Coronavirus

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by Hugh

"Working from home" probably…

Yes.

---------- Post added at 16:24 ---------- Previous post was at 16:24 ----------

Originally Posted by jfman

I dunno I know plenty of folk with jobs and “working” is a stretch.

[nffc]

Originally Posted by jfman

I don’t know unless they’re suppressing thousands of cases that figure is fairly standalone, unless you think they’re just not testing but on a per 100k basis that’s been shown to be the opposite they are testing more than us.

“A like for like basis” is a convenient straw for some to clutch to in order to avoid unfavourable comparisons. Seph has drawn us towards a very interesting observation here that shouldn’t be easily dismissed. There could be something useful to learn from comparisons, but there of course has to be a willingness and not just a belief grounded on quicksand that we must be the best in the world.

Yes but it's correct that you have to understand how your figure is measured.


If you look, for example, at a common quoted official death metric for a covid-19 death, it's simply counted as a death within 28 days of a positive test; the implication that this is significant time to count the death as due to covid is likely in a lot of cases. What it could also potentially include is someone who tested positive with mild symptoms, recovered within a week but then died in a car accident or something within 28 days, presumably that would still count on the official figures. But you do have to have a metric which can be measured consistently and doesn't depend on a more objective view of someone who has processed the paperwork, where in some cases, it's difficult to say whether covid has contributed to the death significantly or not.



Given that different countries have different measuring criteria you need to look at what they are actually measuring and how they are measuring it. The Austria comparison is interesting if they are doing more tests but maybe we are targeting them better. If for example they are just slinging tests at everyone and expecting them to do this twice a week and record it, which is registering a high number of tests which are unlikely to come back positive, as opposed to targeting testing capacity at unvaccinated school kids who are highly likely to have it and likely with mild or no symptoms. Or if they are counting LFTs and/or PCRs and what cycle they run at.



The observation is interesting because they have, superficially at least, higher testing capacity and a similar vaccination rate but are still registering fewer new cases and fewer deaths/people in hospital. But even those figures aren't necessarily measuring the same thing everywhere. Whereas you'd be clear that say looking at figures from London or Manchester are likely to be using the same testing basis.

Only those deaths with COVID as the underlying cause are counted, not any death within 28 days of someone who has COVID.

As I showed on the previous page of this thread

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/show...postcount=7437

[nffc]

Yet the government website says:

Number of deaths of people who had had a positive test result for COVID-19 and died within 28 days of the first positive test.

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/deaths


It is absolutely silly though. People who haven't died of covid shouldn't count.

[1andrew1]

Originally Posted by nffc

Yet the government website says:

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/deaths

It is absolutely silly though. People who haven't died of covid shouldn't count.

They don't count in the later ONS stats though.

[nffc]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

They don't count in the later ONS stats though.

I know. They are two different studies, like the ONS infection was revealed earlier to be as high as January. Quite how this can be the case with hospitalisations nowhere near is presumably only possible if it's mainly kids getting it now, or simply that the vaccine has reduced the illness in most jabbed people to be mild enough not to require it.



Given that they tend to work such studies by extrapolating from a stratified sample of the population, it is often likely to lead to something inaccurate. But then, the official figures only count the first positive test.


I don't think there's a significant variance between the ONS and Gov death figures though, despite the metrics being different, or wasn't at least last time I looked between them.


Suppose there's a reasonable assumption in most cases that someone who has died within 28 days of a positive test has probably died because of something related to catching covid, and if they do even include the car accident after recovering in the figures, these are unlikely to be high enough to be statistically significant anyway.

[jfman]

All hail glorious private healthcare.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ic-says-report

[spiderplant]

Originally Posted by nffc

It is absolutely silly though. People who haven't died of covid shouldn't count.

And people who died after 28 days should.

[nffc]

Originally Posted by spiderplant

And people who died after 28 days should.

Yes, 28 days is plenty of time to be in ICU and then die. It's silly on plenty of levels.

[jfman]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...efore-pandemic

We did this analysis on a potential MERS outbreak but didn't think it was relevant. Ooer....

Some further 'benefits' of lockdowns, distancing (and masks, obviously) ;

Flu deaths could hit 60,000 in worst winter for 50 years, say experts.

