Covid-19

[FierceKitty]

Damnation - main school is closed for a fortnight. Not welcome for those on hourly wages.

[Orcs]

I work for a multi national telecoms company, they are being very slow about taking any action on Corvid 19.  

The reason is I believe is that many of our contracts have stringent Service Level agreements written into the contract . eg  One account with the NHS has a condition that ALL phone calls have to be answered within 15 seconds.  If we fail to meet this on a single call they get a pay back (as free service) of £3 million (no that's not a typo 3 Million).

Consequently The company are not going to take precautionary measures before the Government makes them compulsory.(not advised but compulsory).  If the Government makes us all work from home and they fail to meet a Service level agreement they can claim "Force Majourer" , which voids the need for compensation.

So Until the government makes it compulsory we will all work as normal.

[Orcs]

Damnation - main school is closed for a fortnight. Not welcome for those on hourly wages.

Step daughters school has just closed until after Easter. Due to not enough staff in. they have 60 pupils self isolating at the moment. 

[Matt J]

27,980 cases in Italy

4,907 of these cases now have an outcome - 44% mortality....

[Big Insect]

27,980 cases in Italy
4,907 of these cases now have an outcome - 44% mortality....

Yes, but there is a bigger picture here, in that those are 27,980 recorded/known cases - the problem with the statistics is that most countries have no real idea what the actual infection rate is as they are not able to mass test. So they are actually only measuring the 'presented' cases. And by default these are the more severe. So the outcome for these presented cases will be much higher than the population as a whole.

Also if you look at the profile of who's catching it, and then who's surviving and who's not, you come back to the same conclusion.
If you are reasonably fit and healthy and you catch it, you are (based on current probability) going to be unwell for 7 - 10 days and then make a full recovery.
If you have an underlying medical condition - almost regardless of your age - you will be more unwell and there is a % chance that you potentially might die. But not from the disease, but from its impact upon your already weakened system.
I think the critical thing here is that a very high % of the population in most countries is actually fit and healthy. So the prognosis for that high % of population is good.
We should be focused on those in our societies who are vulnerable - have weak immune systems, other health issues (especially respiratory ones) and those who cannot keep themselves fed or adequately warm.

There is no doubt this is a crisis - a huge medical and social emergency - but I hope that with some sensible planning and adjusted social behaviours we can all pull through this.
It isnt the 1st and wont be the last pandemic emergency in human history.

[Techno]

How many have died today, Matt ?  .......Stroll on !

When I looked this morning it was 27,980 cases and 'only' 2158 deaths. ...which is still higher than the "3%" we're being told......I make that something over 7.5%  NOT GOOD.

On 4,907 out of  27,980 ?.......That's not 44%, surely ? (17% and a bit, I reckon.)

Cheers - Phil

[Norm]

On the BBC news now;

'Meanwhile, the government's chief scientific adviser said it would be a "good outcome" if 20,000 or fewer people died of the virus in the UK'.

(refers to UK)

Is that best case scenario?

Yesterday, they (BBC) said without intervention, modelling shows 81% infected with 500, 000 deaths by August, but with mitigation it could reduce to 260,000 (refers to UK), but that would still overwhelm intensive care capacity.

How did we sleepwalk into this, there was a fair bit of notice coming out of China, even by January.

[Steve J]

My wife and I have been talking about this over a few weeks and the general reaction to it. Having lived in Nigeria where there are on average 54,000 deaths a year from malaria (mainly in children under 5), which would equate to roughly 27,000 in the UK. Then there are the deaths from typhoid, cholera, meningitis etc on top of that. Yet society carries on as normal as they are so used to it.

Now this is not to belittle what is going on, but as Mark has already highlighted, the deaths from flu each year are much higher than the current deaths from Covid-19. Yes it is wise to take precautions, but the panic buying that is going on is a massive over reaction IMHO.

Oh and the schools have started partial closures here due to staff shortages. My wife expects them to be closed by the end of the week.

