Coronavirus outbreak

[Dogtrousers]

I'm interested in the finger pointing aspects of this, and the entertaining political soap opera and all that but what's most important is lessons to be learned and plans to be made.

Like will we have contact tracing and all the other whatnots on standby. How much money does it make sense to devote to this and will we fall into the trap of being well prepared for the previous global emergency.

 

[Ajax Bay]

Shame, while its inevitable politically linked...this is an interesting subject that's just been spoiled by excessive focus on the politics.
Do us all a favour mods, shut it down

I too depreciate this dragging sectional politics in and suggest that comments which seek to drag the tone down are amended or deleted. But this thread was deliberately pulled across from its previous sub-forum: 'shutting it down' for you is easy: just activate the 'ignore thread' button (top right).
Unlike @Dogtrousers I am supremely disinterested in the "finger-pointing". This aspect reflects the 'blame culture' (which pervades the NHS and elsewhere btw) and makes identifying and learning lessons from mistakes/failures so difficult.

Like @Dogtrousers I am very invested in the knowledge management aspect (learning lessons).
I am keen that we (the UK) identify the lessons from the pandemic and how the country can prepare and respond to achieve a better outcome, overall, next time.
We need to identify best practice (which will vary from country to country btw), and see if we can follow that. But some 'lessons identified' will not be learned (the necessary change will not be made), not because 'we' don't want to but because the costs (monetary, philosophically or culturally (and more)) will be judged too great (outweighing the benefits). And those will be political decisions. Taken by whoever is in charge (by popular electoral mandate) at the time.
Off for a ride to Torquay to meet a friend riding home from work, and back this afternoon and a 200 audax on Sunday. Hope you get some time on the road this weekend @kingrollo

 

[tom73]

I'm interested in the finger pointing aspects of this, and the entertaining political soap opera and all that but what's most important is lessons to be learned and plans to be made.

Like will we have contact tracing and all the other whatnots on standby. How much money does it make sense to devote to this and will we fall into the trap of being well prepared for the previous global emergency.

It's important to remember contact tracing is not new or something that just appears. It's happening all the time in public health and has been done for years. It works best at local level carried out by staff who know how it work and can use it correctly. Scaling up is possible and can to a point be done quite easily and quickly. The problem is and was they try to reinvent the wheel. It's knowing which staff and how you reply them to testing. In New Zealand for example they quickly redeployed the counties civil defence staff to do it and it work well.
We could easily set up a national NHS reserve in a similar way to retained fire service. So they get paid for attending yearly updates. The full in and outs are for a different discussion. A new civil defence of some sort for the treats of today is also equally possible.
Setting up a totally different process cutting off the existing one equalled one big mess. It not all about money take the form that health care staff used when sending tests to the labs. It listed all the placers eg hospital, care home ect ,ect. but missed off prions so staff had to write it on in any place they could find. Processing the form then took longer so test results got longer. That's a very cheep fix for the next pandemic. As for cost we can't afford not to invest in public health inc replacing the once extensive net work of PH labs and PH professionals we once had. Too long no matter what government public health has been left underfunded without it we don't have a hope of dealing health issues we face. Let alone a pandemic which is still number one on the national risk register.

 

[icowden]

I'm interested in the finger pointing aspects of this, and the entertaining political soap opera and all that but what's most important is lessons to be learned and plans to be made.

Like will we have contact tracing and all the other whatnots on standby. How much money does it make sense to devote to this and will we fall into the trap of being well prepared for the previous global emergency.

Agreed - Private Eye have published some good information about this, and about the issue that when a department exists but isn't used, the government tend to defund it and then panic when they suddenly need the thing they don't have any more.

