read.

I do think there is a misconception that middle aged people and younger are not affected, as the deaths rates are lower here. There does have to be balance in terms of what we spend \ do vs other illnesses such as cancer, heart disease etc but it’s worth remembering that this can have life changing effects on people, much of which remains unknown and does not generally appear to in widely circulated figures (I am speaking anecdotally). So I think it’s right to question the approach - we should always do this, but keep in mind deaths are not the only thing we should look at.

The other point I would make, is that if we are lucky to get a vaccine next year, things may change rapidly .

Last bit we used the government funded but teacher led https://classroom.thenational.academy/ which was brilliant last year during lockdown if your school does not have the resources for online learning - it was also easier from a parent to child relationship as teachers are speaking to kids and telling them what do. You do need a spare laptop or PC though (or Ipad I assume works also) .

Good luck!

What a load of twaddle. I’ve seen this peddled by the national press but it’s just bad reasoning (ie ignores the fact that the prevalence of Covid is nowhere near as stable as the annual number of lightning strikes).

Maybe… it will be interesting to see what we do if the vaccine doesn’t come along.

Chickenpox parties are not a myth. When I was a young child growing up in the 1950’s (on Shipman Road) the parents of the first local kid to get chickenpox, measles, german measles or mumps invited all the other kids round so they could get it too as these diseases were known to be innocuous in young children but dangerous to adults; just like COVID 19.
Although I suppose people had a more relaxed attitude to personal risk back then and, of course, would never have dreamed of suing anybody.

These days you can just get the vaccine at Boots, though it’s not cheap at £140 but potentially worth it given children can also be sent home from nursery for a period if they have chickenpox.

Interesting - thanks.Strangely siblings quite often don’t seem to get it at the same time, and in our case both got very quite different numbers of spots as such.

I suppose with chicken pox you are less likely to get it as an adult compared to covid, so the risk is smaller, if you have had it as a child anyway, so it is viewed as a good idea to get it I thought. No idea on measles etc, which I think we all get vaccines for nowdays.

As above, I thought getting chicken pox as a child was a good thing as it provided some immunity in later life to stop you getting as an adult, which is more serious (in shingles adult chicken pox or am I making that up?)

edit NHS information somewhat more reliable than my ramblings.

Yes. The vaccine also provides that immunity.

I remember chickenpox parties too; in North London in the 1970s it was practically compulsory.

I remember having mumps, and all the neighbours kids were sent round. It was a pragmatic way of supplementing the available vaccines, saying a) this group has been socialising, so they probably already have it, and b) it saved on childcare to get siblings out of school at one go, preferably the neighbours kids too. Pooled childcare allowed mothers to take turns going to work while the other minded the kids.

Currently available vaccines have transformed the picture, and I’m baffled by people gambling with other people’s lives. Children’s illnesses can be extremely dangerous for the vulnerable, and risky for lots of adults.The long-forgotten consequences of these childhood diseases have reemerged now vaccine levels dropped. If your child gets German measles, they can infect pregnant women, which might make the baby being blind, and with other conditions. Mumps - every year, new arrivals at University come from vaccine-avoiding homes. If they catch it then it is quite serious, and I believe may lead to infertility. Being cautious about a perceived risk may sometimes land you up to the neck in another problem.

I can remember the hot summer of 1990 when I was a young lad of 28. Caught chicken pox off my baby daughter. Not an experience I would wish on any one. I vividly recall that the only relief was placing my head into a bucket of cold water for as long as I could stand it.

It’s also known as Rubella - it’s called German measles because it was identified in Germany not because it originated there. I actually wondered if it was some kind of propaganda like China Virus but it seems legit.

In the 1950’s when I was a kid the only available vaccines were for polio and tuberculosis and I think that was still true in the 1970’s. I believe the MMR vaccine wasn’t introduced until the late 1980’s; a memory based solely on Tony Blair repeatedly refusing to say whether or not his children had been vaccinated.

Whooping cough vaccine was introduced in the 50s in time for me to jave a jab. Didn’t we also have diptheria jab? I didn’t get my TB jab until I was early part of secondary school - 1965/66ish.

I remember TB - called BCG and was some giant needle and the whole thing would blow up into a huge scab. Then we had to play rugby every week and it would get worse and worse. I still have a physical and mental scar from it, but no TB.

I’d forgotten those. I guess I didn’t have a whooping cough jab as, according to my Mum, I got it at 3 months old so wouldn’t have needed one. TB jabs were always given at about 13/14 years old as it was most prevalent in young adults but I don’t recall having a diphtheria jab; perhaps I was preoccupied with an important football game or building a go cart or something that day.

Children have a low risk of COVID-19 and are disproportionately harmed by precautions:

This is a very good read and might reassure people and even change some minds :

And at least one of the polio doses was on a sugar cube.

