Re: Coronavirus
 

Currently at work in full PPE.

One of the care homes we deal with had 35 staff now show today......

Re: Coronavirus
 

To be fair, it is not always obvious to people in England when a UK Gov service is only actually available in England. The UK is a unitary state, not a federation, and sovereignty is devolved from the centre by HMG, not pooled to the centre by otherwise autonomous states. The UK government governs for England, it doesn't adopt a separate identity or branding in order to do so. The web page itself does say towards the bottom that it is an England-only service. In this case it's because it is being managed by the NHS, which is devolved in Wales, Scotland and NI.

I have to be honest I think there's a big political upside to the current crisis, in Scotland at least - it has forced the SNP to actually govern rather than using state resources to carry on a perpetual referendum campaign, it has forced Nicola Sturgeon to actually agree with a Tory when the Tory says something right, rather than looking for points of differentiation and grievance, and more's the point it has forced a lot of people to confront the hard truth that an independent Scottish state would simply not have the firepower to deal with this on its own in so comprehensive a way as the UK is doing. And that right about now there's a real risk the border might be getting shut at Gretna and Berwick, with all the horrible symbolism that would entail.

And, when the dust settles, the UK national debt is going to be so astronomically high, and north sea oil revenue so pitifully low, that the economic case for independence (which was always a bit shaky) will be seen for the smoke and mirrors that it is. Scotland could simply never shoulder its fair share of the national debt, and only the most swivel-eyed nationalist loons could ever claim that debt was run up on projects Scotland never 'consented' to.

Re: Coronavirus
 

And that's what frustrates the life out of us but naturally is a topic for another day/thread.

It's helpful to point out such things when important advice/information is given out.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Not a happy bunny, I just got a memo at work.

We have been declared key workers, so must carry on.

Not only that if we are sick instead of us being given a full wage and the company claiming the £94., we will only get £94.

As a result I have had to temporarily stop seeing my mum in hospital.

My sister had it confirmed we can visit.

Re: Coronavirus
 

What company do you work for?

Re: Coronavirus
 

A UK app has just launched to help researchers track the spread of coronavirus.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/...of-coronavirus

Re: Coronavirus
 

BREAKING: 2020 Olympic games have been suspended until 2021 due to World wide Coronavirus outbreak.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Numerous police responses to supermarkets in the North East. Apparently the message wasn't clear enough. Embarrassing.

Re: Coronavirus
 

No words. :shocked::mad:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-52019720

Re: Coronavirus
 

Lock them up and throw away the keys would be a just punishment.:(

Re: Coronavirus
 

Looks like America is gearing up to go back already:https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/...55267603877894

Re: Coronavirus
 

I'm not sure I understand his incoherent, narcissistic rambling.

Re: Coronavirus
 

I hope they catch whoever did it.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Just received a text message alert from UK Government:

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...1&d=1585063624

Re: Coronavirus
 

Another group of mindless people here who have wilfully chosen to ignore the new restrictions as well.

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/new...entry-17972208

Re: Coronavirus
 

Just as well it isn't a warning about an incoming nuclear attack. Only those of us on EE would have survived (we got ours around 8 this morning). :D

Re: Coronavirus
 

The emergency services don't need to be responding to crap like this. Three feral youths also arrested not far from me for setting fire to wheelie bins outside shops and a care home.

Government should be setting up temporary detention centres for morons like this where they're kept in cages for the duration of the lockdown.

Re: Coronavirus
 

I think the police should be given the powers to give such people a good shoe-ing to the bollards as well as a fine.

Re: Coronavirus
 

The UK has recorded the highest number of coronavirus deaths in one day after another 87 people died across the country - taking the total to 422.

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavir...kdown-11962837

https://twitter.com/DHSCgovuk

Re: Coronavirus
 

They must be doing it by age i just got mine:)

Re: Coronavirus
 

Got mine at 1.00pm.

Re: Coronavirus
 

l got mine around midday.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Having a curve slightly below Italy counts for little when it's all going the same way.

Re: Coronavirus
 

No text yet here on Vodafone.

Re: Coronavirus
 

O2 have said they are sending the message in batches, I expect that is what Vodaphone are doing.

Re: Coronavirus
 

I'm on VM so not got it yet - another "coming soon" for me. :D

Re: Coronavirus
 

I've had 3 of these texts now....

Re: Coronavirus
 

Size isn't everything:sulk:

Re: Coronavirus
 

A update, we maintain C-130 parts, the US DoD and Lockheed Martin would like us to remain open as far as it is possible. The RAF said we are a key organisation and it is envisaged that the RAF C-130s will be key in the assist to combat Covid-19.

