Coronavirus

[Graham Breeze]

On reflection I am fortunate to be able to report the misdeeds of youth.

In my bright yellow top and on my bright orange bike (even the two bottles are orange) and in clear weather and on the right line to turn second left (ie straight on) and having given a hand signal a BMW still decided to zoom into the roundabout as I passed round.

I don't know whether he hadn't seen me at all or thought he could nip in front of me but the screech of his brakes when he realised he was going to hit me would have wakened the dead. As I disdainfully looked down, his bumper was no more than two feet from my left foot. Even at 30mph a car will do about 44 feet in one second so not knocking me off and under his car by merely 2 feet is cutting it a bit fine. I have been knocked off my bike and I try to avoid it.

I admit I sometimes misjudge things on my bike but on this occasion I felt the expletive I directed was warranted.

[Mike T]

I didn't see the briefing, but how do they come to that figure? They are reporting circa 2000 a day, so of course there is some extrapolation involved as they don't test everyone that gets it, but there has to be a lot of guesswork and where are the "hotspots" because the whole of North West England is down to less than 100 confirmed cases every day now, with large areas reporting 0.
That's more than 10% of he UK population.

In March and April my facebook was full of people self-isolating, unconfirmed mostly. I haven't seen one this month.

Something doesn't add up.

The 8,000 cases a day is based on the random testing program that is ongoing.

[Mike T]

Mike . Does it need explanation?

The reality is covid was here long before the first cases were official. The symptom checkers were way oversimplified.

We were then told not to report it unless desperate because of perennially claimed “ overstretched” medical resources. So nobody knows how many cases are happening outside official channels.

This is true everywhere. When we had it in Portugal we were told not to report it, when Portugal had only 100 cases I’m official channels, we seemed to know half of them! and their symptom checker was no better than here.

So there is official world and parallel world everywhere. Italian statistics agency was saying the ultimate view of current death toll could be double the amount already claimed. No idea where they think the difference is.

I also wonder how many are exposed who are disposed not to get it, not just those who have it but are assymptomatic.
It will be years if ever before a true picture evolves,

It would be very helpful to know if people are getting it in shops, on public transport, at petrol stations, from teenagers in groups who take it home to their parents and siblings, from adult groups from more than one household meeting up too closely in parks/backyards, groups of walkers/cyclists/motorcyclist/runners - is it refuse collectors, postmen and women - if we knew we could then take the appropriate measures. It is probably a mixture of all of the above, so some cases will be because people are breaking the rules, and some from people despite doing their best to follow the rules.
Now that we are unlocking, it will make it harder to get to the source of each case, particularly as test/trace/isolate is far from up and running.

[Stagger]

On reflection I am fortunate to be able to report the misdeeds of youth.

In my bright yellow top and on my bright orange bike (even the two bottles are orange) and in clear weather and on the right line to turn second left (ie straight on) and having given a hand signal a BMW still decided to accelerate into the roundabout as I passed round.

I don't know whether he hadn't seen me at all or thought he could nip in front of me but the screech of his brakes when he realised he was going to hit me would have wakened the dead. As I disdainfully looked down his bumper was no more than two feet from my left foot. If he was accelerating at only 15 mph he will do about 22 feet in one second so not knocking me off and under his car by merely 2 feet is cutting it a bit fine. I have been knocked off my bike and I try to avoid it.

I admit I sometimes misjudge things on my bike but on this occasion I felt the expletive I directed was warranted.

Glad you are safe after the nearest of misses.

I too dress in the most visible colour in an attempt to avoid motorist. But like Cummings most appear to need a trip to the castle to test their eyes.

Black cycling gear and you could have been a goner Mr B.

[Witton Park]

The 8,000 cases a day is based on the random testing program that is ongoing.

Yes I've seen it now on the BBC website.

Seems lacking in clarity and explanation to me.

This is from the ONS.

Around 7% have been infected anti-body tests "suggest". That's from 885 people on 26th April.

From these 885 tests they come up with the 7% - on what basis? It doesn't say.

The "same household survey" carried out a swab test to detect presence of virus on "many more people" 19,000 people, 9000 households.

"Between 11 and 24 May, the swab tests of 36 people came back positive from the snapshot survey of households."

It really is all over the place.

If it was the same household survey, how have we jumped from April to May?

The 885 is nowhere near enough to make a judgement.

From the these tests the ONS estimates there are 54,000 weekly infections - but weekly when? Back in April, in early May, or now.

This reporting is absolutely shambolic.

If I get chance later I'll maybe have a dig around on the ONS because from what I can see it doesn't stack up.

[molehill]

I don't follow the figures closely but I can see they are something of a mish-mash that raise more questions than provide answers.
To give out national figures on cases prefixed by the words "could be" should not be taken as gospel. The virus is in all kinds of different infection stages in different parts of the country, we have no sign of it here yet are preparing for a zombie apocalypse to come up the valley!

I fear the virus may still have some surprises in store, the one thing that does keep recurring is how little we understand about it. It could get be harder to beat than we think.

