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

theological

Aegir wrote: »

With the exception of France, Spain and Portugal.

Guess where people are going on holiday?

New cases per million if I'm using that page as a data source from yesterday:


France = 582 / 65.2 = 8.92 cases per million
Spain = 422 / 46.7 = 9.03 cases per million
Portugal = 374 / 10.19 = 36.7 cases per million
United Kingdom = 519 / 67.8 = 7.65 cases per million

Are a lot of other countries doing better than this?

Sure. There's some way to go, but the idea that the UK's transmission is significantly worse at this stage is false.

Enzokk

theological wrote: »

Edit: Enzokk, the UK has one of the highest test per million rate in Europe also. We know how many tests overall are being conducted even if some have to be retests. I think at this stage the claim that the UK aren't testing enough is false. It was definitely true in March or April, but thankfully it seems to have been resolved.

You are doing it again. I am asking about people tested and you are now talking about testing rate per million. I freaking hate it when politicians do it and for you to do it here, when it doesn't matter other than your ego taking a boost or bump, is weird.

Stop trying to move the goalposts or change the focus. It is dishonest and doesn't promote good etiquette on the forums. You do it because you know the point I am making is valid so you try to have to focus on something else. If you want an example of this, here is Rishi Sunak doing just this,

https://twitter.com/Femi_Sorry/status/1201387937646206976?s=20

theological

Enzokk wrote: »

You are doing it again. I am asking about people tested and you are now talking about testing rate per million. I freaking hate it when politicians do it and for you to do it here, when it doesn't matter other than your ego taking a boost or bump, is weird.

Stop trying to move the goalposts or change the focus. It is dishonest and doesn't promote good etiquette on the forums. You do it because you know the point I am making is valid so you try to have to focus on something else. If you want an example of this, here is Rishi Sunak doing just this,

https://twitter.com/Femi_Sorry/status/1201387937646206976?s=20

If I can remind you, you moved the goalposts on my original question about why it is a big risk to have British travellers coming to Europe.

You're right, there is no metric for determining how many people are tested, but we do know how many tests were conducted. Even if I concluded that all of the UK tests conducted were done twice that would still be a lot of people. The positive case numbers refer to the number of positive people.

The criticism that the UK is no longer testing enough is false. I agree that it was true in March or April.

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

If I can remind you, you moved the goalposts on my original question about why it is a big risk to have British travellers coming to Europe.

You're right, there is no metric for determining how many people are tested, but we do know how many tests were conducted. Even if I concluded that all of the UK tests conducted were done twice that would still be a lot of people. The positive case numbers refer to the number of positive people.

The criticism that the UK is no longer testing enough is false. I agree that it was true in March or April.

Not for the first time you address something that wasn't quite said and ignore the thrust of the arguments being made.

The issue is we dont know how many people are being tested, we dont know how many failed tests (they used to publish this info up to end of march but stopped, wonder why), we dont know turnaround times. All we get are figures and promises dumped out daily and this is a government already taken to task by the statistics authority. Give me one single good reason why we should trust them.

They still clearly have serious issues with their testing system, dazzling people with mouthwateringly big numbers doesnt change that.

Joe_ Public

On the whole data non sharing mess, i stumbled across this guardian piece from May 20. The devolved nations were warning Matt Hancock about the likely data issues in MARCH and insisting on their own arrangements. England, though, was determined to plough its own merrie furrow, all the way to last weeks debacle in Leicester and god knows where in the future.


"The devolved governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have said they warned the health secretary, Matt Hancock, about the problem in March, before he set a target on 2 April to test 100,000 people a day by the end of that month.

"Wales and Northern Ireland insisted on changes to the system in their areas in order to make it effective and ensure every result was linked quickly to each person’s patient records. But England and Scotland were left with a booking system which, nearly two months after the programme launched, has left health agencies still trying to retrospectively match each result with individual patient records. This means that while individuals receive their results, their doctors are not automatically notified."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/28/coronavirus-testing-hit-struggle-match-results-with-nhs-records

theological

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Not for the first time you address something that wasn't quite said and ignore the thrust of the arguments being made.