If we are ill we will get a full wage, if we have to self isolate because a member of the house is showing symptoms you will only get £94 per week:mad:

Re: Coronavirus
 

Well, you’ll have to be "ill", then...

https://digital.nhs.uk/news-and-even...solation-notes

Re: Coronavirus
 

Our HR manager knows the people who take the mike.

Trouble is if you go of ill with Covid symptons, you could look a tit a month later when you do get it.

Re: Coronavirus
 

As we manufacture where I work we are classed as essential(luckily), we have been told we will still receive full wages whether we have to self isolate or actually have the virus.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Our boss cares more about his bonus than he does closing for 3 weeks.

Mind you it was quiet to and from work.

Re: Coronavirus
 

You look more of a tit if you go in with the virus and take down most of the workforce, and endanger lives. If they had pulled their fingers out with testing then this wouldn't be an issue.

Re: Coronavirus
 

What is the point of testing when it might be at the stage where it doesn't show up or you might pick up the virus just seconds later.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Just to lighten things up a bit,

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...8&d=1585081664

Re: Coronavirus
 

Because both of these eventualities are statistically unlikely.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Thats weird thinking, both those things are possible. But knowing whether you're infectious or possibly immune/not infected and able to return to work would be handy. Hence the Govt. belatedly scrambling to buy 3.5 million tests. Lots are self isolating unecessarily as they don't know, it's crippling the NHS with absent staff.

Re: Coronavirus
 

No-one is self isolating unnecessarily.

Re: Coronavirus
 

A lot are as we aren't testing. Those countries that have got on top on this (eg S Korea) have tested much more widely than we have. Knowledge is power. Our Govts. response has been a shambles.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Only as "unlikely" as getting it in the first place. There isn't a "time of the month" when it can only happen. The test isn't currently a quick one like a pregnancy test.

Re: Coronavirus
 

No it isn’t because you are putting a time on it, whereas the chances of getting coronavirus over an infinite period of time is infinitely higher. There’s value in it being right 99.999% of the time and the recipient of the test taking the appropriate action.

I suppose there’s no point screening for breast cancer or prostate cancer - after all the person getting the test could start to develop it the next week? :confused:

---------- Post added at 20:49 ---------- Previous post was at 20:48 ----------

Indeed but we can’t confirm whether those who are have coronavirus or a a mild cold. That could have consequences further down the line.

Re: Coronavirus
 

The NHS is “rallying the troops” for the war on coronavirus, with volunteers being called up to help vulnerable people stay safe and well at home.
The nation is looking for up to 250,000 volunteers to help up to 1.5 million people who have been asked to shield themselves from coronavirus because of underlying health conditions.
Members of the public can sign up quickly and easily at goodsamapp.org/NHS to become NHS Volunteer Responders, and can be called on to do simple but vital tasks such as:
– delivering medicines from pharmacies;
– driving patients to appointments;
– bringing them home from hospital;
– or making regular phone calls to check on people isolating at home.
NHS Volunteer Responders is not intended to replace local groups helping their vulnerable neighbours but is an additional service provided by the NHS.
GPs, doctors, pharmacists, nurses, midwives, NHS 111 advisers and social care staff will all be able to request help for their at-risk patients via a call centre run by the Royal Voluntary Service (RVS), who will match people who need help with volunteers who live near to them. Some charities will also be able to refer people to the service.
https://www.goodsamapp.org/NHS

Re: Coronavirus
 

Cancer can also be in too early a stage to detect. It may be in the process of developing or yet to start to develop. With cancer there is a larger time frame between where it is at a detectable stage and it is actually detected, ie years.



"Just seconds later" could just as easily have been "just minutes later", "just hours later", or "just days later". Principal is the same.

Re: Coronavirus
 

At least you are being consistent.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Re: Coronavirus
 

Beijing’s roads and restaurants grow crowded, as scientists warn second coronavirus wave is ‘inevitable’..

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/worl...ientists-warn/

Re: Coronavirus
 

Screening and quarantining international arrivals is a good start seeing as Europe is now the epicentre of the virus.

Re: Coronavirus
 

New York looks set to overtake Lombard and Madrid as the worst region for CV deaths.

https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status...66536071507968

Re: Coronavirus
 

Things are about to get really bad there and the U.S in general. They've been so poor at reacting to this.

Re: Coronavirus
 

I’m not a mathematician, but I’d love to see the output of that equation but I think you’re right.

The probability of contracting CV over infinity, would be infinity, I don’t like those odds.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Well, unless the underlying health issues get you first.

---------- Post added at 23:08 ---------- Previous post was at 23:07 ----------

On the plus side we will get to find out if herd immunity works and the human cost of achieving it.

