The UK response to Covid-19 [MOD WARNING 1ST POST]

S.M.B.

theological wrote: »

The government have a stockpile of PPE ready. Bed capacity is sorted with the Nightingale hospitals which are already standing empty. I'm pretty sure they've thought about call handling at this stage also.

I'm happy to engage with valid and justified criticism, but I don't think this is. Having spare tracing capacity is a good thing.

According to your logic you are saying having even more NHS capacity in preparation for the second wave is a bad thing so.

theological

S.M.B. wrote: »

According to your logic you are saying having even more NHS capacity in preparation for the second wave is a bad thing so.

The logic is just damned if you do and damned if you don't.

If more capacity was built up, you'd have Joe_Public complaining about more resources going to waste.

As I say, if the criticism is reasonable then I'm all for it, but a lot of the criticism on this thread isn't reasonable.

Donald Trump

theological wrote: »

The logic is just damned if you do and damned if you don't.

If more capacity was built up, you'd have Joe_Public complaining about more resources going to waste.

As I say, if the criticism is reasonable then I'm all for it, but a lot of the criticism on this thread isn't reasonable.

Hi Theo,


While your argument can be framed to appear "logical" I cannot believe that you cannot see the flaws in it. People are merely saying it is a mismanagement of resources because there are other more pressing matters that maybe should have been prioritized and taken care of first.




As an analogy, cycling is a good exercise and bicycle lanes make cycling safer. So nobody could argue that in general, all else equal, it is not better to have more cycling lanes than less.

However if the new government decided to ignore the current housing crisis and slashed budgets pertaining to housing and instead used all their resources to add cycling lanes to every single road and laneway in the country, nobody would say that that was an appropriate use of resources.

theological

If you are aware that there could well be a second wave in the epidemic in the autumn and the winter, it is sensible to know that one can scale up contact tracing in the event it is needed.

If I'm to take the slightly bemusing bike example, it would be like realising that there is a strong possibility that the uptake of cycling in the autumn would be so great because more and more people need to get to work, or that there is going to be a potential for a mass influx of cyclists

I'm yet to see what these "more pressing matters" are. The ones that have been mentioned by others already seem to be sorted capacity wise.

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

The logic is just damned if you do and damned if you don't.

If more capacity was built up, you'd have Joe_Public complaining about more resources going to waste.

As I say, if the criticism is reasonable then I'm all for it, but a lot of the criticism on this thread isn't reasonable.

Again with the straw manning. Writing my replies now as well as interpreting them.

If you can find where i explicitly stated excess capacity was a bad thing, then point to it and I'll instantly retract and we can all get on.

The point is and has been very simple, if 25,000 people are sitting on their butts with nothing to do, then there is a breakdown in the system somewhere. The response that all is good because we might need them in the winter is pretty abject with all due respect.

According to your off cited kcl tracker, there are currently 120,000 or so people with c19 in the uk. Daily new symptomatic cases are running at 2,300 or thereabouts.

And yet, positive cases are returning at less than half that and a smaller fraction again are being registered for tracing. Why is this the case? Why are you passing empty testing centres when there are hundreds of new people showing symptoms every day?

Last week Keir Starmer pointed these facts out at pmqs and Boris Johnson lied that the "vast majority" of cases were being traced before embarrassing himself again by not knowing other countries had launched apps.

But, hey, look, we have 25,000 tracers, more than any other country in the world. Thousands of extra critical care beds (without the staff to actually cater for them but never mind). A billion zillion tests every day. The system is dysfunctional but the figures are world beating, that's all that matters.

Dave0301

Joe_ Public wrote: »

According to your off cited kcl tracker, there are currently 120,000 or so people with c19 in the uk. Daily new symptomatic cases are running at 2,300 or thereabouts.

And yet, positive cases are returning at less than half that and a smaller fraction again are being registered for tracing. Why is this the case? Why are you passing empty testing centres when there are hundreds of new people showing symptoms every day?

From the man himself on number of people tested.

https://twitter.com/Haggis_UK/status/1277863090080698369

Donald Trump

theological wrote: »

If you are aware that there could well be a second wave in the epidemic in the autumn and the winter, it is sensible to know that one can scale up contact tracing in the event it is needed.

