London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing • Hacker News Board

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#221

Post by LeoNatan25 » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:25 AM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #71

lrossi wrote: post #41

Here is a video filmed in London this Christmas: https://youtu.be/Yz7wJZln6Kw Plenty of people outside. In fact, I would call it lightly crowded, although less than other years. Many people don’t wear masks. It’s not a surprise that transmission has increased. Nevertheless, London looked absolutely beautiful. Not sure if this was worth the risks though.

The people in the video seem to just walk around outdoors and not very close to other people. That many people obviously will mean a risk that some of them go into stores, but if there is a reasonably safe thing to do outdoors (like a particularly nice street) it’s natural that this becomes extra popular when people want to find something to do outdoors.

Outdoors, especially in a humid night, is not a magical place where the virus is inactivated right at the mouth of the shedding individual. People being so close, people walking into air that someone recently exhaled—these are big opportunities for infection.

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#222

Post by fsdfgsfsdfsdfsd » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:25 AM UTC

GlennS wrote: post #173

polote wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the government should just let this run its course Isn't it just an opinion? I personally think that way. Why wouldn't I be allowed to think that?

I guess it seems like a surprising view to have (to think that the government should let it run its course)? I mean, the evidence is pretty clear by now isn't it? Countries that responded to the pandemic with swift strong action, especially restrictions on movement, have had the best outcomes for both health and the economy. Countries that tried to protect the economy / their nation's finances by enacting watered dow…

I don't think the evidence is clear. There are countries that were unsuccessful with their lockdowns, and countries were numbers were decreasing (because of lockdown or other reasons is unclear).

Then there is China, whose numbers can't be trusted. And some remote island states seem to have done well. Most interesting case perhaps Taiwan (which incidentally also belongs to China).

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#223

Post by Aeolun » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:26 AM UTC

ldrndll wrote: post #166

polote wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if we let the virus lives its life, maximum 2% of pop will die, 90 more % will live normally and a few percent will have covid related health issues. so we sacrifice a few percent of population for the future of the others

Care to cite any stats supporting your assertion that a maximum of 2% of the population would die? During periods where the healthcare system has been overloaded the mortality rates have been many multiples of that during times when healthcare is provided at an appropriate level. What’s more, do you have any reasonable figures to suggest why letting a percentage or more of the population die unnecessarily, consigning…

> What’s more, do you have any reasonable figures to suggest why letting a percentage or more of the population die unnecessarily, consigning even larger numbers to long-term health problems and so forth is somehow a good choice?

If I squint my eyes a bit. Reduce the burden on the pension system?

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#224

Post by Blahah » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:27 AM UTC

andy_ppp wrote: post #142

flukus wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So, er, what if the growth trends are suppressed by the tighter lockdown, as seems likely? Will things then be better than the "best" case scenario? There's two lag factors to consider. The first is the lag between restrictions and cases dropping, this takes a couple of weeks and cases and the growth isn't likely to even slow for 1 week. The second is the lag between infections and people getting seriously sick and…

Or because of the incompetence of those in charge people just don’t take the lockdown seriously...

Nobody is in charge of people's perspectives. The UK has really gone all in on psychosocial nudge tactics in this pandemic, and it has massively failed so far. Arguably, they've done so because they knew the population were so belligerent and arrogantly ignorant that a more direct approach would definitely fail. They have leveraged the 'new variant' to implement at the last moment the measures that were being recommended for months by all their expert committees. People here don't want to be told what to do and there are very well organised efforts to encourage people to feel empowered in their ignorance and irresponsibility. The 'people in charge' aren't the only ones to blame for that.

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#225

Post by mhh__ » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:27 AM UTC

TMWNN wrote: post #204

mhh__ wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to flesh this out, the NHS could use more money, but it's worth saying that it's the only European healthcare system I'm aware of so fragile. If you ask a lot of British people they seem to think that the only alternative is the wild west found in the US, rather than the other healthcare systems in Europe. There was a good piece in the private eye a few years ago listing headlines saying the NHS is doomed tomorr…

>There was a good piece in the private eye a few years ago listing headlines saying the NHS is doomed tomorrow going back to before Blair. https://twitter.com/KulganofCrydee/status/833654730849136641 >Just to flesh this out, the NHS could use more money, but it's worth saying that it's the only European healthcare system I'm aware of so fragile. You've fallen for the very "NHS is more fragile than systems in other co…

I said fragile but I would've mentioned efficacy - it's past midnight. The NHS isn't even that good, but it's hard to bring it up because it's the sacred cow.

I think Denmark apparently has the most comparable system in Europe, but I've not read much about it (just heard it in passing).

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#226

Post by Supermancho » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:27 AM UTC

GlennS wrote: post #173

polote wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the government should just let this run its course Isn't it just an opinion? I personally think that way. Why wouldn't I be allowed to think that?