Re: Coronavirus
 

There is no question it works, the only question is what will/would the cost be.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Hopefully they'll develop a vaccine first.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Probably 9-18 months for a vaccine

Re: Coronavirus
 

Claim here that the virus can last up to 17 days outside the human body:

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/23/cdc-...KV_zwXHM08BqiY

Re: Coronavirus
 

Shows cleaning is very important..

Re: Coronavirus
 

Another Red Herring, do you read the story before you post.

at the very bottom of the article is this

Re: Coronavirus
 

No, it doesn’t - at the bottom of the article it states Detection of viral RNA does not necessarily indicate the presence of infectious virus.

To me, the important bit was in the source report

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/...cid=mm6912e3_w

This shows it doesn’t matter if "you feel fine" - nearly 10% of the passengers on the Diamond Princess didn’t show symptoms at the time of testing, even though they were infected (thus able to infect others).

Re: Coronavirus
 

Wow, that is worrying. There will be lots of people with the virus who have no idea they have it.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Which is the reason for the 14 day self-isolation for people who have been in contact with a known sufferer, as opposed to the 7 days if you have symptoms and are on your own.
Link

Re: Coronavirus
 

The only consolation is that whilst New York has the steepest curve of all areas globally (with deaths doubling every day) other areas in the US like Washington and California are currently showing flatter growth.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Bring back pillory posts?

Re: Coronavirus
 

Rather less than wrecking the economy, presumably. No-one seems to care that the response to this and the government handouts that are being made as a result will put us in a worse economic position than the financial crash in 2008.

Which is the lesser of these two evils? No-one calls for such measures to deal with seasonal flu, which also claims many lives each year. The number of deaths globally from coronavirus is nowhere near the world totals for 'normal flu'. I suppose the main issue here is that the deaths from Covid 19 are concentrated into a much smaller timescale, putting health resources under enormous pressure for a few weeks.

Still, the cost of isolating people is eye-watering. Expect a lot of questions to be asked about over-reaction when all this is over and we have to suck up the financial consequences.

---------- Post added at 10:21 ---------- Previous post was at 10:19 ----------



Most people, actually. It is a minority who show symptoms that require hospital treatment and most won't even be aware they've had it.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Nonsense Old Boy. Haven’t you seen the videos of people dying in hospital corridors in Italy? The army taking away bodies. This is far from the common flu. The first thing being that nobody would have noticed if it was.

The ignorance of some that this is no more than seasonal flu is what is prolonging the pain and “wrecking” the economy. The stock exchanges were tanking while Europe was treating this as business as usual.

You are forgetting that the capitalist economies are essentially pozni schemes build upon trillions of debt. Countries, businesses, consumers. All drowning in it.

Dealing with virus response swiftly, protecting people’s jobs and businesses would allow everyone to come out the other side with confidence. Months and months of misery would not.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Prince Charles has Covid-19.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Research shows that those with no/small symptoms will "shed" less virus that those showing more symptoms. This lower shedding (providing not being surrounded by it) may cause a lower virus load on the person catching the virus and this (other research) show may lead to the body being better able to counter the virus.

Re: Coronavirus
 

well me and Mrs Pierre are taking precautions.

https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2020/03/2.gif

Re: Coronavirus
 

Thanks for bringing some economic literacy to the debate. Also worth knowing that external events like this crisis tends to have a lower long-term impact on economies than internal financial ones like the Global Financial Crisis.

Re: Coronavirus
 

No, the main issue is that it is a novel coronavirus, and we don't know the medium to long-term effects of it, as opposed to flu, which we have researched for decades...

Re: Coronavirus
 

Wonder how he got tested if he's not seriously ill in hospital? (no need to answer).

Re: Coronavirus
 

I do like James Blunt...

:D

Re: Coronavirus
 

This is the statement that has been released

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...081e5eda236592

Re: Coronavirus
 

The criteria being an actor/politician/royalty. Meanwhile front line NHS staff aren't being tested. That test could have been better used elsewhere even he has been massively stuck down with 'mild symptoms'.

Re: Coronavirus
 

In Scotland that's not true now so fair play to NHS Scotland and the Scottish government for changing that:
https://www.gov.scot/news/covid-19-t...-back-to-work/

Re: Coronavirus
 

For those wondering about the impact of working from home on the internet have a read of this.

A Snapshot of UK and EU Broadband Speed During COVID-19

Re: Coronavirus
 

Good find - an important part of that article was My son is working from home (his flat) at the moment, and as he cannot access his, or the common, network drive (not enough Citrix licences), everything is being done through O365 mail - his girlfriend does TEFL to Chinese children for about 6-7 hours a day, which requires two way video; this was impacting on his speed/productivity, as they were both using Wi-fi (as well as all the other things in the flat (Amazon Fire Stick, Spotify, etc.)), so I gave him a 10 meter Cat6 cable, and lo and behold, the problem disappeared... :)

Re: Coronavirus
 

So fay, I have been pleasantly surprised at the network performance. We use 2 levels of VPN at work, a basic one everyone has and a deeper one with hard tokens for those who really need to dig in the weeds of work data and need softphone access like me.