 

[Ajax Bay]

national risk register

For those interested, here's the 2023 version, which notes (scroll to page 15) 'pandemic' (54) as the most likely catastrophic risk (less likely are CBRN attack (1-5%), Failure of the National Electricity Transmission System (1-5%), civil (ie UK) or foreign nuclear fallout (<0.2%). Significant most likely risks include: Outbreak of an emerging infectious disease (55) at 5-25%.
5-25% means "most unlikely in the next 5 years" btw.
https://assets.publishing.service.g...e/1175834/2023_NATIONAL_RISK_REGISTER_NRR.pdf
And early on there's a special box about the last pandemic:
"The most significant risk to materialise in the UK in recent years
has been the COVID-19 pandemic. This has impacted all aspects
of society and will have consequences into the future.
The risk of a pandemic has long been identified as one of the
most serious risks facing the UK. The reasonable worst-case
scenario used for planning purposes has in previous versions
been based on an influenza-like illness pandemic. Any new
pathogen transmitted by the respiratory route is likely to share
characteristics with influenza in that it can spread rapidly
via close proximity, can travel rapidly and there are few easy
immediate countermeasures. It has therefore been a planning
assumption that a plan for pandemic influenza would have
considerable overlap with a plan for other diseases easily
transmitted by the respiratory route.
The lessons from COVID-19 have been incorporated into the
government’s risk assessment methodology. The reasonable
worst-case scenario has been reshaped into a more generic
pandemic scenario reflecting a broader range of possible
manifestations, and additional impacts, measures and data have
been incorporated into the assessment."

 

[silva]

What has impacted all of society - the virus or the antivirus forces?
On television during a couple weeks of summer 2020 there was a government commercial spammed on all channels, "never back to what it was" and "the world after corona".
Sunshine flowers bees and happy people out there, and the commercials made me feeling alike some ugly crazy weird whatever gang had hijacked tv stations.
So my opinion is to dig governments presence on the virus market.
In the end, their only reason to be there was as excuse for to not have to be productive.

What's the fallout of the virus?
What's the fallout of the governments measures?
The former harassed the 1%.
The latter harassed the 100%.

That's what you get with people that get paid regardless what they do, they fill their free time by 100 folding problems, corona virus having been such a case. It wasn't the first, wasn't the last and todays followups won't be either.

What is needed is a homefront incorporated into the government’s risk assessment methodology.
Something like this:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W7wqQwa-TU

 

[classic33]

What has impacted all of society - the virus or the antivirus forces?
On television during a couple weeks of summer 2020 there was a government commercial spammed on all channels, "never back to what it was" and "the world after corona".
Sunshine flowers bees and happy people out there, and the commercials made me feeling alike some ugly crazy weird whatever gang had hijacked tv stations.
So my opinion is to dig governments presence on the virus market.
In the end, their only reason to be there was as excuse for to not have to be productive.

What's the fallout of the virus?
What's the fallout of the governments measures?
The former harassed the 1%.
The latter harassed the 100%.

That's what you get with people that get paid regardless what they do, they fill their free time by 100 folding problems, corona virus having been such a case. It wasn't the first, wasn't the last and todays followups won't be either.

What is needed is a homefront incorporated into the government’s risk assessment methodology.
Something like this:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W7wqQwa-TU

If you can't still see differences between 2019 and 2024 and how people were changed by it, can I suggest you remove your blinkers.

Simple things like self-scan, cashless payments, home deliveries and the ever present face masks. The first two were helped on their way by people wanting to help out or avoid contact with anything or anyone that might pass it onto them.
Prior to 2020 the only people I saw on a regular basis wearing a face mask tended to be those from the far east, where such behavior is the norm.

 

[silva]

If you can't still see differences between 2019 and 2024 and how people were changed by it, can I suggest you remove your blinkers.

Simple things like self-scan, cashless payments, home deliveries and the ever present face masks. The first two were helped on their way by people wanting to help out or avoid contact with anything or anyone that might pass it onto them.
Prior to 2020 the only people I saw on a regular basis wearing a face mask tended to be those from the far east, where such behavior is the norm.

I don't see any change.
People at work that had deskjobs, that were forced to work from home, sit again at work location.
In supermarkets nobody wears a mask anymore.
Couple weeks ago I saw an elderly couple, with the woman wearing a mask, that hung under her nose.
Cashless payments, i see people using/trying several cards, some give a beep, personell looks at it then, wipes a finger over it, returns it and say try again. That doesn't appear to me as being scary of viruses.

