Coronavirus

[johnb]

Dave,

I would guess that the disparity in daily death figures is because the figures that are included for non-hospital deaths in England (from PHE) include an adjustment for over counting or double counting in the previous days.

I guess today's true daily figure for "Deaths in all settings" is over 400. An additional 81 to bring the figure they used of 246 for England up to NHS England Hospital Deaths 327, plus what ever the figure is for non-hospital deaths.

By they way, looking at the pdf downloads of the slides they used in the presentations - the horizontal grid lines are always present but the person compiling the graphs has made them very faint so they are impossible (or very difficult) to see on a TV screen, heaven knows why.

Oh, and by the way - we now lead Europe though perhaps not in the way BJ envisaged: as per yesterday we have more deaths in the UK than in any other European country. (Yes I know the deaths/million is a fairer way of comparing countries.)

[Dave2002]

I would guess that the disparity in daily death figures is because the figures that are included for non-hospital deaths in England (from PHE) include an adjustment for over counting or double counting in the previous days.

If that was the case it would be easy to fix with a footnote - to the effect that there was a correction. I don't think many people would object.

By they way, looking at the pdf downloads of the slides they used in the presentations - the horizontal grid lines are always present but the person compiling the graphs has made them very faint so they are impossible (or very difficult) to see on a TV screen, heaven knows why.

Oh, and by the way - we now lead Europe though perhaps not in the way BJ envisaged: as per yesterday we have more deaths in the UK than in any other European country. (Yes I know the deaths/million is a fairer way of comparing countries.)

As I've written previously "what's done is done" - but what's the point of trying to misrepresent the calamitous nature of the situation? Except perhaps that would require an unexpected degree of honesty.

I do believe that many people, including some in government, are genuinely trying really hard to keep things under some sort of control, and not let things get worse. The problems looked to be verging on the insperable some while back, and they still look to be difficult. It was always going to be difficult to manage this.

Things could still go in many different ways. We seem to be on target for maybe 50,000 deaths over the whole period - though some of those can perhaps be reascribed to other causes. That corresponds to a complete wipe out of everyone in just one of the following representative small towns - Torquay, Horsham, Kircaldy, Kings Lynn. Winchester.

I really do hope my predictions turn out to be very wrong, and an over estimate, but the evidence that we have so far does seem to indicate such an outcome.

[Globaltruth]

Forgive me for being tediously pedantic but this is taken from today's daily release on the government website https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavi...mber-of-cases:

 	Tests 	   People tested 	Positive    Deaths in hospitals    Deaths in all settings
Daily 	   76,496 	 56,397 	  4,339 	   [B][COLOR="#FF0000"]396[/COLOR][/B] 			   [B][COLOR="#FF0000"]315[/COLOR][/B]
Total 	1,206,405 	882,343 	186,599 	24,097 			28,446

The deaths in hospitals (only) for NHS England alone is 327.

I don't expect much of this government but .....

to object to this is not mere pedantry.

[LHC]

Oh, and by the way - we now lead Europe though perhaps not in the way BJ envisaged: as per yesterday we have more deaths in the UK than in any other European country. (Yes I know the deaths/million is a fairer way of comparing countries.)

The Head of the ONS was interviewed yesterday, and noted that these international comparisons are 'unbelievably difficult' because each country compiles their statistics in different ways, and have different criteria and timescales for including deaths in their stats.

For example, the ONS figures for England and Wales now include Covid19 deaths in hospital, in care homes and in the wider community. France's stats (I understand), include deaths in hospitals and care homes, but not elsewhere as these are too difficult to compile. Germany's figures includes deaths in care homes, but only if people have tested positive for the virus. Belgium's figures includes any death in which a doctor suspects coronavirus was involved, not just those where the deceased had been tested for CV19 (which may be one reason why Belgium has the highest per capita figures in Europe).

I believe that Spain's and Italy's figures only include deaths in hospitals, and I have seen suggestions that care home deaths in Spain could double their overall figures (this follows earlier news reports of the police in Spain finding care homes that had been abandoned leaving all the residents to die in their beds). An analysis of excess deaths in Italy also showed a much higher figure than was being reported for CV19 deaths.

All of which confirms that international comparisons, especially at this stage, should be treated with a high degree of caution.

[teamsaint]

And it isn't as if other governments aren't also spinning and covering up.

[Jazzrook]

Boris Johnson voted against a pay rise for nurses in 2017:

https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/all-of-the-tory-mps-who-voted-against-a-pay-rise-for-nurses-in-2017-1-6606825

JR

[MrGongGong]

And it isn't as if other governments aren't also spinning and covering up.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/whataboutery

Doesn't make it a good thing though.

