@Eutychus to be clear, the primary reason for describing it as a clusterfuck is that we live in a federal system, where the States and Territories actually run the public schools (there are private ones as well, where the Catholic Church is the biggest provider).
And in this situation a National Cabinet has been put together, with the Prime Minister and the leader of each State/Territory.
There are many things where actual implementation has to legally be done by the States and Territories. And so the Prime Minister will announce a National Cabinet decision, but then it's each State/Territory that has to go and pass whatever regulation is required (usually the next day).
But when it comes to schools, the coherency of the message is completely breaking down. The PM announces that schools are still open. Half the States and Territories then tell parents to keep their kids at home because of a pupil-free day, or bring the start of the school holidays forward, or say that it's preferable for kids to stay home but send them if you can't look after them.
One of my Facebook friends is currently livid because after school care announced they are open, despite the 'pupil free' days (because the school is technically open?), and would be charging parents accordingly... and when pressed the after school care said that a child shouldn't be coming if they hadn't been in school earlier in the day.
I can't think of any other topic where the messaging has become anywhere near as mixed. Although I'm faintly worried about New South Wales now announcing fines for breaching the social distancing guidelines, not least because as a legislative drafter I have a deep, deep horror of calling anything a 'guideline' and then treating it as compulsory. You suggest that to any of my colleagues and you'll probably get a physical wince of pain.
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
@Eutychus to be clear, the primary reason for describing it as a clusterfuck is that we live in a federal system, where the States and Territories actually run the public schools (there are private ones as well, where the Catholic Church is the biggest provider).
And in this situation a National Cabinet has been put together, with the Prime Minister and the leader of each State/Territory.
There are many things where actual implementation has to legally be done by the States and Territories. And so the Prime Minister will announce a National Cabinet decision, but then it's each State/Territory that has to go and pass whatever regulation is required (usually the next day).
But when it comes to schools, the coherency of the message is completely breaking down. [snip].
I agree that the message about schools is inconsistent between states, who each set their own rules. In my opinion, the States are generally more concerned to sort out the health crisis than the economic crisis, whereas the federal government (probably unwisely) puts more weight on the economic aspects. The states figure that funding for lost income etc will in the end come from the federal government.
As another example of federal and state governments blaming each other, look no further than the the way in which a cruise boat was recently allowed to unload 3000 passengers with no immigration (federal) or health (state) checks. This has (at last count) put at least 150 covid-19 cases into the general community. Of course no-one is accepting any responsibility and ( I expect) no-one in a senior position will be disciplined about this incident. Maybe some woman in a junior position may be lumped withe blame, but certainly no Minister will resign, as Ministers no longer have any shame or sense of responsibility. .
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
As another example of federal and state governments blaming each other, look no further than the the way in which a cruise boat was recently allowed to unload 3000 passengers with no immigration (federal) or health (state) checks. This has (at last count) put at least 150 covid-19 cases into the general community. Of course no-one is accepting any responsibility and ( I expect) no-one in a senior position will be disciplined about this incident. Maybe some woman in a junior position may be lumped withe blame, but certainly no Minister will resign, as Ministers no longer have any shame or sense of responsibility. .
It's emerging today that that story is not entirely accurate. Not least it's not accurate that it's put those cases "into the general community". The infected people are the passengers, who were already infected on the boat.
Agreed. An example that viruses are no respecter of persons.
We followed the guidance to pray the Lords Prayer on our doorstep this morning, and our single mum neighbour came out right at the end. We had a good conversation and discovered amongst other things that she is tearing her hair over at the complacency of her parents. Thinks this latest news may make them take notice. (Also, bless her, she gave us a bar of soap she had left over from a recent purchase. Handed it over with due precaution!}
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
You're contradicting yourself. If one household has a member who has just picked it up, either at work or at the supermarket, but isn't noticeably symptomatic (or just plain ignores the advice) and their kid gets it then it gets spread to potentially hundreds of other households across a wide area, each with the potential to then spread it at workplaces and shops.
I have only just realised that when Catholic Churches have reported that they have replaced holy water with hand sanitiser, it does NOT mean they have put hand sanitiser in the bowls where the holy water is placed for the congregation to bless themselves. I am very disappointed. I would have definitely gone to church to see that.
It might make a difference to how the general public perceive the disease.
Exactly.
I was thinking Charles being infected could go either way. If Charles stages a rapid recovery and is not very ill, it could send all the wrong messages. Even more so if he then goes on one of his idiosyncratic waffles on live TV.