If I'm to take the slightly bemusing bike example, it would be like realising that there is a strong possibility that the uptake of cycling in the autumn would be so great because more and more people need to get to work, or that there is going to be a potential for a mass influx of cyclists

I'm yet to see what these "more pressing matters" are. The ones that have been mentioned by others already seem to be sorted capacity wise.

Hi Theo,


If they were paying 25,000 people to sit at a desk and twiddle their thumbs for 6 months, perhaps they could have instead decided to pay 5000 to twiddle their thumbs and organised the other 20,000 to do 6 months training as some kind of nurses aid or similar. Perhaps trained them in hygiene so that they could go into hospitals in 6 months to take charge of cleaning and disinfecting and allow the fully trained nurses to take care of patients. Or even trained them to go into nursing homes and look after the older people in a safe manner.


By September then you'd have an extra 20k people with useful skills. Rather than an extra 20k people who know how to answer a phone and know how to contract trace 1 person ever 2 weeks. (You can keep the 5k others over the Summer as a kind of glorified FAS scheme if you really want to for whatever reason)






(As for cycling analogy, that's up to you. If Boris Johnson opined that it would be a good idea to close Beaumont and use the money to put cycle lanes on all the backroads in Co. Longford, you'd no doubt say it was a genius idea in combating corona...)

Acosta

Dave0301 wrote: »

From the man himself on number of people tested.

https://twitter.com/Haggis_UK/status/1277863090080698369

It's a congested leaderboard, but Hancock has to be in the running for biggest twat of the pandemic.

Seth Brundle

Acosta wrote: »

It's a congested leaderboard, but Hancock has to be in the running for biggest twat of the pandemic.

Nonsense. He's played a blinder when compared to his leader who thought it was fine to not just shake hands with people who had the virus but to actually tell the world that he thought that was ok to shake hands with those people.
Then the idiot somehow managed to catch the virus.
:rolleyes:

RobMc59

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Nonsense. He's played a blinder when compared to his leader who thought it was fine to not just shake hands with people who had the virus but to actually tell the world that he thought that was ok to shake hands with those people.
Then the idiot somehow managed to catch the virus.
:rolleyes:

Dominic Cummings has got to be amongst the favourites

Acosta

Seth Brundle wrote: »

Nonsense. He's played a blinder when compared to his leader who thought it was fine to not just shake hands with people who had the virus but to actually tell the world that he thought that was ok to shake hands with those people.
Then the idiot somehow managed to catch the virus.
:rolleyes:

Well yes. It's BJs to lose, but as I said it's a congested leaderboard. But Charlie Brooker could do a hour long special out of Hancock interviews alone since this began.

A Dub in Glasgo

https://twitter.com/RP131/status/1277982556667797505

Enzokk

theological wrote: »

SMB, I think you can see in this post rather clearly that he is criticising having the capacity to spare.

Joe Public - I still think having people to spare in the event of further outbreaks is the right thing to do. There is nothing to say that we won't need this capacity further on particularly as winter approaches. This just looks like criticising for criticisms sake.

This is a interesting strategy, attack what the poster didn't say. Are you sure you want to go down that track? This criticism isn't just for its own sake though, if you have people not doing anything now how do you expect them to be up to the task when it becomes critical in a few months time?

theological wrote: »

The government have a stockpile of PPE ready. Bed capacity is sorted with the Nightingale hospitals which are already standing empty. I'm pretty sure they've thought about call handling at this stage also.

I'm happy to engage with valid and justified criticism, but I don't think this is. Having spare tracing capacity is a good thing.

Did we ever find out why the Nightingale Hospital only had around 50-100 patients in total? I still wonder how you can add 4000 beds in London alone that would need acute care and therefor more nurses per patient than in a ward. This at a time when there is a shortage of nurses in the NHS. So I still wonder if the reason the Nightingale was left mostly empty had more to do with staff than fewer cases.

This sort of comes back down to the contact tracers argument, its great to have an extra 10 000 extra beds, but what use are they if staff isn't available to allow you to fill the beds? Let us not forget the UK changed their procedures on PPE because of the stock levels they had and not with safety and best practices in mind.

So while it is great to have so many available tracers, are they really useful when they will be needed or are they only something for the government to use to shield themselves from criticism, like you have done on here now?


As for some other interesting bits, this twitter thread on the numbers and how the numbers being released doesn't show the whole picture,

Thread

https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status/1277960112691273728?s=20

Basically again the UK Government is using numbers in a way that seems more intent on misleading people than present the clear picture.

