[petejh]

On comparative mortality figures we don't know how many infected with flu are not counted either. A link upthread from the WHO expert, if you read between the lines, indicates massive under-reporting on flu infection..

Well yes exactly - the takeaways of that being:
Under-reporting of relatively non-deadly viruses isn't unique to covid-19.
Both flu and covid-19 have lower global mortality rates than the figure obtained by deaths/reported cases, rates increasing with age.

....in any case you can only count deaths against reported cases.

As explained just now by the Chief Medical Officer:

Deaths divided by reported cases does not give you the 'mortality rate' of a virus it give you 'deaths per reported cases'.

'Mortality rate' is obtained by deaths divided by total number of cases, which can be estimated by modelling.

Covid-19 mortality rate is currently estimated at 1% of total cases reported/unreported/asymptomatic.

[Offwidth]

Flu mortality rate is estimated at 0.1%

WHO know more than you do Pete. The lower figure of 0.7% is in China outside the early area affected with no expense spared on access to respirators and oxygen and state compulsion on treatment.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/24/who-says-coronavirus-outbreak-in-china-has-peaked-new-cases-in-iran-and-italy-are-deeply-concerning.html

[spidermonkey09]

Offwidth, what do you actually want to happen? At the moment your posts just read like you typing away frantically in an ever increasing panic. I have reservations about how much any government can do in these situations.

[tomtom]

Re China. The podcast that OMM linked to a couple of pages back featuring a discussion with a virologist (N American) - states that the Chinese had been excellent at giving out info. The virus was sequenced incredibly fast and the results posted on line. All the research and findings about how it behaves and is transferred in China had been freely posted... he seemed to think it couldn’t have been done much better.

It’s easy to put the Chinese response in conspiracy theory territory because they are an authoritarian regime etc..

[petejh]

Offwidth what on earth are you talking about - I've just posted exactly what the chief medical officer has said publicly in the televised select committee Q&A, where he said the global mortality rate for covid-19 is estimated at 1%. He broke that down into different populations for age, various different underlying conditions, even down to pointing out the risk for smokers versus non-smokers. Is that not valid enough information for you?
He also answered many other questions, many of which hit on similar points made in your long post copy/pasting the WHO doc. I really don't see what you're getting at.

[dunnyg]

Being a large authoritarian regime does seem like it can be extremely useful in situations like this, having a huge pool of resources you have direct control over is a useful asset, combined with a population who are used to doing what they are told.

[Oldmanmatt]

Being a large authoritarian regime does seem like it can be extremely useful in situations like this, having a huge pool of resources you have direct control over is a useful asset, combined with a population who are used to doing what they are told.

A dictatorship can build an empire in the time is takes a democracy to decide who’s keeping the minutes of their first session.

[duncan]

Being a large authoritarian regime does seem like it can be extremely useful in situations like this, having a huge pool of resources you have direct control over is a useful asset, combined with a population who are used to doing what they are told.

This is the 'At least Mussolini made the trains run on time' argument. Which is untrue: any (debatable) short-term improvements in the early part of the Fascist era were largely due to work done by the post WW1 democracy. And in the longer term, the Italian railways were not running so well by 1945.

The counter-argument in this case is that the virus would not have had a chance to propagate so widely in it's early stages had the regime been more open to reporting bad news. Not that silencing whistle-blowers is unique to authoritarian regimes of course.

Compliance by the Chinese population has at least as much to do with Confucian notions of putting collective before individual welfare as they do authoritarian rulers. The latter are pushing at an open door.

[jwi]

Free flow of information is worth a hundred quarantines*. China did however do a lot of things right, even if they did the one thing they always do wrong wrong.

*so 140 days then?
Sorry

[duncan]

In other news, my work confirmed it's first case yesterday. We've been directed to Keep Calm and Carry On (I paraphrase).

[dunnyg]

I suppose one of the advantages of being in the writing up stage is I just sit alone at my desk all day and have limited interaction with students/staff.

I recon if/when cases get reported at my uni, the remote working capabilities are going to get hammered...

[tomtom]

Being a large authoritarian regime does seem like it can be extremely useful in situations like this, having a huge pool of resources you have direct control over is a useful asset, combined with a population who are used to doing what they are told.

As per our NHS. Will be interesting to see how response in UK/Europe with (generally) state healthcare fares against the more distributed system(1) in the US.

(1) define as you like - you know what I mean, its really quite different...

[teestub]

As per our NHS. Will be interesting to see how response in UK/Europe with (generally) state healthcare fares against the more distributed system(1) in the US.

As per most things with the NHS I assume it will be a total postcode lottery!

[Offwidth]

Offwidth what on earth are you talking about - I've just posted exactly what the chief medical officer has said publicly in the televised select committee Q&A, where he said the global mortality rate for covid-19 is estimated at 1%. He broke that down into different populations for age, various different underlying conditions, even down to pointing out the risk for smokers versus non-smokers. Is that not valid enough information for you?
He also answered many other questions, many of which hit on similar points made in your long post copy/pasting the WHO doc. I really don't see what you're getting at.

My main point is the mortality rate will almost certainly be 3% or higher when resources are not fully available for the 5% who needed respirators to survive and the 15% who needed weeks on oxygen. WHO urged caution only this week on the 1% figure and said 3% was more likely on average (as it was in China in the initial outbreak).