Boris Johnson voted against a pay rise for nurses in 2017:

https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/all-of-the-tory-mps-who-voted-against-a-pay-rise-for-nurses-in-2017-1-6606825

JR

Time we got rid

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavirus/coronavirus-government-advisers-lying-to-support-regime-with-collapsing-credibility-says-lancet-editor/ar-BB12UmAC?ocid=sf&fbclid=IwAR3xKrEQ1mevg_DNf-Q0Bfli5DDAPclCxLJv2xkQRLY3X2saNrBm9mTB5pM

[Cockney Sparrow]

The Head of the ONS was interviewed yesterday, and noted that these international comparisons are 'unbelievably difficult' because ............
................An analysis of excess deaths in Italy also showed a much higher figure than was being reported for CV19 deaths.

I haven't noticed this is a particular feature of the analysis quoted here*, but Professor Spiegelhalter (probably Newsnight, BBC2 last week) suggested that excess deaths is, in his view, an informative statistic to use, no doubt amongst others.

(*Apologies if I've missed it in these posts)

[Dave2002]

This video with Michael Levitt is interesting - though consider it with caution.

https://youtu.be/bl-sZdfLcEk

His view is that coronavirus-19 appears to self extinguish, or at least its rate of infecting others reduces, so that there is not exponential growth. He bases that view on some numbers from different countries, though he does not explain a mechanism.
He is critical of lockdown policies, though he doesn’t advocate not having any at all. He does specifically mention not letting health care facilities becoming swamped, which has unfortunately happened in some regions of the world.

He suggests that left to run “naturally” excess deaths would be significant for about a month.

Some of his views might be considered a bit harsh. Yes, it does appear that there are proportionately more older people, succumbing to the disease, and many have other problems besides CV-19. On the other hand, does that really mean that they should be allowed to die? Dig a bit deeper, and it becomes possible to discount any form of medical intervention at any stage in a person’s life. We do make interventions throughout our lives, and hopefully they do allow people to live longer and better lives. Sometimes people are very ill, but then recover, and go on to live many more years of enjoyable (to them) lives, and may also be productive in other ways which our societies value.

There are people who would have died shortly after birth if there hadn’t been medical interventions, and some have been valuable members of society and are now very much older. So a hands-off approach, or trying to justify such a hands-off policy, doesn’t really work IMO.

As others have said, maybe eventually it will be possible to evaluate this whole event and come up with clearer views of what is happening/has happened, but right now most countries are trying to figure out the best way through it, and the data is imperfect.

[oddoneout]

Moving away from stats for a minute. To the best of my ability I've avoided reading/hearing about the PM's 'fight for his life', but did find this comment, in connection with one part of his narrative, BTL of another article

The vote was 50-50 about whether to let him have a ventilator apparently

[MrGongGong]

Moving away from stats for a minute. To the best of my ability I've avoided reading/hearing about the PM's 'fight for his life', but did find this comment, in connection with one part of his narrative, BTL of another article

Pants on fire again methinks

[LHC]

I haven't noticed this is a particular feature of the analysis quoted here*, but Professor Spiegelhalter (probably Newsnight, BBC2 last week) suggested that excess deaths is, in his view, an informative statistic to use, no doubt amongst others.

(*Apologies if I've missed it in these posts)

I think you may be referring to this article in the Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/30/coronavirus-deaths-how-does-britain-compare-with-other-countries

Many feel that excess deaths give a truer picture of the impact of an epidemic. The latest ONS figures reveal that in the week ending 17 April, the week after Easter, around 22,500 deaths were registered in England and Wales, compared with an average of around 10,500 a week at this time of year. Nearly 9,000 of these had Covid-19 on their death certificate, but that leaves 3,000 extra deaths – more than 400 a day – essentially unaccounted for. Many of these will be indirect effects from the disrupted health service: routine treatments have been largely abandoned, A&E attendances and non-Covid-19 hospital admissions have plummeted.

… my cold, statistical approach is to wait until the end of the year, and the years after that, when we can count the excess deaths. Until then, this grim contest won’t produce any league tables we can rely on.

It is also possible (and I have seen it argued elsewhere) that Covid19 is in the main accelerating the deaths of people with serious health conditions many of whom would have died later this year regardless of Covid19, and that we may see significant reductions in weekly deaths later this year because of this. Of the 26,000 + deaths in the UK from Covid19, over 90% had underlying conditions.

[MrGongGong]

It is also possible (and I have seen it argued elsewhere) that Covid19 is in the main accelerating the deaths of people with serious health conditions many of whom would have died later this year regardless of Covid19, and that we may see significant reductions in weekly deaths later this year because of this. Of the 26,000 + deaths in the UK from Covid19, over 90% had underlying conditions.

Softening us up for the eugenics programme?

[LHC]

Softening us up for the eugenics programme?

Wait until Soylent Green appears in the supermarkets.

[MrGongGong]

Wait until Soylent Green appears in the supermarkets.