Coronavirus - The Thread :(

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Coronavirus - The Thread :(

BTW, do you know it means "tar" in french ? "(swallow tar" is also used to describe driving fans..)

Yes, years ago I lived in France for a while and I used to smoke back then, the word was on all French fag packets and I kind of liked it. (along with merde)


what is this new trend of wearing a mask with your nose poking out, or pulling it down to your dirty neck then back on your face, how does this protect you?

It doesn't and it ain't new.
In fact it's thought that if they are used like this they can do more harm than good, which is why they aren't being generally recommended, at the moment.

This might change, but it's hard to see how a "mask campaign" could be rolled out safely and effectively for everyone and not because there might be a shortage of masks. They are effective if used correctly, if not they aren't just ineffective but actually increase risk.

I wrote in an earlier post that if anyone is considering wearing one, to read up from a reliable source on how to don and doff them and how long to wear a particular mask, otherwise you will almost certainly be increasing the risk of infection.
 
Ricardo,

I completely agree with you. Now aged 75 I can add several much loved Grandchildren to your short list of necessities. We have been trained by commercial interests to "want/need" more of everything and now have a chance to reset this behaviour.

p.s. I nearly forgot to add my, also much loved, Panda to my list.
 
Re: Coronavirus - The Thread :(On a lighter note)

I read on Wikipedia that Matt Hancock M.P., not the Neighbours soap actor, studied for a BA in Philosophy, Politics & Economics......... Also referred to as P.P.E.

Years ago I worked in Texas and the thing they most envied us for was our amazing NHS.

My NHS fitted replacement hip has vastly out-performed any of the sealed for life joints and bearings in my old Reliant Scimitar.

I try every single day to count my blessings, and to strive for contentment. Owning a Panda helps me considerably in this.
 
Where I first started, we got oil off our hands by washing them in diesel fuel, then soap afterwards. Worked a treat.
I remember doing that too. Also using paraffin - we had a paraffin pump which all the old "biddies" in the town would come and buy their oil for the heaters/ stoves from - Diesel used to cause deep cracks in my fingers which itched frightfully and would even bleed sometimes. When the boss installed a swarfega dispenser in the loo it was absolutely wonderful - such luxury!
 
To date, UK has 15.000 excess deaths due to CCP virus. But seasonal flu kills about 50,000 each year in UK yet nobody considers lock-down is appropriate for that.

Sweden with a population of 10 million has avoided lockdown. To date their 1500 CCPV deaths are not so far away from UK's death rates. Sweden is of course under pressure from the mainstream media lemmings to change tack, but their numbers are not significantly worse than UK and they have not collapsed their economy.

Before anyone complains at such heartless attitudes - The whole issue is a balance between maintaining the economy which pays for our healthcare and minimising the numbers of dead.

750,000 people have volunteered to help the NHS. Only 20,000 tasks have been given out.Berkshire-based Apacor Ltd has approval from the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to supply antigen tests. They can deliver 1 million per week. NHS has ignored the offer.

Oxford University Dunn School of Pathology has 119 PCR machines (and the staff to use them) that identify signs of CCPV. The NHS has requisitioned ONE for use.
Due to corporate inertia/inaction/box ticking at the NHS/PHE we have probably left it too late to benefit from testing.

It's looking like UK has got itself the worst of all options. The lumbering healthcare system that refuses help when offered and a refusal to test for infection or antibodies has left us playing guess the next move. Meanwhile our economy is collapsing about our ears.

UK has no idea how many people have been infected by the virus, yet all the while mainstream media ramps up the panic by daily announcements of numbers dead. Without the infection rates its meaningless. And without knowing who is infected, we cant attempt to manage what the virus does next.
 
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To date, UK has 15.000 excess deaths due to CCP virus. But seasonal flu kills about 50,000 each year in UK yet nobody considers lock-down is appropriate for that.

Why do you keep doing this? Posting such drivel ??

Influenza deaths in the uk averages to about 17,000 per year in a 12 month period. Not 50k, at it’s worst it doesn’t even top 30k so where did you get those numbers from?

So far we’ve had 13,700 Covid deaths in a little over 2 months..... it’s clear from the data that new cases are dropping dramatically now, as people self isolate, left unchecked and with cases spreading exponentially we know the current death rate would be much higher and we know the health service would be so overwhelmed that many young people who would normally be treatable, would end up dying due to a lack of facilities and supplies.... we’ve already seen oxygen shortages and medications shortages, which if there where more cases would have undoubtedly resulted in deaths.

