Coronavirus

[Denny’s Yard]

I know a few people who have it and recovered. I see on Strava that one of them done a 30 mile bike ride today, so he is obviously feeling okay.

Seems to affect some much worse than others but obviously age and how healthy you were before are significant factors.... he says as he opens a beer and a packet of crisps!

[weekevie04]

21 hours ago, Ally Bongo said:

The Times have absolutely crucified Johnson tomorrow - he may be in trouble

And Trumpy getting tore into China regards their honesty

He won't be. 

67% of the population (UK) support the Government and for every story that makes the same rounds to the same people on Twitter it'll be matched up with the Major Tom funding story or a boat doing donuts for the NHS.

British people are basically American Europeans when it comes to Trump/Johnson and 50% or a baw hair away fae that will support him.

[Hertsscot]

17 hours ago, slasher said:

I met someone today who has been hospitalised with Covid 19. Its left some mark on him, he's lost a lot of weight and looks very gaunt. His lungs are still fucked and he's on antibiotics for another 6 to 8 weeks. He's the first person I've come across who I actually know that's had this feckin thing. 

Mate of mine in early 60s has been off work  for three weeks, lost three stone and genuinely feared he was going to die.  Neighbour up the road in his 50s had bad flu like symptoms but back on his feet after a couple of weeks, says still bit short of breath but other than that okay. Guy in his mid 80s I know from  church ended up on a ventilator and was touch and go but is back home.Just seems to affect people very differently. 

[Ally Bongo]

The actually asked the First Minister today if the money spent on the Louisa Jordan would have been better spent elsewhere .....

[Orraloon]

6 minutes ago, Ally Bongo said:

The actually asked the First Minister today if the money spent on the Louisa Jordan would have been better spent elsewhere .....

The exact same thought has went through my head a few times.

 

[Ally Bongo]

3 minutes ago, Orraloon said:

The exact same thought has went through my head a few times.

 

Can you imagine if they hadnt spent/done it ?

[scotlad]

17 hours ago, weekevie04 said:

He won't be. 

67% of the population (UK) support the Government and for every story that makes the same rounds to the same people on Twitter it'll be matched up with the Major Tom funding story or a boat doing donuts for the NHS.

British people are basically American Europeans when it comes to Trump/Johnson and 50% or a baw hair away fae that will support him.

Brits are basically the Americans of Europe.  It won't surprise me if we see folk in the UK protesting against lockdown before too long too. 

I've noticed the press suddenly seem keen on the government lifting the lockdown restrictions as soon as possible (perhaps because newspaper sales have tanked over the past month). 

[phart]

There seems to be a concerted effort to get everyone arguing with each other again, just as everyone was coming closer together as a society.

It's far more pronounced in America atm, but you see pieces in media across here that are ludicrous for example coronavirus being an example to shelf independence etc, mind boggling sophistry.

[phart]

Just now, scotlad said:

Brits are basically the Americans of Europe.  It won't surprise me if we see folk in the UK protesting against lockdown before too long too. 

I've noticed the press suddenly seem keen on the government lifting the lockdown restrictions as soon as possible (perhaps because newspaper sales have tanked over the past month). 

The press are the propganda arm for the super wealthy they're getting tanked by the lockdown so therefore we have this "free press" argument coming out "organically" from mouthpices like Kezia Dugdale or whatever her name is.

[Dave78]

12 minutes ago, Ally Bongo said:

Can you imagine if they hadnt spent/done it ?

The folk complaining are probably the same folk on twitter that complain about the SNP's budget 'underspend'

[Orraloon]

1 minute ago, Ally Bongo said:

Can you imagine if they hadnt spent/done it ?

I know it's hindsight and it probably hasn't cost that much in the overall scheme of things. But when we look back on this it will be obvious that we have got lots of the priorities wrong. It can't be easy for the folk making decisions, but it's only right that these questions are being asked. I would like to see it happening more. Who knows we might still need that hospital (hopefully not) if it all goes wrong as we come out of lockdown. Or even next winter if it comes round again.

It's been obvious for some time now that there is an extreme shortage of PPE, but, to me anyway, it doesn't look like we have done enough to resolve that problem. We should have been looking at new solutions to this problem instead of just trying to order more from existing suppliers. The time for doing that came and went and we missed our opportunity. 

It's been well known, amongst folk who are involved in the testing, right from the start, that we would struggle to do enough tests to control this epidemic. We have not done nearly enough to resolve that problem. I believe this is going to be a huge issue as we try to come out of lockdown. I think one of the main reasons we will be in lockdown longer than we need to be, is because we can't do enough testing

 

[aaid]

27 minutes ago, Ally Bongo said:

The actually asked the First Minister today if the money spent on the Louisa Jordan would have been better spent elsewhere .....