And another story, Johnson has said he wants to do a job much like Roosevelt during the Great Depression to rebuild the UK economy with a plan to spend £5bn on the economy. I am sure we will hear how great this is and how big it is and how it is the biggest and best plan and measures of any country, much like how no other country in the world has a working tracing app (he lied, there are apps out there being used right now).

https://twitter.com/Geoelte_Spinne/status/1277927545669902336?s=20

But can Merkel do push-ups and speak in Latin?

theological

You can see using the data as to how many intensive care beds were required at the peak on the BETA coronavirus dashboard on Public Health England.

In a crisis with unknowns it would have been unwise and negligent not to ensure capacity in the event that the spike was worse than it was. We would have had posts from people on here berating in the opposite direction. Hence my comment about the government in many cases being damned if they do and damned if they don't.

There are a lot of fair criticisms that can be made, and criticisms I'd join with you on. But criticising the government for freeing up too much capacity isn't a reasonable criticism.

Joe_ Public

One stat i recall from early on that stays with me was Germany having more spare critical care beds than the total number of critical care beds the UK had in its entire system. Again no one is suggesting that the extra capacity wasnt a good and very necessary thing and the UK was paying for long standing historical failures that placed it in a poor position. According to nhs data, 25,000 patients were discharged into care homes between 17 march and 16 april, many thousands without being tested, and the criteria for hospital admission was stiffened. That definitely helped with the capacity issue anyway, if only seeding an even deeper crisis elsewhere.

CelticRambler

Enzokk wrote: »

Did we ever find out why the Nightingale Hospital only had around 50-100 patients in total?

Yes, we do: they couldn't find enough doctors and specialist nurses to treat any more than that, mainly because those with the right training - believe it or not - were already working flat out in existing ICUs. In the time it took the government to realise that even temporary hospitals need qualified staff, the regular hospitals had figured out how to re-purpose operating theatres, day-care facilities and store rooms.

But hey, at least they had a 4000 spare-bed capacity in a deeply flawed environment, and a few thousand people sitting around waiting to push trolleys if ever they were needed.

fr336

Anyone nervous for the weekend? Well not the weekend itself but two weeks down the line. I don't trust us as a nation (the UK) to not mess things up completely. I'm talking about packing into bars, some bars not taking proper precautions, the list goes on. We will be more like the US than Ireland or Europe.

Timberrrrrrrr

fr336 wrote: »

Anyone nervous for the weekend? Well not the weekend itself but two weeks down the line. I don't trust us as a nation (the UK) to not mess things up completely. I'm talking about packing into bars, some bars not taking proper precautions, the list goes on. We will be more like the US than Ireland or Europe.

All my local bars have pretty much the same thing as this on their FB pages

To accommodate the new government guidelines, we've had to make a few changes to control a temporary limited capacity and alcohol consumption.

These include new temporary opening hours and a booking system!

Walk ins are welcome but we cannot guarantee entry if capacity has been met, so please book a slot in increments of 2 hours for a maximum of no more than 4 people! You can do this by using the "book now" button at the top of our facebook page. (Please wait for confirmation before arriving!)

Temporary opening hours

Monday - Thursday, 2pm - 11pm
Friday - Saturday, 2pm - midnight
Sunday - 2pm - 11pm

(Last orders will be called 30 minutes before closing)

Hi Everyone,

We are so happy to be able to re-open on Saturday and can't wait to see you all. We have missed almost all of your faces so everyone will be welcome 🀣🀣🀣🀣🀣🀣🀣🀣.

Things will look a little different however and we really hope you guys understand why we are making. a few changes.

Firstly, we will now be operating a one way system around the pub. Customers will enter via the bar door, and the lounge doors are exit only. The Beer Garden will be having a face lift and will also have a lot more benches in pace.

Our opening hours have changed slightly and these will be kept under constant review depending on the current situation.

The toilets are open on a one in one out basis, so please respect social distancing when using the toilets to keep everyone safe.

The juke box, bandit and pool table are all off limits I'm afraid, however we will try and get background music playing throughout the day.

Please remember that we are not experts in public health and are just following the guidelines as best as we can. Bear with us, and if we have made any glaring mistakes, we will make the changes as soon as we can.

In the meantime, we can't wait to see you all, and look forward to having a beer with you and putting the world back on track.

See you Saturday..........