We had a skin test at school prior to the BCG to see if we needed one or not. I was probably around 13. I didn’t need the jab then as I had been innoculated as a small child, when TB was rife in Sydenham. A lovely lady who lived in our house had died of TB and my dad was very protective and I can remember him taking me for an x-ray in those mobile screening trucks that used to come to the area.

Measles was a terrible thing. My mum’s baby brother died of that. I cant understand why some people are so complacent that they don’t have their babies immunised. It’s a killer disease.

There was a bad epidemic of Scarlet Fever in Sydenham in Victorian times that led to some of our first building regs. Mount Ash Road and Mount Villas being some of the first buildings designed to meet them… now undone by the addition of extensions undoing much of the good of the Metropolitan Board of Health.

We don’t yet know the long term effects of Covid. It would be foolhardy to take risks.

ugh I remember. I too still have a BCG scar. The school bullies would go round punching kids on the shoulder right where the big painful wound was. I can remember living in fear of that. The sicko’s

I work in a school, a fairly large one at that and it is crazy.
I can stand in a field with 1600 other people for a fire drill! I can sit in an office with 7 other people but I can’t go to the pub with them when I leave next week. We are supposed to stay 2m from kids at all times as well as 2m from each other but it just doesn’t work in practice.
I suspect that schools and colleges are driving the uptick in cases and that it is going to get much much worse… That is despite huge efforts by management, teachers and support staff to try and ensure distancing and sanitisation…
We have had several positive tests (we get 10 whole tests sent to us - woo!). Each class group sits in the same layout and teachers have to record that layout for contact tracing. Those pupils are sent home. I note that all the pupils we have sent home are by de facto actually ill because we dont have tests for anyone who wants one - we only test ill pupils. Natch there are parents keeping pupils home who are ill too but without positive tests - this is the time of year that our little incubators pass round all sorts of coughs and colds. One of the pupils is quite badly affected and therefore the parents are now also in isolation - actually isolated in a room in the house away from the pupils.
It is pretty obvious to everyone in the industry that most children will be exposed to the virus. It may not affect them all and those that is does may not get that ill (some will and some may be badly affected for a long time) but the key is what happens next. Those children are going home and probably mixing with other children from other schools so it is certain to spread but the key thing is if they will pass it on to adults. Obviously there are those of us at school who will probably be exposed to it but most of us are young and most of us are healthy - however our extended families may not be. It is what happens at home for parents and extended family members that might produce problems in the weeks to come.
It all depends on how much transmission there is between children and adults and that is far from certain.
All I can say is that I am very happy to be leaving education. Nothing to do with the fantastic place I currently work in but it is difficult to ignore the stresses caused by working alongside 400 staff and 1200 pupils when it isn’t deemed safe to go to the pub with 6 mates.
Of course many schools would welcome some extra staff at this time so I look forward to seeing people like OP here lining up (spaced apart obvs) to play their part in helping schools manage this

‘It seems the Government’s objective now is to keep us in some form of lockdown until the virus disappears from our shores completely – an absurdly quixotic ambition and a sign of the obvious mission creep that has occurred.’ Paul Emery in Unherd.

The commitment to killing the wasp by blowing up the house is destroying this country.

The number of friends losing their jobs, the suicides (no friends yet, thankfully), and the destruction of civil liberties, none of which occurred during the Hong Kong flu of 1968 that killed far more people than covid should be worrying everyone. Children are being traumatised by parents marinated in the MSM fear and for many their lost education and life chances will be irretrievable.

Coronavirus was only the 24th most common cause of death in England in August. Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) shows Covid-19 accounted for a mere 1.4 per cent of all deaths last month - just 482 out of 34,000. And yet:

The hospitality industry is on the brink of crisis with 1 million jobs imminently at risk. There are already 750,00 people whom have lost their jobs. The decision being avoided is how many jobs – and all that it entails – are worth losing to avoid one death? Should we all be out of work, with all lives saved? This is ultimately the question.

The lockdown has destroyed large numbers of businesses, especially small businesses, with attendant loss of livelihoods, loss of educational opportunities, strains on family relationships, huge levels in undetected heart disease and cancer, eating disorders, increasing alcoholism and domestic abuse and suicides, to name but a few. I’m told that I don’t care and I’m heartless of prioritising these things over people’s lives. ‘YOU DON’T CARE LIKE I DO’ I’m repeatedly told. Well, stress kills, so does loneliness and a diminished quality of life; there’s a bigger picture here.

Covid kills an easily identifiable group of people, whom can be protected if they so choose, or can be made to if they lack capacity. Shield them and allow the rest of us to exist with the miniscule level of risk.

For those that cry ‘what about the children?’ Children’s risk of needing hospital treatment for coronavirus is “tiny” and critical care “even tinier”. Public health England has also confirmed they are poor transmitters of the virus. The six children who have died of Covid had ‘profound’ underlying health conditions that were already complex and themselves life-limiting.

In age groups up to and including 60-69, fewer than 1 in 1,000 people have died from coronavirus.

Age 70-79, it’s 2 in every 1,000 people.