The issue is we dont know how many people are being tested, we dont know how many failed tests (they used to publish this info up to end of march but stopped, wonder why), we dont know turnaround times. All we get are figures and promises dumped out daily and this is a government already taken to task by the statistics authority. Give me one single good reason why we should trust them.

They still clearly have serious issues with their testing system, dazzling people with mouthwateringly big numbers doesnt change that.

The original question was mine. It is still waiting for an answer.


Enzokk didn't answer the question and changed the topic to something else, and now I'm the one moving the goalposts. Unbelievable.


Keep to your own standards for discussion and then maybe I'll follow.


At the moment in the UK a high number of people are being tested and we've seen that as the testing rate increased the rate of new infections is going down.

Now, are the UK finding all cases in testing? Admittedly no, but then I would ask you to find me any country that has found all COVID cases by testing. The meaningful data from the testing, is who is positive and where the positive cases are found. This is why the KCL tracker is also incredibly valuable. It shows us a more complete picture where we know that not all cases are found through testing.

Enzokk

Enzokk wrote: »

You are doing it again. I am asking about people tested and you are now talking about testing rate per million. I freaking hate it when politicians do it and for you to do it here, when it doesn't matter other than your ego taking a boost or bump, is weird.

Stop trying to move the goalposts or change the focus. It is dishonest and doesn't promote good etiquette on the forums. You do it because you know the point I am making is valid so you try to have to focus on something else. If you want an example of this, here is Rishi Sunak doing just this,

https://twitter.com/Femi_Sorry/status/1201387937646206976?s=20

It appears you are confused. This isn’t about Brexit, it is about Covid 19. There are plenty of Brexit threads to post this kind of thing on.

gmisk

Nice to see young couple on BBC getting married.
Albeit with a small number of people allowed.

gmisk

The interview on sky with the man comparing being able to going to the pub after 3 months....to VE day.....ffs

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

The original question was mine. It is still waiting for an answer.


Enzokk didn't answer the question and changed the topic to something else, and now I'm the one moving the goalposts. Unbelievable.


Keep to your own standards for discussion and then maybe I'll follow.


At the moment in the UK a high number of people are being tested and we've seen that as the testing rate increased the rate of new infections is going down.

Now, are the UK finding all cases in testing? Admittedly no, but then I would ask you to find me any country that has found all COVID cases by testing. The meaningful data from the testing, is who is positive and where the positive cases are found. This is why the KCL tracker is also incredibly valuable. It shows us a more complete picture where we know that not all cases are found through testing.

Talking about standards, that is rich! I wont speak for another poster, i personally did not see anyone say the UK isnt doing a lot of tests. The issue for me is one of trust. How do you trust them with their figures? I dont take anything they say on trust. Anyway, we're back in the same old rabbit hole on this thread where big numbers are just thrown out as evidence of achievement. They mean little unless we can see clearly the method behind them - turnaround times, link to tracing etc. According to independent piece linked above, people in labs are saying test results are taking up to a week to come back. Thats worthless. Hancock just tells us "the vast majority come back within 24 hours." I believe them, not him, as he's a proven liar.

No country can know deinitively there arent cases out there. But they could and did do was build robust testing and tracing systems so that once the virus was suppressed they could identify and contain any outbreaks as soon as they occurred.

England might have a declining case load, if too slow for comfort, but it does not have a robust test and trace system and neither has it effectively suppressed the virus yet. And yet, it is pretty much open for business again. Consider the difference between the recent outbreaks in Merthyr Tydfil and Leicester - one in which they could pinpoint the source and confront it directly, the other unidentifiable, could have come from anywhere. If how they handled last week is how they deal with each subsequent outbreak, then they're going to have issues and why a lot of senior medical and scientific people across the country are expressing serious concern.

theological

Joe_ Public wrote: »

No country can know deinitively there arent cases out there. But they could and did do was build robust testing and tracing systems so that once the virus was suppressed they could identify and contain any outbreaks as soon as they occurred.

