Coronavirus

[aaid]

1 hour ago, biffer said:

 

And yes, I know you'll come back with some petty minded shite about ooooohhhh but they control income tax but that isn't sufficient to address something of this magnitude.

He won't come back with anything, believe me.

Not until there's some other metaphorical hand grenade to toss in before scuttling off again.

[Orraloon]

16 minutes ago, Farcity said:

Murdo won't be back on for a few weeks. 

Even Alan has won more elections than Murdo.

 

[biffer]

1 hour ago, phart said:

Even that can be skewed since 2017 was a statistical outlier for the flu due to a particulary ineffective vaccine. Which i think you might have mentioned earlier anyway.

Yeah, although that website's monitoring is one of the reasons we know that. 

[scotlad]

21 hours ago, TDYER63 said:

Cant offer anything more than what the others have posted. I personally think excess deaths are the most reliable number to go on at the moment, thats not to say that wont change of course. 
I also think the way she, and Jason Leitch,  conduct themselves at the briefings gives people confidence and trust in the Scottish Government. People are therefore more likely to adhere to the message they are projecting and thereby reducing deaths.

All that said, the huge number of excess deaths in the  UK is nothing either NS or BJ can be proud of. It is shocking. 

It absolutely is.  Look at somewhere like Slovakia - a small, landlocked eastern European state, formerly part of an Eastern Bloc country, now bordered by five other countries (I think), and with an almost identical number of people living in it as Scotland - it has had 28 deaths from Covid-19 so far.  We've had more than 2,000.

[biffer]

19 minutes ago, scotlad said:

It absolutely is.  Look at somewhere like Slovakia - a small, landlocked eastern European state, formerly part of an Eastern Bloc country, now bordered by five other countries (I think), and with an almost identical number of people living in it as Scotland - it has had 28 deaths from Covid-19 so far.  We've had more than 2,000.

Or look at Denmark, where initial numbers were very similar, but they locked down earlier. Less than 600 deaths.

[aaid]

18 minutes ago, scotlad said:

It absolutely is.  Look at somewhere like Slovakia - a small, landlocked eastern European state, formerly part of an Eastern Bloc country, now bordered by five other countries (I think), and with an almost identical number of people living in it as Scotland - it has had 28 deaths from Covid-19 so far.  We've had more than 2,000.

This is interesting on Slovakia.   

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/05/06/slovakia-coronavirus-pandemic-public-trust-media/

The main differences I see between the actions taken in Scotland and Slovakia are that they went into lockdown earlier - 10 days after the first reported case, whereas in Scotland it was just over three weeks - although there had been restrictions on things like pubs, sporting events and the like for a few days before that.   You'd really need to do the maths as to whether those additional 10-14 days were enough to see the explain the exponential growth in infections that would flow through to deaths though.

They also instituted a quarantine system for people coming into to Slovakia, which didn't happen in Scotland.  I suspect that in order to know the impacts of that you need to know how many people that impacted, ie. how many people travelled and who many of those were infected when they came in.  Given that - post lockdown - there's been very little travel, most of these would have been people returning.   Also, while clearly there was no formal process in place - and it certainly wasn't enforced, I'm pretty sure that the guidance was that people returning from abroad should be self-isolating.  I need to double check that, I know of some people in that situation who did exactly that but I'm not sure whether that's something they did off their own backs.

The other major difference seems to be facemasks - if this does come down to face masks then some very senior scientists will have some big questions to answer.

Also interesting what they say about the approach of the media in constantly reinforcing and not undermining the public health message and also the adherence in the public.

 

[kumnio]

Could Scotland have locked down, stopped flights etc, before the UK did? Genuine question.  

We couldn’t furlough, so we had little control over the economic aspect.

I said pages ago we fucked things up, but I’d primarily blame the UK for this, I don’t think I’m being partisan, but that’s obviously open for interpretation. 

Edited June 1, 2020 by kumnio

[aaid]

7 minutes ago, kumnio said:

Could Scotland have locked down, stopped flights etc, before the UK did? Genuine question.  

We couldn’t furlough, so we had little control over the economic aspect.

I said pages ago we fucked things up, but I’d primarily blame the UK for this, I don’t think I’m being partisan, but that’s obviously open for interpretation. 

FWIW, I haven't seen anything to suggest that there's was a massive difference between what the four nations were saying before lockdown was implemented.   I did pick up on the Scottish government - or at least Nicola Sturgeon - starting to get a bit frustrated with the UKG not moving far enough and quickly enough but that was only in the day or two before everything started to be announced.   My reading at the time was that she was trying to bounce the UKG into lockdown - but again, you are only talking about a few days at most, not weeks.   I suspect her judgement was that it was better for the whole UK to act at the same time but that she wasn't going to wait forever for that to happen.