Age 80-89, it’s 7 in every 1,000 people.

Age 90 and over, it’s 18 people in every 1,000 people.

Males have a higher risk in every age group than females.

(Age concern. June 2020)

It would appear that people are prepared to live with far smaller level of risk than I realised, although with the mainstream media and the government pummelling the population with misleading levels of risk who can blame them for hysterical hypochondria. Fear is in the air. After all, should children permanently wear facemasks to prevent spread of meningitis? It is far more dangerous than Covid 19 and children transmit it, unlike Covid.

81% of people already have immunity from previous exposure to coronaviruses and will show no symptoms at all. So, we are already dealing with only 19% of the population who will show varying levels of symptoms. There is a 99.72% survival rate.

A very high percentage of those currently testing positive under current UK PCR test regime are neither symptomatic nor infectious nor ill in any other medically defined way. This is mass hysteria. Cases here are creeping up as in France and Spain whom we copied in Lockdown, yet increasing deaths are not in the same proportion. The Pillar 2 mass testing is producing mainly asymptotic or mild cases, they are neither symptomatic nor infectious nor ill in any medically defined way.

We had a very low impact flu season in 2019 which meant there was a large number of people alive who would have normally died earlier this year. And we are using a Covid-19 test that has a high % of false positives. Studies have shown that if you die within 28 days of a positive test, then you are counted as having died of Covid. Sweden and Japan who had no lockdown are finding their immunity.

We have a government of a political leaning that prides itself in libertarianism, yet is brandishing the hammer of a fascist state. We have an opposition who want even more draconian measures. They are manufacturing a fear which is irrational to the threat. I feel like a mad person in a sane world when the facts point to the opposite.

We’re sinking the ship to kill the galley rat.

I’m not sure how I feel about your argument yet (it’s a lot of information to process), but massive kudos for the articulate way you’ve argued your point, and the data you’ve shared.

Do we have a ‘comment of the year’ award? Even though I agree and disagree in and out of some of those arguments, I thought that was a great post - thanks. That’s a really well laid out case.

Presumably you are referring to this study??
That is the study that tested the blood of 185 people, who had not had Covid 19, to see if their was an invitro T-cell response to Sars 2 and 81% of people did have some response.
That does not imply complete immunity nor does it imply they wont have any symptoms.
Also to note that it is a tiny survey on a pre print server that is not peer reviewed
“They should not be considered conclusive, used to inform clinical practice, or referenced by the media as validated information.” - I don’t know if it has been reviewed since the date in article but you are making claims not supported by the research.

I do actually have more sympathy for the government than Tom, and I do recognise that COVID can have very nasty long-term side effects when its not fatal. I was actually in favour of the 1st lockdown (in fact it was one or 2 weeks too late).

However, the government (and the scientists) are making the big, arguably flawed assumption that any future 2nd, 3rd outbreak will have the same hospital and mortality rates as March/April. That is unlikely - for starters we won’t get care homes so badly wrong (I would hope). In others words they are now fighting the last battle, not the current one.

Its interesting looking at the Bolton severe local lockdown. It was a big and worrying increase in cases, no doubt about that. Pubs and restaurants were totally shut (aside from takeaways); with I believe no noticeable impact on the cases. But more importantly (and thankfully), hospital cases minimal, COVID deaths I think 1. In other words, high cases numbers, low hospitalisation (thank goodness).

Does SAGE I wonder model non-COVID deaths arising from lockdown / recession etc. Perhaps they should? The first lockdown was into the summer, lengthy days. Whilst what we have at the moment is not a full lockdown, the impacts of continued restrictions into the winter will have a bigger impact, especially re mental health, people not getting non-COVID treatment. Employers are worried about this and rightly so.

Where the strategy should be aiming for in my view is how to live reasonably normally with higher numbers of cases then we would want, but minimising severe cases). As far as I understand it, Sweden broadly follows this. Whereas we are trying to have minimal COVID Cases via suppressing personal interaction and the economy. Even if you can do this, it will be at huge economic and health cost elsewhere.

I think the NHS app can help with a more nuanced approach, as would of course effective track and trace, plentifully supplied.

Finally, governments can try to suppress behaviour with curfews and the like etc, but…look at the experience of the US Prohibition…its not a happy one, it won’t work long-term, behaviour will go underground.

I wonder if some of the measures are being so cautious because normal seasonal flu can stretch healthcare, so that + Covid could make for a particularly unpleasant and dangerous winter?

That said, I do feel children are being disproportionately penalised by many of these measures. It’s not just school closures that are a problem, but all sorts of clubs, sports, swimming pools and other activities are also lost.

Heck, councils even seem to have removed some of the swings from parks - presumably because they aren’t 2m apart.

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Those swings … yes it probably has the added bonus of the council not having to fork out to maintain them

It’s quite depressing seeing these pictures.

it is indeed.

