Coronavirus - worldwide spread and control

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Trish said:
@Wonko, that sounds dramatic. Is there a university in your town with an outbreak? Or a factory? The other thing that occurs to me might be the figures referring to different things, like one figure being daily new cases and the other total number currently infected.
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https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/cases
Rate per 100,000 by area - Lower tier LA - Bedford - 1047.1 (for period - yesterday)
https://www.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk/info/26/public_health/737/coronavirus_-_covid-19/14
Number of weekly positive cases per 100,000 - 19.4 (for period 21-27 Sept - latest figures given)

Unless the rate per 100,000 is different from the number of weekly cases per 100,000 (which they may well be but if so I would construe this as a deliberate attempt to mislead those looking for comparable figures between area's).

There were a series of local news articles from coronavirus the pandemic - episode 1 (a few months ago) which were asking why the rate in Bedford town was so high, no number was given but it was claimed it was the fifth highest in England, at that time.

There is clearly something wrong on the .gov.uk page as the given figure for Bedford is over half that given for Newcastle (1789 per 100,000), but looking at the map beside those figures, and zooming in - one particular ward of Newcastle has 327 active cases (and is surrounded by areas with similar case numbers) whereas my local ward has 17 (and is surrounded by wards with similar or less cases) and 17 is not 60ish percent of 327, unless my understanding of maths is lacking.

Presumably the dataset for 2 items next to each other, presented as alternate ways of looking at the same data, is the same - but who knows.

ETA - So precisely how the 1047 figure given (and the 19.4 figure) was derived is a puzzle, and looking at the official sources for official information about the state of play has simply left me 'confused' and maybe a little paranoid that my local council is manipulating the figures to avoid the consequences of a high rate per 100,000.
 
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The new cases in Italy have started to rapidly increase again. They have been increasing in September but the curve has now changed in a worrying manner.

On September 30 there were 1850 new cases. Yesterday on October 8 there were 4458 new cases.
 
A person I talked to about this says that in Italy this increase is probably driven in good part by the large number of tests because people aren't allowed to work/study if they have symptoms, until they test negative.

The fatalities have changed little. Some doctors here are saying that the virus is much less dangerous compared to how it was in spring.
 
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strategist said:
The fatalities have changed little. Some doctors here are saying that the virus is much less dangerous compared to how it was in spring.
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The fatality rate is strongly related to demographics. The high rate of infections in most countries is now younger people. The early high rate of deaths (above 5% IFR) was because all the ideas and policies about "protecting the old" failed and the virus had a catastrophic impact in aged care.
 
strategist said:
The new cases in Italy have started to rapidly increase again.
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Hold our warm beer.

Covid cases increase rapidly as next steps planned
Coronavirus cases in England have "increased rapidly", data shows, as ministers grapple with what to do next.

Estimates suggest between one-in-170 and one-in-240 people you meet in the street has the virus.

Both current cases, and the speed at which they are increasing, are much higher in the north of England than the national average.

Scientific advisers warn hospital admissions are "very close" to levels in early March.

A deluge of data shows a clear pattern of rising cases:

  • The R number - the average number of people each infected person passes the virus onto - is now estimated between 1.2 and 1.5. Anything above 1.0 means cases are increasing.
  • The Covid Symptom Study app - which uses data from 4 million people and 12,000 swab tests - estimates 21,903 people are developing Covid symptoms every day across the UK. That is 1,000-a-day more than a week ago.
  • The Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimates 224,000 people in homes in England had the virus, up to 1 October. That is roughly double the figure reported for each of the last two weeks, and suggests hopes of a "levelling off" last week may have been a false dawn.
  • The ONS estimates that one in 500 people is infected in Wales and Northern Ireland.
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-54477618

Not sure we should be surprised that the "Eat out to help out" scheme and allowing pubs to open seems to have helped out infection rates.
Data presented to MPs by England's Chief Medical Officer, Prof Chris Whitty, appears to put the hospitality sector in the firing line, given that parts of society such as schools and universities are being kept open.

It says pubs, restaurants and the hospitality sector as a whole are a major area where people testing positive for the virus have been mixing.
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Title : 'It Really was Abandonment': Virus Crisis Grips British Universities

Link : https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/06/world/europe/virus-UK-universities.html

LONDON — Inside a dormitory now known by students as H.M.P., for Her Majesty’s Prison, trash piled up in shared kitchens. Students washed their clothes in bathroom sinks. Security guards stalked the gates, keeping anyone from leaving or entering.