[mollinary]

How many have died today, Matt ?  .......Stroll on !

When I looked this morning it was 27,980 cases and 'only' 2158 deaths. ...which is still higher than the "3%" we're being told......I make that something over 7.5%  NOT GOOD.

On 4,907 out of  27,980 ?.......That's not 44%, surely ? (17% and a bit, I reckon.) :-

Cheers - Phil

Hi Phil,

I think the latest number of deaths in Italy is 2,150.  I think the point that is being made is that of those cases that have been resolved, then 44% have died.

[Matt J]

Yes that correct this is just cases that have been resolved, unfortunately death has a way of resolving issues quite promptly.... .

Of the unresolved cases most are mild conditions with only about 2000 or so being serious or critical. If there were no more recorded cases in Italy and the outstanding cases were resolved then the mortality rate would be better about 16%, which is still bad enough!

[Ithoriel]

Yep, of the 27980 people treated, only 4907 have either recovered or died. That's 17.54% of those treated. Of that 4907, 2158 people have died. That's 43.98%.

Which suggests that if you are sick enough to need hospitalisation it's a coin toss if you survive or not.

What we don't know is if the 23000-odd people still being treated will largely survive, because the really sick have died already or if an increasingly overwhelmed health service will be able to save fewer patients than before. Or perhaps the roughly 45/55 is an accurate reflection of survival rates to be expected.

And NONE of this tells us about death rates in the general population.

So I suggest we be sensible, take care and look out for each other.

Stats don't give you answers, they just tell you where you have problems

[Techno]

Ah.....Right.....OK....Got it !

Thought that sounded a bit odd !  (The way I read it, anyway. )

Cheers - Phil

[FierceKitty]

Well, quoted stats can be interesting indicators of who's lying (I'm not pointing a finger at anyone here). "Don't stay away from church on Sunday! 98.76% of non-churchgoers in history have died, and most of the rest have an average of under 30 years to go globally. Repent - the facts say it's time to get onto your knees, sinners!" No, I'm not exaggerating. I recall an anti-drugs tract in my schooldays warning us that a monitored 95% of heroin addicts started on marijuana. It paid little attention to the fact that they also started on water, and that fewer than 1% of marijuana smokers moved from reefers to narcotics.

[Raider4]

Damnation - main school is closed for a fortnight. Not welcome for those on hourly wages.

No, bugger. And if you're a lowly worker in the cinema, pub, restaurant, sports or retail (except supermarkets) industries you're pretty much shafted economically at the moment.

My wife's an estate agent, and she's started to worry about all the people she's supposed to meet & greet when viewing houses, and also viewing some houses where elderly people live.

[Raider4]

Profiteering or what?

Nope, that's the way capitalism works. Lots of demand vs. low supply --> higher prices.

[Techno]

Everything just seems a tad surreal to me, a the moment......And NO, I haven't taken any mind altering drugs.

Cheers - Phil

[Raider4]

Yeah, what happened to all those "Keep Calm & Carry On" mugs/t-shirts/whatever from a few years back? Think we need a bit more of that.

[Techno]

I'll dig out the coffee mug, Von bought me for my birthday a few years ago.

"Keep Calm, You Grumpy Old Git."

Cheers - Phil 

[Big Insect]

Everything just seems a tad surreal to me, a the moment......And NO, I haven't taken any mind altering drugs.
Cheers - Phil

Let me know when you do Phil ... a) we might not notice the difference and b) I might want you to send me some to keep me insane during this period  

So, just to put the latest statement from the UK Chief Medical Officer into perspective, that c.20,000 people 'might' die from this outbreak of Covid-19 in the UK.

That is approximately 0.03% of the UK population. (c.66.7 million inhabitants) ... I rest my case m'lud. The panic buying is unnecessary.

Mark

[John Cook]

Perhaps the Corona virus will reconsider its tactics when confronted by the Bulldog Britain approach.