Either way, it's a lot more than a piece of celebrity gossip.
Does anyone care? The important question is does anyone we know and care about have it?
Given that a major source of viral spread in Europe was Isgl and Cheltenham was allowed to go ahead, I'd assume that a fair number of people in that particular social strata have been exposed to the virus.
It also seems like he traveled to Scotland after the initial advice to reduce unnecessary movement - thus putting staff (and their families) in both places at risk.
Neil Ferguson (epidemiologist) now saying that the NHS can cope, because of increased capacity and lockdown, and deaths could be under 20 000. Good news, but possibly he should keep it quiet, so that people don't relax. Story in Times and BBC.
Neil Ferguson (epidemiologist) now saying that the NHS can cope, because of increased capacity and lockdown, and deaths could be under 20 000. Good news, but possibly he should keep it quiet, so that people don't relax. Story in Times and BBC.
Saying "we might be able to keep fatalities in the low five figures" doesn't sound like particularly "good news". It's more like "less bad news".
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
You're contradicting yourself. If one household has a member who has just picked it up, either at work or at the supermarket, but isn't noticeably symptomatic (or just plain ignores the advice) and their kid gets it then it gets spread to potentially hundreds of other households across a wide area, each with the potential to then spread it at workplaces and shops.
I'm not contradicting myself. It's an issue of probabilities, not of guarantees. Which is more probable, that kids only interacting with school and parents get infected, or that kids having wider interactions because they're not in school get infected? And then what are the consequences of each those possibilities actually coming to pass? Those are two different questions that shouldn't be conflated.
I've already linked to a story from this morning about modelling that's indicating that closing schools doesn't seem to be effective in actually reducing the total number of infections, though it delays the peak. Among the things that happen in the model is that closing schools shifts the burden of infections, increasing the number of infected children.
In other words, the model suggested that taking children out of schools increases their exposure to the rest of the community and thus increases their exposure to the infections in the community. Obviously it drops the possibility of infection from a classmate to zero, but the whole point of this current discussion is I'm trying to challenge the 'common sense' understanding of schools as places where children go around picking up infections from each other. You have to treat the entry of an infection into the schoolyard as a possibility and weight up how large that possibility is, not just treat it as a given and then discuss how we all know what happens after that.
Honestly, it's basic risk analysis. Probability of occurrence AND consequence of occurrence are separate variables. And mitigation is relevant too. It's not as if when a case is discovered in a school (as has happened in Australia) that we just shut the gates and let the kid spread it to hundreds of others as you hypothesise. That's not how the health authorities dealing with coronavirus in general operate (so why on earth you think they wouldn't do the contact tracing and testing in a school?), and it's not even how the disease
operates.
Obviously any model has to build in various assumptions about what will happen, but the model was built using known data. The projections were highly equivocal that closing schools would achieve something in relation to the disease, and you have to weigh that against the additional disruptions caused by closing schools.
I think Ferguson is viewed with suspicion in some quarters as Imperial College predicted large numbers of deaths from BSE, however, this was almost certainly worst case scenario.
Also Nassim Taleb is in the Guardian today, with his usual forthright style, "the UK govt's coronavirus policy may sound scientific. It isn't."
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
You're contradicting yourself. If one household has a member who has just picked it up, either at work or at the supermarket, but isn't noticeably symptomatic (or just plain ignores the advice) and their kid gets it then it gets spread to potentially hundreds of other households across a wide area, each with the potential to then spread it at workplaces and shops.
I'm not contradicting myself. It's an issue of probabilities, not of guarantees. Which is more probable, that kids only interacting with school and parents get infected, or that kids having wider interactions because they're not in school get infected?
The point, as I've understood it, is that without interventions to limit social contact you have the following node (ie: child) in a network: Child interacts at home with siblings and parents, at school with some of the children there, wider interactions outside school (church, clubs, other kids in playground, people met in the shops ...). Of course, the other nodes also interact (eg: parents interact with people at work, on the bus to work, different clubs, different people in the shops etc)
With school shut down: Child interacts at home with siblings and parents. Period. No interactions at school (closed), no interactions more widely (out of school clubs also closed, don't use playgrounds, don't join parents in the shops, church closed). And, parents interactions are also reduced by staying at home to care for children as well as the other social distancing measures.
