Coronavirus

[oddoneout]

Hmm just as Brexit is about to kick in, the majority of the country will be under virtual house arrest.

It's all very convenient isn't it?

I floated this likelihood at the beginning of November and was told off for being cynical by friends and family. The only difference between then and now is the arrival of a mutant covid which makes it easier to impose tight controls...

[Bryn]

I floated this likelihood at the beginning of November and was told off for being cynical by friends and family. The only difference between then and now is the arrival of a mutant covid which makes it easier to impose tight controls...

Sot's not just Twitter and Facebook that are overrun with conspiracy theories, eh?

[french frank]

Sot's not just Twitter and Facebook that are overrun with conspiracy theories, eh?

Yes. Though the scientists seem to have been yelling at the tops of their voices for weeks that we need to abandon the tiers and just lock down. Not quite sure where they fit in to the conspiracy.

[Bryn]

Yes. Though the scientists seem to have been yelling at the tops of their voices for weeks that we need to abandon the tiers and just lock down. Not quite sure where they fit in to the conspiracy.

I wonder just to what extent such scientists are taking the public reaction into consideration. How does food, power, water, etc. get produced and distributed in a total lockdown? How are those who fail to cooperate with a lockdown to be effectively dealt with? The police don't have the resources. Martial law? I don't think so.

[oddoneout]

Sot's not just Twitter and Facebook that are overrun with conspiracy theories, eh?

Ain't no conspiracy it's a plan...
And if that were true it would be a first just about in this whole sorry saga?

[french frank]

I wonder just to what extent such scientists are taking the public reaction into consideration.

That's the politicians' job They're the ones who are being pulled in both directions.

Second thought. I'm not sure that you can have it both ways: that there's a devilish plan behind this AND that they are a band of totally inept botchers.

[Bryn]

That's the politicians' job They're the ones who are being pulled in both directions.

Quite. No enviable task but they volunteered for it when they put themselves up for election.

[johnb]

Hurrah, we've been moved down to Tier … oops, no, sorry, folks - that was last week - now we're back up to Tier 3 from Sat'day.

Interesting that my MSOA remains stubbornly among the highest within the city - I suspect that this is because we're bisected by a long main shopping high street and there's a lot of movement - people have been coming in and going out doing Christmas shopping.

The hospital situation in the two main hospitals in Bristol isn't good, especially with the BRI. I've attached a screen grab from the latest version of my Bristol Region "thingy".

At 34 cases in the 7 days to 18th, your MSOA currently tops the league in Bristol (it is 4th for cases/100k). But to put it in some perspective, not too long ago my area was running at 90+ cases. It's a mystery how some areas develop high rates - last week Westbury-on-Trim had 614 Cs/100k (it's now 123).

Apologies to non-Bristolians.

By the way, the maps in my Bristol Region Power BI "report" have started playing up in Firefox but they behaves perfectly in Chrome and Edge.

[french frank]

At 34 cases in the 7 days to 18th, your MSOA currently tops the league in Bristol (it is 4th for cases/100k). But to put it in some perspective, not too long ago my area was running at 90+ cases. It's a mystery how some areas develop high rates - last week Westbury-on-Trim had 614 Cs/100k (it's now 123).

Apologies to non-Bristolians.

I think the general pattern is likely to be roughly replicated elsewhere. We've had a week of rising cases, but nowhere near where it was at the beginning of November. And the rate of increase may be slowing. May be, that is. Bristol's cases are below the national average, but the hospital situation has to be factored in as well.

[Bryn]

I think the general pattern is likely to be roughly replicated elsewhere. We've had a week of rising cases, but nowhere near where it was at the beginning of November. And the rate of increase may be slowing. May be, that is. Bristol's cases are below the national average, but the hospital situation has to be factored in as well.

A good friend and erstwhile colleague with whom I was due to have visited for Xmas dinner has tested positive and is thus locked down on her bedroom while her husband and parents-in-law from Barbados are staying in the same house. She almost certainly picked up the virus at work as a London bus driver. Hopefully, her relatively junior age, (early 50s) will shield her from the worst effects. Long Covid could be a real problem for her, however.