This must mean me. Although I am in good health and do not think of myself as vulnerable, I’m in my late seventies and therefore at a higher risk of becoming seriously ill or dying if I contract the virus. Under TomAngel’s scheme I could ‘be protected if I so chose.’ That would presumably mean that unless I was prepared to expose myself to a significantly greater degree of risk than I do under the present provisions, I couldn’t, for example, travel on public transport, go to church or to a pub, restaurant or busy supermarket, have dinner with friends, or visit my daughters or grandchildren. Is that a price we oldies have to be prepared to pay?

None of us are happy with the way the virus works, and who it targets.

Tom’s suggestion, I think, is that restrictions on younger people are lifted, and elderly people are given agency over their own restrictions (but obviously it makes sense for you to shield)

The problem for the elderly is that their pension payments rely on the tax revenue generated by younger working people.

We’re in the perilous position of losing a lot of that tax revenue, so under such extreme circumstances, both elderly and young people are going to have to make some lifestyle changes until the vaccine is available.

Luckily, Robin, your generation is the strongest and most resilient this country has ever seen, so I suspect you’ll be able to handle it.

Well I’m probably stuck in the middle here at 50. Is this a price you want to pay? I think the point being made is for the sake of society and the economy let the young people aka my kids who are at university or working in their first jobs go out and keep things moving. I think that’s feasible, in return it should be possible to allocate ‘safe’ opening times for pubs, restaurants, churches or whatever. I wouldn’t mind if say supermarkets were allocated Fridays for ‘at risk groups’ only. There are ways to make it work and I can see how 6 months of an 18 year old’s life is significantly more impactful then 6 months out of 75 years. This is about society not individuals.

It’s quite a tough debate as there are arguments to be made on both sides, I think we’re going to fumble along until we get a vaccine as there will be no consensus.

I’m not even sure which side of the fence I’m actually on. My father is 82 and I have 3 kids, so how do you figure that out.

I don’t think it’s a price you should be made to pay and I sympathise with your situation. My parents are also in their 70s, both healthy but of course would be considered vulnerable. They live in France and we can’t travel to see them, neither they to see us. I think 6 months of a grandparents life away from their young and rapidly growing grandchildren must feel very long.

I completely agree. When you’re older and you know your days of being able to do the things you’ve perhaps waited and worked your whole life to do are limited, only for the shutters to come down like this, it can be very depressing. No one wants segregation, but if it’s the only way for older and/or more vulnerable people to get out and about, then setting aside a couple of days a week for these groups surely has to be the right thing.

My heart breaks for grandparents, for whom of course this is no real solution.

Equally you could argue should losing jobs. education and suffering poor mental health be a price young people have to pay?

We are in a horrific situation where the measures to protect one section of society are destroying the livelihoods, opportunities and mental health of another.

I am lucky I have a well established career, friends and relationship and a decent housing situation. If this had happened to the 21 year old me - single, living in a houseshare in London with few friends outside work I would have found it really really tough.

We have to land on a sustainable way to protect both groups as much as we can, which may involve different restrictions according to risk.

It is ironic that the more effective the social distancing measures the more people argue that they aren’t needed at all. I personally feel that if the virus was allowed to run rampant, without our continued, collective, concerted efforts to reduce transmission, the figures cited would paint a very different picture.

Hm. Too young for national service, too old for tuition fees, student loans and the gig economy? Free orange juice, school milk, secure jobs, affordable housing, inflation-proof pensions paid for, as you point out, by you lot? I think my generation has had less need to be ‘strong and resilient’ than our parents’ or our children’s.

So perhaps what you really mean is ‘I suspect you’re rich enough to be able to handle it’?

Actually that’s the opposite of my point regarding pensions and freeing up the economy to pay for them.

Great grandfather classed as too old to claim state pension when it was introduced. Grandfather died within a year of retirement, having been worn out by hard manual lump labour since he lost his craftsman’s skilled job due to disability caused by WW1 gun shot wound (a few shillings injured serviceman’s pension for six months only). My pension pushed back by six years with no notice (yes, I had checked with DWP). 50 years of NI payments and I’m told I won’t get a full state pension should I make it to 66 (I was going to say “should I manage to crawl” to the 66 finishing post … but not with these knees ).

No “Uni” for me or any of my year at school. Come to think of it, I didn’t know anyone who went through higher education until I started being leapfrogged at work by public school types on graduate training schemes.

I don’t really have a point, other we all have different back stories. Everybody’s different. Some are better off than me, some are a hell of a lot worse off. But some of us oldies would like to get out and about just as much as the young would. But we can’t. We haven’t got decades ahead of us anyway. These years are our last chance - and in many cases our first chance. It doesn’t mean shutting down the economy, just setting aside a couple of days and evenings a week when we could do our shopping and socialising would be very welcome. Not that it will happen.

I agree but how would you know your fellow oldies had been equally careful given most infections seem to be happening through generations mixing inside houses?

