Coronavirus

[Copps is Magic]

Which means buying 3.5m units of something you aren't quite sure is going to work, a little stupid, and earlier promises made surrounding rolling out antibody tests, pretty disingenuous.

[Copps is Magic]

This is much better news. The World's largest randomised clinical trial of treatments is currently underway in the UK

[ian1980]

Boris Johnson has now been moved to intensive care after his symptoms worsen

[Sprotyrover]

Boris Johnson has now been moved to intensive care after his symptoms worsen

Far from good news and brings all of this to the fore. Get well soon Boris
We wish you well.

[Copps is Magic]

Not good for him, I hope he gets better. If I understand the critical care figures correctly only 50% of males will survive after being admitted to intensive care with the virus.

[Filo]

Awful news, hope he pulls through

[wilts rover]

Serious now, all the best for a full recovery.

[selby]

The total number of cases in South Yorkshire has risen to 1463 cases a rise of 91 new cases  or 6.22% on the day
  The total in the Greater London Boroughs has risen to 12,676 a rise of 682 new cases or 5.38%
   
   As Billy said the numbers could be higher given it is for the Sunday.

  The reported number of cases for Doncaster is 144 total a rise of 7 on the day or 4.86%

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Grim news on the pm, really not the instability we need s a country right now.  Most importantly though it's another person's Dad, son, fiance etc in real trouble.

[BillyStubbsTears]

That's rather shocking news. Fingers crossed for him.

[tyke1962]

I sincerely hope the PM pulls through and makes a full recovery .

[idler]

I don’t like him or anything that he stands for but you wouldn’t want anyone to die of this.

[tommy toes]

I don’t like him or anything that he stands for but you wouldn’t want anyone to die of this.

I don't like him either, I but I wouldn't wish this on anyone. I hope he recovers quickly.

[tommy toes]

My daughter is stuck in Cambodia and has wasted about a grand already on cancelled flights.
She's hopefully on a flight at the weekend arranged by the government.
She's almost out of money so it'll cost me £1200 or so. It had better take off!

[roversdude]

Hopefully Boris beats this, thoughts are with him and everyone else really suffering

[Bristol Red Rover]

Looking at most stats, there's a lot of countries now looking like they've reached the top of their curve on cases and deaths, and a few on the downward slope. Too early to be sure but it's looking like we've just about peaked too.

The most important stat for us I can't find anywhere and that is the number of critical cases. Well, more important would be the number of free ventilators in place but I'm pretty sure that's nowhere to be seen.

[River Don]

At this point Boris Johnson's chances are a little better than 50/50. If the worst were to happen, we surely could not go through all that rigmarole of a Tory leadership election again. Not at a time like this.
The case for a coalition emergency government would suddenly be much stronger.
I feel we can ill afford to lose him at this moment, I really hope he pulls though.

[BillyStubbsTears]

BRR

I'd be astonished if we've peaked. Don't be seduced by today's figures. There's clearly a weekend effect. I wouldn't expect us to peak for another week, judging by the trajectory of other countries.

In Europe, Italy is certainly over the peak. Germany possibly too. France and Spain are nearing it. Netherlands too. Sweden is difficult to tell - they were coming down but they've had a big jump in death today and it will still be interesting to see how they go, with no formal lockdown.

Because the big question now is, how long before we can start to reduce the lockdown? There's little point working this hard to suppress the outbreak, only to return to normal and have it take off again, like there are signs of it doing in Japan and Singapore.

[BillyStubbsTears]

Actually, the jury is back out on Germany. I didn't see that they had changed their death numbers late tonight. Big jump to 30-40% above the previous highest daily total they have had.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Yes they can test all they like the virus is still causing death the same way in nearly all countries.

[SydneyRover]

tests are only any good if they are tracking and isolating contacts, I would have thought Germany would be.

