Off Topic Thread 4.0

I can't believe some of the quotes coming out of the UK right now.

The UK Only Realised "In The Last Few Days" That Its Coronavirus Strategy Would "Likely Result In Hundreds of Thousands of Deaths"

We were expecting herd immunity to build. We now realise it’s not possible to cope with that," said Professor Azra Ghani, chair of infectious diseases epidemiology at Imperial.

This is what happens when only 'yes' people exist among your government and your main adviser is a weirdo armchair eugenicist.

This is the absolute worst possible time for the UK to have ended up with a jokeshop 'brexit' government and a PM absolutely no one trusts.

Neil3030

Really hope they can come up with a safe way for either football or rugby to play behind closed doors with a skeleton crew for broadcast/medical care etc. Having some contemporary event not involving this bleeping virus would be such a boost.

Never have the words of the great Michael Parkinson rang so true, "Sport is important because it's not important."

Neil3030

Ah here...

15,000 cases projected for Ireland by the end of the month?

Netherlands giving up and opting for herd immunity?

How the F did Europe screw this up sooo badly?

sydthebeat

Neil3030 wrote: »

Ah here...

15,000 cases projected for Ireland by the end of the month?

Netherlands giving up and opting for herd immunity?

How the F did Europe screw this up sooo badly?

We'll never know how many cases are here already, as we're not testing every case.

There could certainly be 15,000 cases already in the country.

However if everyone isolates and keeps contact with others to a minimum we can significant reduce the spread to a manageable level.

UK not closing schools is mind bogglingly stupid..... Another on their list of mind bogglingly stupid decisions.

Hopefully after this we see the end of populist government's like bojo and the donald

errlloyd

swiwi_ wrote: »

What will be interesting is if medical ethics has to take a role: X number of intensive care beds with X+Y patients. Who gets the beds: youngest? fittest? richest? private insurance? celebrity? healthcare workers? drawing of lots?

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/who-gets-hospital-bed/607807/

It will happen. It is happening. And some junior doctor barely out of school will probably end up doing it.

Former Former

sydthebeat wrote: »

Hopefully after this we see the end of populist government's like bojo and the donald

I would fear the opposite, that we'd be more likely to see populism rise again. This is going to be a long slog. Once the virus recedes, the economic damage will remain. High unemployment, high taxes, reduced services... People will be angry and so it's ripe for someone to come along and exploit that.

thomasdylan

errlloyd wrote: »

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/who-gets-hospital-bed/607807/

It will happen. It is happening. And some junior doctor barely out of school will probably end up doing it.

I'd be surprised if anyone under reg level has to make the very difficult decisions.

errlloyd

thomasdylan wrote: »

I'd be surprised if anyone under reg level has to make the very difficult decisions.

I mean hopefully the decision is made on high. A set of quite strict guidelines are outlined and no individual ever has to "make" the decision. They just enforce the policy.

Buer

Former Former wrote: »

I would fear the opposite, that we'd be more likely to see populism rise again. This is going to be a long slog. Once the virus recedes, the economic damage will remain. High unemployment, high taxes, reduced services... People will be angry and so it's ripe for someone to come along and exploit that.

Agreed. There's a big opportunity for extremist elements to make their play right now. There's scope to blame others for the mess and fall out. Every decision can be scrutinised and spun.

This situation could be an exceptionally uniting period or result in huge division. Trump and Johnson may be casualties of the situation eventually but who is to say that a half dozen other nations won't introduce right wing governments which will balance that.

There's a ready made vehicle here to blame other cultures and nations for the virus infiltrating a society and the economic fall out. We've already seen people are very happy to get on board with such notions.

stephen_n

A quick glance at twitter would show that this is as polarizing as anything else. The people that believe the Tories were deliberately sacrificing lives. Then those who believe firmly now that they were operating on the best British scientific advice. That this isn’t a U-Turn just the next phase of the plan. Most of those would appear to be Brexit supporters. As yet they haven’t found a way to blame Johhny foreigner, but they will. Just look at Trumps it’s a Chinese disease.

awec

Disney+ due to launch here later this month. I reckon if they could bump their release date up until now they'd make a clean fortune!