The UK has a testing and tracing system in place with weekly statistics available.

By the by, I'd love it if someone could answer my original question about why British travellers are a "big" risk to other countries in Europe given the data.

gmisk

theological wrote: »

The UK has a testing and tracing system in place with weekly statistics available.

By the by, I'd love it if someone could answer my original question about why British travellers are a "big" risk to other countries in Europe given the data.

I suppose there are a number of reasons.
The number of deaths are high especially in England and don't seem to dropping to the same levels of other countries in Europe.
I thought this was an interesting article
https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-which-european-regions-had-the-highest-number-of-excess-deaths-12018172
Excess deaths are extremely high in certain parts of UK. So it's possible the UK and england especially are under reporting their deaths due to corona.

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

The UK has a testing and tracing system in place with weekly statistics available.

By the by, I'd love it if someone could answer my original question about why British travellers are a "big" risk to other countries in Europe given the data.

You forgot "world beating." Matt is insistent that all pr statements include that term.

I would say many countries are sceptical about the idea of british visitors because Britain has the worst performance record of any country in Europe and they know they are unreliable with figures and true caseload is very likely well in excess of what is reported.

theological

Joe_ Public wrote: »

You forgot "world beating." Matt is insistent that all pr statements include that term.

I would say many countries are sceptical about the idea of british visitors because Britain has the worst performance record of any country in Europe and they know they are unreliable with figures and true caseload is very likely well in excess of what is reported.

Yet I've shown above that in respect to newly reported positive cases per million the UK is doing better than lots of other countries.

Your criticism needs to be reasonable and balanced. Why do you think that the UK statistics are less accurate in reporting accurate cases than those in France, Spain, or Portugal for example?

If there isn't a good reason, it just looks like you're just interested in criticising the UK for the sake of it at this stage. Valid criticism I accept. For example the failures in care homes, and the failures in ramping up testing in March and April, but the criticism isn't reasonable at this stage when there are well over 100,000 tests being conducted daily.

I'm also bemused by the intense interest certain posters not living in the UK have in respect to the UK's handling of the virus, but that's a whole separate question. If the criticism was reasonable I wouldn't mind that as much.

S.M.B.

I think any country with a goal of suppressing covid entirely certainly faces a risk when opening up their borders to UK tourists as this does not appear to be a mutually shared goal.

quokula

theological wrote: »

Yet I've shown above that in respect to newly reported positive cases per million the UK is doing better than lots of other countries.

Your criticism needs to be reasonable and balanced. Why do you think that the UK statistics are less accurate in reporting accurate cases than those in France, Spain, or Portugal for example?

If there isn't a good reason, it just looks like you're just interested in criticising the UK for the sake of it at this stage. Valid criticism I accept. For example the failures in care homes, and the failures in ramping up testing in March and April, but the criticism isn't reasonable at this stage when there are well over 100,000 tests being conducted daily.

I'm also bemused by the intense interest certain posters not living in the UK have in respect to the UK's handling of the virus, but that's a whole separate question. If the criticism was reasonable I wouldn't mind that as much.

Deaths per million continues to be significantly higher in the UK than the other countries you mention. While cases per million may not be, all this does is show up the holes in the testing data, which is harder to cover up when you look at deaths.

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

Yet I've shown above that in respect to newly reported positive cases per million the UK is doing better than lots of other countries.

Your criticism needs to be reasonable and balanced. Why do you think that the UK statistics are less accurate in reporting accurate cases than those in France, Spain, or Portugal for example?

If there isn't a good reason, it just looks like you're just interested in criticising the UK for the sake of it at this stage. Valid criticism I accept. For example the failures in care homes, and the failures in ramping up testing in March and April, but the criticism isn't reasonable at this stage when there are well over 100,000 tests being conducted daily.

I'm also bemused by the intense interest certain posters not living in the UK have in respect to the UK's handling of the virus, but that's a whole separate question. If the criticism was reasonable I wouldn't mind that as much.

By their own figures they are only reaching a small fraction of positive cases for tracing and that is not a reasonable criticism! It was supposed to be world beating a month ago, how would criticism of it not be justified?

