Lockdown ? What Lockdown?

[Momac]

4 minutes ago, peterboat said:

we [the world] are in a no win situation until a vaccine is created.

Unfortunately that does  seem to be the case .

Let's hope the people involved in developing , making  and delivering  the vaccine survive long enough ...........

[Guest]

Our local large hospital is starting to deep clean areas that have held covid 19 patients in prearedness for opening the beds to 'normal' presumably elective patients.

 

They have at no point become overwhelmed by Covid 19 patients. Nor do they anticipate becoming overwhelmed in the future. This of course will depend on at least keeping the infection rates flattened or preferably even lowered.

 

The planning that has gone into ensuring this has been the case deserves mention. As od course does the outstanding care the patients are recieving.

[WotEver]

16 minutes ago, peterboat said:

... when lockdown stopped all it would take is one person to spread the virus again, we [the world] are in a no win situation until a vaccine is created.

Surely MP’s post just clearly demonstrated exactly why that is not the case. 

[Stilllearning]

35 minutes ago, MoominPapa said:

The maths of infectious diseases and the maths of nuclear fission chain reactions are pretty much the same. In a chain reaction, each atom of uranium the splits creates 2 point something neutrons which can either be lost from the reaction by absorbtion, or flying out of the lump of uranium, or they can precipitate a new fission. If the number of neutrons which generate a new fission is greater than one, the number of neutrons and the rate of fissioning increases exponentially: in each generation the rate is the previous rate multiplied by a factor greater than one. As the generation time is short, and the increase is exponential, the fission rate goes up fast. If the number of neutrons from each fission is lower than one, the same exponential formula applies, and the rate of neutron production goes down very fast. This is massively dependent on the magic number. Just greater then one - fast increase and boom. just less than one, fast decrease to almost nothing.

 

Infectious diseases are the same - exponential rise and fall, massively dependent on the number of new infections each infection creates. Just more than one and the rate of infection keeps going up to huge levels, just less than one and it keeps going down to low levels. The reproduction, factor depends on how many people capable of being infected each infected person contacts. At the start of a pandemic, nobody is immune, so that's the same as the number of people contacted. Hence lockdown to reduce that number below one. But as the pandemic continues, more and more people have had the disease and are immune, If nobody is immune and each case contacts two people, the infection rate doubles every two weeks or so. If each new case contacts two people and half the population is immune, each new case infects one person. and we are at the tipping point below which the infection rate falls as fast as it rises when it's above that. 

 

Note that the number of people who have to be immune is NOT "all of them". When enough people are immune to reduce the reproduction rate below one, the epidemic ceases and the disease drops to a low level: it becomes endemic. The actual proportion  depends on the contact rate: if each case contacts three people, then  having half the population immune isn't enough, you need to have two-thirds immune. 

 

At  the moment, lockdown means that the reproduction number is less than one without immunity, as more people get immunity, more contact can be allowed without tipping over one, but the amount of extra contact depends on the number who've had it, and half a percent of all who've had it will die, so that's the difficult trade-off.

 

Pay attention in maths lessons, folks!

 

MP.

 

An excellent explanation of immunity in the population, but that omits one thing : no one knows if recovering from covid will in fact confer immunity. This is perhaps one of the herd of elephants in the room at the moment.

[ditchcrawler]

3 hours ago, Jennifer McM said:

They'll be a lot of this.... 

 

I'm certain there's a 'balancing act' going on, and it's all about how many new cases are happening every day.  The Gov has repeated said for us to stay at home, while seemingly turning a blind eye at growing quantity of shops opening. Gov will come down heavily again if new cases threaten NHS's ability to cope. The 'balls' in our court, it's called self responsibility. 

They are not turning a blind eye, they were never told they had to close in the first place. If they control the footfall like supermarkets are then probably be OK. It has to end oneday 

[Richard10002]

4 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

The farrier phones when he is 10 minutes away.

I take 'Hippo' and tie him up outside his stable, and put money in an envelope and place it in the tack-bag.

Farrier arrives.

Farrier does his 'farriering' and collects the envelope.

Farrier leaves.

When I see his truck leaving, I go out and put 'Hippo' in his paddock.

 

Never see the farrier, let alone go anywhere near him.

 

 

I don't see why that could not work with dog groomers.