I guess it seems like a surprising view to have (to think that the government should let it run its course)? I mean, the evidence is pretty clear by now isn't it? Countries that responded to the pandemic with swift strong action, especially restrictions on movement, have had the best outcomes for both health and the economy. Countries that tried to protect the economy / their nation's finances by enacting watered dow…

> I mean, the evidence is pretty clear by now isn't it?

I think the evidence is clear that it's endemic to the world (like Tuberculosis still is, with most ppl carrying a latent infection). Things are deadly in the world. As far as pandemics go, this one is about as bad as the modern world can handle...ok, some govts can handle. If economies/governments fall apart, it will run it's course as well. The bet that the entire world will lock down their borders and get vaccines every 6 mo for the rest of our lifetimes, is silly. Will corona basically be gone this year? Next year? The year after that?

It's all hand wringing theater at this point. I think there's plenty of evidence that govts are taking advantage of the situation, but that's not the same as it being a grand conspiracy to release a virus for transhumanistic purposes (to get ppl used to getting govt injection). That's also nonsense.

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#227

Post by sharken » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:27 AM UTC

e40 wrote: post #54

jpxw wrote: post #33

And yet we still have idiots here in the UK saying things ranging from: * coronavirus is invented as a government power grab * the government locking down is a deliberate ploy to kill small businesses * the government should just let this run its course, it’s Just A Flu TM * hospitals are actually empty (the “proof” being people recording empty waiting rooms in outpatient departments on bank holiday weekends) * coron…

A colleague made the point that we need more pictures of overflowing morgues and ICUs and (like is happening in LA) people waiting in an ambulance for 7-8 hours (and some of those people dying because of it). Just like the US government banned (discouraged?) pictures of caskets coming back from war. These images need to be on the news and on news websites 24/7.

Isn't the images idea similar to what is done with cigarette packs and that certainly doesn't stop the smokers.

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#228

Post by matthewmacleod » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:28 AM UTC

cptskippy wrote: post #171

ppod wrote: post #77

People who are making claims about hospital capacity should compare them to the same times in previous years. The data is all available online: https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas...

The data you provided isn't easily compared to the data in the article. I did a pivot off the Jan 2019 data and got this... LONDON COMMISSIONING REGION Adult Critical Care Beds: Open: 1033 Occupied: 882 -------------- Total: 1915 According to the Article London has... BEST CASE Adult Critical Care Beds: Unmitigated: 1392 Mitigated: 1661 So they lost 300-600 beds capacity since 2019?

AFAIK you have misunderstood the data; the “open” figure is not the number of unoccupied beds, but the total number of beds available for patients (1033) of which 882 were occupied by patients already (meaning 151 unoccupied).

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#229

Post by fsdfgsfsdfsdfsd » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:28 AM UTC

e40 wrote: post #54

jpxw wrote: post #33

And yet we still have idiots here in the UK saying things ranging from: * coronavirus is invented as a government power grab * the government locking down is a deliberate ploy to kill small businesses * the government should just let this run its course, it’s Just A Flu TM * hospitals are actually empty (the “proof” being people recording empty waiting rooms in outpatient departments on bank holiday weekends) * coron…

A colleague made the point that we need more pictures of overflowing morgues and ICUs and (like is happening in LA) people waiting in an ambulance for 7-8 hours (and some of those people dying because of it). Just like the US government banned (discouraged?) pictures of caskets coming back from war. These images need to be on the news and on news websites 24/7.

There should be more awareness about what is going on in hospitals all year round. Media hype can make everything extreme.

And there are many theories to explain, for example NY morgues may have been overflowing because morgue owners were afraid to accept people who died from Covid.

Is there actual evidence that people died because they couldn't receive care? Even in Italy I have not seen the evidence, just YouTube videos of some alleged doctors making such claims.

Serious question. I would love to see evidence of people dying because they couldn't receive care (in the Western world).

Re: London will be overwhelmed by Covid in a fortnight says leaked NHS briefing

#230

Post by sergiotapia » Thu, Jan 07, 2021, 12:28 AM UTC

rland wrote: post #79

e40 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A colleague made the point that we need more pictures of overflowing morgues and ICUs and (like is happening in LA) people waiting in an ambulance for 7-8 hours (and some of those people dying because of it). Just like the US government banned (discouraged?) pictures of caskets coming back from war. These images need to be on the news and on news websites 24/7.

At the beginning of this pandemic, I watched a 2-3 min video of a Turin hospital (back when Italy was the epicenter in the west) of people silently choking to death in their ventilators. It was absolutely fucking eerie and insane and every time I think of doing something risky, I think about the sound in that video. Unfortunately in this context, it is illegal to film people in a hospital. I think that's a fair rule…

Qualify that the people in those videos, for example Italy, were very very obese.