Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[welshbairn]

1 hour ago, Jan Vojáček said:

They're only one example obviously, but my grandparents are 81; my Granny has cancer and my Papa has COPD and Bronchitis. They must be in one of the highest risk groups going and they're down at the health centre/hospital once or twice every single week - but as yet haven't heard a peep about their vaccine. 

The impression I've got in Inverness is the initial Pfizer deliveries went to hospitals and larger care homes; local surgeries etc are waiting for the AZ one which is much easier to handle, I'm expecting an appointment for my 93 year old Mother this month, and as I'll be pushing her round  in her wheelchair I'm hoping to blag one too.

Edited January 3, 2021 by welshbairn

[Bairnardo]

13 minutes ago, Honest_Man#1 said:

I’m assuming you’ve now accepted schools should be shut?

Not necessarily. That issue is ridiculously complex, different for ELC/Primary/Secondary and probably by area too. I also do not believe at this point they should be getting away with open ended restrictions which would no doubt be what they would come with. What I am saying though is I would personally find it acceptable to keep them shut for a defined period, ie until February as a completely arbitrary example, to allow a big dent to be made in vaccine delivery and to somewhat suppress the numbers from their Xmas f**k up.

Before that happens though, lets see the fucking plan for making those numbers as high as possible.

FWIW, once again, my kids will be at school in whatever capacity they are there for key workers, so theres no selfish motivation from me, and I would take a short term hit to give a window of focusing on vaccine delivery, but I am not prepared to watch vaccine numbers slithering upwards at a snails pace and be told that my kids might get educated some time before Easter "if cases allow" etc

[Robin.Hood]

1 minute ago, Tynierose said:

The hubs are open for key workers again.   There is absolutely no way your children can pick up the virus in hubs, nope the hubs are super immune.

There is no way a child who is asymptomatic will pass on the virus to a parent who will then take it into hospital etc spreading the virus to the most vulnerable.   No, hubs are safe just like schools, unlike restaurants.

I'd quite happily take unpaid leave for 3 months if necessary but no way would my employer countenance that nor would many others I guess.  Ah the key worker dilemma...

I could take a career break. A few have however I know personally I cant afford too. 

Meh just get on with it. Today may be less busy 

[Sergeant Wilson]

24 minutes ago, Robin.Hood said:

 hubs will be open?

Yaass!

Eta

Booo!

Edited January 3, 2021 by Sergeant Wilson

[Bairnardo]

4 minutes ago, Tynierose said:

The hubs are open for key workers again.   There is absolutely no way your children can pick up the virus in hubs, nope the hubs are super immune.

There is no way a child who is asymptomatic will pass on the virus to a parent who will then take it into hospital etc spreading the virus to the most vulnerable.   No, hubs are safe just like schools, unlike restaurants.

I'd quite happily take unpaid leave for 3 months if necessary but no way would my employer countenance that nor would many others I guess.  Ah the key worker dilemma...

Leaving aside the 3 months unpaid leave idea, what's the alternative for key workers? I mean, of course they could be harsher on what constitutes a key worker and pare it down to the bare minimum to keep the country functioning.... Is that an acceptable place to be at this moment though? I would be even more damaging that the March lockdown, in the middle of winter....

For me personally, its either school or grandparents. There are literally no other options. Not a hope in hell of any variety of time off for me or the wife, not a hope in hell of our jobs being somehow reclassified. Plenty will be in that boat. So aye... Not exactly an easy issue to resolve without schools in play.

[Marshmallo]

15 minutes ago, Bairnardo said:

 theres no selfish motivation from me

Haha!

[Elric]

14 minutes ago, Tynierose said:

The hubs are open for key workers again.   There is absolutely no way your children can pick up the virus in hubs, nope the hubs are super immune.

There is no way a child who is asymptomatic will pass on the virus to a parent who will then take it into hospital etc spreading the virus to the most vulnerable.   No, hubs are safe just like schools, unlike restaurants.

I'd quite happily take unpaid leave for 3 months if necessary but no way would my employer countenance that nor would many others I guess.  Ah the key worker dilemma...