Your point on people being well enough informed is ridiculous. For starters looking at Twitter it's obvious too many people refuse to learn anything sensible.  I've been watching this closely and learnt a lot from the WHO reports on China . Our government are still peddling the myth that critical cases are only the 5%.... those are the people who will need specialised intensive care to survive, many outside that group will die if the hospital system buckles under the strain and they can't get oxygen. The chief medical officer almost certainly knows the 1% in the UK only applies as long as the outbreak is largely contained and doesn't overwhelm the NHS intensive care capabilities. On the BBC news an unnamed intensive care consultant said Boris's claims on expanding intensive care by 5000 beds were ridiculous.

As I said above it won't take long to see where this is heading and I really hope I'm wrong.

[Offwidth]

Offwidth, what do you actually want to happen? At the moment your posts just read like you typing away frantically in an ever increasing panic. I have reservations about how much any government can do in these situations.

[Offwidth]

Offwidth, what do you actually want to happen? At the moment your posts just read like you typing away frantically in an ever increasing panic. I have reservations about how much any government can do in these situations.

I want honest public health information and advice, to a standard like we have seen in Singapore. I'd like Boris and Matt to be put right by medical experts when they claims by far the majority of people who catch it will have little or moderate symptoms when 15% so far have had serious problems and another 5% require intensive care; and when rabbits they claim to have in hats are largely fictional (we can have fast doubling in intensive care beds, mass recruitment of most retired medical staff is likely etc). I'd like people to be honestly told to be calm as possible but also vigilant as early diagnosis and contact tracking is the best way we keep this from being bigger than it needs to be. It seems to me too few are willing to stand up to this government blustering when we are moving out of (it's almost ubiquirous use in current tory) politics and into life threatening circumstances. I'd like the government and the DHSC to behave as well as experts would want them to

[eastside]

Offwidth, what do you actually want to happen? At the moment your posts just read like you typing away frantically in an ever increasing panic. I have reservations about how much any government can do in these situations.

I want honest public health information and advice, to a standard like we have seen in Singapore. I'd like Boris and Matt to be put right by medical experts when they claims by far the majority of people who catch it will have little or moderate symptoms when 15% so far have had serious problems and another 5% require intensive care; and when rabbits they claim to have in hats are largely fictional (we can have fast doubling in intensive care beds, mass recruitment of most retired medical staff is likely etc). I'd like people to be honestly told to be calm as possible but also vigilant as early diagnosis and contact tracking is the best way we keep this from being bigger than it needs to be. It seems to me too few are willing to stand up to this government blustering when we are moving out of (it's almost ubiquirous use in current tory) politics and into life threatening circumstances. I'd like the government and the DHSC to behave as well as experts would want them to

I'm in full agreement that we are in for major problems. Who exactly is going to be running the ICU after all the doctors and nurses have been quarantined because they have all contracted the virus from patients? In California they quarantined over one hundred healthcare workers just for having been exposed, how's that going to work when there are thousands or millions of infected?

[36chambers]

I suppose one of the advantages of being in the writing up stage is I just sit alone at my desk all day and have limited interaction with students/staff.

I recon if/when cases get reported at my uni, the remote working capabilities are going to get hammered...

I (and two offices worth of employees) had to work from home today, so the company could test work continuity should it all kick off.

[tomtom]

I suppose one of the advantages of being in the writing up stage is I just sit alone at my desk all day and have limited interaction with students/staff.

I recon if/when cases get reported at my uni, the remote working capabilities are going to get hammered...

I (and two offices worth of employees) had to work from home today, so the company could test work continuity should it all kick off.

Some record solitaire scores went down today then...

[yetix]

Today I was notified I will be working from home until the situation changes.

[galpinos]

Today I was notified I will be working from home until the situation changes.

Don't break yourself on the fingerboard......

[yetix]

Today I was notified I will be working from home until the situation changes.

Don't break yourself on the fingerboard......

When all the walls close because of this and given the current weather woes I may only be able to do that!

[SA Chris]

When it happens to me, I might just finish building the woody in the garage. Maybe. Or just walk down to the boulders.

[tomtom]

Bear with me... but if we assume a state of general societal paralysis - where meeting in public places, gatherings, eating out, going to the pub etc.. become something that is discouraged/very much avoided, where does this leave climbing? Random thoughts from me...

1. A climbing wall is (sometimes) busy public space - that involves multiple people touching the same plastic blobs - I'd have thought to be avoided.
2. At the other end of the spectrum - getting in a car and driving to a remote moorland scrittle fest - where no-one has been for months, is probably very safe - and I'd have thought within the realms of self isolation.
3. What about the middle ground... what about popular crags/spots..?
4. CV19 can be transmitted by fomite contact - so how long will it hang about on a lump of rancid limestone (I'm looking at you the Tor...)? Will chalk have a detrimental effect on this? or not?
5. Does this mean I can't hug Shark next time I see him?

Just thinking out loud...

[dunnyg]

1) Climb in full hazmat suit. Possibly useful training for walking up everest? Fighting through crowds with bulky clothing, limited vision and an air supply, to get to your climb....
2) esoterica will become popular (all spots on unknown stones will erode away completely by the end of this year)
3) Stanage will be overgrown
4) The tor will be the last harbor of CV19 in the year 2092. Shark will be a figure of myth and legend who guards the disease ridden grounds. It will be said, upon his passing, the world will be free of the virus. However everyone will be too scared to check incase they see him in his undies.
5) If you are going to climb at the tor anyway, you might aswell