Obviously if the children don't go to school and compensate by spending more time in the playground, have access to out of school clubs, get taken to busy beaches etc then the value of closing the schools is greatly reduced, maybe even to the point where social mixing is greater with the schools closed. But, that's not what should be happening.
Further predictions of the flattening of the UK virus bulge. Dr Jenny Harries, deputy chief medical officer, states that if the lockdown is adhered to, the peak of cases will be manageable by NHS. "The peak of it will be pushed forward and the height will be lower". (Mumsnet discussion).
Taleb has published an article, "Tail risk of contagious diseases", (pdf). It's actually on Twitter, I am holding back, as I don't think my maths is up to it.
Interesting Health Map. Somewhere up-thread someone posted that one way the Chinese were able to contain the virus was because of their 5G technology which the US does not have. Well, if anything, this map does show that there is technology available that shows the US can at least get a general idea of where there are anomalies in temperature readings.
This particular map uses readings from Smart Thermometers produced by Kensa. When someone uses a smart thermometer the reading is not only recorded in the phone but also reported back to the producer of the thermometer--they argue it is for quality control, but Kensa also used the data to produce this daily map.
Now, what they are tracking is abnormal temperature spikes, not necessarily cornovirus related temperatures, but they say they do remove what they consider normal variations.
You can probably find similar health weather maps for your own countries.
The latest restrictions have just been announced in Australia. Some more types of businesses required to shut down. Weddings are restricted to the 5 necessary people - the couple, the celebrant and 2 witnesses. Funerals restricted to 10 people.
Schools not shut. We will never hear the end of fucking schools no matter how many times the Chief Medical Officer explains the weighing up that is informing the decision to not shut them.
You could have fooled me about the schools, @orfeo. I live in the same "state" of Australia as you and all the schools here are having "pupil free days" until the Easter holidays are due to start. Schoolkids are supposed to be at home , with teachers (who are still "at work") working out how to provide resources for them, including online.
I repeat, we will never hear the end of the schools. But there is no national decision to shut them.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
People are so used to thinking of how germs spread in schools that they never ask the question about how germs get into schools in the first place, which is a necessary precondition for them spreading in schools. A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
You're contradicting yourself. If one household has a member who has just picked it up, either at work or at the supermarket, but isn't noticeably symptomatic (or just plain ignores the advice) and their kid gets it then it gets spread to potentially hundreds of other households across a wide area, each with the potential to then spread it at workplaces and shops.
I'm not contradicting myself. It's an issue of probabilities, not of guarantees. Which is more probable, that kids only interacting with school and parents get infected, or that kids having wider interactions because they're not in school get infected?
The point, as I've understood it, is that without interventions to limit social contact you have the following node (ie: child) in a network: Child interacts at home with siblings and parents, at school with some of the children there, wider interactions outside school (church, clubs, other kids in playground, people met in the shops ...). Of course, the other nodes also interact (eg: parents interact with people at work, on the bus to work, different clubs, different people in the shops etc)
With school shut down: Child interacts at home with siblings and parents. Period. No interactions at school (closed), no interactions more widely (out of school clubs also closed, don't use playgrounds, don't join parents in the shops, church closed). And, parents interactions are also reduced by staying at home to care for children as well as the other social distancing measures.
Obviously if the children don't go to school and compensate by spending more time in the playground, have access to out of school clubs, get taken to busy beaches etc then the value of closing the schools is greatly reduced, maybe even to the point where social mixing is greater with the schools closed. But, that's not what should be happening.
I'm gathering we're locked up tighter than in the UK. Although at -11°C playground equipment is not used, they are closed by law here. People are allowed to walk on paths in parks, and on other areas in parks, but there is no use of playgrounds, ice rinks, and no other public facility usage. Churches are all closed too, and only stores allowed to open are grocery, drug stores, gas stations, restaurants for take out only, but you cannot enter the buildings. You either call or write something and show it in the window. Fines start at $2000. Though police have indicated that they will inform and not arrest immediately if compliance occurs. We have to explain why we're not at home if asked. It has to be safe, meaning 2 metres distant.
Somewhere up-thread someone posted that one way the Chinese were able to contain the virus was because of their 5G technology which the US does not have.
