Relaxation of Restrictions, Part III - **Read OP for Mod Warnings**

WhiteMemento9

growleaves wrote: »

You would think from this statement that lockdown was some tried-and-tested method.

*We* are human guinea pigs.

Some East Asian countries used traditional pandemic measures like border control, quarantine etc. We're the ones running wild experiments.

It was the method that 95% of counties have introduced. Without it, given the state of our healthcare system, ICU cpacity etc at the time it would have been a national disaster. There wasn't a single other option for us as a nation at the time and to purport otherwise is an outright barefaced lie.

East Asian countires with high levels of social compliance, app tracking, testing and tracing measure from previous outbreaks among other things. Apples and oranges. You know that already so why make the stupid point.

MrDavid1976

MrDavid1976 wrote: »

I agree with you that the lockdown af the time was necessary

Do you think the current plan to ease restrictions is correct? Is it too slow? Is it too long?

Looking at where the evidence is now.

Hi Goldengirl,

Any chance of your views on this question? Thanks.

Goldengirl

Lyle wrote: »

I thought the metric is based on how many available beds there are altogether so we have more capacity in case there's another little surge in Covid cases needing ICU?



In which case it kinda doesn't matter how many Covid cases are in there, it's about numbers overall and they're fairly steady even with falling numbers of Covid patients... Say 50 more Covid cases leave ICU next week, but 50 patients with other illnesses go in - what then? The same amount of beds are still occupied, and the same number are still available, the occupied ones are just full of varied patients rather than Covid.

Open to correction and understanding on this though! I haven't been able to source anything concrete, this is just my interpretation of how the ICU metric works. ] end quote


Yes I understand what you are saying. Normally it would be only total number of vacant beds but many non Covid patients were moved to step down / HDU as soon as possible to prevent cross infection.I have only heard numbers if Covid patients in ICU recently . It makes sense to also include non Covid patients in ICU also as a metric in the future .. Not sure by how much that would be rising now unless general hospital admissions go up.

MadYaker

growleaves wrote: »

You would think from this statement that lockdown was some tried-and-tested method.

*We* are human guinea pigs.

Some East Asian countries used traditional pandemic measures like border control, quarantine etc. We're the ones running wild experiments.

This virus spreads when people are in close contact. What effect do you think keeping people at home and reducing their contacts might have? You don't need a PhD to figure this one out. I know you can do it!

growleaves

MadYaker wrote: »

This virus spreads when people are in close contact. What effect do you think keeping people at home and reducing their contacts might have? You don't need a PhD to figure this one out. I know you can do it!

Lol

SusieBlue

WhiteMemento9 wrote: »

That isn't the idea. We have a road map to come out of lockdown.

You just said that without extreme measures our numbers will grow, why will that be any different after August 10th than it is now?
It’s going to be the same virus then that it is now, it’s not like it’ll be a weaker version.

I have no issue with the roadmap itself, I have issues with the fact that it’s so lengthy and drawn out.
After 9 weeks of lockdown it’s going to take a further 12 weeks for all industries and sectors to reopen.

This means some people will be out of work for almost 6 months and that society will have been without specific services it previously relied upon for almost 6 months (and I’m not talking about the pub here).
It’s been 9 weeks, these shops and services may not have been deemed overly necessary on March 15th but people need them now, let alone waiting another 12 weeks for them.

In my opinion we should be getting ready for phase 3 but that isn’t coming till the end of June.
It’s insanity.

Ginger n Lemon

MadYaker wrote: »

5 months???? Pubs and restaurants all over europe were closed for weeks. In Paris and Madrid for 6 or 7 weeks people were allowed to leave their houses once a week for shopping and that was it. Outdoor excersise banned. Kids not allowed out at all, police on the streets 24/7 stopping everyone. Not sure if it was the same in Italy as I don't know anyone who lives there but id imagine it was similar.

Thats right, 5 months. Mid March to 10 Aug or 20 July.

5 months give or take. I know, shocking.

MadYaker

I wouldn't be surprised if the gov speed it up a bit in the coming weeks. Pressure is mounting and will continue to mount. I won't argue with you over the roadmap, I think its too long. But the lockdown when implemented was necessary.

Goldengirl

MrDavid1976 wrote: »

I agree with you that the lockdown af the time was necessary

Do you think the current plan to ease restrictions is correct? Is it too slow? Is it too long?

Looking at where the evidence is now.

I think it could be moving a little faster alright.
Gutted for all needing childcare and to get their kids back to school.
But as you see I support most of what has been done do far .
Time to move on if we can now , but don't agree to indiscriminate easing.

WhiteMemento9

SusieBlue wrote: »

You just said that without extreme measures our numbers will grow

I didn't say that. I didn't bother reading the rest of your posts as that is your general posting style on this thread. You start out with a premise that you want to be true, make wild allegations and then come to mad conclusions.