4068ac1elhodqr

After their fiasco that is Leicester, and the proposed newdeal, that is an old deal; and not a great deal,
would expect Liverpool to be next city due for the lock (possible also Chinese village style mortar brick stacking on some B-roads).

The NW was always a poor performing area for the R rate, and after the reds nearly burned down their Liver building as part of recent celebrations, imagine there was also plenty of lock-ins around the same time with punchbowls of home made alcho brew (handgel and mouthwash).

Ideally any ferries from the 'Pool will be restricted if/when numbers flare up.

theological

fr336 wrote: »

Anyone nervous for the weekend? Well not the weekend itself but two weeks down the line. I don't trust us as a nation (the UK) to not mess things up completely. I'm talking about packing into bars, some bars not taking proper precautions, the list goes on. We will be more like the US than Ireland or Europe.

I don't know why you have this pessimism. I think people extrapolate isolated events and make assumptions that they characterise the behaviour of the majority in the UK when they just don't.

I do trust British people to be sensible in the vast vast majority of cases, and I think the police will be able to enforce this.

Any bar that doesn't put clear measures to ensure that they are working in a COVID secure way should be closed.

Accumulator wrote: »

After their fiasco that is Leicester, and the proposed newdeal, that is an old deal; and not a great deal,
would expect Liverpool to be next city due for the lock (possible also Chinese village style mortar brick stacking on some B-roads).

The NW was always a poor performing area for the R rate, and after the reds nearly burned down their Liver building as part of recent celebrations, imagine there was also plenty of lock-ins around the same time with punchbowls of home made alcho brew (handgel and mouthwash).

Ideally any ferries from the 'Pool will be restricted if/when numbers flare up.

On what basis? Due to a small minority being incredibly foolish?

We've seen this type of comment again and again on this thread during previous rounds of easing, and previous rounds of spot the distance on the beach, and it hasn't caused a flare-up.

Timberrrrrrrr

Catalina Inexpensive Piano wrote: »

After their fiasco that is Leicester, and the proposed newdeal, that is an old deal; and not a great deal,
would expect Liverpool to be next city due for the lock (possible also Chinese village style mortar brick stacking on some B-roads).

The NW was always a poor performing area for the R rate, and after the reds nearly burned down their Liver building as part of recent celebrations, imagine there was also plenty of lock-ins around the same time with punchbowls of home made alcho brew (handgel and mouthwash).

Ideally any ferries from the 'Pool will be restricted if/when numbers flare up.

Must be a bitter United fan

4068ac1elhodqr

theological wrote: »

On what basis? Due to a small minority being incredibly foolish?

After 30yrs, reckon there was thousands upon thousands out to enjoy themselves, not only in the streets, but houseparties, lock-ins, backyard bars and so on.

theological wrote: »

...and previous rounds of spot the distance on the beach, and it hasn't caused a flare-up.

With a 10day or so incubation period, and the Dorset beaches only making headlines days ago, still early days. However saying that a sunny salty open air beach is a far, far, better place to be, perhaps than anywhere else. Indeed should be encouraged as long as 2m spacing can be organised somehow, a gated ticket system might work.

theological

Catalina Inexpensive Piano wrote: »

After 30yrs, reckon there was thousands upon thousands out to enjoy themselves, not only in the streets, but houseparties, lock-ins, backyard bars and so on.


With a 10day or so incubation period, and the Dorset beaches only making headlines days ago, still early days. However saying that a sunny salty open air beach is a far, far, better place to be, perhaps than anywhere else. Indeed should be encouraged as long as 2m spacing can be organised somehow, a gated ticket system might work.

Again, I'm merely speaking about the data.

We had the same kind of comments following the other rounds of easing, and during other warm weekends, and during the VE Day bank holiday. The decline continued.

Why? These cases are extremely isolated. They get headlines for sure, but the vast vast vast majority of British people are following the guidance.

Am I saying what happened in Liverpool last week was OK? No. Am I saying that flooding the south coast was wise? No.

What I am saying is that they do not characterise the behaviour of a majority rather that of a tiny minority.

4068ac1elhodqr

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

Must be a bitter United fan

Ah no real fan of the soccerball, outside of World Cups.

Do value it as a social remedy for knucklegraggers and C2/D/E's to let out their primal rage on Saturday afternoons, within an enclosed, controlled environment lol.