Squidgy Black

Varadker making a State of the Nation announcement at 9, almost guaranteed to be announcing the lockdown along with the Garda's new public order force.

thomond2006

Squidgy Black wrote: »

Varadker making a State of the Nation announcement at 9, almost guaranteed to be announcing the lockdown along with the Garda's new public order force.

Nothing too much in terms of changes, but that was a top class speech.

Squidgy Black

thomond2006 wrote: »

Nothing too much in terms of changes, but that was a top class speech.

Yeah I have to give it to him, he's a very good orator.

sydthebeat

thomond2006 wrote: »

Nothing too much in terms of changes, but that was a top class speech.

Completely.

It was an excellent, reassuring speech

Its at a time like this im quite glad we've a doctor as a leader of the country.

Zzippy

Reading between the lines. That speech was an attempt to prepare people for a big shock. They expect the hospitals to be overwhelmed, no two ways about it. This is just preparing the ground.
Mate's wife is in ICU and says the patients they are seeing are "very very sick". Wife knows a Dublin GP who said he thinks it is already widespread in the community there. These aren't WhatsApp rumours, this is the impression of two people dealing directly with this thing.
Varadkar is in an awful position. He knows what's coming but can't spell it out without being criticised for causing panic. Whoever wrote the speech did a fine job too.

swiwi_

Yip that was a pretty decent speech. Looks at the camera too, doesn’t give the impression of having something to hide, no obvious ego.

awec

I thought it was an excellent speech. Well written, delivered well, the right message delivered in the right way. The right balance of reassurance and reality.

I think at this point we need to avoid unnecessary negative speculation, it doesn't help anyone. We have to remember that even doctors, nurses and what not can be affected by this stuff.

ClanofLams

Very grateful a new govt hadn’t been formed before this.

Not sure if there is a constitutional requirement to form new govt within a certain timeframe following election but ideally current govt would stay in place until this is over or well under control at least, even if that is months.

Zzippy

awec wrote: »

I think at this point we need to avoid unnecessary negative speculation, it doesn't help anyone. We have to remember that even doctors, nurses and what not can be affected by this stuff.

On the contrary. Too many people need a wake up call and to realise how serious this is. No point people thinking this isn't too bad and relaxing their social distancing, or not engaging in it. Time is critical here and even a small number of people being blase about it can spread this thing beyond the capacity of the country to cope. Medical staff are well aware of what's coming and most of them want the rest of us to do everything we can to help them out. Fear is a powerful motivator.

awec

Yea I don't mean being relaxed about it. But there's a lot of guff going about that can negatively affect people's mental health for no reason.

I thought Varadkar came across very statesmanlike tonight. I thought it was comforting, but also gave people a sense of the serious of what was about to hit.

Richie_Rich89

When did Varadkar say they were expecting it to hit 15000 cases?

If it increases by 30% every day after that, one month after 15000, there'll be over 23 million cases here. Scary stuff.

Zzippy

Richie_Rich89 wrote: »

When did Varadkar say they were expecting it to hit 15000 cases?

If it increases by 30% every day after that, one month after 15000, there'll be over 23 million cases here. Scary stuff.

The whole point about social distancing is to reduce that 30% to as close to 0% as possible, as fast as possible. Cases will rise very quickly now as it is already in the community and many people are unknowingly infected and spreading it to their families. But after a few weeks of social distancing that increase will hopefully slow rapidly, as those infected are just not coming into close contact with people outside their household. It does require huge buy in and discipline from the population though...

awec

23 million cases in Ireland would truly be a shocking statistic, for a nation with a population of less than 5 million.