[Oracle]

It would be very helpful to know if people are getting it in shops, on public transport, at petrol stations, from teenagers in groups who take it home to their parents and siblings, from adult groups from more than one household meeting up too closely in parks/backyards, groups of walkers/cyclists/motorcyclist/runners - is it refuse collectors, postmen and women - if we knew we could then take the appropriate measures. It is probably a mixture of all of the above, so some cases will be because people are breaking the rules, and some from people despite doing their best to follow the rules.
Now that we are unlocking, it will make it harder to get to the source of each case, particularly as test/trace/isolate is far from up and running.

True.

But I do not think even the basics of risk assessment have been done, before look for complexity:

Starting with the lunacy of sainsbury mixing the most vulnerable with NHS workers on priority times. Thankfully they saw the error of their ways!

A few other examples.

- I have lost count of the number of dogs off leads I have seen running to and from other dogs and people. A sweaty dog is a bug factory. Dogs should have been kept on leads.

- The refusal to allow one time bags in supermarkets now has a payback. I see people fingering fruit and veg before select the ones they want. I see checkout operators touching the same. Those products have been touched by many hands.

- Many delivery procedures are not bug free. They are one way traffic for bugs from sender to recipient.

- Much of the nation is still at work. Sure they are self isolating those with symptoms, but as we already know many are assymptomatic. Is it really possible to keep contaminated droplets out of confined space air systems?

- Following that line of reasoning, then locking people up 23/7 in cities, in buildings whose air systems pass the bugs around has not helped. Those are people who would normally spend far more hours outside in parks but were moved on by police.

And there for me is the issue.

I never saw it as practical to keep the virus out.
Sweden has not suffered by accepting that reality.

And I do not think the processes in such as south korea are responsible for their lack of cases. By the time south korea became aware of cases, it would have been too late to halt the spread from them.

Brazil is interesting because of the prevalence of asthma there. But no single factor seems sufficient to identify winners and losers in COVID.

What is certain is england is the highest population density country in europe with belgium running close second , and london is bigger than paris and berlin put together. That factor was always going to put England (and belgium )high up the list.

From the first , It was my opinion that we should have drawn a ring fence be drawn round the vulnerable and elderly (ie such as care homes) without the option for over seventies to leave home, but then let it burn out in the general population without destroying the economy or education of a generation.

The problem is of course, without reliable tests for carriers, or antibodies, even drawing the ring fence is not easy. Because carers need to visit regardless

[anthonykay]

On reflection I am fortunate to be able to report the misdeeds of youth.

In my bright yellow top and on my bright orange bike (even the two bottles are orange) and in clear weather and on the right line to turn second left (ie straight on) and having given a hand signal a BMW still decided to zoom into the roundabout as I passed round.

I don't know whether he hadn't seen me at all or thought he could nip in front of me but the screech of his brakes when he realised he was going to hit me would have wakened the dead. As I disdainfully looked down, his bumper was no more than two feet from my left foot. Even at 30mph a car will do about 44 feet in one second so not knocking me off and under his car by merely 2 feet is cutting it a bit fine. I have been knocked off my bike and I try to avoid it.

I admit I sometimes misjudge things on my bike but on this occasion I felt the expletive I directed was warranted.

It's just coming up to the tenth anniversary of an incident that happened to me, that was almost identical to yours -- except that the car did hit me. From the Police report, it would appear that he did see me, and thought he could nip in before me; obviously had no idea of how fast cyclists can move. I was quite badly concussed, and a lot of grazes and bruises, but no serious damage; discharged from hospital about 8 hours later. His insurance premium for the following year would have been somewhat higher, after I got the CTC legal aid team onto the case (the Police said they didn't have enough evidence to prosecute).

[Stagger]

The claim is 200,000 per day are now tested.

Positive news.

[Witton Park]

Yes I've seen it now on the BBC website.

Seems lacking in clarity and explanation to me.

This is from the ONS.

Around 7% have been infected anti-body tests "suggest". That's from 885 people on 26th April.

From these 885 tests they come up with the 7% - on what basis? It doesn't say.

The "same household survey" carried out a swab test to detect presence of virus on "many more people" 19,000 people, 9000 households.

"Between 11 and 24 May, the swab tests of 36 people came back positive from the snapshot survey of households."

It really is all over the place.

If it was the same household survey, how have we jumped from April to May?

The 885 is nowhere near enough to make a judgement.

From the these tests the ONS estimates there are 54,000 weekly infections - but weekly when? Back in April, in early May, or now.

This reporting is absolutely shambolic.

If I get chance later I'll maybe have a dig around on the ONS because from what I can see it doesn't stack up.

I haven't had chance to look at the ONS to check, but I have seen critique of the 8000 figure.

It is claimed that the figure is an average. ONS have taken the results of their surveys and calculated the average number of daily cases to 24th May.

So if that is the case and it's an 8000 average, by the path the infection rate is taking the situation at the end of the period would be well below the 8000 average, if it is accepted that the calculation of the ONS holds water.

It also seems quite misleading to present it as "we have 8000 daily new cases...." at the end of May.