Good point @HannahM

I don’t understand the fixation with older people when statistics show that around 92% of deaths at all ages have at least one underlying health condition. Sure, older people are more likely to have underlying health conditions so will of course form the greater proportion of deaths but that is no reason to punish all of us oldies. As has been said before everyone is different and it is time the government brought some nuance into the measures they impose. One size does not fit all.
And Chris B, please don’t call us elderly; we may be older people but we’re not all ancient or decrepid.

Apologies. Wasn’t implying you were. “Elderly” as a term only relates to age. Not ability

Quite. I’d like to reclaim the term ‘elderly.’ ‘Elderly Pride’! ‘Elderly is Beautiful’! And what’s wrong with being ‘ancient and decrepit’? It means people give you a seat on the train.

I appreciate that Chris but in my experience as a trustee of Age UK Lewisham & Southwark for many years I can tell you that older people, me included, don’t like being called elderly.

Noted, thank you

Yes I too got Chicken Pox as an adult aged 23-I felt utterly rotten for about 3 weeks and was caked in Calomine lotion to calm the itchy scabs.
grim

Is it just the higher likelihood of having ‘underlying health conditions’ that makes older people more at risk? Or is it also that we’re just gradually wearing out?

You could well be right Robin; these damn restrictions are certainly wearing me out.

It’s not just an academic question. Does my age make me ‘vulnerable’, even though, so far as I know, I’ve got no relevant ‘underlying condition’? If so, shall I need to ‘shield’ myself if TomAngel’s ‘just protect the vulnerable’’ scenario becomes reality? I hope not.

Age is a risk factor, even after taking known underlying conditions into account. In the world you mention I think you get to make your own assessment of the risk and decide what you do.

Shielding oneself sounds fine and dandy but it’s bloody annoying to do so only to see so many others partying like it’s the last days of Sodom and Gomorrah!

People in care homes and the disabled were all too often out of sight, out of mind during the last peak. If we rely on the official daily figures we can have no real idea of how many are dying, because the goalposts for counting deaths keep moving.

What really worries me is @TomAngel’s remark that: “Covid kills an easily identifiable group of people, whom can be protected if they so choose, or can be made to if they lack capacity.” Or can be made to?

I read this as “made to if they lack capacity” [to chose]. Care in the community but with padlocks?

No doubt @TomAngel was thinking about for example people with dementia or severe learning disabilities, who need to be positively supported in order to protect themselves. ‘Made to’ sounds rather dismissive and unkind, as does @Beige’s reference to padlocks.

Some interesting stats to show the disproportionate response to Covid. And just a little heads up: pro lockdown people do not have the monopoly on concern for others. Maybe they just need to grow up and accept that risk is part of life.

So, what are the chances of dying from covid19?

The CDC’s new estimate, for the first time, is broken down by age groups. Here is what the CDC calls its “current best estimate” of chances of dying from the virus if you get infected:

1 out of 34,000 for ages 0 to 19

1 out of 5,000 for ages 20 to 49

1 out of 200 for ages 50 to 69

1 out of 20 for ages 70 and up.

Here’s another way to look at the same numbers. If you get infected, your chances of surviving are as follows:

Age Group Probability of Survival

0-19:
99.997%

20-49: 99.98%

50-69: 99.5%

70+: 94.6%

This post was flagged and is temporarily hidden.

There was an interesting programme on R4 today about “Long Covid” where people who have had COVID ( not necessarily hospitalised) suffer many months of impaired health. This has to be factored in that COVID is very nasty.

But what I would like to see from the Government is acknowledgement that lockdown/quasi lockdown is also a lamentable calamity - because it is. People will die from not getting non-medical care, suicide, economic depression, domestic violence. Seriously there is a butchers bill from not doing lockdown, but also from doing lockdown. Both should be modelled?

I hope that the government and advisors is modelling that. Lockdown is a little bit like cutting off an arm. Sometimes it is the right thing to do (gas-gangrene), but it is still lamentable

You need consistency of message (Sweden), not chopping and changing measures, where there is little evidence of benefit.

You took that literally?!

Thanks for the ad-hominem. It helps your argument.

For what it’s worth you’re not mad — being concerned about the impact of another lockdown, and continued emergency measures is completely reasonable. But the rest of the world is not as mad as you think either.

As well as avoiding deaths from Covid-19, a large part of the justification for retightening restrictions is to prevent the NHS from being overloaded. As laid out in the scientific briefing last Monday, further measures are being introduced to avoid a plausible worst-case scenario of tens of thousands of new cases per day by mid-October. If there is an associated large rise in hospitalisations, then the government not only has to worry about an increased Covid death-rate, but also knock-on effects to other patients who need to be treated in hospital.

Obviously the projections can be debated, and the impacts of further restrictions (in terms of economics and public health) have to be considered too, but this explains why the government feel that a tightening of restrictions is necessary. Perhaps they are being over simplistic, but it is hardly surprising that the government chooses to avoid the very alarming impact that is being forecast by their scientific advisers, even if it risks a serious but uncertain impact down the line.

