Coronavirus Thread (Off Topic, Politics) (23 Viewers)

[Sick Boy]

It’s a fair point Sick Boy and the US banned flights from China on 3 or 4 Feb (think we only banned flights from Wuhan), however, I’m not convinced it did either country much good as by then the virus was already in the respective countries

Hindsight’s a great thing but in reality from what I can see (I might be wrong) youve got to pretty much ban all flights/international travel at very early stage (or the world leaders all agree travel ban from the high risk areas). One example would be that there’s little point Italy banning flights from China if the rest of the EU doesn’t (with freedom of movement).

Once the pandemic is reasonably wide spread any partial travel bans (other than very high risk areas) probably have little effect.

The international coordination in response to the pandemic has been poor (don’t get me started on China and their initial suppression of information)

Yeah I agree with you, banning flights from specific countries is pointless, I wasn’t the one making the point though.

 

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[djr8369]

Oh it’s our biggest advantage no question and yes we could have locked our borders immediately and should have done. Whatever you think of this government it’s essentially weak and liberal on its thinking and courts popular thinking. If they’d done it the outrage regarding its racist, xenophobic behaviour would have been confirmed. The Rachel Riley stalkier would have been in full flow and everyone pretty much in here would have been outraged

Churchill would have locked the borders and anyone who’s travelled from China, Italy and Spain would be against their will isolated

and everyone on here would squeal racist Tory

You described the pandemic as social media hyperbole so don't now pretend you thought stronger action should have been taken because you want to spin some bullshit narrative that the government is "weak and liberal" and can't take strong action because of social media criticism.

 

[djr8369]

I think if children going skiing in Italy in January were forcibly detained for two weeks afterwards there would have been outrage. I do think the one thing the government could and should have done is locked borders and detained all nationals from high infected areas for two weeks and then cancelled all future travel but I also think the backlash would have been horrific.

Why is the alternative to not taking action locking up children? Clearly they would have just restricted people going on holiday. You fucking maniac.

 

[Sick Boy]

The Italians seemed less than happy

'As if we were the disease': coronavirus brings prejudice for Italy's Chinese workers

So do the British.

Chinese students flee UK after 'maskaphobia' triggered racist attacks

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

Agree Ian. I can’t see international travel getting fully back to normal until much later this year at the earliest anyway. It surely should be in our thinking when agreeing exit from lockdown strategy (no point us getting it under control and allowing travellers from high risk areas in).

However, do you allow travel from non high risk areas/countries with similar transmission rates to ourselves ?! My view is probably yes (as travel numbers will probably be significantly lower compared to a normal year) but then again, if those countries are allowing high risk travellers into their countries the problem remains.

tricky !

We could let them in but test for symptoms and/or make them isolate and provide details of travel plans etc. Ideally we could test them on arrival properly but not feasible (at the moment anyway).

Mind you, we should have done that from the start.

 

[wingy]

So do the British.

Chinese students flee UK after 'maskaphobia' triggered racist attacks

Some of the Spanish don't like their medical workers either,getting abused by those they live near to
Fear drives irrational behaviour.
Unacceptable in either case.

 

[CCFCSteve]

We could let them in but test for symptoms and/or make them isolate and provide details of travel plans etc. Ideally we could test them on arrival properly but not feasible (at the moment anyway).

Mind you, we should have done that from the start.

Details of travel plans (contact details etc) I 100% agree with for tracking/tracing.

Our border controls are shit, always have been, probably always will be !

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

So do the British.

Chinese students flee UK after 'maskaphobia' triggered racist attacks

Before school was closed I had several awkward cases of white British students making all the usual 'it's their fault they eat dogs' in the presence of a few Chinese students. 'What's racist about that' was the reply to being sanctioned

 

[Astute]

Smokers 80% less likely to get the virus?

French researchers to test nicotine patches on coronavirus patients

 

[clint van damme]

Smokers 80% less likely to get the virus?

French researchers to test nicotine patches on coronavirus patients

Sure I read something the other day saying they were more likely!!

 

[Flying Fokker]

So do the British.

Chinese students flee UK after 'maskaphobia' triggered racist attacks

I had a problem with the weird mask wearing.
It was often quoted that the mask wearing was because people had a cold and didn’t want to pass it on.
i explained this away as a weak argument because most of the mask wearers live in highly polluted cities and not Warwick Uni Campus...so why insult people in the uk?

I see olde people wearing masks now. I hope this stops as soon as they are safe. It would be a kick in the balls for the Yoof if they try to look hard in front of Ninja Gertrude.

The sooner we get back to normal the better.

Then I can pour scorn on mask wearing Yoof.

 

[djr8369]

Sure I read something the other day saying they were more likely!!

Yes a lot of evidence saying you're higher risk being a smoker. I think our authorities were saying you were 14 times more likely to die if you were a smoker. There seems to be a lot of confusion around this. I am wondering if a lot of the smokers with poor health in the most vulnerable age categories are already deceased so it appears fewer smokers have it, yet perhaps once they do it is more likely to be fatal.