I've no problem with journalists asking questions like that particularly as the FM is more than capable of dealing with them, as she did on this occasion, it's the ones that get the snidey wee digs in at the end of their question that annoy me.  Again she's more than capable of dealing with them but it's uncalled for.

i couldn't understand what a Football journalist was doing on their though, I half expected Chris McLaughlin to ask her what she thought about Steven Gerrard's recent comments.   I doubt he got the answer he was hoping for from the question he did ask though. Essentially, no football any time soon.

[phart]

34 minutes ago, Orraloon said:

I know it's hindsight and it probably hasn't cost that much in the overall scheme of things. But when we look back on this it will be obvious that we have got lots of the priorities wrong. It can't be easy for the folk making decisions, but it's only right that these questions are being asked. I would like to see it happening more. Who knows we might still need that hospital (hopefully not) if it all goes wrong as we come out of lockdown. Or even next winter if it comes round again.

It's been obvious for some time now that there is an extreme shortage of PPE, but, to me anyway, it doesn't look like we have done enough to resolve that problem. We should have been looking at new solutions to this problem instead of just trying to order more from existing suppliers. The time for doing that came and went and we missed our opportunity. 

It's been well known, amongst folk who are involved in the testing, right from the start, that we would struggle to do enough tests to control this epidemic. We have not done nearly enough to resolve that problem. I believe this is going to be a huge issue as we try to come out of lockdown. I think one of the main reasons we will be in lockdown longer than we need to be, is because we can't do enough testing

 

It's been known before the pandemic "if you're not measuring you're not managing". The UK's (including Scotland) has been a disaster.

 

[TDYER63]

19 hours ago, weekevie04 said:

He won't be. 

67% of the population (UK) support the Government and for every story that makes the same rounds to the same people on Twitter it'll be matched up with the Major Tom funding story or a boat doing donuts for the NHS.

British people are basically American Europeans when it comes to Trump/Johnson and 50% or a baw hair away fae that will support him.

This woman writes for the Guardian so she is hardly impartial, but she isnt wrong in this. 
 

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/04/16/opinion/coronavirus-boris-johnson.amp.html

[Orraloon]

1 hour ago, phart said:

It's been known before the pandemic "if you're not measuring you're not managing". The UK's (including Scotland) has been a disaster.

 

Exactly, we've known about this problem for years. We've been reducing our ability to react to these events rather than increasing it. It seems that as each year went by without a pandemic, the people in charge got more and more complacent and seemed to think that this was reducing the probability that we would have another one, when in fact it's obvious that the opposite is the case.

In Scotland, we started out with the capability of doing about 800 tests per day. That clearly was not nearly enough to do proper test and contact tracing. It's the main reason that we didn't even make any serious attempt at doing it, once we had our first cases. We are now supposed to be up to 2000 tests per day. But that assumes everything going well. We are actually struggling to do over 1200-1400 per day. A new facility should be opening soon in Glasgow which is supposed to take us up to 3500 tests per day. But even at that rate it would take over 4 months to test 10% of the population. And lots of folk need tested more than once. Boris was tested at least twice that we know of, probably more. 

On top of that we have the problem of supply of test kits. We just can't get enough of them.

 

 

Edited April 20, 2020 by Orraloon

[macy37]

That cunt Johnson will be appearing back from the wilderness very shortly. I look forward to the shit he’ll spin.

[thplinth]

This lockdown is murder but. Even when you go out you are in virtual isolation as so little is open and social distancing etc... 

There are going to be mounting mental health costs that need to be considered versus the direct risks from this virus. And that is before you get into the colossal economic damage being done (which results in deaths just the same as a virus, i.e. indirectly). These are very hard calculations and decisions.

China, S.Korea and Japan have shook this off by acting decisively at an early stage (employing slightly different but effective strategies it seems).

Britain by being so corrupt and thus inept is likely now to be like an Italy / Spain or perhaps even worse. It was a huge false economy to delay our response (no doubt at the behest of Boris' big business buddies). Trump and Boris are similar, they thought it was nothing until it was too late. The major difference is Trump has an election gun at his head and six months to get it right so I suspect he will now move mountains to save his own arse. Boris however has unbelievably everyone feeling sorry for him, the media in his pocket and four years of a huge tory majority to fritter away at his leisure. So relatively he is off the hook at this point. And yeah the Scottish Government are no better.

[thplinth]

It is only anecdotal evidence from one major hospital in Glasgow but I was told their ICU wards are currently not bursting with it by any means. 

It makes you wonder where all the deaths are happening. Nursing and elderly care homes I am guessing. 

Edited April 20, 2020 by thplinth

[Orraloon]

7 minutes ago, thplinth said:

It is only anecdotal evidence from one a major hospital in Glasgow but I was told their ICU wards are currently not bursting with it by any means. 

It makes you wonder where all the deaths are happening. Nursing and elderly care homes I am guessing. 