The question isn't technology, but how we want technology to be used. The Chinese don't have a massive 5G network, what they (and other SE Asian countries) have is the means to track the location of a phone - that doesn't need 5G, 3G would be more than adequate. This allows for the creation of "infection hot spots" and to automatically generate alerts to phones as they approach those locations. But, it requires the authorities to have access to the information on where infected people (or, more accurately, their phones) have been as part of the information used to devise those maps; the other part ("you are near a hot spot" alerts) isn't that different from an app that tells you where the nearest McDonalds is. Phones are also been used as a means of carrying information about people - information to say "this person is allowed outside" (for specified purposes) that can be checked by police, records of testing for the virus etc. that is also similar to using a phone to hold a boarding pass for an airline or other applications that replace pieces of paper.
The difficulty with implementing these measures in most of Europe, US etc is cultural. We value personal liberty, and so react against the idea of a government agency using data on our phone to track our movements - even if that then allows them to track who else we've potentially been in contact with to allow them to be tested for infection and/or instructed to self-isolate. And, a lot of people seem to be suspicious if a government agency issues a phone app, or even a pdf with barcode or QR Code to put on our phone, even though we all download similar apps/documents for supermarket loyalty schemes, airlines, cinemas etc.
A school socially isolates a group of people away from the general community for many hours of the day. We have fences and everything.
Well, sure, but then the kids go home to their families.
So every night the kids swap viruses with their families, and then they go to school and pass them on to a thousand of their closest friends, who go home to their families.
To reduce the spread of the virus, you need to dramatically reduce the number of different people each person has potentially transmissive social contact with. The school acts as a massive bridge between the families of all the schoolkids.
Yes it is. A relative works at an agency which normally feeds 5000 children and 3500 seniors. It's changed from school-based delivery to pick up, and with all the public buildings closed, they've got a problem with people who need to pee and a drink of water, and all the shelters are closed to new admissions.
There's people who were dependent on other agencies which are working from their homes and only via phone and computer which homeless and others can't use. We always have free WiFi available in core areas and it's still on, people cluster at building ventilation for for warmth and try to communicate. The provincial phone company which owns almost all of the infrastructure (it's not economically viable for private companies; gov't does internet and cell phones better here) have removed data caps on all cell phones. Thus if you've a cell phone you can use that for communication at no charge. But you need a phone.
It was cold last night, down to about -18°C. It's at times like these that people actually try to get arrested to have a warm overnight place. Which is something which cannot be provided. The conversion of some buildings to shelters appears to be happening locally, plus use for others as additional field hospitals.
City busses have gone to free, and you must enter and exit at the back door only, spacing out within. Some people are riding around to stay warm. As far as I understand it, bus drivers are exhausted and scared.
We have to explain why we're not at home if asked. It has to be safe, meaning 2 metres distant.
Taking my permitted exercise this afternoon on the pedestrian paths round my quite densely-populated European city suburb (not US suburb!) home, I've discovered that as of about 24 hours ago, as soon as somebody spots someone in the middle distance, they (and I) veer off at right angles on another path.
From the air it must look like a giant game of Pacman.
I just looked at Facebook and got an ad for an at-home test for covid-19. I flagged it as a scam. I expect there will be no shortage of "businesses" who will be offering tests soon, as it looks like there are some nearing the point of being usable, happy to take your money then supply nothing or something that isn't what it claims to be (or, in a few months maybe even the genuine article with an extra zero on the price tag compared to other retailers). Some people will exploit any crisis to scam people out of money.
Now Whitty is saying that the NHS will cope, so long as people stick to the rules. That's 3 experts today, saying that. Whitty is chief medical officer, also Ferguson, (Imperial College), and Harries, deputy chief scientific officer.
I went to the laundromat this morning. My usual day is Thursday, but the supermarket where I prefer to shop has announced that Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6:00am-7:00am will be reserved for seniors (whereas last week I was told "Our company doesn't do that" when I inquired). So I'll drag myself out of bed at the crack of dawn tomorrow morning to try to get some groceries.
The laundromat is not allowing children inside. Customers cannot wait inside while their laundry is in the machines -- we were encouraged to wait outside in our cars. We cannot fold our clothes inside -- I used the back seat of my car. Anyone caught stealing toilet paper or paper towels from the lavatory will be banned permanently from the premises.
There were only three other people there. I felt safe.
I also stopped off at the bank to use the ATM machine. Had no trouble getting money out (although I don't know where I'm going to spend it). There was a sign on the door of the bank, but I didn't read it. I'm sure it said that in-person banking services have been suspended and that customers must use the ATM machine or the drive-up window.
On a more positive note, the call for 250000 volunteers has been responded to by about 400000 people.