Goldengirl

road_high wrote: »

I’m a FG voter and can see the madness clear as day. Donohoe isn’t strong enough at all, you need a Charlie Mccreevy type in there. He’s clearly muzzled by Leo, Simon and all the other “lives are more important “ virtue signallers.

Oh my, this is classic !

growleaves

You know that already so why make the stupid point.

I'm making the point because there are so many hypothetical assumptions at play.

That x no. of people would have died but didn't because of the introduction of a novel, empirically untested, extreme and controversial containment measure.

That this new containment measure wasn't a gamble but those who didn't adopt it were involved in a high stakes gamble.

I don't see it that way.

MadYaker

growleaves wrote: »

I'm making the point because there are so many hypothetical assumptions at play.

That x no. of people would have died but didn't because of the introduction of a novel, empirically untested, extreme and controversial containment measure.

That this new containment measure wasn't a gamble but those who didn't adopt it were involved in a high stakes gamble.

I don't see it that way.

So what should the Italians have done as their hospitals became overwhelmed with covid pateints and the doctors had to choose who lived and died? Nothing?

Outline how you see it so.

jibber5000

MadYaker wrote: »

Thats for the UK? I see nothing in that article about modelling at all. Professor Philip Nolan, Chair of the NPHET Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group was responsible for constructing our models.

As i understand it. Our models predicted 15,000 cases by the end of march which would have been a disaster as that rate of infection would have overwhelmed the ICUs. So we implemented a lockdown to push that peak out into April. Slow the spread right down so less people are presenting at hospital at the same time. And it seems to have worked. I agree we should open up a bit faster, but I think we got it pretty much right.

From my understanding it was from the Imperial College model that our policy along with practically every other country was based. I know New Zealand used it.

If you have a link to say that we constructed our own entirely separate model I will concede I am wrong.

He only announced that on the 16th of March which would have been too late to massively affect the number of cases presenting by the end of March. I don't think anyone here is disputing that we made the right decision at that point. It is just the steadfast need not to deviate from the earlier trajectory in light of what we now know about the disease that is causing frustration.

MrDavid1976

Goldengirl wrote: »

I think it could be moving a little faster alright.
Gutted for all needing childcare and to get their kids back to school.
But as you see I support most of what has been done do far .
Time to move on if we can now , but don't agree to indiscriminate easing.

So maybe they need to think that through a little bits it. Today they are encouraging people to walk and cycle to work which makes sense in respect to public transport - the problem is that bikes shops are shut. You are right to highlight childcare and schools as that will facilitate get back to work but it does not take account of this. To me it is incoherent.

If we get the exit wrong all the sacrifices made on the lockdown will be in vain.

WhiteMemento9

growleaves wrote: »

I'm making the point because there are so many hypothetical assumptions at play.

That x no. of people would have died but didn't because of the introduction of a novel, empirically untested, extreme and controversial containment measure.

That this new containment measure wasn't a gamble but those who didn't adopt it were involved in a high stakes gamble.

I don't see it that way.

There was no other way to see it at the time. We had such a low ICU capcity that we didn't have any room for error. Without immediate and harsh intervention the R numbers was already so high at the time that even without it increasing our healthcare system would have been overwhelmed and fallen over within weeks. That then becomes a national disater for all the other dominoes that are connected to a functioning health care system especially in the middle of pandemic.

You can argue other points around the current situation but the introduction of the lockdown measures was in my eyes at the time an indisputable national imperative.

NIMAN

It'll be mayhem at the garden centres on Monday.

Hopefully no-one tells Leo or Tony!

MadYaker

Everyone has 20/20 vision in hindsight. With the info we had at the time we took the correct course.

jibber5000

WhiteMemento9 wrote: »

It does? Texas is currently experiencing growth in numbers and deaths? You understand the exponential growth in the virus that has been talked about to death, excuse the the awful pun. These things start off slowly and then explode when you aren't curbing the spread with extreme measure. While you have rising number of cases it seems the last thing you should be doing is lifting restrictions.

The number of cases in Texas is up due to their massively increased testing. The percentage of those actually testing positive is down.

This thread explains it pretty well.

https://mobile.twitter.com/SeanTrende/status/1261651271817351169

Rodin

MadYaker wrote: »

Everyone has 20/20 vision in hindsight. With the info we had at the time we took the correct course.

Many thought we should have been much more strict.
I certainly do.

Goldengirl

MrDavid1976 wrote: »

So maybe they need to think that through a little bits it. Today they are encouraging people to walk and cycle to work which makes sense in respect to public transport - the problem is that bikes shops are shut. You are right to highlight childcare and schools as that will facilitate get back to work but it does not take account of this. To me it is incoherent.

If we get the exit wrong all the sacrifices made on the lockdown will be in vain.

