Corona virus - Covid 19 discussion

The problem is that the term 'herd immunity' is being thrown about by people who have no idea what it actually means. If you show some of these articles you're talking about to, for example, an actual virologist, they'll probably say something quite rude.

There's a good argument that the term 'herd immunity' shouldn't be used at all for simply allowing a majority of a population to catch a disease, and should be strictly applied to it being achieved through vaccination.

Sweden has peaked at around 6-7% of people having antibodies to protect against Covid-19 infection, with increasing evidence that immunity can fade within months. That's a million miles away from herd immunity, which has, I repeat, never been stated as an objective in Sweden.

By all accounts the reason Sweden is doing so well is that they're doing a great job on social distancing and hygiene and having very strong and cohesive societal structures that lend themselves well to a population working well as a group to limit the spread of a very dangerous disease. Their success has nothing to do with herd immunity, because they don't have it.

Further reading -
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For some reason it seems that in most of places, currently new infections are in areas where were very few infections at spring, like in Sweden and in many countries in different areas than back then. Nobody knows answer for sure why, but some (even these virologists) are thinking possible effect of T-Cells, all what's been tested are antibodies and as said above, these numbers are so low and many don't have them almost at all that it doesn't explain why virus seem going to "new places" instead of getting another round where it was it's worse in spring.

Wouldn't think ie. in Sweden they have started now to keep social distancing and wash their hands and didn't do it at all when it was it's worse. They didn't close schools, restaurants or anything which have made many of these experts to wonder what's happening. Many have started to think that something else than only antibodies could have given some immunity/tolerance against virus, these spoken T-Cells to be one possibility.

That's something we don't know, maybe one day somebody will find out, now still there are no source who would be sure about what happened, all are more or less educated guesses/estimations/assumptions.
 
I think it is a fact that Sweden is closer to the state of herd immunity than we are, they may still be miles off but allowing fit and healthy people to catch the virus and come through it benefits the more vulnerable population and puts them [statistically] at less risk.

Also it is widely accepted this virus is mild for a large number of people, they may not even realise they've had it.

"Fifteenth SAGE meeting- March 13 2020: 'SAGE was unanimous that measures seeking to completely suppress spread of COVID-19 will cause a second peak.' 'Community testing is ending today.' 'The science suggests household isolation...of the elderly and vulnerable should be implemented soon.' "
 
I'm seeing tentative signs that we may have seen the worst of COVID.

The case figures for France and Spain seem to be showing signs of plateau. If we had today's testing regime back in March and April and plotted the cases graph, this current wave would be a mere ripple.

The fact that the rate of cases increase appears to be slowing in Spain and France suggests, to me, the virus is hitting the buffers naturally. This, in turn, suggests 2 things. 1) We are seeing an increase in asymptomatic spread or 2) We are rapidly approaching immunity threshold. The two may be interlinked.

My guess? I have a thought that whatever that dry cough bug was that ripped through Nov-Jan time was another coronavirus variant which has afforded some crossover T cell immunity to the wider community.
 
I don't think these numbers match the ones I see on worldometer.

What figures are you seeing? I haven't read that full article as it's paywalled, would be odd for the Times to get a basic thing like this wrong

The gov site says 4,368 cases today, I think the population is 66.5 million, and they said per 100,000, I think they may have meant per million as that would equal: [4368/ 66.5= 65.6] which then isn't a mile off their figure of 69 :confused:
 
What figures are you seeing? I haven't read that full article as it's paywalled, would be odd for the Times to get a basic thing like this wrong

The gov site says 4,368 cases today, I think the population is 66.5 million, and they said per 100,000, I think they may have meant per million as that would equal: [4368/ 66.5= 65.6] which then isn't a mile off their figure of 69 :confused:

I didn't realize it was daily cases, but it looks like per million. I didn't read the article either because of the paywall.

I'm using the Worldometer cases per 1 million and dividing it by 10

586.5/100K UK
872.5/100k Sweden
 
I didn't realize it was daily cases, but it looks like per million. I didn't read the article either because of the paywall.

I'm using the Worldometer cases per 1 million and dividing it by 10

586.5/100K UK
872.5/100k Sweden

Yes that looks about right, not sure though if our testing systems have been similar from the start of the outbreak.

63 deaths per 100,000 uk
and
sweden 59

so if the case figures are comparable [similar testing] they've had about 30% more cases and yet lower deaths.

Have achieved that using less a severe lockdown strategy, and so no extra deaths from untreated illnesses down the line, less depression and mental health problems from isolation and fear, fewer redundancies and bankrupt firms [less collateral damage for want of a better word]
 
Yes that looks about right, not sure though if our testing systems have been similar from the start of the outbreak.

63 deaths per 100,000 uk
and
sweden 59

so if the case figures are comparable [similar testing] they've had about 30% more cases and yet lower deaths.

Have achieved that using less a severe lockdown strategy, and so no extra deaths from untreated illnesses down the line, less depression and mental health problems from isolation and fear, fewer redundancies and bankrupt firms [less collateral damage for want of a better word]

I stopped listening to it once it became politicized. iirc was sometime in may. I'd have to go back in the thread to see but it seemed march/april was more unified.

Its the same here

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I was watching Robin Gill/Global News a couple days ago on Ontario restrictions.

 
Careful with that Karol Sikora guy.

Notorious for made-up institutions and qualifications. More of a quack than an actual professor.

Also has copious links to private healthcare providers and advocates the breaking up of the NHS.

Blocks anyone and everyone who challenges anything he says.

Famously got the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi released on compassionate grounds saying he had less than three months to live. He lived for nearly three years.



Also calls the NHS the 'last bastion of Communism', so I hope you've all got your private healthcare insurance premiums at the ready and, y'know, don't suffer from any pre-existing conditions.