I don't think this is necessarily a good thing. If this is part of running a functional health service, then it should be paid roles (bearing in mind that there are people who perform similar roles for the NHS already -- who have since been outsourced and are sometimes working for subcontractors who don't offer sick pay).
Even on a purely pragmatic basis, it's going to be better to have a smaller number of full time employees doing these tasks and reduce those who are put at risk.
The Saskatoon lab already has a head start. It has been working on coronavirus vaccines, primarily for animals, for four decades, including successful vaccines for cattle and pigs.
...in the past, generating interest in funding research into a pan-coronavirus vaccine for humans has been a challenge...
They're testing on animals as of last week.
Basically it's been a follow the money exercise, where previously no-one wanted to fund cornovirus vaccine research, and now, of course, they do.
Why are the USA and China not cooperating in the research with WHO, which involves 10 countries? Is this more a follow the money thing? You can bet that no country will honour a patent on a vaccine.
On a more positive note, the call for 250000 volunteers has been responded to by about 400000 people.
I don't think this is necessarily a good thing. If this is part of running a functional health service, then it should be paid roles (bearing in mind that there are people who perform similar roles for the NHS already -- who have since been outsourced and are sometimes working for subcontractors who don't offer sick pay).
Even on a purely pragmatic basis, it's going to be better to have a smaller number of full time employees doing these tasks and reduce those who are put at risk.
The roles described are not generally undertaken by NHS staff, we don’t normally deliver food and medicines, or act as befrienders or transport staff. We do have volunteer hospital car drivers. Voluntary befriender schemes have existed for a long time and charities often run similar programs, food parcels are likewise something normally offered by charities like the Salvation Army.
On a more positive note, the call for 250000 volunteers has been responded to by about 400000 people.
I don't think this is necessarily a good thing. If this is part of running a functional health service, then it should be paid roles (bearing in mind that there are people who perform similar roles for the NHS already -- who have since been outsourced and are sometimes working for subcontractors who don't offer sick pay).
Even on a purely pragmatic basis, it's going to be better to have a smaller number of full time employees doing these tasks and reduce those who are put at risk.
The roles described are not generally undertaken by NHS staff, we don’t normally deliver food and medicines, or act as befrienders or transport staff. We do have volunteer hospital car drivers. Voluntary befriender schemes have existed for a long time and charities often run similar programs, food parcels are likewise something normally offered by charities like the Salvation Army.
List of countries with at least 5,000 known COVID-19 cases.
China - 81,218 (4,287 / 73,650 / 3,281) 4.3%
Italy - 74,386 (57,521 / 9,362 / 7,503)
United States - 64,765 (63,463 / 393 / 909)
Spain - 47,611 (38,799 / 5,367 / 3,445)
Germany - 37,323 (33,570 / 3,547 / 206)
Iran - 27,017 (15,315 / 9,625 / 2,077)
France - 25,233 (20,002 / 3,900 / 1,331)
Switzerland - 10,897 (10,613 / 131 / 153)
South Korea - 9,137 (5,281 / 3,730 / 126)
United Kingdom - 8,264 (7,694 / 135 / 435)
Netherlands - 6,412 (6,053 / 3 / 356)
Austria - 5,588 (5,549 / 9 / 30)
The listings are in the format:
X. Country - [# of known cases] ([active] / [recovered] / [dead]) [%fatality rate]
Fatality rates are only listed for countries where the number of resolved cases (recovered + dead) exceeds the number of known active cases by a ratio of at least 2:1. At the moment China is the only country to meet that criteria.
The whole topic is a complete clusterfuck. Not least because people either can't or simply won't understand the very rational but counterintuitive reasons why keeping schools open could actually be the better option.
Can you describe a school? What size and how big are you thinking of.
I could absolutely see the point with boarding schools.
UK Primary schools density, typical large size (3+4)*30 people I could see the argument. You still wouldn't probably want to rely on it. Thinking of the places I've lived you probably could probably plan to get the secondary schools students who had come from the primary, somewhere and still have room to thin things out (use the churchs and halls). Loads of issues, but there's a feasible chance that you could slow things that by the time it went worker-kid-classmate-brother-classmate-worker-coworker-new school you are getting ahead of the game.
Secondary schools, no way, ours had a catchment of about 15 miles, 1000 pupils in a much more confined space, and there is no way the. boundaries between any two nearby schools is solid.
On a similar basis I'm social distancing at work, but while I'd like to help deliver food or the like in some way, I think it has to be a way that doesn't involve any networks.