Do other countries report full data or just Pillar One data like England? I dont know. I dont vouch for the likes of Spain or Portugal which is why i never explicitly mentioned them. Fact is every country has to make its own judgement as regards british travellers and more than a few of them are nervous because they are looking at the record overall as well as current numbers and i dont honestly know what should be surprising about that.

Why do you care what a bunch of people living in ireland think anyway?

theological

quokula wrote: »

Deaths per million continues to be significantly higher in the UK than the other countries you mention. While cases per million may not be, all this does is show up the holes in the testing data, which is harder to cover up when you look at deaths.

Deaths tell us about historic prevalence because there is a lag between catching the infection and sadly dying of it.

I agree that the UK was definitely worst performing in respect to numbers of deaths. I'm not convinced that the current prevalence of the virus is greater than many other European countries at the moment from the case data.

EDIT: Many of the reported deaths on a given day can go back weeks or months.

Joe_ Public wrote: »

By their own figures they are only reaching a small fraction of positive cases for tracing and that is not a reasonable criticism! It was supposed to be world beating a month ago, how would criticism of it not be justified?

Do other countries report full data or just Pillar One data like England? I dont know. I dont vouch for the likes of Spain or Portugal which is why i never explicitly mentioned them. Fact is every country has to make its own judgement as regards british travellers and more than a few of them are nervous because they are looking at the record overall as well as current numbers and i dont honestly know what should be surprising about that.

Why do you care what a bunch of people living in ireland think anyway?

Pillar 1 and 2 are in the reported data on the Public Health England tracker.

You'll need to explain about track and trace because from the last statistics I saw, most of the reported cases were contacted, and most of the contacts of the reported cases were also contacted.

I don't particularly care what you think, I'm more interested in challenging disinformation.

Joe_ Public

theological wrote: »

Deaths tell us about historic prevalence because there is a lag between catching the infection and sadly dying of it.

I agree that the UK was definitely worst performing in respect to numbers of deaths. I'm not convinced that the current prevalence of the virus is greater than many other European countries at the moment from the case data.

EDIT: Many of the reported deaths on a given day can go back weeks or months.



Pillar 1 and 2 are in the reported data on the Public Health England tracker.

You'll need to explain about track and trace because from the last statistics I saw, most of the reported cases were contacted, and most of the contacts of the reported cases were also contacted.

I don't particularly care what you think, I'm more interested in challenging disinformation.

Challenging disinformation? Like what?

As Keir Starmer pointed out at pmqs on Wednesday, there were 22,000 new cases according to their own statistics in the latest available week up to june 14. Less than 5,000 were reached for tracing. The figures were worse than the previous week.

According to the PHE investigation report released last week, 11 people had been contact traced in Leicester up to June 24. I'll link if you want. Thats 11 out of many hundred.

I dont believe there is any effective link at all between P2 and contact tracing. Whatever tracing is going on is being done by public health officials linked to local trusts.

The system is not fit for purpose.

141C3CB6-5C2B-4B13-9A58-F84C930A8A13.png

Surely this is why residents of the UK might not be welcomed with open arms in other countries?

A Dub in Glasgo

https://twitter.com/RP131/status/1279478057494028289

fr336

Unbelievable that 90% of uk cases at local level not revealed until now. I thought my town was doing well with average of 10 new cases per week turns out its 500. I will leave the pub a bit longer

4068ac1elhodqr

£4phr slave sweat shop labour (some of it black market) in Leciester might account for their very high levels:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8488859/Leicesters-fast-fashion-die-Cramped-ragtrade-workshops-pariah-city.html

maebee

The "Essential Travel" rules only applies to the plebs:-

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8489815/Stanley-Johnson-offers-wear-swimming-trunks-HEAD-denies-breaking-lockdown-rules.html

Enzokk

theological wrote: »

If I can remind you, you moved the goalposts on my original question about why it is a big risk to have British travellers coming to Europe.