 

Gardeners are still 'allowed' to operate so why shouldn't other 'trades' that are also solo-workers ?

I know how it "could" work with dog groomers, and I wondered why it didnt. For a couple of weeks prior to the lockdown, our groomer operated a system where you opened her main door, let the dog through it and, once the outer door was shut, she opened her little inner door under the counter, and got the dog.

 

As soon as the lockdown happened, she texted to say that her "Groomers Organisation" had stated that she should close.

 

I would add that she has a retail shop front, so may have been caught by this but, having said that, as far as I can tell, all local groomers, whether shops, mobile vans, work from home, visit you at home, have all stopped.

 

Pets at Home stores are open, (pet shops are allowed), but their grooming service isn't operating, (at least not at our closest store).

 

It doesnt seem to matter whether they are allowed to or not.

 

Assuming they are "allowed to work", I guess I am hoping that something will happen that will "encourage them to work".

[Richard10002]

3 hours ago, The Welsh Cruiser said:

Don't get me wrong I love dogs, I'd have one myself if it wasn't such a responsibility. I do think they should be on leads more though. They regularly piss on the wheels of my motor bike, marking their territory I suppose. Also on my mooring ropes. I doesn't bother me unduly but it's amusing when the 'owner' makes profuse apologies. Empty apologies of course, because the dog is still free to piss on the ropes of the boat next to me. If the apology was genuine, the dog would be put on a lead. 

What do you do when a bird shits on your bike? Put them on leads?

 

Dont get me wrong, our dog has been on a lead when out in public for the whole of this thing..... but you seem to single out dogs, when there are plenty of other animals that can go to the toilet on your bike.

[Dr Bob]

7 minutes ago, Stilllearning said:

An excellent explanation of immunity in the population, but that omits one thing : no one knows if recovering from covid will in fact confer immunity. This is perhaps one of the herd of elephants in the room at the moment.

...and the other thing is that we dont really have a clue how many people have had the virus. Some reports say it is as much as 3% of the population yet individual studies in small towns show that over 50% have been infected - so will stop further spread. If the 3% number is right then there is a long time to go until the immunity has built up to a level where it will stop the chain reaction. The 'so called' do it at home antibody test has never materialised and it sounds like the lab test for antibodies is picking up any corona virus so anyone who has had a recent cold may be included.

[Richard10002]

3 hours ago, Jennifer McM said:

They'll be a lot of this.... 

 

I'm certain there's a 'balancing act' going on, and it's all about how many new cases are happening every day.  The Gov has repeated said for us to stay at home, while seemingly turning a blind eye at growing quantity of shops opening. Gov will come down heavily again if new cases threaten NHS's ability to cope. The 'balls' in our court, it's called self responsibility. 

I think Hancock said very quickly that the shops that are opening are the ones who didn't have to close, but merely chose to.

[Sir Nibble]

2 minutes ago, Richard10002 said:

What do you do when a bird shits on your bike? Put them on leads?

 

Dont get me wrong, our dog has been on a lead when out in public for the whole of this thing..... but you seem to single out dogs, when there are plenty of other animals that can go to the toilet on your bike.

The birds have not been in close contact with possibly infected humans. If someone allows their dog to try and play with a stranger (happened to me about a fortnight ago) they might as well walk up and shake hands. This only applies to domesticated animals. Anyone handling my hamster would pick up an infection from me, the same is not true of a wild rat.

[Jennifer McM]

5 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

The birds have not been in close contact with possibly infected humans. If someone allows their dog to try and play with a stranger (happened to me about a fortnight ago) they might as well walk up and shake hands. This only applies to domesticated animals. Anyone handling my hamster would pick up an infection from me, the same is not true of a wild rat.

Was watching a programme on these deadly viruses. It was said that bats and ducks were the worse to carry viruses. I've been eyeing the ducks with a wary glance since I heard ?

[Jennifer McM]

15 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

...and the other thing is that we dont really have a clue how many people have had the virus. Some reports say it is as much as 3% of the population yet individual studies in small towns show that over 50% have been infected - so will stop further spread. If the 3% number is right then there is a long time to go until the immunity has built up to a level where it will stop the chain reaction. The 'so called' do it at home antibody test has never materialised and it sounds like the lab test for antibodies is picking up any corona virus so anyone who has had a recent cold may be included.