I agree.....but.. bike shops open next week. Or is that just repairs?

growleaves

MadYaker wrote: »

So what should the Italians have done as their hospitals became overwhelmed with covid pateints and the doctors had to choose who lived and died? Nothing?

Outline how you see it so.

Quarantine (i.e. border control, restrict entry), cocooning the elderly and vulnerable, (temporary) social distancing, limit mass gatherings. Throw in masks if you like.

Italy were letting in immigrants, legal and illegal, in April.

They could have got the army to harvest essential crops.

I don't believe it was justified to use the army to lock ordinary healthy people indoors. I haven't seen proof it saved lives, only projections.

crossman47

NIMAN wrote: »

It'll be mayhem at the garden centres on Monday.

Hopefully no-one tells Leo or Tony!

Theres a hell of a lot of people with damn all interest in garden centres.

MadYaker

jibber5000 wrote: »

From my understanding it was from the Imperial College model that our policy along with practically every other country was based. I know New Zealand used it.

If you have a link to say that we constructed our own entirely separate model I will concede I am wrong.

He only announced that on the 16th of March which would have been too late to massively affect the number of cases presenting by the end of March. I don't think anyone here is disputing that we made the right decision at that point. It is just the steadfast need not to deviate from the earlier trajectory in light of what we now know about the disease that is causing frustration.

I'm not sure. But I would think that getting a foreign country to construct our models would have required us to divulge a huge amount of potentially sensitive info. I don't know much about the models but I imagine they'd factor in demographics like pop density, age range of the population (how many over 60 over 70 etc) health system capacity, prevelence of under
lying conditions, average number of people per household and probably heaps of other stuff that I haven't even thought of. I don't think the UK could have done that for loads of other countries. It seems to me like the type of thing countries have to do for themselves.

SusieBlue

WhiteMemento9 wrote: »

I didn't say that. I didn't bother reading the rest of your posts as that is your general posting style on this thread. You start out with a premise that you want to be true, make wild allegations and then come to mad conclusions.

You said the numbers grow slowly and then explode when we aren’t curbing the spread by utilising extreme measures.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable to query why that won’t happen in August and why it will happen if we lift things a bit quicker, but if that counts to you as coming to ‘mad conclusions’ then fair enough :pac:

WhiteMemento9

jibber5000 wrote: »

The number of cases in Texas is up due to their massively increased testing. The percentage of those actually testing positive is down.

This thread explains it pretty well.

https://mobile.twitter.com/SeanTrende/status/1261651271817351169

That is what Texas is claiming, that video you linked doesn't give any statistics on increased testing. Deaths are also still rising but I accept that could be down to a lag effect. Either way while cases are still rising I don't think they should be reopening. It doesn't make any sense to me at all. There would be no one here arguging to reopen if we had cases going up.

Deleted User

Deleted User wrote: »

Horse racing is due to go ahead on 8th June. Is horse racing as essential as homeware? I wouldn’t have thought so.

Will the trainers, owners, jockies and officials have to live within 20km of the race course? Or is it deemed essential work?

I’m not allowed to see my family until 20th July, but horse racing can go ahead?

Baffling decisions by this government!

Irish politics and Irish horse racing, you'll be hard pressed to find a cosier combo, and we're seeing the results of that with this decision. It's a bit sickening tbh.

Me and my ilk can't afford such lobbying power or connections, so we're left to rot and our businesses let crumble before our eyes.

Goldengirl

MadYaker wrote: »

I'm not sure. But I would think that getting a foreign country to construct our models would have required us to divulge a huge amount of potentially sensitive info. I don't know much about the models but I imagine they'd factor in demographics like pop density, age range of the population (how many over 60 over 70 etc) health system capacity, prevelence of under
lying conditions, average number of people per household and probably heaps of other stuff that I haven't even thought of. I don't think the UK could have done that for loads of other countries. It seems to me like the type of thing countries have to do for themselves.

Vaguely remember some young French guy ,medical researcher from some Californian university who invented the curve model, talking about Irish numbers , but can't be certain..anyone else?
Think it was on The Source , BBC

MadYaker

No crowds at the horse racing I think and way less people than usual in general. I wouldn't be against it. Sould be easy enough to maintain social distancing.

The HorsesMouth

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

He's right.

Can't criticise someone for telling it like it is.

If infection rates surge then new impositions have to be introduced. If they don't then we can move forward.

Given Ireland's climate during summer can be damp and cool conditions for spread may also be superior here to the continent when the heat builds there.[/QUOTE

As long as I've been on here I have always found your posts fairly well thought out and well rounded...even on this thread when I've disagreed with a lot of what you've said.

But that post above is a step into the abyss. The virus is going to spread because of damp conditions...it has been raining across europe for a lot of April and May!

Cillian de Gascun knows we will never go back and can never go back...but he's going to tell us that might be the case to scare us into behaving as they think we should.