On a more positive note, the call for 250000 volunteers has been responded to by about 400000 people.
I don't think this is necessarily a good thing. If this is part of running a functional health service, then it should be paid roles (bearing in mind that there are people who perform similar roles for the NHS already -- who have since been outsourced and are sometimes working for subcontractors who don't offer sick pay).
Even on a purely pragmatic basis, it's going to be better to have a smaller number of full time employees doing these tasks and reduce those who are put at risk.
The roles described are not generally undertaken by NHS staff, we don’t normally deliver food and medicines, or act as befrienders or transport staff. We do have volunteer hospital car drivers. Voluntary befriender schemes have existed for a long time and charities often run similar programs, food parcels are likewise something normally offered by charities like the Salvation Army.
Comments
And in this situation a National Cabinet has been put together, with the Prime Minister and the leader of each State/Territory.
There are many things where actual implementation has to legally be done by the States and Territories. And so the Prime Minister will announce a National Cabinet decision, but then it's each State/Territory that has to go and pass whatever regulation is required (usually the next day).
But when it comes to schools, the coherency of the message is completely breaking down. The PM announces that schools are still open. Half the States and Territories then tell parents to keep their kids at home because of a pupil-free day, or bring the start of the school holidays forward, or say that it's preferable for kids to stay home but send them if you can't look after them.
One of my Facebook friends is currently livid because after school care announced they are open, despite the 'pupil free' days (because the school is technically open?), and would be charging parents accordingly... and when pressed the after school care said that a child shouldn't be coming if they hadn't been in school earlier in the day.
I can't think of any other topic where the messaging has become anywhere near as mixed. Although I'm faintly worried about New South Wales now announcing fines for breaching the social distancing guidelines, not least because as a legislative drafter I have a deep, deep horror of calling anything a 'guideline' and then treating it as compulsory. You suggest that to any of my colleagues and you'll probably get a physical wince of pain.
And then disperses them throughout the wider community having shared their germs. If it were a boarding school the idea would be sound. As is, particularly in rural areas, you end up shoving kids on a hot bus for up to an hour, shoulder to shoulder, each way and sending them back to different villages and hamlets to share whatever they've picked up. It's different if the kids all walk to school from the same housing scheme and they'd be in the bus shelters having a fag if they weren't in school.
I agree that the message about schools is inconsistent between states, who each set their own rules. In my opinion, the States are generally more concerned to sort out the health crisis than the economic crisis, whereas the federal government (probably unwisely) puts more weight on the economic aspects. The states figure that funding for lost income etc will in the end come from the federal government.
As another example of federal and state governments blaming each other, look no further than the the way in which a cruise boat was recently allowed to unload 3000 passengers with no immigration (federal) or health (state) checks. This has (at last count) put at least 150 covid-19 cases into the general community. Of course no-one is accepting any responsibility and ( I expect) no-one in a senior position will be disciplined about this incident. Maybe some woman in a junior position may be lumped withe blame, but certainly no Minister will resign, as Ministers no longer have any shame or sense of responsibility. .
Again, you are thinking about what normally happens. If shutdowns and social distancing are happening in the general community, than where are the children getting these germs, and where are these children dispersing germs to?
The fundamental point of minimising social contact is to divide society in lots of smaller groups, each of which has relatively little contact outside that group. This slows the infection between groups, not within whichever groups have an infection present. We do more rigorous separation within a group once we know there's an infection there.
I mean, we're accepting that families should generally still be able to live in a house together, right? Or are we going to argue that we have to split up the family, because one of those family members going to the supermarket is going to pose a risk to rest of the household when they come back? No. We only get people within a family to isolate from each other in much more specific circumstances.
It's emerging today that that story is not entirely accurate. Not least it's not accurate that it's put those cases "into the general community". The infected people are the passengers, who were already infected on the boat.
Has the queen been tested?
We followed the guidance to pray the Lords Prayer on our doorstep this morning, and our single mum neighbour came out right at the end. We had a good conversation and discovered amongst other things that she is tearing her hair over at the complacency of her parents. Thinks this latest news may make them take notice. (Also, bless her, she gave us a bar of soap she had left over from a recent purchase. Handed it over with due precaution!}
You're contradicting yourself. If one household has a member who has just picked it up, either at work or at the supermarket, but isn't noticeably symptomatic (or just plain ignores the advice) and their kid gets it then it gets spread to potentially hundreds of other households across a wide area, each with the potential to then spread it at workplaces and shops.
