Where Are People Catching Covid-19 From?

[AuntPollyGrey]

The UK has now been in lockdown nearly five weeks, longer than it takes an individual to catch CV-19 and show signs, therefore the hundreds of new cases admitted yesterday into hospital and the 813 people who died in hospital yesterday must have caught the virus after the lockdown -or did they? Where are people catching the virus? In supermarkets? From delivered shopping? Post? Why is the Government not researching where people are catching the virus from now we are in lockdown.?

[Spicerack]

Yes, most people leave NY out of any stats as it's such a standout.
Didn't help when the Dem Mayor and the Dem Chief Medical Officer told people it was nothing to worry about in February.

[Spicerack]

[woofgang]

so not evidence as in published research but some guy on Youtube?

[Spicerack]

A guy on You-tube reading statistics. Here's one comparing the lockdown/non-lockdown States.
How many people on here would want to plough through 'research papers', Dr Woof? I was asked where I'd seen it and I've answered that.

[jim360]

A clearer example of correlation not implying causation you couldn't find. Lockdowns will have been implemented after the disease was running out of control. No, I don't see that this provides evidence that lockdowns are harmful -- in the context of limiting CoronaVirus, at least.

On the other hand, it may be that right now, in plenty of states, full lockdowns might appear to be premature, but that is a different question.

[Spicerack]

Well I did say I didn't know why and it could be for other reasons than lockdown. Just food for thought.

[jim360]

It's very difficult to take seriously a video that starts off by calling the foremost US Expert on epidemiology a fraud. Fauci may be wrong but given that he's been trusted from across the political spectrum, a fraud he is not.

[woofgang]

spicerack,"food for thought is research evidence" not some guy on youtube

[jim360]

The single biggest flaw in the doctor's analysis is his consistent use of "they did, they had". The past tense is simply not appropriate here. We're still in the middle of an outbreak. The same with the comparison to the flu. If 60,000 people maximum in a year die of flu in the US and we're already at 50,000 from Covid in a month, it's not difficult to see which is medically speaking worse. We are not at the end of the outbreak. You can't compare to a flu season until the Covid outbreak is over. It's likely to end up twice as worse in terms of fatality.

I also question his extrapolations, since the probability that someone has Covid-19 without being tested is difficult to assess. It's not clear that you can assume it's identical to the probability that someone who was tested has Covid-19, and that makes his extrapolations simply unreasonable.

The point about other consequences, secondary effects etc, is perfectly valid, though, and I have no criticism about that. It's vital to keep assessing those questions.

[jim360]

Oh, and, finally, if you want your food for thought to be taken seriously, then maybe don't insult, don't call people who have criticisms hard of thinking, and don't be so rude.

[Spicerack]

I've never ever seen a research paper on this site. Bore off.

[jim360]

You've never ever looked, then. I've linked to research papers regularly.

[JimF]

The sun's been out all afternoon and, for the first time since all this started, the street has been full of children playing, dozens of them, from different families. No social distancing, no face masks.

You have your answer.

[Buenchico]

To address the original question, as posed by APG, the policy of 'social distancing' was never expected to prevent the spread of Covid-19 entirely. The modelling used by Imperial College London (which is what Government scientists have been working from) was based upon the assumption that it would simply cut the rate of transmission by 75%.

The ICL model predicted that, at the very best, the total number of deaths in the UK might be kept to under 20,000 through using social distancing (and other lockdown measures). While that rather optimistic figure has now been passed, it's still far better than the ICL's predction of at least half a million deaths in the UK if the current measures hadn't been adopted.

So it was known from the very start that there would be a lot more cases of infection from people going to work or going shopping (even where social distancing is properly maintained).

[brainiac]

The lockdown is evaporating by the day, if not the hour. Colder, rainy weather is on the way, so maybe that'll clear the streets.

[Spicerack]

You insult people all the time.
If other people don't take stuff I post seriously, I don't care much. I can't force them.
It's not something that you get to decide though.

[jim360]

It's also notable that he doesn't talk about the R0. I think most people are in agreement now that the overall fatality rate is somewhere in the range of 0.1-0.5% (notice how the doctor in the video seems incapable of saying "per cent" most of the time), but Covid-19 spreads far more rapidly than flu does. 0.1% of the population is still a lot, especially from a new disease that is providing a clear sign of excess deaths over the population.

Final criticism -- I simply don't understand how he can dismiss the clear difference between the outcomes and scale of disease in Norway and Sweden. There's an order of magnitude difference in deaths between the two, an order of magnitude difference in death rate as a percentage of population, twice as many cases in Sweden as in Norway, and the spread of the disease in Norway has significantly reduced. Sweden's remains on an upwards trajectory. All of this entirely undermines his case, and yet bizarrely he implies that it's "insignificant".

Were early projections overly pessimistic? Very possibly. By definition, since we've taken action in various forms, it will be hard or impossible to tell for certain. What *is* certain is that 200,000 people are recorded to have died, this is already an underestimate, and the progression of Covid-19 is continuing so that the "final" death toll will be higher anyway.

Healthy scepticism is important, but there was a reason for the pessimism, and it was right that we took the threat seriously.

[woofgang]

I'd be fascinated to know how you bought the kit as you have to apply to get it.