Richie_Rich89

Maybe we should all buy gas masks for when we're out and about?

https://www.ebay.ie/itm/Polish-Military-Gas-Mask-MP-4-Genuine-respiratory-chemical-Grey-Olive-NEW/274265187896?hash=item3fdb7aa638:m:mzplDzx3o3q2PQUSsItNEJA

Neil3030

awec wrote: »

Yea I don't mean being relaxed about it. But there's a lot of guff going about that can negatively affect people's mental health for no reason.

I thought Varadkar came across very statesmanlike tonight. I thought it was comforting, but also gave people a sense of the serious of what was about to hit.

It's not easy. You have a population who are not taking this seriously and they need a kick up the arse. You have another population who are terrified and need to be reassured that the virus is not an automatic death sentence and that we will get through this. Any specific message for one will serve the opposing purpose with the other.

Thought Leo did pretty well last night. There was nothing enormously new about it but just projecting an air of competence, letting people know the actions that are being taken, hammering home the seriousness of the situation is worth something (edit - actually it's worth a lot) and I hope people take that message on board.

aloooof

Interesting (if worrying) tweet:

https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1239041092978343937

errlloyd

aloooof wrote: »

Interesting (if worrying) tweet:

https://twitter.com/DrEricDing/status/1239041092978343937

This is surely way more a combination of how the symptoms present and social dynamics rather than the attributes of the virus.

aloooof

errlloyd wrote: »

This is surely way more a combination of how the symptoms present and social dynamics rather than the attributes of the virus.

Agreed, it'd be useful if that was cross-referenced with demographics for the total numbers tested to get something more meaningful.

Seems the panic buying is worse in the UK than we are seeing here. I think the lack of leadership is a big part of this.

Leo's speech was important for a lot of reasons, but for those of us with relatives or family who are front line healthcare workers it was an important reminder to us to completely look after them while they are dealing with this surge of patients we have coming.

My local Tesco in Phibsborough was reasonably well stocked last night. I think it could be because it has a tiny tiny car park so most traffic to it is on foot but there was loads of toilet roll for example, there was fresh veg, I bought bread, eggs, milk etc.

Squidgy Black

I think stability plays a big part in the lack of panic buying as well. Our government have come out and said supply chains will remain operating, our economy isn't under stress due to external factors (yet), we've rolled out strong policies for those in need and backing for anyone under financial strain, and leadership are taking proactive steps to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Compare that to Bojo and Co, with an economy under stress already from Brexit and no clear strategy being relayed to the people, it's going to cause the population to panic and fear the worst.

Bazzo

Supermarkets are cleaned out here, was in 2 massive Asdas and an Aldi yesterday no milk, no bread, no rice, no pasta, very little fruit and veg fresh or frozen. Got some milk in the small co-op across the road thank ****

Squidgy Black

Squidgy Black wrote: »

I think stability plays a big part in the lack of panic buying as well. Our government have come out and said supply chains will remain operating, our economy isn't under stress due to external factors (yet), we've rolled out strong policies for those in need and backing for anyone under financial strain, and leadership are taking proactive steps to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Compare that to Bojo and Co, with an economy under stress already from Brexit and no clear strategy being relayed to the people, it's going to cause the population to panic and fear the worst.

What policies are these?

Squidgy Black

[Deleted User] wrote: »

What policies are these?

Welfare pay of 305 a week for anyone who's been tested and confirmed to have the virus, 6 weeks emergency jobseekers at the full rate for anyone laid off as a result of businesses temporarily closing. Add to that the supports being rolled out to elderly/sick people and the speed we're mobilising testing at compared to the likes of the UK and US, we're currently at 6 to 7 times more tests per capita in the same period.

I'm expecting we'll also see a further announcement about Donohoe's meeting with the banks.

Neil3030

What's the plan for Croker, would a big carpark and a marquee not do the trick?

Squidgy Black

Neil3030 wrote: »

What's the plan for Croker, would a big carpark and a marquee not do the trick?