Exactly.
It will also make a difference to the ‘moral of the nation’ if the Queen dies.
Not that anyone's allowed in at the moment, anyway...
I was thinking Charles being infected could go either way. If Charles stages a rapid recovery and is not very ill, it could send all the wrong messages. Even more so if he then goes on one of his idiosyncratic waffles on live TV.
Either way, it's a lot more than a piece of celebrity gossip.
Given that a major source of viral spread in Europe was Isgl and Cheltenham was allowed to go ahead, I'd assume that a fair number of people in that particular social strata have been exposed to the virus.
It also seems like he traveled to Scotland after the initial advice to reduce unnecessary movement - thus putting staff (and their families) in both places at risk.
Saying "we might be able to keep fatalities in the low five figures" doesn't sound like particularly "good news". It's more like "less bad news".
I'm not contradicting myself. It's an issue of probabilities, not of guarantees. Which is more probable, that kids only interacting with school and parents get infected, or that kids having wider interactions because they're not in school get infected? And then what are the consequences of each those possibilities actually coming to pass? Those are two different questions that shouldn't be conflated.
I've already linked to a story from this morning about modelling that's indicating that closing schools doesn't seem to be effective in actually reducing the total number of infections, though it delays the peak. Among the things that happen in the model is that closing schools shifts the burden of infections, increasing the number of infected children.
In other words, the model suggested that taking children out of schools increases their exposure to the rest of the community and thus increases their exposure to the infections in the community. Obviously it drops the possibility of infection from a classmate to zero, but the whole point of this current discussion is I'm trying to challenge the 'common sense' understanding of schools as places where children go around picking up infections from each other. You have to treat the entry of an infection into the schoolyard as a possibility and weight up how large that possibility is, not just treat it as a given and then discuss how we all know what happens after that.
Honestly, it's basic risk analysis. Probability of occurrence AND consequence of occurrence are separate variables. And mitigation is relevant too. It's not as if when a case is discovered in a school (as has happened in Australia) that we just shut the gates and let the kid spread it to hundreds of others as you hypothesise. That's not how the health authorities dealing with coronavirus in general operate (so why on earth you think they wouldn't do the contact tracing and testing in a school?), and it's not even how the disease
operates.
Obviously any model has to build in various assumptions about what will happen, but the model was built using known data. The projections were highly equivocal that closing schools would achieve something in relation to the disease, and you have to weigh that against the additional disruptions caused by closing schools.
Also Nassim Taleb is in the Guardian today, with his usual forthright style, "the UK govt's coronavirus policy may sound scientific. It isn't."
With school shut down: Child interacts at home with siblings and parents. Period. No interactions at school (closed), no interactions more widely (out of school clubs also closed, don't use playgrounds, don't join parents in the shops, church closed). And, parents interactions are also reduced by staying at home to care for children as well as the other social distancing measures.
Obviously if the children don't go to school and compensate by spending more time in the playground, have access to out of school clubs, get taken to busy beaches etc then the value of closing the schools is greatly reduced, maybe even to the point where social mixing is greater with the schools closed. But, that's not what should be happening.
This particular map uses readings from Smart Thermometers produced by Kensa. When someone uses a smart thermometer the reading is not only recorded in the phone but also reported back to the producer of the thermometer--they argue it is for quality control, but Kensa also used the data to produce this daily map.
Now, what they are tracking is abnormal temperature spikes, not necessarily cornovirus related temperatures, but they say they do remove what they consider normal variations.
You can probably find similar health weather maps for your own countries.
You do want to highlight the Atypical link.
The difficulty with implementing these measures in most of Europe, US etc is cultural. We value personal liberty, and so react against the idea of a government agency using data on our phone to track our movements - even if that then allows them to track who else we've potentially been in contact with to allow them to be tested for infection and/or instructed to self-isolate. And, a lot of people seem to be suspicious if a government agency issues a phone app, or even a pdf with barcode or QR Code to put on our phone, even though we all download similar apps/documents for supermarket loyalty schemes, airlines, cinemas etc.
Pretty hard on those who don't have homes to be in.
Well, sure, but then the kids go home to their families.
So every night the kids swap viruses with their families, and then they go to school and pass them on to a thousand of their closest friends, who go home to their families.
To reduce the spread of the virus, you need to dramatically reduce the number of different people each person has potentially transmissive social contact with. The school acts as a massive bridge between the families of all the schoolkids.