I anticipated doing a dance of the VPNs, logging into the US in the morning and Asia in the afternoon but, on the whole, things have stood up well using the UK and Netherlands servers. I am generally hitting 50-60Mbps and downloading 200MB per hour

Re: Coronavirus
 

Been working from home for a week now with no problems with speeds. I pay for 40mb and I'm getting around 38 constant.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Ditto, no issues here either (on VM 350).

Re: Coronavirus
 

The Chancellor Rishi Sunak will announce the new package of measures for the self-employed at the daily press conference tomorrow.

https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/...96195136839687

---------- Post added at 13:11 ---------- Previous post was at 12:56 ----------

A 21-year-old woman is believed to be the youngest person with no pre-existing health conditions to have died after contracting coronavirus in the UK.

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavir...id-19-11963451

Re: Coronavirus
 

Universal Credit backlog.

Half a million people have applied for Universal Credit in the last nine days. 105,000 of these claims were made yesterday alone! The DWP are to start ringing claimants instead of forcing them to call them. Problems with the online identity check system haven't helped, so 10,000 extra staff are to be redeployed to help to clear the backlog.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Re: Coronavirus
 

Everyone hopefully will get the support they need, however there have been a proportion of self employed people, sadly some of them in my family who have crowed about dodging tax for years. Hopefully the aid they receive will shame them into a lesson when this get better

Re: Coronavirus
 

As much as I'd usually avoid citing the Daily Star as a source, this looks promising:

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/cor...gn=mirror_main

Re: Coronavirus
 

UK coronavirus mass home testing to be made available 'within days' .

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...le-within-days

Re: Coronavirus
 

Re: Coronavirus
 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52036333

Re: Coronavirus
 

It'll be interesting to see if they can be used more than once (by the same person).

Re: Coronavirus
 

A message from a (The) Doctor...



---------- Post added at 15:06 ---------- Previous post was at 14:59 ----------

This made me chuckle

Re: Coronavirus
 

MOT is due in July. Am I right in assuming that if it can't be done, it's exempt till September 30th?

Following the new MOT guidance today. Someone else has told me January. Not really sure whether it'll show as MOT'd after said date or not.

Re: Coronavirus
 

You no longer need to try to get it done in July. You have an automatic six month extension, so it is now due in January next year.

The only exceptions to this are those whose MOTs are due before the end of this month, because the new regulations can’t be brought into legal force more quickly.

Re: Coronavirus
 

I've had a very slight sniffle for a number of days, with no sign of a temperature(already had a thermometer) If it has been a mild attack of covid-19, it would be extremely useful to know. Health wise, I was likely to have been in the requiring hospitalisation group(high BP and BMI, with heart failure a few years ago).

If it has been covid-19 and I successfully recover, then not only could I more easily go out and about, I might be of use to neighbours.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Thanks, I've already carried out the work needed, but looking at a new car for late this year so the whole thing works to my benefit as I plan to scrap this when I'm done with it anyway. Essentially maintaining it for the road but not piling money in for nothing.

Re: Coronavirus
 

In additional to tell their staff to work in Tescos rather than pay them even the 80% backed up the Government, Weatherspoons is now seemingly not paying their supplies even for delivered goods: https://twitter.com/ByRobDavies/stat...23001688735753

Re: Coronavirus
 

Well let's hope people remember how this company behaved when this is all over. Sports Direct should be boycotted too for attempting to stay open.

Re: Coronavirus
 

Maybe when this is all over we can revert back to pubs closing at 11pm, and night clubs closing at 2am

Re: Coronavirus
 

Yet it wouldn't be useful for a key worker about to start a shift on a construction site to know? :confused

Chances are your test would come back negative as a "sniffle" is an extremely rare symptom of Coronavirus. You could equally go out seconds later and catch it though.

Re: Coronavirus
 

My point still stands true. A negative result proves nothing.:rolleyes: A positive result on the other hand is useful. No contradiction at all.

At the point of testing somebody could have the virus on their hands and then touch their face and other surfaces.

Doesn't matter if you have billions of the PCR testing kits, you still need the limited number of machines and their operators to use those kits. The "kits" are not fully self-contained like a pregnancy test. People do not seem to get that.

If the suggestion of fully self-contained usable at home testing kits being available from Amazon or Boots turns out to happen, then still a negative result isn't that useful.

Re: Coronavirus
 

The Coronavirus could mutate in the person standing next to you and you could catch it again.

Statistically unlikely yes, however so is your contention someone could have it on their hand while testing negative THEN touch their face and catch it.