On this website, it’s telling us how many people in the UK have had coronavirus but not how many have it at the moment. They should stop hiding it, people have a right to know https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Some countries, including the UK, aren’t reporting the number of people who have recovered.

On this website, it’s telling us how many people in the UK have had coronavirus but not how many have it at the moment. They should stop hiding it, people have a right to know https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Some countries, including the UK, aren’t reporting the number of people who have recovered.

Some countries, including the UK, aren’t reporting the number of people who have recovered.

I know. It’s like they’re hiding things from us

I was at B&Q on Monday!

 

I'm back to work on a rota one day a week each from after the bank holidays. Will any summer weddings go ahead do you think?

 

They also announced at the same time that they would ease restrictions to allow weddings where at least one of the people has a terminal illness from Monday. As for regular weddings, I wouldn't bet on it this summer, although by autumn it should be on the cards. I'm due to go to a wedding in Donegal in September, so I hoping that things have eased off by then.

Some countries, including the UK, aren’t reporting the number of people who have recovered.

I know. It’s like they’re hiding things from us

For the countries that are reporting recoveries, how are they doing it? It's not as simple as counting the number of people released from hospital, since the majority of cases aren't severe and are self-isolating at home. I wouldn't imagine countries are deliberately hiding recovery numbers since that's a positive statistic most would want to show off, it's probably just not a priority given the difficulty of counting them accurately.

Trump promising a vaccine for Covid-19 by the end of 2020. Hope this is where the European powers (including the UK) keep a cool head. Got a funny feeling the US based efforts are going to jump through some red tape..

Trump promising a vaccine for Covid-19 by the end of 2020. Hope this is where the European powers (including the UK) keep a cool head. Got a funny feeling the US based efforts are going to jump through some red tape..

There is already pressure from the usual suspects to cut out some of the regulation in the UK.

@1237760980450451456

 

This video shot during the 'herd immunity' week has aged so badly jesus, particularly the second half of it. The idea that other countries took the same actions earlier (such as social distancing) that the UK eventually did too, only because other countries that have worse politicians who are only want to be seen to be doing something rather than following scientific advice is reprehensible.

 

What the UK government did and didn't do in March goes a long way to explain why so many British people have died and also why lockdown needs to last longer overall, as many other countries are easing theirs a lot sooner.

 

From what I've heard, wearing of facemasks is a lot less widespread in Britain than elsewhere. Here it's probably about 60-70% on the street and compulsory in schools/certain shops. I'm not sure what the official UK advice is but I imagine it's dictated by availability and cost of PPE rather than the benefit of it.

@1237760980450451456

 

This video shot during the 'herd immunity' week has aged so badly jesus, particularly the second half of it. The idea that other countries took the same actions earlier (such as social distancing) that the UK eventually did too, only because other countries that have worse politicians who are only want to be seen to be doing something rather than following scientific advice is reprehensible.

 

What the UK government did and didn't do in March goes a long way to explain why so many British people have died and also why lockdown needs to last longer overall, as many other countries are easing theirs a lot sooner.

 

From what I've heard, wearing of facemasks is a lot less widespread in Britain than elsewhere. Here it's probably about 60-70% on the street and compulsory in schools/certain shops. I'm not sure what the official UK advice is but I imagine it's dictated by availability and cost of PPE rather than the benefit of it.

 

The advice is wear a facemask where possible. But it's not been as clear as other countries. No idea what the logic is behind our current strategy.

 

I can't see the video so I can't compare. The Government made some mistakes, totally undeniable but I've actually been thinking about all this a little bit this week and applied some of my business improvement thinking to the Government response and afterwards. And the root cause every time is we obviously did not have a proper Pandemic Planning procedure. If we have that then it solves a lot of problems rather than having to think on the spot.

@1237760980450451456

 

This video shot during the 'herd immunity' week has aged so badly jesus, particularly the second half of it. The idea that other countries took the same actions earlier (such as social distancing) that the UK eventually did too, only because other countries that have worse politicians who are only want to be seen to be doing something rather than following scientific advice is reprehensible.

 

What the UK government did and didn't do in March goes a long way to explain why so many British people have died and also why lockdown needs to last longer overall, as many other countries are easing theirs a lot sooner.

 

From what I've heard, wearing of facemasks is a lot less widespread in Britain than elsewhere. Here it's probably about 60-70% on the street and compulsory in schools/certain shops. I'm not sure what the official UK advice is but I imagine it's dictated by availability and cost of PPE rather than the benefit of it.

Availability of masks is certainly one reason why the government isn't pushing them so much. Given the scientific advice, I suspect other government are promoting their use due to public pressure more than anything else. The general consensus seems to be that they are utterly pointless unless you are actually carrying the virus.

 

Meanwhile, there was a mass protest arranged for today to oppose the distancing rules and other lockdown restrictions. Here is a list of all the people who turned up.

 

 

Yes, that's it :lol:

The advice is wear a facemask where possible. But it's not been as clear as other countries. No idea what the logic is.

 

I can't see the video so I can't compare. The Government made some mistakes, totally undeniable but I've actually been thinking about all this a little bit this week and applied some of my business improvement thinking to the Government response and afterwards. And the root cause every time is we obviously did not have a proper Pandemic Planning procedure. If we have that then it solves a lot of problems rather than having to think on the spot.