It's already in place apparently, they're testing 400 a day or something by appointment. You drive in to the tunnel where the buses go in under the stands and they've 8 bays or so where you park up and they take an oral and nasal test.

Synode

Yeah there's a video of it going round WhatsApp

Neil3030

Neil3030 wrote: »

What's the plan for Croker, would a big carpark and a marquee not do the trick?

Possibly but why not use the facility that's there already? There's a video as mentioned, it's drive-thru testing, you don't even need to get out of your car. Seems a pretty good setup.

swiwi_

The anti-vaccination lobby will have their work cut out for them...

Dave_The_Sheep

swiwi_ wrote: »

The anti-vaccination lobby will have their work cut out for them...

Couple of those silly whatsapp groups I'm in, I have (some of the) people who are anti-vaccers and they're still going on about "keeping that **** away from me". Vaccines, that is, not the virus. The mind boggles given what's gone on.

You can't reason with these f*ckers.

swiwi_

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

Couple of those silly whatsapp groups I'm in, I have (some of the) people who are anti-vaccers and they're still going on about "keeping that **** away from me". Vaccines, that is, not the virus. The mind boggles given what's gone on.

You can't reason with these f*ckers.

I’m sure St Peter at the pearly gates will be up for a debate

Squidgy Black

Squidgy Black wrote: »

Welfare pay of 305 a week for anyone who's been tested and confirmed to have the virus, 6 weeks emergency jobseekers at the full rate for anyone laid off as a result of businesses temporarily closing. Add to that the supports being rolled out to elderly/sick people and the speed we're mobilising testing at compared to the likes of the UK and US, we're currently at 6 to 7 times more tests per capita in the same period.

I'm expecting we'll also see a further announcement about Donohoe's meeting with the banks.

Yup.

https://www.thejournal.ie/banks-mortages-loans-paschal-5049764-Mar2020/

thomond2006

Tom Brady's association with the Patriots are no more. It's going to be odd watching Brady line out for the Buccaneers.

What does our resident bucsfan think?

Dave_The_Sheep

swiwi_ wrote: »

I’m sure St Peter at the pearly gates will be up for a debate

Most of them aren't the ones that'll die, though, that's the problem - others die for their stupidity.

errlloyd

Had a digital session with the physio this morning, he told me he has to give me a program and leave me to it because he has effectively been drafted into the HSE. He said most physios will just take over outpatient, to free up the regular hospital physios to move on to more serious stuff, but he has ICU experience so fair play to him.

Heard 20,000 people volunteered in the last day to help the HSE. Ireland might never go to war again, but I imagine this is vaguely what it would feel like.

prawnsambo

The Chinese have reported that they've had very good success rates treating people with a Japanese developed flu treatment.

Patients who were given the medicine in Shenzhen turned negative for the virus after a median of four days after becoming positive, compared with a median of 11 days for those who were not treated with the drug, public broadcaster NHK said.

In addition, X-rays confirmed improvements in lung condition in about 91% of the patients who were treated with favipiravir, compared to 62% for those without the drug.

errlloyd

prawnsambo wrote: »

The Chinese have reported that they've had very good success rates treating people with a Japanese developed flu treatment.

The second sentence is the good one. 60% 90% percent improved. or if inverted it means that 40% of people had lunch problems previously now only 10% do. A huge result for what could be the biggest burden on medical resources.

aloooof

errlloyd wrote: »

Had a digital session with the physio this morning, he told me he has to give me a program and leave me to it because he has effectively been drafted into the HSE. He said most physios will just take over outpatient, to free up the regular hospital physios to move on to more serious stuff, but he has ICU experience so fair play to him.

Heard 20,000 people volunteered in the last day to help the HSE. Ireland might never go to war again, but I imagine this is vaguely what it would feel like.

Saw somewhere on twitter as well (it's hard to keep track of all the content) that 24 doctors were coming home from Australia to help here. It's pretty amazing stuff.