Coronavirus

[Bryn]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000mj18
R4 'Life Scientific'.

Indeed. An excellent edition.

[johnb]

FWIW, I was in Tesco today and noticed that a standard tin of Heinz baked beans was 85p. But there are offers of 4 tins for £2.50 (26% discount per can) or 6 for £3.00 (41% discount).

I didn't take the plunge, but if you're a baked bean fan stocking up for another lock down...something to ponder.

I used to do my main grocery shopping in a large Tesco, using the self checkout tills but I've been appalled by the cursory approach they have employed for CV19 protection at those tills. The main checkout tills are fine but for the self-checkout tills there are just freestanding vestigial screens (something between 40cm and 50cm wide) between tills and there are no screens at all between the tills and customers waiting to use them.

Compared to the large Sainsbury's I now use, Tescos are merely going through the motions and making the minimum effort to keep their customers safe.

[Bryn]

I used to do my main grocery shopping in a large Tesco, using the self checkout tills but I've been appalled by the cursory approach they have employed for CV19 protection at those tills. The main checkout tills are fine but for the self-checkout tills there are just freestanding vestigial screens (something between 40cm and 50cm wide) between tills and there are no screens at all between the tills and customers waiting to use them.

Compared to the large Sainsbury's I now use, Tescos are merely going through the motions and making the minimum effort to keep their customers safe.

Unfortunately, Sainsbury's closed their supermarket here, earlier this year. There is one the other side of the town but it is a right pain to get to by public transport, and not much better by car. One of the two Tescos (each equidistant walking distance from my abode) had 2 cases of COVID-19 and month or so back, so I now avoid that one. Their sanitising facilities have fallen off in recent weeks so I now tend to do a weekly shop at Aldi on Sundays (the only day of the week with convenient bus link from nearby). They appear to take their responsibilities more seriously.

[Pianorak]

Having reverted to doing my own shopping these last few weeks, I have now decided to resume home deliveries. By far the safest option. Tesco home delivery a fixed £4.50 - Sainsbury's from 50p if you can be flexible.

[Petrushka]

The local Waitrose has been well organised from the start, back in March, and continue to clean basket handles, trolleys, and self-service tills.

I've yet to see any customer in there without a mask since they became mandatory and the added use of disposable gloves ought to give as much protection as you are likely to need. A dangerous complacency has undoubtedly set in with many and with cases swiftly rising once again it's time to increase protection accordingly, though I will not do home delivery. Living alone means you need 'best before' dates to be as far forward on many items as possible in order to avoid unnecessary waste and home delivery will not do that for you.

[johnb]

There seems to be a total lack of transparency about causes of the testing fiasco, with the government refusing to give any detailed explanations.

Then, of course, they quote the misleading figure of 360,000 testing capacity when 120,000 of that capacity is for antibody tests and has nothing to do with diagnostic swab testing.

According to the government dashboard, the Pillar 1 & 2 diagnostic swab test capacity was 243,817 on 10th Sept with 205,659 tests reported on that date.

Matt Hancock said today that 100,000 tests are reserved for care homes.

I jotted some figures down. They might be wildly out but .....

Pillars 1 & 2 Capacity as at 10/09:		 243,817 (the most recent published figure)
Pillar 1 Capacity (NHS/PHE) as at 18/08:	  80,000 (no longer published)
Therefore Pillar 2 Capacity probably around:	 163,817
less tests reserved for Care Homes: 		-100,000
Leaves Pillar 2 Capacity for general testing: 	  63,817

Pillar 1 is swab (antigen) testing processed by PHE and NHS labs for those with a clinical need and health & care workers.
Pillar 2 is swab (antigen) testing for the wider population performed by commercial providers (includes drive through, mailed kits, etc).

Some of the Pillar 1 testing capacity *might* be being used to bolster the Pillar 2 (commercial) capacity.

[Serial_Apologist]

One of the local testing centres in London has gone from drop-in to booking in advance only. On the local lunchtime TV news a family unaware of the changed status was shown turning up and being turned away, until the father pleaded that he needed either to get his children to school or arrange for them to be cared for at home as both he and his wife were key workers. Fortunately they were finally admitted, although it needed to be asked how much this was down to the presence of the media.

[oddoneout]

I wonder if the London centre found itself in this position, relating to Oldham council which wasn't told of changes, so people were being turned away at test centres to which the council had directed them on the basis of the information the council had at the time.

The council leader, Sean Fielding, said local authorities had been “completely undermined by incompetence” in Whitehall. “The complete lack of courtesy to local authorities when they are changing the rules for testing centres within our boroughs is disgraceful,” he said.

There is more here, https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...e-to-get-tests which supports the conclusion that it is lab capacity that is the problem. The fact that swabs are being sent to Italy and Germany for processing is a bit of a giveaway and doesn't tally with the government's continued claim that it is shortage of tests that is the problem.

[Simon B]

How many people suitably skilled/qualified to execute/supervise this work in pathology labs are there among the UK population? This isn't shelf stacking (offence taken by shelf stackers is unintended and incidental).