 

Prof Sikora has been testing his staff from a consignment he ordered from abroad a couple weeks ago. 

 

Course, there are so many questions that need asking, like how many of this 7% had the symptoms. 

 

 

 

[Sir Nibble]

1 minute ago, Jennifer McM said:

Was watching a programme on these deadly viruses. It was said that bats and ducks were the worse to carry viruses. I've been eyeing the ducks with a wary glance since I heard ?

The funny walk, the ridiculous voice and the comedy mask are just a front. Ducks are child murderers, thieves and rapists. 

[tree monkey]

5 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

The funny walk, the ridiculous voice and the comedy mask are just a front. Ducks are child murderers, thieves and rapists. 

But taste so, so very good

[Richard10002]

31 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Surely MP’s post just clearly demonstrated exactly why that is not the case. 

What it does demonstrate is that we are reliant on immunity in those who have had it, (and/or a vaccine).

 

There seems to be a lot of unfounded talk, (even by WHO), about the "possibility" of no immunity, usually couched in "terms".

 

It seems that there IS a test available which confirms immunity, or at least antibodies of both types, but it requires a blood sample to be sent away, (to a lab in Germany?), rather than the pinprick, pregnancy type, test, that they are hoping will become available for distribution to millions.

 

Karan Faridoon Bilimoria, Chairman of Cobra Beer, has had the blood test, and it confirmed he has the antibodies. Presumably he is immune and, if so, he is also proof that immunity happens.

[Sir Nibble]

3 minutes ago, tree monkey said:

But taste so, so very good

That was the downfall of the dodo, they evolved to be delicious.

[Richard10002]

22 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

The birds have not been in close contact with possibly infected humans. If someone allows their dog to try and play with a stranger (happened to me about a fortnight ago) they might as well walk up and shake hands. This only applies to domesticated animals. Anyone handling my hamster would pick up an infection from me, the same is not true of a wild rat.

I think he was talking about the actions of dogs in general, and not merely at this particular time. My question, of him, still stands.

[Sir Nibble]

1 minute ago, Richard10002 said:

I think he was talking about the actions of dogs in general, and not merely at this particular time. My question, of him, still stands.

Fair enough. I presume you would be tolerant of a passing drunk pissing on your mooring lines for the same reason.

 

[tree monkey]

4 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

That was the downfall of the dodo, they evolved to be delicious.

And very curious plus a bit stupid apparently 

[Alan de Enfield]

37 minutes ago, Richard10002 said:

Assuming they are "allowed to work", I guess I am hoping that something will happen that will "encourage them to work".

Speculation :

 

Maybe its a case of "lets close the doors and get paid 80% of our salaries for stopping at home and doing nothing".

 

Maybe stopping the 80% payment would "encourage them back to work".

[Machpoint005]

Their island habitat and inability to fly might have had something to do with it?

1 minute ago, tree monkey said:

And very curious plus a bit stupid apparently 

 

[Sir Nibble]

2 minutes ago, tree monkey said:

And very curious plus a bit stupid apparently 

Yes. When a ship drops anchor with a crew desperate for fresh meat, "hello sailor" isn't the best strategy for a Christmas dinner on legs.

[tree monkey]

4 minutes ago, Machpoint005 said:

Their island habitat and inability to fly might have had something to do with it?

 

Yes completely, they had no real predators and would investigate unusual noises, a perfect storm for extinction 

[matty40s]

48 minutes ago, Sir Nibble said:

 Anyone handling my hamster would pick up an infection from me, the same is not true of a wild rat....

So which infections have you given your hamster and how, should we be getting the RSPCH involved.

[Momac]

6 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Speculation :

 

Maybe its a case of "lets close the doors and get paid 80% of our salaries for stopping at home and doing nothing".

 

Maybe stopping the 80% payment would "encourage them back to work".

The furlough scheme presently ends at the end of June.

The furlough payment is capped at £2500 and that sum is before tax . Not everyone will be on the £2500 of course.

 

At the end of June unless the furlough is extended even further there will be redundancies . No one in  employment can be certain of being safe against that threat. However I think those presently on furlough may be at greatest risk of redundancy .

 

It is possible that some people  have furloughed themselves (I know of one ) but the great majority of people have had no choice in the matter as they have been furloughed by their employer  . Stopping the 80% payment at this time  , for the great majority  , would probably result in redundancy.