Friends daughter is divorced with a child but with new partner. She works as a credit controller but considers herself to be a key worker so last time kid was sent to school.  Kid also goes and stays with father in different LA every second weekend where she mixes with other children.  There is no possibility that she will be at risk of carrying and spreading the virus!

The SG seriously have to lay out who is a key worker and who is not if the schools are going to be open to key workers children only.

[Bairnardo]

8 minutes ago, Elric said:

Friends daughter is divorced with a child but with new partner. She works as a credit controller but considers herself to be a key worker so last time kid was sent to school.  Kid also goes and stays with father in different LA every second weekend where she mixes with other children.  There is no possibility that she will be at risk of carrying and spreading the virus!

The SG seriously have to lay out who is a key worker and who is not if the schools are going to be open to key workers children only.

I believe they allowed the LA's to define it themselves. I never did it in March so don't know if its different now but there's a form which defines the criteria. When I filled it in I got a reply from the school straight away saying it was fine. I guess it does leave room for interpretation/embellishment

[effeffsee_the2nd]

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/mrc-global-infectious-disease-analysis/covid-19/report-42-sars-cov-2-variant/
Non peer reviewed pre print from Ferguson and his crew at Imperial.
Under a half dozen different models the new strain is expected to have an additive effect on R by 0.4 to 0.7 (Well, 0.36 to 0.68)
The paper also looked at trying to figure out the R for both the old and new strains through the second English lockdown. It comes to the conclusion that the R for the old strain during that lockdown was 0.92 vs. 1.45 for the new strain, so 0.53 difference in additive effect of R.
Given the tier 4 restrictions up here managed to get R below 1 as well, it seems that the old strain could be controlled with schools remaining open.
The new strain cannot. Where the new strain is not dominant, it will become so as it outcompetes the old stuff. That means at the very least I'd expect Sturgeon to announce schools continuing in online earning until February.
If transmission is raised across all age groups equally as the paper here suggests: https://cmmid.github.io/topics/covid19/uk-novel-variant.html then there might be some scope to get the younger kids and primary schools back in person but you'd expect them to wait and collate a lot more data before going down that route.
The issue is that if the increase in R is closer to the upper end suggested by Ferguson, then closing schools might not necessarily be enough to control transmission by itself. So what then? Strict stay at home order? Curfew? 
If there is to be a return to a full March lockdown, then it has to go hand in hand with a schedule for vaccinations. Even if it means plowing f**k tonnes of money at AZ to guarantee supply. Otherwise it won't stick. I do think restrictions need to stay in place at least until they can get enough of the vulnerable groups vaccinated to bring down hospitalisations. Otherwise we run the risk of crashing the NHS at the point where it is trying to manage a massive vaccination program. The stories coming out of SE England are not exactly cheery.

What is the point in a curfew when everything else is closed ? Do people really spread the virus going for a walk or going to the supermarket late at night? Or is it because people use those as excuses for doing things that are not permitted and the police have no way of enforcing it?

[renton]

3 minutes ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

What is the point in a curfew when everything else is closed ? Do people really spread the virus going for a walk or going to the supermarket late at night? Or is it because people use those as excuses for doing things that are not permitted and the police have no way of enforcing it?

Well, presumably the rationale is that a curfew simply limits the statistical probability of your contacting someone else.

You could put a curfew on starting things (i.e. a later opening for supermarkets for example) but all that would achieve is condensing the number of folk using a shop or service into a shorter period of time and hence increasing the number of contacts you'd have.

A night curfew probably doesn't have that effect.

[Steven W]

For someone who's supposedly 'scunnered' with all this, NS tone and use of language is remarkably different when it's bad news versus good news.

A 5 post thread this morning on Twitter about impending restrictions preceded a re-tweet of a lengthy study on this new variant.

Versus a solitary tweet about the AZ vaccine approval an hour and a half after the news broke.

To me it sends out all the wrong signals. Granted things are a little bleak just now, but we really need to be hearing about vaccine progress as well as the all negative stuff. A good example being we get daily updates on deaths, hospitalisations, infections etc. But vaccination numbers are weekly.