The handgel/mouthwash comment may have been slightly cruel :pac:, but do remember a TV show years ago about a hotel workers (wedding reception) in the 'Pool, and the staff kept finding dozens of bottles of mouthwash stashed around the their hotel (a poor man's brandy hipflask).

nacho libre

theological wrote: »

We've seen this type of comment again and again on this thread during previous rounds of easing, and previous rounds of spot the distance on the beach, and it hasn't caused a flare-up.

There has been no flare up because transmission in open spaces is quite low. Also
the fact the vast of majority have actually abided by the guidelines.
However, the true test is coming on July 4th, theological

Enzokk

theological wrote: »

You can see using the data as to how many intensive care beds were required at the peak on the BETA coronavirus dashboard on Public Health England.

In a crisis with unknowns it would have been unwise and negligent not to ensure capacity in the event that the spike was worse than it was. We would have had posts from people on here berating in the opposite direction. Hence my comment about the government in many cases being damned if they do and damned if they don't.

There are a lot of fair criticisms that can be made, and criticisms I'd join with you on. But criticising the government for freeing up too much capacity isn't a reasonable criticism.

No, if the government does a decent job it will not be damned if they do and damned if they don't. Was there an extra 4000 beds available in London with the staff available for those beds? The fact that so many people died alone at home makes me think the answer to this is no. If you can show me evidence where staff were waiting and the beds were ready, why then the strict admission criteria and the many deaths in care homes?

I refuse to believe all the elderly that died in Care Homes all had NFR/DNR orders that would have them die in their care homes.

lainey_d_123

theological wrote: »

Again, I'm merely speaking about the data.

We had the same kind of comments following the other rounds of easing, and during other warm weekends, and during the VE Day bank holiday. The decline continued.

Why? These cases are extremely isolated. They get headlines for sure, but the vast vast vast majority of British people are following the guidance.

Am I saying what happened in Liverpool last week was OK? No. Am I saying that flooding the south coast was wise? No.

What I am saying is that they do not characterise the behaviour of a majority rather that of a tiny minority.

Sure, but that's how exponential spread works.

It was a 'tiny majority' of people coming back from Italy and Spain in February-March time, infected with Covid, and look how bad things were just 2-3 weeks later.

All it takes is a few people infected at a rave or a house party and then suddenly it's 50 people infected, who go and pass it on to their friends and family, and then we're looking at an enormous spike again.

This whole pandemic has been about the irresponsible and stupid minority wreaking havoc for everyone else. Those people who just had to go to Cheltenham, or to huge concerts or to the pub well into March when everyone knew the virus was rampant. Then they get onto public transport and pass it on to people just trying to go about their daily lives and get to work.

I really, really hope there's something we don't know about this virus, that there might be some truth in the theory that many people have natural immunity to it and that it will drop off and become much less serious. Otherwise we're looking at months or years of misery and stress.

fr336

lainey_d_123 wrote: »

This whole pandemic has been about the irresponsible and stupid minority wreaking havoc for everyone else. Those people who just had to go to Cheltenham, or to huge concerts or to the pub well into March when everyone knew the virus was rampant. Then they get onto public transport and pass it on to people just trying to go about their daily lives and get to work.

This sums it all up. These types went very quiet during the peak of this, now they're back in abundance just like they were in March. The minute they got things opening up again, they wanted more. Because it's their right you see. And they'll use every excuse under the sun - mental health, excess deaths from other causes, the economy - all perfectly valid points in isolation but what it really boils down to is them and what they want - to do whatever they want whenever they want. Well tough luck, they live in a country where they don't provide everything for themselves. The healthcare, the transport, the food, the list goes on - there is such a thing as society, contrary to their self centrered beliefs.

theological

lainey_d_123 wrote: »

Sure, but that's how exponential spread works.

It was a 'tiny majority' of people coming back from Italy and Spain in February-March time, infected with Covid, and look how bad things were just 2-3 weeks later.

All it takes is a few people infected at a rave or a house party and then suddenly it's 50 people infected, who go and pass it on to their friends and family, and then we're looking at an enormous spike again.

This whole pandemic has been about the irresponsible and stupid minority wreaking havoc for everyone else. Those people who just had to go to Cheltenham, or to huge concerts or to the pub well into March when everyone knew the virus was rampant. Then they get onto public transport and pass it on to people just trying to go about their daily lives and get to work.