Where did you get your numbers for the 1968 flu. I am certainly not an expert but the estimates for deaths for that whole pandemic seem to be along the lines of 1 million worldwide (which of course Covid-19 has just passed) and 30,000 in the UK (which we have already exceeded). I don’t think it can be argued that the 1968 flu was more deadly than Covid-19.

It’s important to remember also that the impact of the 1968 flu was not mitigated by lockdowns, social distancing or enforced isolation. The death toll from Covid-19 in August was low, but part of the reason it was so low is because cases were low, in part thanks to the measures that have been taken.

The big problem we are facing now is that a further nationwide lockdown is bound to be disastrous for all the reasons you state. Yet we are unable to adequately protect the more vulnerable people in our society, or effectively flatten the curve without such harmful blanket restrictions. This is because of the well-publicised failures of the Track and Trace system and the lack of sufficient numbers of tests. If we cannot test across the whole country, and we cannot rely on individuals to self-isolate when told to, we cannot continue to open up society without allowing the virus to develop in an uncontrolled way.

I hope the new contact tracing app is effective, but the number one priority for the government is ensuring we have a competent testing regime. We can’t go back to normal without being able to control the spread of the virus.

There are some really valid and thought provoking points made by several contributors to this thread and I look forward to reading more in the coming days. However, what I hope most of all is that we continue to be respectful to each other. Play the ball not the man.

Good post @neilw.

Just to address this one point:

We hear a lot from the mainstream media about the UK’s supposed failings, and rarely our successes. But our testing has been streets ahead of the rest of Europe for a while now:

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And we can all agree to disagree. There are no winners in this covid nightmare

As at 16 September, the number of Covid-related deaths in England involving individuals under 60 and who had no existing medical condition was 309. And, for many of these, Covid may not have been the thing that actually killed them.

This is from https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-daily-deaths/

and before all the virtue signallers get foamed up, this shows the insanity of what is going on. At a colossal and often unrecoupable cost we have protected everyone when we could have prioritised the few most at risk.

@TomAngel - is it this graph you are referring to under that link?

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Thank you for sharing the info, learning lots!
A question on the over 60s- do you know the % who already have underlying conditions vs not? I imagine it’s not so easy to get that info, but reason I ask is because I don’t consider 60 to be old in the slightest. So I wonder whether those falling in that age group with no underlying conditions would generally fare in a less strict set of rules - many of which are full time working, commuting, etc…

Does anyone know how ‘existing condition’ is defined as in the covid data?

Is it the same as this?:

or something more specific?

I’m not totally sure of the consistency of the definition, but we could start with this:

Any longstanding condition

source
[https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/health-survey-for-england/2018/health-survey-for-england-2018-data-tables]

• [Health Survey for England, 2018: Longstanding conditions data tables]

Wow, quite sobering numbers there!

Definitely worth a watch:

This seems to be by one Ivor Cummins. I can’t find much about him via Google (no Wikipedia entry) but it appears he is an Irish chemical engineer. Is he qualified to advise us on epidemiology and Covid-19 policy?

This is also certainly worth a read -

‘Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health. The results (to name a few) include lower childhood vaccination rates, worsening cardiovascular disease outcomes, fewer cancer screenings and deteriorating mental health – leading to greater excess mortality in years to come, with the working class and younger members of society carrying the heaviest burden. Keeping students out of school is a grave injustice.’

Teenage girls (well they dud when my daughter was at school in the 80s) had a test to see if she had immunity to rubella, brcause of pregnancy. I’m not aware she has had rubella (it is a very mild disease, my mum told me) but she did have immunity.

Interesting article that, and certainly authored by some smart folks:

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This article suggests:

The UK government ‘Delay Phase’ states it will:
aim to minimise the social and economic impact, subject to keeping people safe

There is a subtle difference in wording but I doubt that accounts for the differences in suggested (policy). It’s really about whether ‘Focused Protection’ would work.

I think most western governments have concluded that herd immunity, even ‘Focused Protection’, cannot be achieved without an excessive amount of risk that the health service would ‘collapse’. There might be some element of career risk aversion (“nobody ever gets fired for doing the same thing as everyone else”) involved too.

I think you are right about the health system. Even without extra Covid loading, there is now a back log of treatment, operations and appointments for the NHS to deal with, as well as the threat of seasonal illnesseses looming. The ‘cracks’ are already evident:

The other problem with allowing those not at risk to live normally, while maintaining lockdown for the vulnerable, is that it feels very unjust in a society that trys to treat everyone equally.

We used to get blood tests at The Jenner health centre but now we have to go to a phlebotomy clinic. Just tried the 080 333 3217 number to book a test, my call is important to them but I was 59th in the queue!

There’s a pretty interesting shakedown of this whole thing over at Wired.

Excellent article, thanks for sharing.