[Bairnardo]

Just now, Steven W said:

For someone who's supposedly 'scunnered' with all this, NS tone and use of language is remarkably different when it's bad news versus good news.

A 5 post thread this morning on Twitter about impending restrictions preceded a re-tweet of a lengthy study on this new variant.

Versus a solitary tweet about the AZ vaccine approval an hour and a half after the news broke.

To me it sends out all the wrong signals. Granted things are a little bleak just now, but we really need to be hearing about vaccine progress as well as the all negative stuff. A good example being we get daily updates on deaths, hospitalisations, infections etc. But vaccination numbers are weekly.

They are not prepared to have it scrutinised. Either methods or results.

[ICTChris]

Friends daughter is divorced with a child but with new partner. She works as a credit controller but considers herself to be a key worker so last time kid was sent to school.  Kid also goes and stays with father in different LA every second weekend where she mixes with other children.  There is no possibility that she will be at risk of carrying and spreading the virus!
The SG seriously have to lay out who is a key worker and who is not if the schools are going to be open to key workers children only.

I’m sure there is a document laying out who is a key worker.

We send our son to a private nursery who shut between March and June IIRC. They are staying open for children who have one key worker parent, so we qualify as wife is a key worker (I am a filthy capitalist so non-key worker).

[Thereisalight..]

On 02/01/2021 at 10:57, bendan said:

I think when people say 24/7 they actually mean not just 8-4 Mon-Fri. 

It will ultimately be irrelevant as we won't have enough vaccine anyway.

Yet the drive through test centres are open from 8am-8pm Mon to Fri and were also open Christmas and New Years Day. You’d think vaccinating the elderly/vulnerable and actually getting on with life would be more important than asking people with no symptoms and who feel perfectly fine to get tested 

[Guest Jedi]

We now have a Tory education minister on TV this morning saying that 'a lot of learning time has already been lost during the Christmas break'. (presumably he thinks that schools should only have been closed on Christmas Day). That was his 'reasoning' that schools have to open at full capacity in England from tomorrow.  Meanwhile following his 'schools are totally safe' announcement, Johnson moves on to start wittering about the need for tighter restrictions across the country.

I would expect the SG to try something similar tomorrow.....probably along the lines of 'we need to make more sacrifices elsewhere to ensure that schools are at full capacity from the 18th (if not sooner). Given that all exams have been cancelled in Scotland, where is the 'pressure' to have pupils in a face to face environment rather than online?

With regards to the argument that schools must be open to keep the economy moving...whilst I accept that home learning is an issue for childcare, there are still tens of thousands (if not more) workers whose jobs simply can't be done from home.....pubs, shop workers, hairdressers, building sites to name just a few...are people doing such jobs not in a position to support online learning, while hubs operate for 'key' workers? We also need a definition of 'key' worker in the sense of what it takes to keep society functioning for a few weeks eg NHS, transport, supermarkets, emergency services.

[bendan]

Just now, Thereisalight.. said:

Yet the drive through test centres are open from 8am-8pm Mon to Fri and were also open Christmas and New Years Day. You’d think vaccinating the elderly/vulnerable and actually getting on with life would be more important than asking people with no symptoms and who feel perfectly fine to get tested 

Yes, you would, but it took us months to get to that point with testing.

And it's not as if we could possibly have known we'd be giving out vaccines at some point.

[doulikefish]

My mother and neice both got the first dose of the Vaccine on a Sunday so it must be different in each health board area.

My Nieces was done at 7pm in the care home she works in,mothers was at 1445 at the local health centre 

[ICTChris]

Things not going so well in Ireland.

[NotThePars]

Great stuff down south when you've got a governing party petrified of being seen to cave in to those dreaded unions and an opposition party whose one big stand this year has been on reopening schools with zero caveats.

[tamthebam]

Boris is famously not a details person and has a cabinet full of non-entities so it's not a wonder England has shat it.

I don't think our Universities are due back until the end of January but it does concern me that students from the plague ridden South may return to Scotland and possibly cause another spike in infections. Some of said students may also have been sharing households with younger siblings who have had to return to an English school with all the implications that presents.