covid-19

[RandBlade]

I completely disagree. Either we remain under lockdown restrictions forever, which is farcical and unliveable, or we learn to live with the virus in which case the virus needs to burn itself out, or learnt to be lived with.

The vaccine rollout is done effectively, the very few hospitalisations that are occuring are almost entirely concentrated within the tiny minority who have refused the vaccine. What are we supposed to do - keep restrictions in place forever to protect antivaxxers?

We're pretty close to herd immunity and the virus is just filling in the gaps where people haven't taken the vaccine, or aren't eligible for it (children). After that it will be over and burnt out as the virus smashes into a wall of vaccine-created herd immunity once it runs out of others to infect.

With respect the flaw in your logic is that there isn't an infinite pool of people for the virus to infect, so no it won't eventually eliminate the effectiveness since the virus will be burnt out before that happens.

If the virus isn't causing deaths or hospitalisations eventually we need to stop testing and panicking over this and just live with it like we do the flu and if it spreads, it spreads.

******

Another way of looking at it is that if a novel virus had arrived in normal circumstances with our post-vaccine infectiousness, hospitalisations and deaths as the default unvaccinated rate would we have ever locked down in the first place? No, we wouldn't. It would have just been considered like the flu and not been this pandemic. Actually fewer people are dying from this than the flu, post-vaccination this disease is less deadly than the flu. If the link between cases and hospitalisations/deaths has been broken then its time to stop worrying about cases.

[LittleFuzzy]

I completely disagree. Either we remain under lockdown restrictions forever, which is farcical and unliveable, or we learn to live with the virus in which case the virus needs to burn itself out, or learnt to be lived with.

The vaccine rollout is done effectively, the very few hospitalisations that are occuring are almost entirely concentrated within the tiny minority who have refused the vaccine. What are we supposed to do - keep restrictions in place forever to protect antivaxxers?

We're pretty close to herd immunity

That's not what those recent infection numbers indicate. Am I saying you should be in lockdown forever? No. But you're not exactly in a real lockdown now anyway, are you? You've got a few restrictions still. Should they continue? Maybe, maybe not. If they should continue, it ought to be until you DO actually reach a herd-immunity status, or until the pandemic is brought under control elsewhere (looks at India). What is clearly and certainly NOT the case is your constant trumpeting that you have the virus licked and everything is absolutely normal and ok. Because if that were actually the case, you would not be seeing the infection spike your own sources reference.

[RandBlade]

That's not what those recent infection numbers indicate. Am I saying you should be in lockdown forever? No. But you're not exactly in a real lockdown now anyway, are you? You've got a few restrictions still. Should they continue? Maybe, maybe not. If they should continue, it ought to be until you DO actually reach a herd-immunity status, or until the pandemic is brought under control elsewhere (looks at India). What is clearly and certainly NOT the case is your constant trumpeting that you have the virus licked and everything is absolutely normal and ok. Because if that were actually the case, you would not be seeing the infection spike your own sources reference.

Not at all. There is no spike in hospitalisations or deaths which is all that matters. If the virus post-vaccine is reduced to essentially a common cold it doesn't matter how much the infection "spikes". And the data shows that ~90% of all adults in the UK now have antibodies against Covid either from vaccines or Covid so absolutely it is close to herd immunity and just filling in the gaps now.

Its irritating that the earth was salted by idiots like Trump and Toby Young etc saying absolute claptrap last year which is true now. Last year for both spikes if we didn't do the tests then the cases could be seen in deaths and hospitalisations anyway (see the first wave) so the suggestion that there'd be fewer cases if we did fewer tests was bloody stupid then. But its true now, we're doing a million tests per day and we're finding a few cases in that which aren't overloading the NHS or seeing people die. So frigging what?

Its worth noting that the UK has for some reason ramped up testing to the n-th degree while other countries are ceasing to do them. The UK's testing rate is an order of magnitude more than other nations and going up while the testing rate in other nations is a fraction in comparison and going down.