I really, really hope there's something we don't know about this virus, that there might be some truth in the theory that many people have natural immunity to it and that it will drop off and become much less serious. Otherwise we're looking at months or years of misery and stress.

Your assumption is that those who attended Cheltenham led to an outbreak in the whole nation. I don't agree with this hypothesis and it is unproven. I do think it was unwise to hold it.

The community spread of the virus by the time Cheltenham had took place was probably already rather significant. I don't think the races were a major cause of the epidemic in the UK. Perhaps there was some transmission as a result, but it is overly stating a point to say that Cheltenham happened ergo there is large scale transmission as if Cheltenham was the cause of the outbreak!

Back to the point at hand. We've had a number of big splashes of spot the difference in the newspapers and on that dreadful mire that is Twitter repeatedly since the Easter holidays.

The decline in cases has continued despite these indiscretions. This shows that these were from a tiny minority. A much smaller minority than a rather significant number of people who were returning from Spain, France and Italy in February.

The notion that the vast vast majority of British people are just stupid and can't follow rules is categorically false. This notion is frequently stated on this thread as if it is factual.

fr336 wrote: »

This sums it all up. These types went very quiet during the peak of this, now they're back in abundance just like they were in March. The minute they got things opening up again, they wanted more. Because it's their right you see. And they'll use every excuse under the sun - mental health, excess deaths from other causes, the economy - all perfectly valid points in isolation but what it really boils down to is them and what they want - to do whatever they want whenever they want. Well tough luck, they live in a country where they don't provide everything for themselves. The healthcare, the transport, the food, the list goes on - there is such a thing as society, contrary to their self centrered beliefs.

Things have only opened up in stages as it has been safe to do so. I agree with nacho libre that the steps on July 4th are a big step, but it is unreasonable to suggest that just because people want society to open up that they are selfish.

It is also selfish to want society to stay locked down when transmission has obviously reduced when it is having a negative impact on other peoples livelihoods and on the economy. It is still selfish to prioritise your own safety over the well being of others.

I think there's two sides to being selfish in respect to this debate. The side who want all the doors flung open tomorrow back to normal without transition, and those who want all the doors to stay shut into perpetuity. The non-selfish side are those who want to see a gentle easing while it is safe to do so.

bob mcbob

theological wrote: »

Your assumption is that those who attended Cheltenham led to an outbreak in the whole nation. I don't agree with this hypothesis and it is unproven. I do think it was unwise to hold it.

The community spread of the virus by the time Cheltenham had took place was probably already rather significant. I don't think the races were a major cause of the epidemic in the UK. Perhaps there was some transmission as a result, but it is overly stating a point to say that Cheltenham happened ergo there is large scale transmission as if Cheltenham was the cause of the outbreak!

Back to the point at hand. We've had a number of big splashes of spot the difference in the newspapers and on that dreadful mire that is Twitter repeatedly since the Easter holidays.

The decline in cases has continued despite these indiscretions. This shows that these were from a tiny minority. A much smaller minority than a rather significant number of people who were returning from Spain, France and Italy in February.

The notion that the vast vast majority of British people are just stupid and can't follow rules is categorically false. This notion is frequently stated on this thread as if it is factual.



Things have only opened up in stages as it has been safe to do so. I agree with nacho libre that the steps on July 4th are a big step, but it is unreasonable to suggest that just because people want society to open up that they are selfish.

It is also selfish to want society to stay locked down when transmission has obviously reduced when it is having a negative impact on other peoples livelihoods and on the economy. It is still selfish to prioritise your own safety over the well being of others.

I think there's two sides to being selfish in respect to this debate. The side who want all the doors flung open tomorrow back to normal without transition, and those who want all the doors to stay shut into perpetuity. The non-selfish side are those who want to see a gentle easing while it is safe to do so.

According to PHE - Covid cases increased in 36 areas in England between the week 13th June and 20th June. Leicester far and away the worst but in other areas Doncaster went from 11 to 32, Hammersmith 7 to 18, Ealing 5 to 14.

I don't think anyone is saying that things can stay closed forever but from the article.

I am expecting there to be a number of Leicesters,” Prof Deenan Pillay, a virologist at UCL and member of the influential Independent Sage group told The Guardian.

“The base level of infections going on in the UK is still much higher than it was in other countries in Europe when they started to release their lockdowns.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/coronavirus-cases-england-counties-regions-latest-covid-update-a9594486.html