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Oh yes and Imperial College London had to threaten him with legal action to stop him associating himself with them.

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And despite the wave of restrictions he rebuffed
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and
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calls to extend the furlough scheme - which ends on October 31 putting millions at risk of redundancy.

That's nice for some, especially when this intellectual made it "perhaps 6 months" for once, why not to add something bit more positive that "We will review and monitor situation closely and end of every month measure need of these different restrictions and act accordingly".

Of course for now losing jobs would maybe be a bad thing as now everything is out of governments control but all is caused by pandemic which seem to also have huge impact to our economy, even we had our "oven ready" trade deals and great Brexit planned but everybody dancing and singing got ruined because of COVID.

The PM warned the Army could be deployed to help boost numbers, saying: "We will provide the police and local authorities with the extra funding they need, a greater police presence on our streets and the option to draw on military support where required to free up the police."

Maybe it's cultural difference, but wouldn't really sound great in my ear when your country leader is threatening public with with own military troops. For sure everybody with some brain cells in head understand that if there are some huge problems, there are loads of police forces and possible assist of Army IF needed. Not make huge impression to shout these kind of things before these really are needed.
 
Johnson one year ago versus Johnson today.

ONE YEAR AGO - Bloody government telling everyone what to do and what not to do, I'll put a stop to that!

TODAY - Stay out too long for a beer and the soldiers are coming for you.

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Careful with that Karol Sikora guy.

Notorious for made-up institutions and qualifications. More of a quack than an actual professor.

Also has copious links to private healthcare providers and advocates the breaking up of the NHS.

Blocks anyone and everyone who challenges anything he says.

Famously got the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi released on compassionate grounds saying he had less than three months to live. He lived for nearly three years.



Also calls the NHS the 'last bastion of Communism', so I hope you've all got your private healthcare insurance premiums at the ready and, y'know, don't suffer from any pre-existing conditions.

View attachment 142162


Oh yes and Imperial College London had to threaten him with legal action to stop him associating himself with them.

View attachment 142164


This man has been the only sane voice since March in a sea of MSM and government scare tactics, lies and complete BS. , And he's been spot on with his predictions every step of the way unlike the government and most of their so called "experts"
 
I always thought a dystopian future would be cooler, like Judge Dredd.

Instead, we have Judge Judy
give it time, the virus might mutate into zombieness sooner or later; seems to be heading that way :D
 
Careful with that Karol Sikora guy.

Notorious for made-up institutions and qualifications. More of a quack than an actual professor.

Also has copious links to private healthcare providers and advocates the breaking up of the NHS.

Blocks anyone and everyone who challenges anything he says.

Famously got the Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi released on compassionate grounds saying he had less than three months to live. He lived for nearly three years.



Also calls the NHS the 'last bastion of Communism', so I hope you've all got your private healthcare insurance premiums at the ready and, y'know, don't suffer from any pre-existing conditions.

View attachment 142162


Oh yes and Imperial College London had to threaten him with legal action to stop him associating himself with them.

View attachment 142164


Nothing like a good bit of casual character assassination eh chop, rather than debating or discussing the merits or not of the letter, any ammunition against the other people involved with the letter?

-----------

"Karol Sikora was born in 1948. His father was a captain in the Polish Army who arrived in Great Britain during World War II[8] and his mother was a Scottish schoolteacher.[9] His childhood was spent in Edinburgh, Stafford and London.

He attended Dulwich College on a London County Council scholarship before going to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge where he became a Foundation Scholar and obtained a double first.[10] He received his PhD at Stanford University, where he also served a clinical fellowship.[11]"

"From 1985 to 1997, he served as the clinical director for cancer services at Hammersmith Hospital in London, where he established a cancer research laboratory, and was Professor of International Cancer Medicine at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, later the Imperial College School of Medicine.[13] During the 1990s Sikora was also deputy director of clinical research at charity the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, the predecessor to Cancer Research UK "


NB The Royal Postgraduate Medical School (RPMS) was an independent medical school, based primarily at Hammersmith Hospital in west London. In 1988, the school merged with the Institute of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, and in 1997 became part of Imperial College School of Medicine.

So the claim he has been fraudently making a link to imperial college is a distortion in the way you presented it, and the description "notorious for made-up qualifications and institutions" sounds a bit far fetched to me.

In 1997 he became the Chief of the Cancer Program of the World Health Organization
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before resigning in 1999 over a disagreement with the UN regarding their proposals to restructure work on non-communicable diseases, stating this would create a "top-heavy bureaucracy


The more I read the more based and principled he sounds, this is likely his beef with the NHS too if you think about it. Doctors want to treat patients with the least interference from overpaid pen pushers.

Sikora has published over 300 papers and written or edited 20 books,
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notably the "standard" UK postgraduate textbook Treatment of Cancer


In a 2017 Newsnight opinion piece, he described the NHS as "the last bastion of communism - it is a monolithic, unmanageable and inefficient system [...] the staff are great but the system is not"

^ so that is the context to that comment, and many would agree the NHS needs reform, if the german french, and other health systems etc are routinely achieving better results in outcomes and waiting times.

The Scottish government confirmed Sikora's report was not used by the Scottish Justice Minister in making the decision to release Megrahi, which was instead based on their own medical reports and input from the parole board and governor.

It was likely a political decision, but the man had a terminal illness.
 
No offense, but seriously. This should have been done long ago.

Masks will become compulsory for shop and pub staff from Monday and taxi passengers from Thursday - while the fine for failing to wear one, or breaking the 'rule of six' on gatherings, will double to £200 for a first offence.

I know workers that have to wear a mask all day long at their jobs which is why I don't complain about wearing one because my total accumulated time of wearing one is less than an hour a day when running errands.
 

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