Off topic - travel corridors.

[mariner]

IMO any person entering the UK could/should be tested for Covid 19 at point of entry and be required to provide contact details,rather than self-isolation for 14 days. Apparently there is an excess of testing facilities. Grant Shapps take note.
Someone on the News said he would only abide with the 14 day isolation.

[AndrewDod]

What are you going to test for exactly? The tests give wrong results about 50% of the time, and there is also a timescale of false positives versus false negatives that is not constant. Different tests give different results too.

https://apnews.com/38967d1644ef374d1...P5GIn02Jx2QPFg

It was all very well having the Guardian jumping up and don't about Boris's failure to test, but the tests are partially rubbish. Wrong a lot of the time.

[mariner]

No testing can be 100%,. but better than no testing/voluntary isolation.
Which option do you prefer?

[royw]

If we'd done something about in March we wouldnt be so far in the sh*t as we are now. It seems to be more like 70% accuracy but the only safe option is a proper quarantine in an airport hotel. Though with idiots cramming onto beaches, going to raves etc the chances of controlling it are so remote a few more probably won't make much difference. Friend's mother died so sister came over from USA. Flew to Heathrow, no temperature check, told them address in the NW where she'd be isolating. No questions about how she'd get there (public transport) and there's been no check if she's at the address. It's no surprise those countries who have controlled their own outbreak don't want us.

[Kape65]

It's my belief that the government is following the herd immunity strategy on the sly.

[AndrewDod]

It's my belief that the government is following the herd immunity strategy on the sly.

Which, most likely in retrospect, will be the strategy that will cause the least deaths and suffering.

Not sure about "on the sly" though. The strategy is transparent.

[theartfullodger]

Given England has such terrible figures on covid19 deaths, infections, etc it's amazing more other countries aren't insisting on more English visitors being quarantined.

Artful: Born English

[AndrewDod]

Ultimately everyone is going to be infected. It is only a matter of timescale. The cost of altering that timescale is very high indeed (in terms of deaths and other things). There is not going to be any magic vaccine or drug that will not be intensely problematical.

[royw]

The strategy to cause the least harm to both people and the economy is a proper lockdown before it spread throughout the country. Look at the difference between NZ and UK. Any fool could and should have worked out what was going to happen.
Without a vaccine there are only two options, lockdown or herd immunity. Herd immunity is fine - and good for the planet - as long as it isn't my family that dies in the process. The results of this strategy aren't looking too good in the US. I'm not sure they're deliberately following this strategy here, more that they've worked out how big the financial black hole is so they have to get the economy going again

[AndrewDod]

The strategy to cause the least harm to both people and the economy is a proper lockdown before it spread throughout the country. Look at the difference between NZ and UK. Any fool could and should have worked out what was going to happen.
Without a vaccine there are only two options, lockdown or herd immunity. Herd immunity is fine - and good for the planet - as long as it isn't my family that dies in the process. The results of this strategy aren't looking too good in the US. I'm not sure they're deliberately following this strategy here, more that they've worked out how big the financial black hole is so they have to get the economy going again

Yes people die of that too (and have already done so, in large numbers) - possibly many more than from the virus in the long run.

There has been no reliable vaccine for the common cold (of which this is a variant) after 50 years of intensive research. Drugs and vaccines all have positive and negative consequences, and it is pretty much inconceivable that the negative consequences will not outweigh the positive in most people if widely applied. That creates massive ethical issues, especially since 99% of people who will not benefit at all will have to be forced to have the drug (by law). Most of the research so far on the current virus does not hold out much hope and is not very transparent. The fuss made about the drug remdesivir for example is largely hot air -- the company sponsored the trial and controlled the results, they changed the goalposts half way. The drug had no effect on mortality at all but did reduce the number of days to recovery in some people who did recover. An independent trial showed no effect on anything (including mortality). It costs £3000 per person, doesn't seem to work, and US hospitals have bought the entire supply on earth. You should read about the history of Tamiflu, a related drug.

NZ and the UK are totally different animals -- the former is a sparsely populated country which has a long history of extreme xenophobia (in terms of border controls) and most people in the population adhere to sensible behaviour and are not inconsiderate rampaging yobs.

There is absolutely nothing stopping vulnerable people from self isolating (as I am myself). What happens to the rest is not fundamentally different to the effect of vaccination (if one were to be developed) with both some risk and possible immunity.

There is also the small issue of timing of infection by season. Pushing infection into next winter will result in many more deaths than summertime infection of the same people. And it remains the case that the people who are paying the heavy price for all this are our children.

[AndrewDod]

To add, the problem with a "proper lockdown" too is that there is no inclination to properly implement the existing ones -- which would have involved throwing some politicians, and many rampaging yobs on political marches into jail (in strict isolation of course except from each other), levying life-changing fines, public floggings, as well as clamping down properly (or at all) on those communities who have refused to behave. Political correctness has prevented this.

I walk down the street, and I have runners passing me at a distance of 6 inches spitting all over. That does not happen in Korea.

[AndrewDod]

This is a useful read with a lot of untold back-story on the problems with only real drug candidate so far
https://theconversation.com/the-us-h...t-of-us-141791

[royw]

What are you talking about? In this country no-one has been required by law to vaccinate themselves or their children. And what makes you think they aren't safe? The anti-vac proganda that stopped thousands of parents vaccinating their children has been shown to be untrue. There are field trials of a vaccine currently being carried out. They might not work but sooner or later one will be found. There is a difference between a vaccination and a cure which I agree may take much longer.
Political marches - if it wasn't so serious it would be laughable. Campaign for 'black lives matter' by spreading a deadly virus amongst them. Black Lives didn't matter much to the organisers.

[jpkeates]

Herd immunity is predicated on people with the disease who don't die developing some kind of immunity against a future infection.
As it's not possible to prove that that's what happens with this particular virus, it's a hell of a gamble - given the number of people who will die as an inevitable consequence of allowing everyone to catch it.

[AndrewDod]

Herd immunity is predicated on people with the disease who don't die developing some kind of immunity against a future infection.
As it's not possible to prove that that's what happens with this particular virus, it's a hell of a gamble - given the number of people who will die as an inevitable consequence of allowing everyone to catch it.

Yes but that is exactly the same for any conceivable vaccine. There has never in the history of medicine been any vaccine that causes greater immunity than having the disease itself. So if herd immunity doesn't "work" neither will any vaccine. Unless it is assumed that the virus will magically disappear from the earth, saying that some form of herd immunity is bad, but a possible vaccine at some point is good, makes no sense at all.

The fact remains that the mortality rate in people who should not be self-protecting anyway is way less than 0.1%. And the deaths from other causes (delayed or no treatment for other diseases, poverty, lack of education) will be far far greater.

How do you propose not eventually "allowing everyone to catch it" JP? The problem is that the good epidemiologists have been silenced, and the scientific pronouncements are being driven by politicians and commercial companies.