Not sure anything like this will be clear until we have more accurate data all around and time to put together proper studies and peer review them.

 

[Flying Fokker]

What is the point? EU scheme to provide medical supplies hasn't made SINGLE delivery

 

[tisza]

What is the point? EU scheme to provide medical supplies hasn't made SINGLE delivery

Made this point last week. (I think. Dates & times blurry now )
Govt here had said we were weeks away from getting any EU organized PPE etc. Everything here so far organized by Govt on an individual basis.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Smokers 80% less likely to get the virus?

French researchers to test nicotine patches on coronavirus patients

It’s on about nicotine not all the damage done to your lungs which makes you vastly more vulnerable to serious problems.

 

[skybluetony176]

What is the point? EU scheme to provide medical supplies hasn't made SINGLE delivery

I don’t think anything is supposed to be delivered yet is it? There’s schedules for delivery to meet demand as it’s needed based on information from those that took part in the scheme. It set out to find new suppliers and manufacturers for PPE and other medical supplies and as far as I understand they succeeded in that. If the first scheduled delivery is missed then the article may have a point.

 

[Mcbean]

Hope we don’t go the mask route - that plus a hoodie makes a crim virtually invisible

 

[fernandopartridge]

What is the point? EU scheme to provide medical supplies hasn't made SINGLE delivery

I suppose the problem with it is that essentially the manufacturing capacity is the same, no matter how many different buyers or configurations of buyers there are. The EU collaboration should perhaps be more attractive to manufacturers due to the scale of the orders in normal circumstances, but I'd imagine they are pretty maxed out as it is.

 

[djr8369]

Some of the praise of Sweden is a bit misleading. They are still experiencing growth in cases and growth in deaths. The nature of their demographics, high proportion of people live alone, pop density etc seems to have just meant they had to implement fewer measures compared to some other countries. They have one of the worst death rates per million people, in the top ten worse affected countries, far higher than the neighbouring countries, bar the Netherlands who also had a softer approach. I should think at some point they will have to implement tougher measures to bend the curve and not overwhelm their healthcare system (in fairness I think they acknowledge it's early days and this may happen, from what I have read). Of course, they have the advantage of having further measures in their arsenal.

 

[fernandopartridge]

Some of the praise of Sweden is a bit misleading. They are still experiencing growth in cases and growth in deaths. The nature of their demographics, high proportion of people live alone, pop density etc seems to have just meant they had to implement fewer measures compared to some other countries. They have one of the worst death rates per million people, in the top ten worse affected countries, far higher than the neighbouring countries, bar the Netherlands who also had a softer approach. I should think at some point they will have to implement tougher measures to bend the curve and not overwhelm their healthcare system (in fairness I think they acknowledge it's early days and this may happen, from what I have read). Of course, they have the advantage of having further measures in their arsenal.

Who is praising Sweden? Is it the herd immunity pushers? They present a superficial of everything

 

[djr8369]

Who is praising Sweden? Is it the herd immunity pushers? They present a superficial of everything

The libertarian "we need to open the economy as soon as possible, you don't understand that lockdown could do as much damage as the disease" types mainly. As if nobody is noticing they are not at work or the constant barrage of forecast on the economic damage.

 

[CCFCSteve]

Who is praising Sweden? Is it the herd immunity pushers? They present a superficial of everything

I think Sweden is taking a huge risk but it’s up to each country to try to manage the disease as best they can. If they can allow it to spread without breaching their health service capacity then who’s to say that ultimately that might not be the best decision in the long run.

The problem I can see with their strategy is the lag between restriction measures being implemented and the confirmed cases coming through (people showing symptoms and then needing hospital treatment) and whether it spreads to higher risk individuals. This is made even more difficult due to the high number of asymptomatic/mild cases ie You could start putting restrictions in place to control the spread but it could be too late as it’s spread more than you think and you’re going to breach your health service capacity anyway.

I honestly don’t think anyone will know the best solution/strategy for months or even longer. The only fact we know at the moment is we don’t have a vaccine and therefore this is around for a good while yet.

All countries can do in the meantime is try to buy some time in order for us to find out how to best to manage/treat the virus (or find a vaccine), whilst remaining within their health care capacity, without damaging the economy to the point whereby more damage is done to society than would be done by the virus itself.

Not easy

ps also, if it’s discovered that you can catch it again, there’s another layer to the mess which changes the dynamics again

 

[CCFCSteve]

Some of the praise of Sweden is a bit misleading. They are still experiencing growth in cases and growth in deaths. The nature of their demographics, high proportion of people live alone, pop density etc seems to have just meant they had to implement fewer measures compared to some other countries. They have one of the worst death rates per million people, in the top ten worse affected countries, far higher than the neighbouring countries, bar the Netherlands who also had a softer approach. I should think at some point they will have to implement tougher measures to bend the curve and not overwhelm their healthcare system (in fairness I think they acknowledge it's early days and this may happen, from what I have read). Of course, they have the advantage of having further measures in their arsenal.