Since when did people become less important than how much money wealthy companies where making from our economy?
Mass deaths also has a rather significant impact on the economy, there is a lot of discussions now on weather or not China will be paying for a lot of the damage caused.
 
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Certainly not wanting to stir things up, but are you sure 50,000 deaths each year due to flu? Out of curiosity I had a quick look on the net & couldn't come across such figures, but my computer skills are limited....:D
 
Why are you so keen to support our incompetent heath service management? NHS and PHE have failed at every turn, Slow to respond and making the wrong calls. NHS front line staff are being put at severe risk and the Nightingale units have hardly had any use.


I got the figures from here. So Yes that's USA so I was wrong. And I have the humility to say so. :p
https://www.health.com/condition/cold-flu-sinus/how-many-people-die-of-the-flu-every-year
Quote -
This year's flu season is shaping up to be possibly less severe than the 2017-2018 season, when 61,000 deaths were linked to the virus. However, it could equal or surpass the 2018-2019 season's 34,200 flu-related deaths.
End quote


But the main point still stands. Fliu clearly kills similar numbers to Covid. But no fuss is made about flu. We can however bet that 2019/20 will be reduced for flu and blamed on Covid. Exactly because Covid deaths and flu deaths look much the same and nobody is doing any testing.
 
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Why are you so keen to support our incompetent heath service management? NHS and PHE have failed at every turn, Slow to respond and making the wrong calls. NHS front line staff are being put at severe risk and the Nightingale units have hardly had any use.


I got the figures from here. So Yes that's USA so I was wrong. And I have the humility to say so. :p
https://www.health.com/condition/cold-flu-sinus/how-many-people-die-of-the-flu-every-year
Quote -
This year's flu season is shaping up to be possibly less severe than the 2017-2018 season, when 61,000 deaths were linked to the virus. However, it could equal or surpass the 2018-2019 season's 34,200 flu-related deaths.
End quote


But the main point still stands. Fliu clearly kills similar numbers to Covid. But no fuss is made about flu. We can however bet that 2019/20 will be reduced for flu and blamed on Covid. Exactly because Covid deaths and flu deaths look much the same and nobody is doing any testing.

:bang:

The NHS is testing. The arguments about testing come from not testing staff or the general public, which while initially was terrible. They are now doing it and ramping up the numbers day by day.

We will likely see far less deaths from Flu this year. Mainly because Covid Kills much quicker, and also because of social isolation which doesn't just stop covid from spreading.

We will know the difference between covid and the flu because all those deaths they keep reporting every day, those hundreds of unfortunate people have all tested positive for covid, because in hospitals they are testing anyone they suspect of having it.

Where testing is not so prevalent is in care homes and peoples homes and in those situations they are not testing. However when you get a 90 year old in a care home who needs everything doing for them, whether its covid or flu the outcome is still the same, the person dies, and its not recorded as covid or flu. He may be heart failure, or old age.

I'm not defending the way it has been managed, clearly there are a lot of things that could be done better, but you keep posting rants against the lock down and arguing that people will die anyway, you're basically suggesting its all pointless when all the evidence points to lives being saved and the progress of the illness being slowed.

Lock down is about "flattening the curve" If a very elderly person is going to catch it and die from it, this doesn't mean they won't it just means it happens hopefully later and the NHS doesn't become overwhelmed.

The hard work of the NHS staff is also working and so the NHS has not become overwhelmed, they are just keeping their head afloat.

Calling off the lockdown now would almost certainly crash the system in a matter of days.


Please explain why you admitted you were wrong then went on to quote different stats about the flu which were also nothing to do with the UK.
The CDC is specifically american and has nothing to do with the Uk.
 
Good grief! I was only asking.:D In my neck of the woods the NHS has delivered, I personally have not had any bad stories, but that's my finding. As I say post code lottery, in fact due to our family situation we have had letters of support from both our GP & Hospital. I'm well aware that things aint perfect for lots of reasons, some out with the government control. I'm certainly not a Tory lover at all & certainly there are things I would agree on, I just feel like others having a negative attitude is not ideal.

I've said before, I'm a half glass full chap. Keeping upbeat at times like this if you can may help somewhat.
 
Oh dear we have some torrid tantrums the resident supporter of our NHS/PHE senior management.


To say they the NHS is only now ramping up testing has to be a joke. Germany did it from day one. If the Germans could do it then so could UK - Except our NHS management are incapable of making it happen.