There was a procedure. It was even tested in an exercise a few years ago (although the government ignored its conclusions). The shambles is entirely down to a lack of competence, not a lack of policy.

Availability of masks is certainly one reason why the government isn't pushing them so much. Given the scientific advice, I suspect other government are promoting their use due to public pressure more than anything else. The general consensus seems to be that they are utterly pointless unless you are actually carrying the virus.

 

Meanwhile, there was a mass protest arranged for today to oppose the distancing rules and other lockdown restrictions. Here is a list of all the people who turned up.

Yes, that's it :lol:

 

Unless it's the proper masks they're uttely useless to protecting you from the virus. But it does seem the science is there that it at least highly prevents you from spreading the virus as easily if you are a carrier.

 

I've seen some of the lockdown protests- seems there were more police there than actuasl protestors. Didn't Corbyn's brother get arrested?

There was a procedure. It was even tested in an exercise a few years ago (although the government ignored its conclusions). The shambles is entirely down to a lack of competence, not a lack of policy.

 

Local Government has policies on everything, how to safely pick your nose in the work environment, how to stop people in senior management running off with 200k worth of laptops and flogging them on ebay, how to avoid signing up for years to a company about to go bankrupt within weeks - and yet shit happens if you ignore the policies. Two of those examples are actual things, the other is cynical broad exaggeration when applied to my organisation. Yes, it's the nose-picking one.....

just to cheer everyone up, here's the latest Covid briefing. I found it immensely helpful...

 

It’s certainly given me some clarity :lol:

 

As for the actual latest briefing, about schools returning, it was quite a lot of waffle basically designed to make school workers and parents feel guilty about wanting to ensure safety for students and staff. Schools want to get back to ‘normal’ but the government is expecting English schools to reopen in two weeks without yet giving any guidance on safety measures. It’s not good enough to assume each school will decide themselves what’s for the best, a consistent approach is needed.

Allowing schools to decide for themselves would make more sense if they had some guidelines they could work to. That would include advice on keeping a group of five-year-olds two metres apart.

There was a procedure. It was even tested in an exercise a few years ago (although the government ignored its conclusions). The shambles is entirely down to a lack of competence, not a lack of policy.

 

It's not just a policy though, it's a failsafe mechanism for when shit hits the fan. I'm not a huge fan of policies myself, even though they are meant to be black and white they're still unclear at times and advice rather than legal. Clear guidance tells people how they should act; e.g. have stockpiles of PPE. The current 'stage' system we are implementing has all the hallmarks of a pandemic system which has just been built. Contrast that to a few other countries which has already created a pandemic system.

The general consensus seems to be that they are utterly pointless unless you are actually carrying the virus.

That's not what we're being told at work... It's just that you can't touch the front of the mask once you're breathing into it and should be changed every four hours, or sooner if you cough/sneeze/sweat into it. So that's a *lot* of masks needed and tricky when working with kids as young as 11.

It's not just a policy though, it's a failsafe mechanism for when shit hits the fan. I'm not a huge fan of policies myself, even though they are meant to be black and white they're still unclear at times and advice rather than legal. Clear guidance tells people how they should act; e.g. have stockpiles of PPE. The current 'stage' system we are implementing has all the hallmarks of a pandemic system which has just been built. Contrast that to a few other countries which has already created a pandemic system.

 

A proper policy has details and is designed to cover every foreseeable eventuality. We do it all the time in local government, right down to staff safety when going out meeting members of the public outside the work environment. It's basic H&S management:

 

"What might go wrong if you do x?" "What can you do to reduce the risk of x?" "How can you ensure staff follow the risk-reduction of x?" "Are you making sure staff are informed about x?" This applies to everyone, even the people at the top who think who might think they can do whatever they want. It's how I view the world, I've been doing it so long - that's why I can usually logically work-out the end-result of actions and policies made up by people who go "ooh this is a good idea!" all excited off the top of their head and fail to follow-it through to it's logical conclusion. A dead giveaway to this is the knee-jerk response "well if you don't like it you can just find another job, I only want people who support this fab new idea who are with me" that it actually is a shit idea and they don't have answers to simple questions about what may well happen thanks to the fab new idea (which is invariably a previously-tried rubbish idea that failed then as well).

 

One of the basic foreseeable pandemic rules is "Make sure you have adequate substantial stocks of PPE which are used on a rota basis to stop it getting out of date" and "Make sure you have industrial potential to create PPE at short notice with a named supplier who holds the contract, which must be reviewed every 5 years".

 

It's not rocket science. It's actual common sense, which the UK gov hypocritically keeps telling us we should have when they clearly have f*** all common sense, just political dogma that has landed them and us in the shit.

It's not just a policy though, it's a failsafe mechanism for when shit hits the fan. I'm not a huge fan of policies myself, even though they are meant to be black and white they're still unclear at times and advice rather than legal. Clear guidance tells people how they should act; e.g. have stockpiles of PPE. The current 'stage' system we are implementing has all the hallmarks of a pandemic system which has just been built. Contrast that to a few other countries which has already created a pandemic system.

We’ve always known that a pandemic was going to happen and that we would probably not get a lot of notice when it did happen. Therefore, it has always been essential that we should be prepared. That’s not a political issue, it is plain common sense. Of course, if a government then ignores all the preparation and refuses to act on the conclusions of an exercise in testing preparedness , they give clear evidence of their unfitness to govern.