The building had been primed for a coronavirus outbreak since first-year students arrived at Manchester Metropolitan University for Freshers’ Week, Britain’s debaucherous baptism into university life, complete with trips to crowded pubs and dorm room parties.

But when the inevitable happened, and the virus tore through chockablock student suites, the university largely left students on their own: It imposed such a draconian lockdown that students had to nurse roommates back to health, parents drove hours to deliver food and lawyers offered pro bono help.

To date, roughly 90 British universities have reported coronavirus cases. Thousands of students are confined to their halls, some in suites with infected classmates, and many are struggling to get tested. The government, fearful of students seeding outbreaks far from campus, has warned that they may need to quarantine before returning home for Christmas.
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On the other hand, in some more positive news,

Masks and closures in Arizona led to a 75% decrease in coronavirus cases

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/entertainm...irus-cases/ar-BB19Sk31?li=AAnZ9Ug&ocid=ASUDHP

Mask mandates, closures of certain businesses and other COVID-19 mitigation strategies implemented over the summer led to a 75% drop in new coronavirus cases in Arizona, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

In stark contrast, when the state's stay-at-home order was lifted at the start of June, but such measures weren't yet put in place, the number of new COVID-19 cases increased 151% within two weeks, according to the report. As mounting evidence has shown, "widespread implementation and enforcement of sustained community mitigation measures, including mask wearing," can help prevent the spread of COVID-19, the authors wrote in the report.
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An open letter that made headlines calling for a herd immunity approach to Covid-19 lists a number of apparently fake names among its expert signatories, including “Dr Johnny Bananas” and “Professor Cominic Dummings”.

The Great Barrington declaration, which was said to have been signed by more than 15,000 scientists and medical practitioners around the world, was found by Sky News to contain numerous false names, as well as those of several homeopaths.

Others listed include a resident at the “university of your mum” and another supposed specialist whose name was the first verse of the Macarena.

Sky News discovered 18 self-declared homeopaths in the list of expert names and more than 100 therapists whose expertise included massage, hypnotherapy and Mongolian khoomii singing.
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...r-signed-fake-experts-dr-johnny-bananas-covid
 
anciendaze said:
Today Florida reported 5,570 new cases and 178 resident deaths. Considering the cases not reported yesterday, we are still running over 2,000 new cases per day, and something like 90 deaths per day. This is not a stable situation.
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Wow!

Meanwhile in Victoria, the government is saying 15 cases per day is too many and we need numbers to drop below 5 before bars/restaurants can open tables again!

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-12/victoria-coronavirus-cases-rise-by-15/12753430
https://covidlive.com.au/
 
Wonko said:
This says that, as of yesterdays figures, the rate per 100,000 in my town is 1047.

A 5394% increase in under 3 weeks.
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Similar thing has happened where I live. Number of cases in my local area stands, as it has done for months, at 0 - 3 per week in a population of about 7,500.

In one of the student areas, they're at 750+ per week within a similar-sized population. Some students* are refusing to stay in and isolate, saying they are paying a lot of money for the privilege of being at uni, and it's therefore up to them whether they take risks of becoming infected. Meaning the rest of us just have to put up with the fact that it will inevitably escape into the local community.


* According to people who work on the campus, it is just a minority of entitled tw@ts who take this attitude. Other students are extremely worried, and a few have already decided to leave their courses for good because it's not worth the risks to them and their families.
 
Kitty said:
In one of the student areas, they're at 750+ per week within a similar-sized population. Some students* are refusing to stay in and isolate, saying they are paying a lot of money for the privilege of being at uni, and it's therefore up to them whether they take risks of becoming infected. Meaning the rest of us just have to put up with the fact that it will inevitably escape into the local community.
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I struggle to understand why agencies worldwide have allowed the idea that only certain groups are vulnerable and the rest won't be affected - the influence of behaviourists possibly?

Sure in these days of social media influence it wouldn't have been such a terrible challenge to make putting yourself and others at risk of infection socially unacceptable?

In recent years it became socially unacceptable to just sit beside someone, even outdoors, and light up a cigarette unless in a designated smoking area. I'd far rather have a smoker light up beside me than risk sitting beside someone who doesn't give a hoot about infecting me because they believe covid won't really affect them.
 
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