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

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

#281

Post by d4mi3n »

dj_mc_merlin wrote: post #217
patrec wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking only for myself, I think your opinion is idiotic based on some simple back of the envelope math I did many months ago (when the UK announced its herd immunity plan), relating to hospital capacity, likely peak case numbers, proportion of cases that would need hospital treatment or die and some simple minded guesses about knock-on effects for the rest of the health system. I have not bothered to redo these cal…

> So let me ask: on what basis did you arrive at your opinion? I will answer this, although more than likely my comment will get killed soon: I believe that the high-risk people (elderly, immuno-compromised, people with diseases that put them at risk) should go into voluntary quarantine if they wish, together with a government package to support them. Anyone who wishes to undergo lockdown can also do so, although wit…

What do you do about folks who don’t have the luxury to choose to isolate? The majority of US citizens don’t have the funds to stop working for more than a week or so.

What about all the nurses who die in the line of duty treating all these new infections? Should they be allowed to opt-out of infection risk?

I understand the desire to keep things going, but so long as there is community spread the lockdown can never end, and the virus would never go away.

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

#282

Post by dj_mc_merlin »

patrec wrote: post #268
dj_mc_merlin wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So let me ask: on what basis did you arrive at your opinion? I will answer this, although more than likely my comment will get killed soon: I believe that the high-risk people (elderly, immuno-compromised, people with diseases that put them at risk) should go into voluntary quarantine if they wish, together with a government package to support them. Anyone who wishes to undergo lockdown can also do so, although wit…

> That said, it would mean the lowest amount of economic stress (which kills silently) for the following years What makes you think so? Did you look at the life-expectancy impact of severe economic downturns and compare them to likely excess fatality figures due to your proposed policy? I suspect not, because last I looked for it I didn't seem to find much evidence for silently killing economic stress. > This will no…

> What makes you think so? Did you look at the life-expectancy impact of severe economic downturns and compare them to likely excess fatality figures due to your proposed policy? I suspect not, because last I looked it didn't seem to find much evidence for silently killing economic stress.

Not the point I was making. I do not know which option will lead to less death, neither do you, neither do really the scientists (although they have a better idea). However, a full lockdown will lead to more economic loss at least in the short term than a voluntary lockdown. Long-term, as I said, I don't think any of us can say.

> you might still find that just the "legitimate" cases are enough to really mess up urgent health care for a lot of other people.

Like is currently happening? Yes, my solution wouldn't stop all bad effects. There will be much death regardless, the hope is that the people who are left to die as they chose no protection will "help out" with the number of ICU beds needed in general.

> how would you even check ?

You are in lockdown until you fill in some sort of form with the government, waiving your rights to hospital care in the case of catching Corona. This list is used to make decisions. This part at least is implementable.

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

#283

Post by cptskippy »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #228
cptskippy wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

I disagree. The word open is superfluous if that's the case. What's the meaning of the word open if not unoccupied or available?

Of course that begs the question, why did they use open instead of unoccupied?

If open is meant to mean bed that can be utilized, then we don't have a true number of beds or a reason why a bed would be closed.

Either way it's confusing but generally the term open as the opposite of occupied for filled. For example, open positions in a company aren't employees, they're vacancies.

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

#284

Post by asadhaider »

olivermarks wrote: post #233

What happened to the Nightingale hospital? Can it be re erected? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/04/london-nhs-nig...

I believe it's back on standby as is the one in my city, Nightingale Hospital North West, in Manchester. The issue is staff though, there simply isn't enough qualified staff to work it alongside their hospitals.

I've been working as a volunteer nursing assistant in hospital A&E departments through St John Ambulance it's honestly just insane. I don't know what the plan is for Nightingale but we're focusing on getting mass vaccination centres setup currently and delivering the vaccines.

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

#285

Post by intended »

nitrogen wrote: post #199
dandellion wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point I'm not sure they're capable of feeling embarrassed or stupid. They get all riled up and start acting out, but it doesn't look like insulting and embarrassing them is working...

Surprise surprise, amplifying division just further amplifies division. We're hearing this: A: "I'm dying inside because of lockdown. I can't work and I'm this close to the end of my rope." Should the response be this? B: "People are dying outside because of COVID. I don't care about your pain. You are an idiot." A: [storms capitol] Or this? B: "This sucks all around for sure. Your pain is real, and I feel it too. Th…

While valid, this argument can only apply in a different information reality than our current world.