As ever the NHS front line staff have been stunning - working all hours at considerable personal risk. However those who captain the ship have moved with feet of lead. They ignore suppliers like Oxford University who sit ready and waiting with 120 testing machines and full staffing. They ignore private companies, one of whom can deliver 150,000 tests per day right now.

UK has the capability. London's 4000 bed Nightingale unit was built in NINE DAYS. By the Army and private contractors. 750,000 of the great British people have offered their help free of charge, but to date the PHE/NHS has given out just 20,000 tasks. Yet again management show their incompetence and lead feet.
 
What on earth are you talking about? tantrums!!!!!:D I asked a simple question. I'm quite upbeat. Whether you mean to, you actually come across quite negative. I try to be civil, please try to do the same.
 
Let’s just go back a minute to what you posted initially before you twist and turn this round to cover your own arse.

To date, UK has 15.000 excess deaths due to CCP virus. But seasonal flu kills about 50,000 each year in UK yet nobody considers lock-down is appropriate for that.

Sweden with a population of 10 million has avoided lockdown. To date their 1500 CCPV deaths are not so far away from UK's death rates. Sweden is of course under pressure from the mainstream media lemmings to change tack, but their numbers are not significantly worse than UK and they have not collapsed their economy.

Before anyone complains at such heartless attitudes - The whole issue is a balance between maintaining the economy which pays for our healthcare and minimising the numbers of dead.

So no it’s not 50,000 a year and your argument that the coronavirus is no worse than the flu, which is a comparison you seem obsessed with is nonsense, firstly you’re not even getting your information from reputable places and where you’re getting it from doesn’t even contain uk data and while I concede you did acknowledge that you then immediately posted another load of information from another source which was also not Uk based.

3 seconds of googling tells me that the swedes have screwed up but not only that they are on a partial lockdown, which you claimed they are not. So of all the places you chose to make your argument, that we should follow them and not have any sort of lockdown and that we were destroying our economy by doing so, you failed to note that they are on a lock down and they have impacted on their economy.

You complain at the media whipping up a storm about the death rates but also fail to recognise that they may be doing a similar thing by whipping up a storm about all these places ready to go with testing, essentially all the
Things you are complaining about are just news stories from the press and media.

You complain about tantrums but fail to bring any honest evidence to the table about the tantrum you just threw??

They built 500 beds of the nightingale hospital, this was done by the army and external contractors because the NHS doesn’t build hospitals,
There isn’t an NHS hospital building department, and the fact that it’s been barely used is testament to the hard work the rest of the NHS has put in. There is no way I can see that we should be critical of that. Would you rather we didn’t build it and had the people who need it die? Or would you rather the virus was worse and filled it up?

Companies have a vested interest in making a big deal to the news how they could be helping the current crisis, looks good on their share prices and to the share holders, but policies still have to the followed, there is no point using a lab at a university for example if they don’t have the control processes or computer systems in place to feed the results back to the NHS front line computers, also a huge amount of checks need to be done on the facility as the last thing you want is 100,000 false positive tests from machines that are not calibrated or used correctly.

Seriously stop parroting everything you read in the paper, I,e don’t just read one thing and then get angry and ranty about that without maybe looking to get the full facts and then maybe applying a little critical thinking.
 
750,000 of the great British people have offered their help free of charge, but to date the PHE/NHS has given out just 20,000 tasks. Yet again management show their incompetence and lead feet.

So what would you have 730000 people do (why don't they go and help the farmers instead of having to import manual labour from Romania...)
testing cant happen until the kits are available and test centres built to give rapid results.
test centres need to be manned the people manning them have to be trained.
It's like PPE, there is no magic storage facility with all this equipment stocked up just in case.
It seems you expect everything to happen overnight I can guarantee you that there is so much happening behind the headlines to get all this up and running
and the numbers of people involved is extraordinary. Same as any Battle, the NHS is the frontline but there is a huge organisation behind of many different areas of life helping to keep the NHS working
 
something has gone tits up with the testing stations, on the radio today there were people running them saying no nhs staff are turning up so they are now offering them to police and fire service.
Then others who work for nhs said they haven't been told where to go or if they have the place they are sent is way to far away.
If someone is doing a 13 hour shift they can be expected to do a 2 hour round trip for a test surely.
 
Of course you are right, the limited number of test stations is only the start.
the numbers or way of testing will increase rapidly.
the methodology of test to results to informing the individual is now in place allowing the increase to take place.
Put it this way there are No test centres in the Southwest give it a week or two and they will crop up everywhere.
 
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