Rusty Nails
We remember
- Location
- Living in the slow lane
Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.
Saliva test trial is scaled back 
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...vid-saliva-tests-plan-after-trial-scaled-back
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...vid-saliva-tests-plan-after-trial-scaled-back
Operation moon pig going well then. Don’t leave us with many options going into winterSaliva test trial is scaled back
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...vid-saliva-tests-plan-after-trial-scaled-back
midlife
Guru
Saliva test trial is scaled back
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...vid-saliva-tests-plan-after-trial-scaled-back
The article says
But sources said the pilot scheme was struggling to persuade even 250 Salfordians to provide saliva samples.
Is this because positive results and self isolating means loss of pay?
mjr
Comfy armchair to one person & a plank to the next
- Location
- mostly Norfolk, sometimes Somerset
I'm sorry but I've lost track of this one: why is the UK only just now trialling saliva tests when so many other countries are already using them routinely?Saliva test trial is scaled back
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...vid-saliva-tests-plan-after-trial-scaled-back
Rusty Nails
We remember
- Location
- Living in the slow lane
I don't think what is happening now could be described as a wave, it's a predictable seasonal ripple and another will follow. I am sure that there will not be any wave. If there was then it would make the UK unique in Europe and there is no reason for that to be so. So yes, let's wait and see, other scientists want the opposite.
Hospital recoveries are about matching admissions.
Define hospital recovery.
For many discharge is just the start. Any excess work for primary care and social care at this time needs to be avoided. As we are not yet into peck trips and fall session emergency Orthopedic surgery is not at capacity. Which in turn feeds into already reduced capacity at a time they are expected to increases planned surgery. Both for many increases demand post hospital.
On the medical side we are not at peck respiratory demand. The latter may now have more equipment such as the widely talked about CPAP. But they need experienced Nurses or chest Physio to safely and efficiently use them. Taking them away for other patients. That's before we can guarantee enough blood gas machines and equipment to take them. Peck respiratory demand is not yet feeding into primary care either. Which is already expected to continue day to day and has been though out but with less capacity. Which if it fails to cope they only have one option that's to admit them.
So if covid admissions are pegged and less capacity is taken with it it will still go on effecting the rest of the NHS and social care for some time to come. Any extra capacity be it covid or none covid needs the staff across the board and we simply don't have them. Now with unpredictable staff being off isolating at anyone time makes it worse. This is before we even take into account the extra work covid has already added to post hospital capacity.
It's now been confirmed the PPE stock pile is 4 months worth as it's now default with every patient contact covid or not. It will not take much to run out just on masks alone we have no UK manufacturing option.
For many discharge is just the start. Any excess work for primary care and social care at this time needs to be avoided. As we are not yet into peck trips and fall session emergency Orthopedic surgery is not at capacity. Which in turn feeds into already reduced capacity at a time they are expected to increases planned surgery. Both for many increases demand post hospital.
On the medical side we are not at peck respiratory demand. The latter may now have more equipment such as the widely talked about CPAP. But they need experienced Nurses or chest Physio to safely and efficiently use them. Taking them away for other patients. That's before we can guarantee enough blood gas machines and equipment to take them. Peck respiratory demand is not yet feeding into primary care either. Which is already expected to continue day to day and has been though out but with less capacity. Which if it fails to cope they only have one option that's to admit them.
So if covid admissions are pegged and less capacity is taken with it it will still go on effecting the rest of the NHS and social care for some time to come. Any extra capacity be it covid or none covid needs the staff across the board and we simply don't have them. Now with unpredictable staff being off isolating at anyone time makes it worse. This is before we even take into account the extra work covid has already added to post hospital capacity.
It's now been confirmed the PPE stock pile is 4 months worth as it's now default with every patient contact covid or not. It will not take much to run out just on masks alone we have no UK manufacturing option.
Joey Shabadoo
My pronouns are "He", "Him" and "buggerlugs"
mjr
Comfy armchair to one person & a plank to the next
- Location
- mostly Norfolk, sometimes Somerset
OK, how do you define a wave and a ripple, please?
The current increase has been described as a wave by many epidemiologists — such as David J Hunter, professor of epidemiology at Oxford University who said there's "no doubt the second wave is well advanced" — and it definitely looks like the leading edge of a wave, although we'll only be able to tell for sure once it starts to recede.
Maybe not unique, but there is a reason for us to be among the first: we were only a few weeks behind the first-hit European countries in the first wave, but the UK failed to get the virus as much under control afterwards, which makes us vulnerable to being among the first-hit in the second wave because we're starting from a higher level. The lowest the UK got its death rate was 0.1 deaths/M before our government got giddy and started paying and scaring people back into cafes and restos, whereas every other major European nation got their death rates lower than that.
That said, Spain appears to be ahead of us again, but it looks like this wave may have already peaked there (deaths now level, cases halving every 16-78 days) and the UK is now on a much steeper trend (deaths doubling every 8-13 days) than Spain ever was (this wave seems to have peaked at deaths doubling every 24-36 days - all estimates from https://worldhealthorg.shinyapps.io/covid/ ). Maybe Spain's was only a ripple to you, but 100 deaths a day seems a bit more than that to me.
But are those scientists the covid equivalent of climate change deniers, getting disproportionate coverage as journalists scratch around for any "balancing" view?
What's your source for that? The estimates I've seen (because there aren't official statistics about this) are about 8 to 1 recovery to death. Maybe that's "about matching" to you, but it still looks like a lot of coffins to me.
mjr
Comfy armchair to one person & a plank to the next
- Location
- mostly Norfolk, sometimes Somerset
"Hospital recovery" is discharge from covid-related outpatient hospital care and back under the care of their GP, IIRC. As you note, that's far from the whole story, with "long covid" sufferers ending up in A&E again later with heart attacks and other things. Definitely not internationally comparable, either.
How on Earth do we still have no UK PPE mask manufacturing? A wide range of countries have used emergency powers to enlist local factories to start producing PPE (including the USA, I think) so how deep is Johnson's commitment to laissez-faire to still not intervene? Free market economics over lives?
fossyant
Ride It Like You Stole It!
- Location
- South Manchester
mjr
Comfy armchair to one person & a plank to the next
- Location
- mostly Norfolk, sometimes Somerset
Every farking time. Announce restrictions but give people a couple of days to fark themselves and each other first. Maybe next time, they could quietly tell businesses to "be ready" to avoid holding stock and stuff and local government and police to be ready to enforce restrictions, but I think many in affected areas were already doing that before Monday's announcements. Then announce the restrictions and start them ASAP. When will they learn?
And on a similar note:
"Analysts say expert-led measures, better compliance and learning from past mistakes are helping some nations manage the virus." https://www.aljazeera.com/features/...s-in-europe-might-avoid-a-second-wave-and-why
Well, that's the UK farked, then