The pace of interaction and information has simply overwhelmed the ability of human one on one interaction. Most of our actions are with a mobile phone near us, meaning that the social sphere is directly with us and only a twitter/FB/Reddit/HN glance away.

Doesn't even help that the sites are designed to be competitively addictive on top of it.

IF that is the case - no matter how much you listen to someone, a few seconds after they return to their phone they are part of the new outrage cycle.

Do note that the whole thing above is doable with cable television as well. IF your uncle goes back home to listen to X TV channel day in and day out, your one on one interaction is going to only have a tiny impact.

The saddest part of what tech has created is a faster pace of communication that is orienting itself inimically to slower one on one human interaction.

Even this para above is built with the idea that parts of it will be broken off by people who read it and then reused later on. It's not a conversation with just the person I am responding to, but to everyone else reading it.

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

#286

Post by tomatocracy »

anthilemoon wrote: post #265
lhnz wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live in North London, there was a testing centre for people that were not showing any symptoms. Before Christmas (and after the Tier 4 restrictions were introduced) there was a huge queue of people without symptoms that were very interested in finding out whether they had Coronavirus. I found it quite strange, since if you were staying at home and had zero symptoms, why would they need a test? However, somebo…

I live in London but I went back to Paris where I'm from for Christmas. Here in Paris it was the norm: everyone got tested before driving to their families for Christmas. The days before Christmas there were white tents every couple of blocks where you could get tested without an appointment. You're probably right that's what lots of people in London did as well.

Yes. Some employers here (London) also offered testing on-site for this exact purpose.

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

#287

Post by jtbayly »

titzer wrote: post #137
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?

You're allowed to think any way you want. And you're even allowed to explain that you do think that and why. But most people will probably think that's plainly a bad plan and point out that lots of people will die because of it, so be prepared to feel embarrassed often.

Kind of like letting people drive cars, right?

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

#288

Post by jlokier »

polote wrote: post #151
patrec wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking only for myself, I think your opinion is idiotic based on some simple back of the envelope math I did many months ago (when the UK announced its herd immunity plan), relating to hospital capacity, likely peak case numbers, proportion of cases that would need hospital treatment or die and some simple minded guesses about knock-on effects for the rest of the health system. I have not bothered to redo these cal…

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

I suppose you are free to decide that 1.32 million people in the UK should die an avoidable death, so that others have an easier life for a few months. Yes it's a value judgement. But it's a particularly awful value to hold:

- Advocating for the death of a million people when it's avoidable is abhorrent

- It would be more than that, due to the collapse of health services, causing people who would currently survive to die instead

- It would be more again due to the increased likelihood of viral mutations when left to run rampant

- Also due to the collapse of health services, most deaths would be outside hospitals, i.e. at home, slowly suffocating to death

- Some would survive with brain damage due to lack of oxygen at home

- While dying, people at home would know if they could get a hospital place they'd probably survive, and avoid brain damage, but they can't get one

- It wouldn't even boost the economy, because a million deaths is actually quite a drag on the economy, especially when most of them are dying at home with their families staying at home to look after them due to collapse of the health services

- It would be horrendously traumatic; a lot of people would struggle to work afterwards after watching their family members, friends, neighbours and people they know die at home slowly from an avoidable cause

- It would cause tremendous social division, as many of the traumatised people having watched their family members (& friends, etc) die, avoidably, would know it was caused by the actions of their own neighbours & local community, along with national decision-making to "sacrifice" those million

- That's just deaths; survivors with long Covid would also be a large drag on the economy, struggling or unable to work, requiring support, and potentially expensive for the healthcare services and their familiies in later life if it's long-term organ damage as some fear. The numbers with long Covid would exceed the current number of official unemployed

- Advocating for serious life-long disability for another several million people when it's avoidable is abhorrent too

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

#289

Post by malandrew »

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…

> 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.

If you ask people to cite statistics for their claims, you should also do so for your claims such as this one.

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

#290

Post by asadhaider »

mhh__ wrote: post #238
simonbarker87 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the status of nightingale? In use or not?

I still think they were really intended to be overflow morgues rather than proper hospitals, or at least solely palliative. You can't build a hospital like that in a week, and there are no staff.

They are unfit for use as hospitals and you're right, there's no staff, hospitals around the country alone are struggling. There's no adequate places to even wash your hands due to toilets located sparsely in unsuitable places.

I've worked in Nightingale (London) and am on standby for Nightingale North West if needed. Luckily I didn't have to deal with any patients there and I hope we don't again.

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