There's people who were dependent on other agencies which are working from their homes and only via phone and computer which homeless and others can't use. We always have free WiFi available in core areas and it's still on, people cluster at building ventilation for for warmth and try to communicate. The provincial phone company which owns almost all of the infrastructure (it's not economically viable for private companies; gov't does internet and cell phones better here) have removed data caps on all cell phones. Thus if you've a cell phone you can use that for communication at no charge. But you need a phone.
It was cold last night, down to about -18°C. It's at times like these that people actually try to get arrested to have a warm overnight place. Which is something which cannot be provided. The conversion of some buildings to shelters appears to be happening locally, plus use for others as additional field hospitals.
City busses have gone to free, and you must enter and exit at the back door only, spacing out within. Some people are riding around to stay warm. As far as I understand it, bus drivers are exhausted and scared.
Taking my permitted exercise this afternoon on the pedestrian paths round my quite densely-populated European city suburb (not US suburb!) home, I've discovered that as of about 24 hours ago, as soon as somebody spots someone in the middle distance, they (and I) veer off at right angles on another path.
From the air it must look like a giant game of Pacman.
The article is 1000% accurate. (I'm in the US.)
The laundromat is not allowing children inside. Customers cannot wait inside while their laundry is in the machines -- we were encouraged to wait outside in our cars. We cannot fold our clothes inside -- I used the back seat of my car. Anyone caught stealing toilet paper or paper towels from the lavatory will be banned permanently from the premises.
There were only three other people there. I felt safe.
I also stopped off at the bank to use the ATM machine. Had no trouble getting money out (although I don't know where I'm going to spend it). There was a sign on the door of the bank, but I didn't read it. I'm sure it said that in-person banking services have been suspended and that customers must use the ATM machine or the drive-up window.
I don't think this is necessarily a good thing. If this is part of running a functional health service, then it should be paid roles (bearing in mind that there are people who perform similar roles for the NHS already -- who have since been outsourced and are sometimes working for subcontractors who don't offer sick pay).
Even on a purely pragmatic basis, it's going to be better to have a smaller number of full time employees doing these tasks and reduce those who are put at risk.
They're testing on animals as of last week.
Basically it's been a follow the money exercise, where previously no-one wanted to fund cornovirus vaccine research, and now, of course, they do.
Why are the USA and China not cooperating in the research with WHO, which involves 10 countries? Is this more a follow the money thing? You can bet that no country will honour a patent on a vaccine.
This is an interesting article - https://tinyurl.com/t7om2cu
Is this the recall of retired medical personnel story?
No, it's this programme https://www.goodsamapp.org/NHS which among other things is asking for people to do PTS.
The roles described are not generally undertaken by NHS staff, we don’t normally deliver food and medicines, or act as befrienders or transport staff. We do have volunteer hospital car drivers. Voluntary befriender schemes have existed for a long time and charities often run similar programs, food parcels are likewise something normally offered by charities like the Salvation Army.
PTS - which is one of the roles mentioned on that page is one of the things that the NHS does - it has been outsourced in some areas, and the staff are currently trying to get sick pay.
Also not as if the NHS doesn't employ delivery drivers.
The listings are in the format:
X. Country - [# of known cases] ([active] / [recovered] / [dead]) [%fatality rate]
Fatality rates are only listed for countries where the number of resolved cases (recovered + dead) exceeds the number of known active cases by a ratio of at least 2:1. At the moment China is the only country to meet that criteria.
No countries have joined the list since yesterday's compilation.
I could absolutely see the point with boarding schools.
UK Primary schools density, typical large size (3+4)*30 people I could see the argument. You still wouldn't probably want to rely on it. Thinking of the places I've lived you probably could probably plan to get the secondary schools students who had come from the primary, somewhere and still have room to thin things out (use the churchs and halls). Loads of issues, but there's a feasible chance that you could slow things that by the time it went worker-kid-classmate-brother-classmate-worker-coworker-new school you are getting ahead of the game.
Secondary schools, no way, ours had a catchment of about 15 miles, 1000 pupils in a much more confined space, and there is no way the. boundaries between any two nearby schools is solid.
On a similar basis I'm social distancing at work, but while I'd like to help deliver food or the like in some way, I think it has to be a way that doesn't involve any networks.
Outsourcing is of the devil.
But citizen volunteers are not becoming ambulance drivers.