A cursory scan yields opacity around exactly what qualifications are mandatory. However, it appears that the NHS is trying to recruit, by the hundreds, post-grad and post-doc mollecular biologists and even current virology/microbiology/biomed undergraduates providing they have experience of operating in biohazardous laboratories.

There are structural shortages of these in the UK and they can't be willed out of thin air overnight. Least of all in a society (and it very definitely is society, not just the state) with a long-term self-harm disorder of deprecating the value of STEM subjects and people... Or increasingly, anyone with two braincells to rub together. Even the usual Brexit debate around freedom of movement of skilled labour isn't really relevant here as every other country has the same surging requirement for those skills. Reap what you sow.

This is probably why there is a focus on rapidly developing tech/kit to automate relevant processes so that people who don't know what they're doing can accomplish the task. That can't be conjured out of nowhere either.

[Frances_iom]

From discussion on R4 lunchtime - it seems that many tasks could be handled by an out of work barrista as seems more manual opening of sample packages etc - seems worthwhile approaching Costa 'graduates'

[Simon B]

From discussion on R4 lunchtime - it seems that many tasks could be handled by an out of work barrista as seems more manual opening of sample packages etc - seems worthwhile approaching Costa 'graduates'

Hopefully it is just logistics then, so far... Is the hypothesis that that accounts for the discrepancy between theoretical capacity (measured in terms of lab apparatus + the skilled staff needed to do the task) and the lower ceiling that appears to have been run into?

Maybe someone should get Amazon on the case*?

*Deliberate provocation!

The skilled staff issue will be harder to confront when it becomes the limiting factor. The degree of informed scepticism around the moonshot/magic-unicorn "plan" suggests the prospects for imminent advance in automation don't look too great.

[teamsaint]

Hopefully it is just logistics then, so far... Is the hypothesis that that accounts for the discrepancy between theoretical capacity (measured in terms of lab apparatus + the skilled staff needed to do the task) and the lower ceiling that appears to have been run into?

Maybe someone should get Amazon on the case*?

*Deliberate provocation!

The skilled staff issue will be harder to confront when it becomes the limiting factor. The degree of informed scepticism around the moonshot/magic-unicorn "plan" suggests the prospects for imminent advance in automation don't look too great.

In my opinion, the moonshot programme, daily testing for “health passports” is potentially very dangerous in terms of our freedoms, and I will oppose it every which way I can. The implications are enormous, almost too big to contemplate.

[LMcD]

Apparently it's possible to book a test in the London area if you enter an Aberdeen postcode (question to Matt Hancock in the House today - his reply: 'Don't game the system').

[oddoneout]

How many people suitably skilled/qualified to execute/supervise this work in pathology labs are there among the UK population? This isn't shelf stacking (offence taken by shelf stackers is unintended and incidental).

A cursory scan yields opacity around exactly what qualifications are mandatory. However, it appears that the NHS is trying to recruit, by the hundreds, post-grad and post-doc mollecular biologists and even current virology/microbiology/biomed undergraduates providing they have experience of operating in biohazardous laboratories.

There are structural shortages of these in the UK and they can't be willed out of thin air overnight. Least of all in a society (and it very definitely is society, not just the state) with a long-term self-harm disorder of deprecating the value of STEM subjects and people... Or increasingly, anyone with two braincells to rub together. Even the usual Brexit debate around freedom of movement of skilled labour isn't really relevant here as every other country has the same surging requirement for those skills. Reap what you sow.

This is probably why there is a focus on rapidly developing tech/kit to automate relevant processes so that people who don't know what they're doing can accomplish the task. That can't be conjured out of nowhere either.

There seems to be a fair amount of conflicting information about lab capacity. Not so long ago I read an article that included comments from existing UK labs who had offered their facilities, skills and staff, and had heard nothing or been turned down, and others that had underused capacity. It's possible that offers have now been taken up and there is still a lack, but given the way, and to whom, contracts have been awarded I don't think one could take that as definite.
Does the NHS recruitment reflect an increasing trend to take testing 'in-house' - increasing capacity at hospitals - rather than use the government appointed(or not) facilities which have too often not delivered what they need when they need?
Pushing ahead to find an automated option that doesn't need specialist staff and facilities is sensible, except that experience(and hype so far) suggests that those in charge of sourcing, commissioning and decision making fall into the 'don't know what they are doing' category, regardless of the ability of those who might operate such devices, so I can't see it being a solution anytime soon.

[johnb]

The good news is that, according to published case figures, the number of local authorities with case rate greater than 20, 30 and 40 has declined since reaching a peak on 8th Sept. (The number of LAs with case rates above 60 have levelled off.)

The bad news is that the decline is most probably due to testing being concentrated on the areas with the highest infection rates.

There are structural shortages of these in the UK and they can't be willed out of thin air overnight

errr ... forgive me if my memory is playing tricks but I thought that, for months, everyone had been saying that we would be relying on testing, on test & trace and on having adequate testing capacity when schools reopened, when the lockdown eased and when autumn arrived. Ministers said it, health officials said it, academics said it, the bloke down the pub said it.

So what the hell went wrong?

(Sorry, silly question. It's just par for the course as far as this lamentable government is concerned.)

In general I agree with what you posted.