Covid-19

[Chicky]

I’m not sure that’s actually going to be the case, official announcement tomorrow i think.

[Disco]

This is all so relentless.

[Ella77]

I know this is such a thick thing to say, but I keep being staggered by how this thing is EVERWHERE.

[Kleio]

Looks like we’re going into local lockdown

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/no ... s-18945698

Looks like we *just* miss that.

Official records are saying that our cases have dropped but that was because no one could get a test.

[olive]

Sorry, if this has already been covered but has it been reported why cases are rising in the North?

[Chicky]

We weren’t hit as badly in the first wave (the majority of deaths where I am were in care homes, there were very few affected in the community compared to London so I think it’s been gradually making its way further north. The same happened in the flu pandemic in 1918 (South was hit badly then it made its way north).

[Mountain Goat]

God Chicky, if that turns out to be accurate, it's harsh.

I see cases hit close to 4,000 today and that's despite people not being able to get one, so god only knows what it would be if we had an effective way of collecting data. That must mean that the positivity rate is ramping up. Hospitalisations have been trending upwards for long enough for that to be meaningful rather than a data blip too.

[Disco]

Apparently still a lot more tests are being done than back in March and April so the infections levels are not as rampant as they were then...well this is what I've read.

It's worrying me though. I haven't slept properly this last week and I think it's because I've got the rising cases on my mind.

[Mountain Goat]

I absolutely concur with that, back then it was hospital testing only and you certainly can't compare case numbers in April to case numbers now. The ONS has some estimates of what they think the real daily case rate was then and I think they said it was around 12,000, though tbh the dataset was complicated and I didn't look at it for long enough to be sure I had it right. But you can compare over the last few weeks and case numbers are increasing strongly while testing is not (and might be decreasing, I'm not sure on that though as they are so opaque with their data) so positivity rates are definitely an issue. I don't think we're anywhere near where we were in March but I do think we're standing on a precipice right now and losing all control over test/trace and over public confidence/compliance worries me a lot. I think we could cope with this rise if we had decent test/trace.

[Disco]

Definitely agree with you there. T&T is going to become null and void though, it's the very reason they gave up on tracing at the beginning because they didn't get a grip on the testing element.

[Mountain Goat]

Yep. HOLD ME PLEASE.

[Disco]

From a distance I will.

[olive]

We weren’t hit as badly in the first wave (the majority of deaths where I am were in care homes, there were very few affected in the community compared to London so I think it’s been gradually making its way further north. The same happened in the flu pandemic in 1918 (South was hit badly then it made its way north).

That makes sense.

[Disco]

What do they think is the overall % of the population that has had it? Is it about 10% with London closer to 17%? I think these are figures I've read at some point.

[Heebie Jeebie]

The early infection numbers must have been absolute mince. I just looked and we have had 378k cases and 41,684 deaths. That would be ~10%!

[Disco]

It's all guesswork without antibody testing everyone and then do antibodies last/ are the tests sensitive enough.

[Kleio]

Just a stones throw from where the lockdowns are happening Middlesbrough Football Club are trialling have 1000 people in the ground this weekend.

[Disco]

For god's sake!

[Chicky]

Just a stones throw from where the lockdowns are happening Middlesbrough Football Club are trialling have 1000 people in the ground this weekend.

There was an article about how they need to let spectators back so that football clubs don’t go under. The article underneath was about Gareth Bale earning £600k A WEEK.

[Kleio]

It looks over the empty testing site too!