The UK is conducting more than twice as many tests per case found than the USA is, but because we're doing over 11x the tests per capita than the USA is, the UK is finding more cases. Does that mean the virus is more prevalent in the UK, or not? We don't know, but nor does it matter. In the USA there's probably plenty of cases spreading too - but since tests aren't happening, deaths aren't happening and hospitalisations aren't happening then its not being detected.

In the only ways that matters which is excess deaths and the risk of the NHS being overwhelmed the virus is completely licked and the only thing that is not normal is the restrictions on civil liberties; that is clear from the data.

[Ziggy Stardust]

People don't only die from Covid, they also get various long term health issues. Those also should be in consideration.

[Aimless]

People don't only die from Covid, they also get various long term health issues. Those also should be in consideration.

The government has the option of pursuing a very simple and effective strategy for dealing with PASC/long covid: not diagnose, not support, deny disability and rehab.

[RandBlade]

People don't only die from Covid, they also get various long term health issues. Those also should be in consideration.

Yes people don't only die from Covid, they die from a myriad of diseases. Covid has for months provided <1% of all deaths in this country.

If people have a health issue, the NHS is there to serve them. We are not here to serve the NHS.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Yes people don't only die from Covid, they die from a myriad of diseases. Covid has for months provided <1% of all deaths in this country.

If people have a health issue, the NHS is there to serve them. We are not here to serve the NHS.

What?

I was reacting to "In the only ways that matters which is excess deaths and the risk of the NHS being overwhelmed".

I disagree, and opt long term effects also should be in consideration.

[Ominous Gamer]

There is no spike in hospitalisations or deaths which is all that matters.

This is perhaps the dumbest take on public health this board has seen yet.

[Aimless]

This is perhaps the dumbest take on public health this board has seen yet.

why do you have to jinx it like that

[RandBlade]

This is perhaps the dumbest take on public health this board has seen yet.

Why? Give a reason please.

Coronaviruses have long existed, they cause the common cold. Indeed there's reason to believe that current common cold strains began life causing pandemics like Covid19 before immunity meant that it was no longer an issue - Covid19 f***ed us last year since we had no immunity but now with vaccines we do.

If vaccines mean that this coronavirus joins the rest of the coronaviruses in background circulation basically causing common cold effects because it isn't causing hospitalisations and death then we should treat it like we treat the cold. If it spreads it spreads, who cares?

We don't lockdown the country for the flu or any other virus. If Covid19 is no longer causing deaths and hospitalisations, we should treat it exactly the same.

Plus if its going to spread amongst the unvaccinated then best for it to spread now in the summer when we don't have the NHS dealing with winter flu season.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/12/h...ty-future.html
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6530/741

[LittleFuzzy]

Not at all. There is no spike in hospitalisations or deaths which is all that matters.

Your hospitalisations are spiking. Not as sharply but they've more than doubled and are still increasing.

[RandBlade]

Your hospitalisations are spiking. Not as sharply but they've more than doubled and are still increasing.

A very slow gradual increase from an incredibly low base is not what I'd define as a spike. Last time case numbers reached what they are now, following a similar path, the in-hospital figure was 12k - this time around it is 10% of that now and the evidence seems to be that the vast majority of those are people who refused their vaccine, which everyone is now eligible for. That about 10% have refused the vaccine and hospitalisations are about 10% seems an interesting coincidence - or not.

So what are we supposed to do? Lockdown the country to prevent some antivaxxers from getting infected? No, fuck them, they've made their choice, we've been locked down long enough. Lockdown went against all principles of civil liberties but it only ever made sense to take away fundamental human rights to prevent a collapse of the healthcare system (that's been achieved). There's no risk of the collapse of healthcare now, so if a few people get sick now then so be it, if a few people die so be it. People get sick and die every single day, it isn't the end of the world.

Some people seem to have lost all perspective. People need to realise they'll get their antibodies one way or another, you can get it the easy way with a needle, or the hard way naturally. But we're not going to lock the nation down to prevent something that's more like the cold for those who've had their vaccinations now from spreading.

PS if you're going to stay locked down to prevent antivaxxers from getting infected then how or when does this dystopian nightmare ever end? Staying locked down to develop and rollout vaccines is bad enough, but to do so post vaccines? What are we waiting for exactly before we say this thing is over and now its endemic rather than pandemic?