I think there are currently about 170 COVID patients in ICU in Scotland. We should have over 700 ICU beds by now if things have gone to plan. Seems like lots of folk dying without going through ICU. 

Edited April 20, 2020 by Orraloon

[thplinth]

11 minutes ago, Orraloon said:

I think there are currently about 170 COVID patients in ICU in Scotland. We should have over 700 ICU beds by now if things have gone to plan. Seems like lots of folk dying without going through ICU. 

Or maybe they are being denied an ICU spot in anticipation of an ICU overload that never materialized. Maybe a significant number could have been saved but were never given that opportunity in fear of a wave that never came.

Only when this over and the 'average normal deaths' versus 'this period deaths' are compared will we see the true scale of it (or lack). Look at the death rate in Germany versus the UK. That is what a competent health care system looks like versus one that has been run into the ground quite deliberately for profit motives (IMHO).

This has just been badly managed in the UK from start to finish. Totally incoherent strategy.

Edited April 20, 2020 by thplinth

[thplinth]

This is worth a read.

https://asiatimes.com/2020/04/us-china-decoupling-a-reality-check/

The comments by the boss of Apple are especially interesting...

Here is Apple CEO Tim Cook on why Apple makes I-phones in China: “China has moved into very advanced manufacturing, so you find in China the intersection of craftsman kind of skill, and sophisticated robotics and the computer science world. That intersection, which is very rare to find anywhere, that kind of skill, is very important to our business because of the precision and quality level that we like.

“The thing that most people focus on if they’re a foreigner coming to China is the size of the market, and obviously it’s the biggest market in the world in so many areas. But for us, the number one attraction is the quality of the people… It’s not designed and sent over, that sounds like there’s no interaction. The truth is, the process engineering and process development associated with our products require innovation in and of itself. Not only the product but the way that it’s made, because we want to make things in the scale of hundreds of millions, and we want the quality level of zero defects.”

Cook added: “The products we do require really advanced tooling, and the precision that you have to have, the tooling and working with the materials that we do are state of the art. And the tooling skill is very deep here. In the US you could have a meeting of tooling engineers and I’m not sure we could fill the room. In China you could fill multiple football fields.”

The US doesn’t have the engineers to make a smartphone. In fact, we don’t have enough engineers to expand US manufacturing output by any significant margin. As of 2015, China graduated six times as many engineers as the United States, according to the National Science Foundation. That was five years ago. In the meantime China’s university system, enriched by tens of thousands of American-educated doctoral candidates, has come up to par with US universities in most STEM fields. Four out of five US doctoral candidates in electrical engineering and computer science are foreign students, and the largest cohort by far is Chinese. And most Chinese engineers go home when they get their degree, because only 5% of American college students major in engineering, and there aren’t enough faculty jobs around to hire new PhDs.

Meanwhile, Russia, China’s de facto partner in a range of high-tech industries, graduated nearly twice as many engineers as the United States in 2015. Russian engineers are first rate, as the Israelis well know; mass immigration of Russian Jews brought about 150,000 scientists and engineers to Israel, and turned the small country into a pocket superpower. Together, China and Russia have an eight-to-one advantage over the United States in engineering graduates.

Whether the United States could train up enough tooling engineers to produce I-phones onshore, and how long it would take if we could, is hard to answer. The US graduates barely over 30,000 mechanical engineers per year. If we waste our limited talent by replacing production of consumer electronics imports from China, we will lose the race for pre-eminence in the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The United States should concentrate on forcing breakthroughs in frontier technologies that China does not yet dominate, rather than chasing after China’s production of existing products.

We are so fucked. 

[Toepoke]

23 minutes ago, thplinth said:

Only when this over and the 'average normal deaths' versus 'this period deaths' are compared will we see the true scale of it (or lack).

Graph I saw showed current deaths in Scotland at about double the seasonal norm...

[hampden_loon2878]

Anyone seen the oil price in the last half hour, holy shit

 

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/business-52350082

Edited April 20, 2020 by hampden_loon2878

[thplinth]

12 minutes ago, hampden_loon2878 said:

Anyone seen the oil price in the last half hour, holy shit 🙈

Fuck things are really going to go mental now. This is really, really bad. lol. (what can you do! this is insanity stuff, negative interest rates, negative price for a barrel of oil.) It is like we are approaching a singularity type event of false machinations.  At this point I think this whole shit storm has been totally orchestrated. I think we are maybe seeing the Sampson Option being enacted.

Edited April 20, 2020 by thplinth

[Dave78]

28 minutes ago, thplinth said:

 

We are so fucked. 

There's a brilliant documentary called 'American Factory' on Netflix. It follows the takeover of an American car windshield factory by Chinese owners, over a period of about 10 years. You should have a look.

That was my thoughts after watching it. Can't even begin to compete with the Chinese.