[johnb]

I think the general pattern is likely to be roughly replicated elsewhere.

Very true

We've had a week of rising cases, but nowhere near where it was at the beginning of November. And the rate of increase may be slowing. May be, that is. Bristol's cases are below the national average, but the hospital situation has to be factored in as well.

I'm not too sure about Bristol's rate of increase. I think it could go either way.

The following are two screen grabs from my other Power BI "report", the one for the UK by local authority. They show six weeks to date for Bristol and a not untypical local authority from the SE as a comparison.



One can certainly see why the government is concerned about the rise in the SE "quadrant" of England.

[Bryn]

A good friend and erstwhile colleague with whom I was due to have visited for Xmas dinner has tested positive and is thus locked down on her bedroom while her husband and parents-in-law from Barbados are staying in the same house. She almost certainly picked up the virus at work as a London bus driver. Hopefully, her relatively junior age, (early 50s) will shield her from the worst effects. Long Covid could be a real problem for her, however.

Regretably my friend has now been taken into hospital, her condition having deteriorated. My heart goes out to her and her family.

[muzzer]

I wonder just to what extent such scientists are taking the public reaction into consideration. How does food, power, water, etc. get produced and distributed in a total lockdown? How are those who fail to cooperate with a lockdown to be effectively dealt with? The police don't have the resources. Martial law? I don't think so.

Agree entirely. What we have, if I may say so, is a macro level debate of the issues around ‘rule-following’. By which I mean - what constitutes a rule, to whom it applies, how a community treats it, how it’s enforced (or not), what the consequences are of it not being followed. But for loads of rules across diverse circumstances in a time when the very notion of what constitutes the successful application of a rule, and a fact generally, is in dispute.

It’s made me look back anew at previous times of strife, the most obvious one in the U.K. being WW2, and reassess how it must have felt versus even the most objective record of what it was like to live then. With far fewer sources of “news”, genuine shortages (I’m not ruling out those now, obviously hoping they don’t happen), and surely widespread uncertainty over a prolonged period. How did people really view their neighbours who were gaming the ration, for example? Or people leveraging contacts to avoid active service? When others were helpless and without agency.

Because that’s where we’re going now. I don’t for one moment expect some sort of armed conflict to arise, quite the opposite in fact. It’s the effect on the nation’s psyche of long-term restrictions, lack of social mobility, and actual mobility, say where you need a vaccine record to travel. Bear in mind that even modest inflation will have a massive impact and that most people under a certain age are massively over-leveraged after a decade or more of cheap borrowing. Baked-in dependence.

People with a lack of agency, increasingly dependent on bread and circuses. I don’t care who’s to blame, though the current crop of charlatans are the worst insults to intelligence to hold office in my lifetime.

With every successive cancellation of a cultural event these past months my heart has sunk. Imagine how those with rather more basic needs feel.

Blair was right. It’s an uncomfortable truth, but it’s not rocket science. This country has limited resources. We’ve got to stop the spread as soon as possible. The most vulnerable should shield for the foreseeable future, wherever possible. Those who can’t and are at most risk from transmission and most likely to pass on the virus should get the jab. And we need as many jabs bought as possible and ASAP.

And then we must get back to work.

And then perhaps this disgrace of a government can somehow be held to account.

Apologies for this long rambling post, and the warmest of season’s greetings to all members of this forum, which I find an outpost of civility, information and reassurance in what are grim days indeed.

[Bryn]

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/12/uk-variant-puts-spotlight-immunocompromised-patients-role-covid-19-pandemic

[Petrushka]

Muzzer #4458. You might be interested in this book regarding crime in the Second World War https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crime-Secon...s=books&sr=1-6

I felt for many years that the Second World War left a psychological mark on my mother who was nine in 1939. To be sure, it was nothing obvious or far reaching but it was there nevertheless, especially in her attitude to food and travel. Many of our generation could well say similar of their own parents. I think the pandemic will affect children of a similar age to my mother for years to come.