A while ago I tried to calculate the cost of lockdown to compare it to the current QALY cost of the forecasts of death numbers (what the NICE/NHS/ the state is willing prepared to pay for a citizens year of life) and couldn’t get close to what lockdown was going to cost. I put the decision making down to:

• The precautionary principle - We knew very little about covid - worst case scenarios would be devastating.

• Moral imperative - Morally, how could we do significantly less to protect our citizens than others in the developed world ?

• Legacy risk - The idea of being the PM who oversaw 250K premature deaths is probably not what our current one had in mind.

Seems like a lot of the experts are fake too.

This has little to do with the experts or their opinions set out in their treatsie on Covid-19 response.

This is reporting that the unaudited petiton attached to the article has some fake entries (Dr. I.P. Freely, Dr. Person Fakename, Dr. Johnny Bananas, Dominic Cummings!!).

Nothing unexpected here. See Boaty McBoatface, who may have signed the petition too.

Sadly it looks like some media outlets are trying to delegitimise the ideas of these eminent scientists by smearing them by association, rather than taking up the debate. UnHerd are on to it too:

Even the WHO do not advocate Lockdown :

We have blood on our hands. And it’s not by catching Covid.

the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER), a libertarian free-market think-tank in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, hosted a private gathering of scientists, economists and journalists

The whole thing was sponsored by Koch in the U.S so I’m remaining somewhat skeptical.

It’s fine to be sceptical, but it’s a shame to continue to cite articles that predominantly seek to belittle the scientists’ ideas by association, rather than taking up the scientific debate or provide data and counter-argument or even a better hypothesis.

From the above article, Koch ‘sponsored’ the American Institute for Economic Research (who hosted the meetup in Great Barrington where this treatsie was authorised) to the tune of $68,100 in 2018. Hardly a lot of money in this day and age, and almost insignificant when AIER have their own private investment funds totalling $284,492,000.

I think the Wired article I posted pretty much covered the scientific debate angle didn’t it?

I think the scientists make some interesting points, but felt the Wired article was fairly compelling. And the point that author cites from Tim Harford with respect to how lobbying organisations promoted the idea of a lack of scientific consensus to counter curbs on smoking and action being taken on climate change is well made.

It’s all very well for David Nabarro from the WHO to say lockdowns are not necessary but he doesn’t (in the clips I’ve seen on Andrew Neil’s feed) explain what’s he thinks is the alternative. And he was saying a month ago that they are necessary when you have an emergency.

I’m hopeful that the enhanced therapeutics since March will prevent things spiralling out of control, but I am definitely also alarmed, and arguably it is an emergency that there are as many people hospitalised in the UK today as there were at the start of lockdown in March, because we know what happened over the next few weeks back then.

I think we must be reading different Internets @clausy!

The Wired article seems to try and discredit the epidemiologists for daring to publish their opinion - a hypothesis - without having already completed research and published data to back it up (if we had the data, things would be much easier, but it takes time to get a full picture and decisions are needed now).

The Wired article also seems to take on a topic of scientific divide (the Barrington Declaration makes no mention of divided scientific opinion itself) and makes a leap to compare this division with methods of big tobacco and climate change deniers. This seems like more smearing by association.

Notably with the exception of a link to a German language article from Max Planck, the Wired article presents no data, opposing research or interviews itself.

Wired, and others, also suggest the Great Barrington Declaration is rallying against a lock-down that doesn’t exist i.e. that it is somewhat irrelevant. Yet today Scotland is facing increased restrictions and England may follow suit. The original epidemiologists treatsie also explicitly mentions a number of activities which are currently restricted:

Personally I found the declaration interesting and relevant, but see it as the opinion of some very well informed experts, not scientific fact. The crux of their opinion, to me, seems to be that all pandemics end when herd immunity is reached in the population, so how we achieve that is really what’s at stake. Handwashing and social distancing reduce the infection rate lowering the bar for herd immunity, an effective vaccine would greatly help achieve herd immunity too. Beyond that protecting vulnerable groups while allowing others to mix and gain natural exposure and immunity sounds very sensible.

But as @jonfrewin noted above, hospitalisations are getting to an alarming level so the need to flatten the curve and protect healthcare must be a priority to avoid some very bad outcomes.

I suppose it depends who at WHO you want to listen to…

https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/coronavirus-who-chief-scientist-warns-against-herd-immunity-134439662.html

Obviously different media outlets have different agendas.

It seems to me that the key question for the Great Barringtonians is how they propose that vulnerable people (including presumably everyone over 60) should be effectively ‘shielded’ (or advised to shield themselves) without making them prisoners in their own homes and cutting them off from virtually all human contact.

Exactly, it just doesnt work in practice. An example would be a grandparent who is a sole carer for a school-age child who would in going to school, attend a large gathering with other young people on a daily basis. Would that child have to go into social care if the grandparent gets put into protection?

Also, my in-laws are over 60 but still have 3 of their adult kids living at home. Technically they would fall into the category of “vunerable” as they are over 60 so would have to live somewhere else in order to have their “focused protection” away from other people living in the house?

