Coronavirus

[MrGongGong]

"And that also means people getting in their cars in England," he added, saying police in Wales "absolutely have the power to fine" people for making non-essential journeys.

"Essential" is an interesting word
Does it refer to what one thinks is "essential" or what others deem to be "essential" ?

Sometime in the next couple of weeks, I'm going to have to go and pick up a new beehive from 30 miles away.
Technically speaking bees are livestock so it's ok
BUT the local plod listed "picking up a beehive" as an example of one of the "ridiculous" excuses given for people breaking the "rules" (or is it guidance ?)

If I don't do it our bees are likely to swarm and most will go..............

I have no qualms at all of going and doing it regardless of what some numbskull says.

[oddoneout]

The issue of excess deaths is, I think, an interesting one. There are reports of people not seeking medical attention for such things as stroke and heart attack(for fear of contracting the virus in hospital), who may subsequently die, and the cancelling of treatments and operations may cause a mortality increase. The other side to it is the improvement in air quality which might prevent some otherwise expected deaths, and the drop in alcohol and vehicle related accidents - another cause of A&E departments being quiet. Balancing out the figures would seem to me to be rather difficult as the first element could be difficult to establish - being dependent on probabilities to a large extent rather than straightforward comparable figures such as 'this period last year'.
It is a great pity that one of the features of 'returning to normality' will be the return to alcohol and vehicle related incidents burdening the NHS which will already be struggling with the backlog of 'ordinary' medical procedures built up during the pandemic.

[johnb]

Personally, I think the comparative excess death graph ensembles given here https://www.ft.com/content/a26fbf7e-...3-955839e06441 give a much more meaningful and nuanced insight overall, albeit at the price of inevitably greater timelags on the data.

What seems to be of interest though is that, unless I've totally misunderstood this - which is possible, the use of excess death data makes the whole picture look a lot worse.
....

Interesting posts.

Personally I think the FT charts of excess mortality aren't very useful. The countries are at different stages of the pandemic and the cut off dates for the charts vary considerably making them pretty useless if the intention is to compare excess mortality across countries. I think that excess mortality figures will only be meaningful at the end of the year or perhaps next year, once the pandemic has passed (yes I know that is wishful thinking). Until then they have to be treated very cautiously indeed.

Having said that, it is pretty obvious that the UK is in a pretty bad situation.

[Simon B]

I think that excess mortality figures will only be meaningful at the end of the year or perhaps next year, once the pandemic has passed (yes I know that is wishful thinking). Until then they have to be treated very cautiously indeed.

Having said that, it is pretty obvious that the UK is in a pretty bad situation.

Agreed on all points. However, they become incrementally more useful as time passes - really that's just another way of saying the same thing though.

The latest such UK data from the ONS seems to convey quite a lot of information though (subject to some assumptions though):



Total excess deaths are clearly way above normal. Of these, rather a lot have not been attributed to CV-19.

The assumption from previous updates (before the falling trend manifested in this inherently delayed data) was that the rest of the excess was the law of unintended consequences in action on the lockdown. People not seeking medical attention for critical conditions - heart attacks, strokes, other acute illnesses.

However, the very strong cross-correlation between the shape of the peaks in the dark blue and red curves is a contra-indicator of this hypothesis. The lockdown hasn't eased yet to any meaningful degree. So, either the message that people should call the GP/Attend A&E for serious matters has got through at the same time that deaths from the epidemic have reduced, or perhaps many more of these excess deaths also had CV-19 as their underlying trigger mechanism.

Discuss...

[Dave2002]

"Essential" is an interesting word
Does it refer to what one thinks is "essential" or what others deem to be "essential" ?

Sometime in the next couple of weeks, I'm going to have to go and pick up a new beehive from 30 miles away.
Technically speaking bees are livestock so it's ok
BUT the local plod listed "picking up a beehive" as an example of one of the "ridiculous" excuses given for people breaking the "rules" (or is it guidance ?)

If I don't do it our bees are likely to swarm and most will go..............

I have no qualms at all of going and doing it regardless of what some numbskull says.

Does a new beehive come with bees?

If not, can you get one via mail order, such as this - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/National-...MAAOSwE9Bb1y42 or https://www.amazon.co.uk/National-su...290859&sr=8-16

Maybe those models are no good, or your bees are very fussy - I don't know - I'm not a bee expert.