The far east: I noticed back then, and sometimes now, in city centre, tourists, that they wear masks.
They often speak English, I once stopped and asked, and she told me that she did it to not have to do make up in the morning. And that it's a fashion item for them.
Where i also see masks: at places where state personell is busy. Not on their faces, but on their vans, that at that time got printed on them, to make people wear masks. Also along streets here and there, forgotten boards aside in the dirt.
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20230213/p2a/00m/0li/004000c
"'Like facial underwear'"

Mouth mask production, I know a company (Belgium) that in 2020 converted its production to mouth masks.

https://www.made-in.be/oost-vlaande...o-klaar-voor-80-miljoen-mondmaskers-per-jaar/
Google translate:

September 22, 2020

AALST/EEKLO – Ontex today unveiled a Belgian production line with a capacity of around 80 million face masks per year. The Ontex face mask production line is located at the factory in Eeklo and has been producing a hundred thousand masks per day since August.

https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2024/0...iet-volledig-onverwacht-het-bedrijf-hing-aan/
Google translate:

Finally, Ontex announced today that almost half of the jobs in Belgium will be lost. The production site in Eeklo will close its doors completely. 349 people will lose their jobs there.

I'd say I'll keep my blinkers, they're not in the way.

 

[Mo1959]

What has impacted all of society - the virus or the antivirus forces?

Definitely the latter I think!

I actually don’t even think about the virus any more and that’s from someone who decided against any vaccinations. I haven’t even had a sniffle yet the amount of people I know around here that were vaccinated and now seem to be picking up bugs and suffering from long chest infections that are difficult to shift, coughs, etc seems a bit suspect.

 

[MrGrumpy]

Definitely the latter I think!

I actually don’t even think about the virus any more and that’s from someone who decided against any vaccinations. I haven’t even had a sniffle yet the amount of people I know around here that were vaccinated and now seem to be picking up bugs and suffering from long chest infections that are difficult to shift, coughs, etc seems a bit suspect.

Maybe your just lucky or natural immunity ? What I can tell you, as I know of few folk with long covid . They are proper knackered, one has decided to sell the house so they can move into a bungalow . Can’t manage the stairs . Another lady whom was keen cyclist , regular 50-60 miles every weekend . History now as she’ cannot even cycle a few miles.
But ya know it’s all made up . This was before they got vaccines as it was early days of Covid .

As for the sniffles , I could say the same , been relatively healthy , fully vaccinated?!

 

[roadrash]

What I can tell you, as I know of few folk with long covid . They are proper knackered,

yeah , my wife is the same , hospitalised twice , 3 weeks on icu and resus and life is totally changed, but as they say its all a lie and made up, it p!sses me off

 

[Electric_Andy]

My BIL had it 18 months ago, has had constant headaches/migraines ever since. Was off work (self-employed) for 9 months so no pay or any financial help. He is over the worst of it now but he can't work as much as pre-covid, which has put a real strain on them as him and his partner were both on low wages to start with.

 

[screenman]

Pam went into hospital for minor heart surgery; she contracted Civid whilst in the and lasted 3 months in hospital before passing away in March this year with multiple organ failures. I honestly believe that had she not got the virus that I would still have her with me now.

That was extremely hard to type and has taken me a few days to be able to do it, certainly it has made me cry.

 

[a.twiddler]

For many years I was flu free and never bothered with the vaccine offered every year. Since the pandemic I've had all the Covid vaccines offered and anything else available. I've seen too much misery suffered by friends, acquaintances and strangers over the last few years. The saying that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger is so not true when it comes to Covid and, particularly, Long Covid. Some of us kid ourselves that we're indestructible, it won't affect us. Others claim "secret knowledge" from the internet that it's all a hoax or a plot to control our freedom. Vaccination isn't the complete answer but it's the best we've got. Since the greatest contributor to global health in the last century or two has been vaccination and clean water, I'll take that over dubious theories and claims.

 

[roadrash]

Pam went into hospital for minor heart surgery; she contracted Civid whilst in the and lasted 3 months in hospital before passing away in March this year with multiple organ failures. I honestly believe that had she not got the virus that I would still have her with me now.

That was extremely hard to type and has taken me a few days to be able to do it, certainly it has made me cry.

I offer my deepest condolences, I was told to expect the worst for my wife at one point, I can not begin to imagine how you cope.