More than 35m people will be offered jabs after health chiefs warn that lockdowns and social distancing have led to a drop in immunity

[Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by Paul

Some further 'benefits' of lockdowns, distancing (and masks, obviously) ;

I don't understand this. Viruses are particular. How would we get immunity from a new virus if we mingled? Would we not become ill with circulating viruses? Or is it that viruses were not circulating, in which case why would there be reduced immunity?

[nffc]

Originally Posted by Sephiroth

I don't understand this. Viruses are particular. How would we get immunity from a new virus if we mingled? Would we not become ill with circulating viruses? Or is it that viruses were not circulating, in which case why would there be reduced immunity?

From what I understand, they are saying that your natural immunity to some viruses wanes over time (potentially as they mutate - I don't think they've ever really been sequencing things like noroviruses or colds as much as they have with covid-19) which means that the longer you're not exposed to a cold virus the more likely you are to get ill with one (and probably the more you are the more likely your immune system will be able to recognise it and fight it off.


The viruses are still circulating as they have reservoirs in other species (which may or may not cause the same illness) for example noro is in shellfish and oysters so even if humans aren't getting them they're still out there.


I suppose one possibility is that if we say that it takes 20 mutations of a cold virus to make it swerve your immunity, and that it does 1 mutation every month, if you get exposure to a cold virus 5 months after your previous one your immune system will recognise it from the one it saw 5 months ago and know what to do, so you either don't get ill or don't get it as badly; but if you've gone the full 20 months then it's unrecognisable (in the theoretical situation) so you'll get the full effects of it.



So if the measures put in place to combat covid (whether or not they actually worked, we have mixed less with others) stop other viruses spreading too (which is logical) it's entirely correct that you'll see a spike in other things, which is exactly what the CMO said in the summer.

[Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by nffc

From what I understand, they are saying that your natural immunity to some viruses wanes over time (potentially as they mutate - I don't think they've ever really been sequencing things like noroviruses or colds as much as they have with covid-19) which means that the longer you're not exposed to a cold virus the more likely you are to get ill with one (and probably the more you are the more likely your immune system will be able to recognise it and fight it off.


The viruses are still circulating as they have reservoirs in other species (which may or may not cause the same illness) for example noro is in shellfish and oysters so even if humans aren't getting them they're still out there.


I suppose one possibility is that if we say that it takes 20 mutations of a cold virus to make it swerve your immunity, and that it does 1 mutation every month, if you get exposure to a cold virus 5 months after your previous one your immune system will recognise it from the one it saw 5 months ago and know what to do, so you either don't get ill or don't get it as badly; but if you've gone the full 20 months then it's unrecognisable (in the theoretical situation) so you'll get the full effects of it.


So if the measures put in place to combat covid (whether or not they actually worked, we have mixed less with others) stop other viruses spreading too (which is logical) it's entirely correct that you'll see a spike in other things, which is exactly what the CMO said in the summer.

Thanks for that.

You've got me worried about eating raw oysters now!

[tweetiepooh]

Originally Posted by nffc

From what I understand, they are saying that your natural immunity to some viruses wanes over time (potentially as they mutate - I don't think they've ever really been sequencing things like noroviruses or colds as much as they have with covid-19) which means that the longer you're not exposed to a cold virus the more likely you are to get ill with one (and probably the more you are the more likely your immune system will be able to recognise it and fight it off.


The viruses are still circulating as they have reservoirs in other species (which may or may not cause the same illness) for example noro is in shellfish and oysters so even if humans aren't getting them they're still out there.


I suppose one possibility is that if we say that it takes 20 mutations of a cold virus to make it swerve your immunity, and that it does 1 mutation every month, if you get exposure to a cold virus 5 months after your previous one your immune system will recognise it from the one it saw 5 months ago and know what to do, so you either don't get ill or don't get it as badly; but if you've gone the full 20 months then it's unrecognisable (in the theoretical situation) so you'll get the full effects of it.



So if the measures put in place to combat covid (whether or not they actually worked, we have mixed less with others) stop other viruses spreading too (which is logical) it's entirely correct that you'll see a spike in other things, which is exactly what the CMO said in the summer.

Add to that the 5 month infection "resets" the clock to the next 20 providing the mutations are "linear". So if you are infected say every 8 months your immunity may give protection from serious illness each time and each time you body learns a bit more.