[Serial_Apologist]

No, not if you drive (but if you walk you may get round the law). The Welsh government has announced Keep out of Wales, and says that in Wales the Welsh law is the law. A problem for people whose work takes them across the border, but that's probably provable, whereas taking a walk would be a no-no.

"Earlier, the Welsh minister responsible for the coronavirus recovery, Jeremy Miles, said rules "do not permit people to get in their car and drive to destinations in Wales".

"And that also means people getting in their cars in England," he added, saying police in Wales "absolutely have the power to fine" people for making non-essential journeys.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-52614204

The case of a golf course near Oswestry, where part of the course lies west of the England/Wales boundary, raised the spectre of Welsh police arresting anyone recovering stray balls on the "wrong" side, on a TV discussion this morning.

[MrGongGong]

Does a new beehive come with bees?

If not, can you get one via mail order, such as this - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/National-...MAAOSwE9Bb1y42 or https://www.amazon.co.uk/National-su...290859&sr=8-16

Maybe those models are no good, or your bees are very fussy - I don't know - I'm not a bee expert.

New beehive is for splitting a colony
Yes, you can get everything mail order but not from the place we want to get this one from

It makes a difference

[johnb]

Discuss...

Difficult to say.

Looking at the excess mortality over the last four weeks, the weekly pattern of deaths categorised as non-Covid has roughly followed the Covid deaths so you might well be on to something.

[Pulcinella]

Owen Jones (Guardian) on BJ's message to the working class:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/12/boris-johnson-working-class-good-luck

[Dave2002]

New beehive is for splitting a colony
Yes, you can get everything mail order but not from the place we want to get this one from

It makes a difference

Can't those people ship it to you - or won't they? You could otherwise just go out, and run round a field near where the bee hives are available, for exercise, and pick up a beehive (weight lifting?) on the way back - and you wouldn't be breaking the rules - or do you live in a community where your every move is watched with suspicion?

[MrGongGong]

Can't those people ship it to you - or won't they? You could otherwise just go out, and run round a field near where the bee hives are available, for exercise, and pick up a beehive (weight lifting?) on the way back - and you wouldn't be breaking the rules - or do you live in a community where your every move is watched with suspicion?

Not going to get it shipped... no need, I can get in a car and go and get it
and not watched where I live at all (mostly folks working in agriculture and the like anyway)
No need to run
and it's LIVESTOCK so no problem
If it was a nuc colony of bees it would be amusing to open the box to prove what was in it

And i'm not sure if they are "rules" or "guidance" anyway

[johnb]

Just thought I would post this chart of the Covid-19 hospital deaths in England, by date of death.

There will be ongoing upward revisions, most significantly to the last five days.

However, the days that are circled seem to indicate that the steady decline is levelling off. (It might be a temporary hiatus due to, say, increased transmission over Easter.)



Source data: https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistic...-daily-deaths/

[Simon B]

Try working this one out:

Person X lives in one of the devolved nations
Person X is employed in England
Person X has to make occasional visits to the office to use expensive bulky equipment, without which progress made while mostly working remotely becomes impossible
Person X does this at funny times, like on a Sunday morning, to maximise social distancing and minimise risk of exposure from colleagues in an office where people normally keep hours of 08:00-19:00 Mon-Fri
After (legally) travelling to England to visit the office, person X drives somewhere else in England and takes a long walk
Eventually, many hours later, person X drives back to home in devolved nation
Person X is stopped by officer plod on the M4/M74 once over the border and questioned

Has person X broken the rules/(law - seemingly a more complex question)?

Damned if I know... This isn't a hypothetical scenario.

[Petrushka]

Person x should obtain a signed warrant on letter headed paper from his/her employer authorising him/her to be out and about in said circumstances. One of my friends has had to do this in case of police or any other enquiries.

This should cover all bases and avoid long explanations.

[MrGongGong]

Person x should obtain a signed warrant on letter headed paper from his/her employer authorising him/her to be out and about in said circumstances. One of my friends has had to do this in case of police or any other enquiries.

This should cover all bases and avoid long explanations.

What happens when "Person X" IS the "employer" ?

Are the norms of employment SO ingrained that everyone is always assumed to have a "superior" ?

I frequently give myself "permission" to do all sorts of nonsense