[Iberian Red]

Spanish deaths fall for fourth consecutive day

Don't read too much into those figures as the national average has been swayed by Madrid,Barcelona and a hotspot in the north.
The rest of the country is playing catch up,as it is still nowhere near peaking in heavily populated areas such as Valencia,Sevilla,Zaragoza,Malaga etc. Those cities are still waiting for the peak,and tha has the possibility to change the figures drastically. I know of 2 deaths and a large increase in the last few days where I am,the shit still hasnt hit the fan in very large parts of the country.

[selby]

  Billy the German numbers have always shown a large number in the critical column although the deaths have been low compared with other countries, the complete opposite to our own numbers on the same list.
  Yesterday the Belgian and Swedish numbers were the ones that stood out  as expanding quickly compared with how they had been performing.

[selby]

  Belgium have just had a massive jump to 403 cases this morning

[BillyStubbsTears]

German had an unusual demographic spread in their early cases. A few weeks ago, it was reported that only 10% of their infections were in the 65+ age group. Researchers were speculating that was because the virus had probably come into Germany via relatively young people either coming back from business in China, or having had skiiing holidays in Italy. They said that there is relatively little direct contact between younger and older generations in Germany and that probably explained why the infections were predominantly in younger people, with consequently lower mortality rates.

The same researchers said that in italy, by contrast, there was a much higher early infection rate in older people. They said again that the virus had almost certain come into Italy through young-ish people returning from business trips to China, but they noted that there are many more multi-generation households in Italy (take my wife's uncle - they have his mother and son in their house and that is far from unusual). So older people were coming into contact with the virus quickly, hence the death rate rising there before anywhere else in Europe.

The researchers did say that they expected the German trend in deaths to follow other countries as more old people became exposed, but that the numbers would tail a few weeks behind other countries.

Germany's testing must have helped them though. They have almost certainly been able to identify and treat sufferers more quickly. And they are the one and only Western country that seems to have got off the trend of deaths doubling every 3 days at a relatively early stage.

[DonnyNoel]

On a lighter note, good twittter thread by Doncaster council on following advice and staying indoors:

https://www.thepoke.co.uk/2020/04/06/this-doncaster-council-thread-looks-totally-random-but-makes-its-point-brilliantly/

[SydneyRover]

Have just been listening to a uk expert that said that covid 19 was still very much an unknown quantity and that they think it is more a blood and vascular condition as carbon dioxide rich blood was entering the lungs but leaving to circulate the body in pretty much the same condition and that some patients that looked blue were not aware of their own breathing problems. Very different from 'normal' lung problems associated with flu.

[SydneyRover]

NEW: Have just had it confirmed that Michael Gove is self-isolating.

A member of his family is displaying symptoms, but he remains well himself.

Gove continues to work, as per his round of interviews this morning. But yet another challenge for this government to work around.

[SydneyRover]

ONS blog on how deaths are tallied and reported on the UK

https://blog.ons.gov.uk/2020/03/31/counting-deaths-involving-the-coronavirus-covid-19/?WT.mc_id=2a19838a4a228a1d716f781f72dabf93&WT.sn_type=TWITTER&hoot.message=This%20is%20slightly%20lower%20than%20the%20figures%20reported%20by%20%

[Copps is Magic]

ONS blog on how deaths are tallied and reported on the UK

https://blog.ons.gov.uk/2020/03/31/counting-deaths-involving-the-coronavirus-covid-19/?WT.mc_id=2a19838a4a228a1d716f781f72dabf93&WT.sn_type=TWITTER&hoot.message=This%20is%20slightly%20lower%20than%20the%20figures%20reported%20by%20%

 

Its a useful link.

I will sumarise for anyone who hasn't got time to read: Department of Health and Social Care figures that everyone is quoting are "deaths occurring in hospitals in the UK among patients who have tested positive for coronavirus". The ONS figures are compiled of figures where Covid-19 appears on the death certificate (even if suspected but no confirmed test), and from figures outside of hospitals. This is why the ONS figures will take longer to compile but will be larger than the Dep for Health, and probably a more accurate representation of the impact.