Here we go again .

2 (probably false) positives In a local primary school and the classes have been sent home. Children thrown under the bus once again.

When children don’t die from covid or transmit it and all the age groups at risk of dying from it have been vaccinated! This is hysterical. These people are now on the wrong side of history. I stand with the children

MODERATOR EDIT - Paragraph removed.

I was thinking that lockdown and covid has been an enlightening study in group behaviour and exposed people for who they really are, and what they REALLY believe in. And a supportive society, with all of its millions / billions of tiny daily communal benefits to mankind is something they clearly don’t actually believe in. That it’s optional. MOD EDIT - Sentence removed.

If it’s the same class I’m aware of today, I believe the first positive was a (reliable) PCR test, and the second was a lateral flow.

I do agree that the whole primary school class unconditionally self-isolating for 10 days is a high price, and probably disproportionate when we consider the success of the vaccination program and availability of testing.

Also, I happen to know that the teacher of the class I’m aware of has previously been vaccinated.

Yes, lock down is costly.

There is give and take all round. It’s not ideal for anyone.

As a ‘supportive society’, the balance surely has to be the interest and safety of all.

‘These people’ that you refer to are striking that balance. No easy task.

Don’t be outraged by that effort. Don’t be hysterical. Be more balanced.

Much love. Nylon xxx

It certainly is a high price for all kids, parents and teachers. I wonder if having to extend lockdown possibly through to summer (and causing many more deaths, it’s so easy to get used to) would be seen as a much higher price though.

For the moment I’m glad they’re keeping some safeguards in place.

If there is a new strain which is resistant to the vaccine, I suspect a new lockdown will be highly likely regardless of whether local schools and businesses are open or not.

Of course having more of the virus in circulation increases the odds of a mutation, though I’d personally be more concerned to help countries where vaccination and healthcare are not as advanced as here. Still, this underlines the need for us all to keep doing our bit to help i.e. get vaccinated, socially distance and follow lockdown guidance.

Overall I would probably complain less about the school closures if it were clear they would somehow open over summer to make up lost time in teaching, though that still doesn’t recover the stresses placed on families who have to try home-schooling on top of existing commitments. Of course we may still be surprised by plans for summer education, so let’s hope a good balance is found.

The autumn term experiment of school, university, and pub openings showed that opening up too quickly, without vaccines administered, kills people - not necessarily those in schools and universities or even in the pub, but they transmit the virus and pass it on to less protected members of society.

There remain parts of London with less than 70% of over 60s vaccinated and even if Covid isn’t going to kill people, it can have serious health implications for adults and possibly for children, so it is worth avoiding catching it if you can.

Within a school it could quickly spread to other classes and their families. For this reason it is worth closing a single class or two, rather than a whole school. And after weeks of nationwide school closure and home-schooling, a couple of extra weeks where there is a risk is not really the equivalent of throwing children under buses. Making them attend classes with infections running rampant is much more equivalent to throwing children (and their families) under buses. If this were the attitude of schools then I suspect many parents would not be happy to send their children to school (that was my decision one year ago when the government was still not taking it seriously), but I’m much happier for schools to make those difficult decisions rather than parents.

I’m afraid I’m still a little impatient for the vaccine to be approved for use on children so that we can completely vaccinate everybody (similar to the way we vaccinate all old and young people against flu, despite very low mortality from flu in children - but they are very good vectors).

The situation in September was very different to now. We are far along in vaccination with half of all adults in the UK having recieved their first dose, home testing is widely available, and in Lewisham the infection level is among lowest of all London boroughs. As we look towards more general reopening of some shops and business in about 3 weeks time, I feel it should be possible to have a more nuanced reaction to a few positive cases in school classes.

Also in areas where the vaccination rate is lower, I think it is a problem of uptake rather than availability or capacity. It’s probably a debate for elsewhere as to what sacrifices society should make to try and protect those that refuse to be vaccinated (noting that some people can’t be vaccinated, making it all the more important for those that can be vaccinated to do so).

I also don’t buy the argument that this is ‘just another few weeks’. Children have lost a so much already, and it shouldn’t be so easily dismissed as just a bit more.

No one is suggesting that, but perhaps we can minimise lost time in class through rigorous testing rather than the current default position of sending entire classes to self-isolation for 10 days at a time even if repeated lat-flow and PCR tests are negative.

I’m with you there. That will be a fantastic milestone.

This is the sort of common sense approach I think makes sense, rather than the current reaction to send whole bubbles (which include their teachers) into self-isolation without question:

Right now children are being told to self-isolate and stay indoors for 10 days due to positive tests in their class or teaching groups even if:

• The child tests daily with lateral flow tests and they are all negative.
• The child tests negative with a PCR test.
• The child previously had a confirmed case of Covid, but recovered.

Certainly at one local primary the bubble sizes are in excess of 30 pupils, so individual cases of Covid have a big impact which would be significantly lessened from the above scheme - for those parents that are happy with that approach.