You're right, there is no metric for determining how many people are tested, but we do know how many tests were conducted. Even if I concluded that all of the UK tests conducted were done twice that would still be a lot of people. The positive case numbers refer to the number of positive people.

The criticism that the UK is no longer testing enough is false. I agree that it was true in March or April.

No I didn't. You asked why British people should be seen as a big risk. I linked a story that UK visitors to New Zealand brought Covid to the country. You pointed out it was a quarantine failure. Those people went to New Zealand from the UK and had Covid-19. Them going out was a quarantine failure, not having the disease.

As others have pointed out, nobody said the UK isn't testing enough. You are again using a technique politicians do, attack a point not said.

Aegir wrote: »

It appears you are confused. This isn’t about Brexit, it is about Covid 19. There are plenty of Brexit threads to post this kind of thing on.

Are you being deliberately obtuse now? I was commenting on a technique theological was using and showed an example. Usually your comebacks are quite sharp, this one was just bad and slow.

theological wrote: »

The UK has a testing and tracing system in place with weekly statistics available.

By the by, I'd love it if someone could answer my original question about why British travellers are a "big" risk to other countries in Europe given the data.

I will tell you why people from the UK is a big risk. Because of all the failures so far, which I am sure you will acknowledge, and then looking at when the UK came out of lockdown compared to other countries in Europe.

You were always quick to try and point to timelines of the virus. The UK had a terrible time trying to deal with it and yet they are opening their pubs earlier than Ireland. If Ireland is 2 weeks behind the UK, why are we taking longer to open our pubs?

Joe_ Public

Matt Hancock doing the media rounds this morning and, quel surprise, the usual level of bluff and bluster.

Marr put it to him that - quoting gov own figures - the number of close contacts being traced went from 93% 3 weeks ago to 73% on latest figures. Hancock replies that it's how many people are at home isolating that matters, not the percentage. This is up there with his it's the number of tests being done, not how many people tested, remark last week. Marr doesnt challenge him enough but he rarely does.

On care homes, the usual appalling absence of contrition or acknowledgment of error. Keeping the elderly out of hospital is not something he should be boasting about. Discharging 25,000 into care homes without testing, on the other hand, is something he should be profusely apologising for.

https://twitter.com/PeterStefanovi2/status/1279697309950005248?s=20

Dave0301

Joe_ Public wrote: »

Matt Hancock doing the media rounds this morning and, quel surprise, the usual level of bluff and bluster.

Marr was extra useless this morning in how he let Hancock bluster on and not press him on anything.

This reminds me of Father Ted..."I've had my fun, and that's all that matters."

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson_MP/status/1279675616992858113

To be fair though, there doesn't seem to have been huge amounts of trouble which is good, but social distancing doesn't seem to have been a thing either.

Nearly all the pubs around me were still shut and aren't opening until next week.

Joe_ Public

Dave0301 wrote: »

Marr was extra useless this morning in how he let Hancock bluster on and not press him on anything.

This reminds me of Father Ted..."I've had my fun, and that's all that matters."

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson_MP/status/1279675616992858113

To be fair though, there doesn't seem to have been huge amounts of trouble which is good, but social distancing doesn't seem to have been a thing either.

Nearly all the pubs around me were still shut and aren't opening until next week.

Can't fault Marrs knowledge or research and he asks most of the pertinent questions, but too much allowing guests like Hancock to waffle on without necessary interjections. Ridge is the same over on sky. Oh for a Vinny Browne at times like these!

IamtheWalrus

I think the pictures of people out drinking and not socially distancing are a bit overblown. The scientists say that the transmission rate is much lower outdoors than indoors.

Dave0301

IamtheWalrus wrote: »

I think the pictures of people out drinking and not socially distancing are a bit overblown. The scientists say that the transmission rate is much lower outdoors than indoors.

I agree with that in principle, but I don't like seeing rules broken. Social distancing should still be maintained, and it was clear that it was not in some cases. A senior Police chief said similar after finishing his shift.

Whether it has an impact on the number of cases is another thing. Given that the prevalence of the virus seems to be decreasing and as you say, it was mostly outdoors, hopefully it won't.