As I say above I’m not supporting their strategy but the death rates are a strange one until you know how many in the population has it/has had it. Even the best testing (major) nations haven’t really got a clue, only estimates from some relatively low number antibody sampling

If for example after testing we find out that half the population in Sweden has had it at the current number of deaths then it would put a totally different slant on the argument

I’m not saying that’s the case at all but you get the point.

 

[Astute]

It’s on about nicotine not all the damage done to your lungs which makes you vastly more vulnerable to serious problems.

The guess is it is nicotine. But as usual many seem to know more than the specialists know.

About 50% of smokers die from a smoking related cause. Fact.

In France over 25% of the population still smoke. Fact.

In France only about 5% of those with the virus are smokers. Seemingly a Fact.

The big question is how come smokers who have respiratory problems have an 80% lower chance of getting a respiratory based virus. This could be the start of a breakthrough.

So what do the experts on here say?

 

[CCFCSteve]

The guess is it is nicotine. But as usual many seem to know more than the specialists know.

About 50% of smokers die from a smoking related cause. Fact.

In France over 25% of the population still smoke. Fact.

In France only about 5% of those with the virus are smokers. Seemingly a Fact.

The big question is how come smokers who have respiratory problems have an 80% lower chance of getting a respiratory based virus. This could be the start of a breakthrough.

So what do the experts on here say?

It’s fascinating isn’t it. I think I read that smokers are less likely to get it but if they do are at a higher risk. Might be wrong though

 

[shmmeee]

The guess is it is nicotine. But as usual many seem to know more than the specialists know.

About 50% of smokers die from a smoking related cause. Fact.

In France over 25% of the population still smoke. Fact.

In France only about 5% of those with the virus are smokers. Seemingly a Fact.

The big question is how come smokers who have respiratory problems have an 80% lower chance of getting a respiratory based virus. This could be the start of a breakthrough.

So what do the experts on here say?

I say this is not the news I needed on my one week anniversary of quitting.

Devils advocate: could it be that at the age profile corona kicks in those with weak lungs have already been weeded out?

The real test would be vapers I reckon. Or those getting direct nicotine some other way.

 

[Astute]

As I say above I’m not supporting their strategy but the death rates are a strange one until you know how many in the population has it/has had it. Even the best testing (major) nations haven’t really got a clue, only estimates from some relatively low number antibody sampling

If for example after testing we find out that half the population in Sweden has had it at the current number of deaths then it would put a totally different slant on the argument

I’m not saying that’s the case at all but you get the point.

Those of us that are looking for clues on what will happen next will agree with you. Those of us that know more than the experts will think you are mad.

 

[wingy]

I say this is not the news I needed on my one week anniversary of quitting.

Devils advocate: could it be that at the age profile corona kicks in those with weak lungs have already been weeded out?

The real test would be vapers I reckon. Or those getting direct nicotine some other way.

That and shielding perhaps

 

[Astute]

It’s fascinating isn’t it. I think I read that smokers are less likely to get it but if they do are at a higher risk. Might be wrong though

That is why they are testing nicotine patches. But who knows.

Maybe smokers have already destroyed where the virus attacks so the virus has a problem taking a hold.

 

[robbiekeane]

Where are people going for the latest statistics updates for the UK?

find the BBC UK home page buries stuff so it’s hard to find. Would like to see updated charts and daily figures, etc.

Thanks!

 

[Astute]

I say this is not the news I needed on my one week anniversary of quitting.

Devils advocate: could it be that at the age profile corona kicks in those with weak lungs have already been weeded out?

The real test would be vapers I reckon. Or those getting direct nicotine some other way.

I'm about 2 years into packing the weed in. Now vaping faster than usual to protect myself

 

[Astute]

That and shielding perhaps

So smokers are 80% better of 'shielding' than non smokers?

 

[wingy]

I say this is not the news I needed on my one week anniversary of quitting.

Devils advocate: could it be that at the age profile corona kicks in those with weak lungs have already been weeded out?

The real test would be vapers I reckon. Or those getting direct nicotine some other way.

Just completed 21 days cold turkey .
Still reckon if I took a walk up to the local shop to buy some milk I'd cave.
Did 2 weeks off the ale as well

 

[Astute]

Where are people going for the latest statistics updates for the UK?

find the BBC UK home page buries stuff so it’s hard to find. Would like to see updated charts and daily figures, etc.

Thanks!

It is all lies if it doesn't say what some want it to say.

 

[Astute]

Just completed 21 days cold turkey .
Still reckon if I took a walk up to the local shop to buy some milk I'd cave.
Did 2 weeks off the ale as well

Well done. That is good going.