Also given the nature of relations between the four administrations are never good at the best of times, had there been any major disagreements raised, if for example, the Scottish Government had been calling for furlough but the UKG wouldn't agree because of the economic impact, that's something I'd be amazed if it came out.  In particular from the UKG side which has always been pretty leaky.   All there's been is some stuff about her not showing proper respect by calling him Boris and not Prime Minister on COBRA calls and other inanity.

I suspect that what was happening is that the general agreement on approach was driven by them all getting the same scientific advice from the same sources and so came to broadly the same conclusions.   

[kumnio]

3 minutes ago, aaid said:

All there's been is some stuff about her not showing proper respect by calling him Boris and not Prime Minister on COBRA calls and other inanity. 

See I hate this respecting the title thing. Respect is earned, not given by a title IMO, he should be called Boris, not PM, well thats being kind, Id be tempted to call him something else, but thats beside the point. Same goes for people saying Mr President to Dobo the Yank clown.

I believe/think we could have acted better as an independent nation, but theres no way of proving or disproving this, so its pointless really.

[kumnio]

 

Hell yeah, on yourself Boris

[aaid]

1 minute ago, kumnio said:

See I hate this respecting the title thing. Respect is earned, not given by a title IMO, he should be called Boris, not PM, well thats being kind, Id be tempted to call him something else, but thats beside the point. Same goes for people saying Mr President to Dobo the Yank clown.

I believe/think we could have acted better as an independent nation, but theres no way of proving or disproving this, so its pointless really.

Particularly as apparently he asks people to call him Boris in the first place.   It says more about those who complain about something like that than anything.

On the last point, it would've made it more straightforwards to take different decisions but there's nothing to suggest that they would've done that.   Most of the decisions are all in devolved areas anyway.  Even quarantining people from abroad, fair enough you couldn't stop people at international borders - and that's not being suggested - but you could impose quarantine if you wanted to, after all, that's what they're planning to do now.

[aaid]

1 minute ago, kumnio said:

 

Hell yeah, on yourself Boris

Way to go China - no Russian numbers though, probably threw all the pollsters off balconies.

[kumnio]

8 minutes ago, aaid said:

Way to go China - no Russian numbers though, probably threw all the pollsters off balconies.

Vietnam.

[kumnio]

Brazils deaths look far too low, as do Russias.

Comparisons between countries is so difficult for various reasons, I think once you get outside of the EU, its probably pointless comparing things.

[aaid]

18 minutes ago, aaid said:

Way to go China - no Russian numbers though, probably threw all the pollsters off balconies.

Good spot - I was worried for the 5% of Chinese who didn't agree.

[Orraloon]

56 minutes ago, kumnio said:

Brazils deaths look far too low, as do Russias.

Comparisons between countries is so difficult for various reasons, I think once you get outside of the EU, its probably pointless comparing things.

Even within the UK it's difficult to compare like with like. In Scotland alone we have two different counts going on at the same time.

[Orraloon]

Apart from the economic aspects of lockdown, which couldn't be ignored, I don't think the SG had the political power to enforce lockdown, before the emergency powers were passed at Westminster on 26th March. They had some limited powers under the Public Health Act 2008, but not enough to impose full lockdown.

[phart]

The response has been shite across the UK. Arguing who has been the shitest out of the shite doesn't detract from the combined shiteness of the response.

[Rich NATA]

The Scottish Government could have acted quicker (or at least differently) and therefore, fewer people would have died...

However, just look at the shit the Unionist's and Unionist media have throw at Sturgeon for not easing the lockdown at the same time as the UKG.

Just imagine what the SNP's opponents would have said - with the backing of a complicit Unionist media - if Sturgeon had been the first off the mark to lockdown?!

They would have utterly f*cking crucified Sturgeon.

 

More people in Scotland would now be alive, but the Unionist media wouldn't be reporting how well the Scottish Government had done. It would all be about Sturgeon/SNP undermining the UK Government.

Edited June 1, 2020 by Rich NATA

[phart]

To be fair a couple thousand extra excess deaths are a fair price to pay if it means Sturgeon didn't get slaughtered in the media.

Edited June 1, 2020 by phart

[Ally Bongo]

39 minutes ago, phart said:

To be fair a couple thousand extra excess deaths are a fair price to pay if it means Sturgeon didn't get slaughtered in the media.

I think you give too much credence to "The Scottish Government could have acted quicker "

It's a red herring and your post illustrate's it

Edited June 1, 2020 by Ally Bongo

[phart]

54 minutes ago, Ally Bongo said:

I think you give too much credence to "The Scottish Government could have acted quicker "

It's a red herring and your post illustrate's it

Well let's test it.

What did the UK government do that allowed us to put in the track and trace system we have? What was the mechanism they had to activate before we could do it?

What mechanism did the UK government set in motion about how care home residents in hospital were repatriated back to them?

Folk like to mock the too wee too stupid line, but can't have your cake and eat it with this one. Either we were too wee too stupid and couldn't have done anything sooner cause of WestMinster(or god forbid what would the unionist press say) or we could have done things differently. The British figures are terrible comparatively, just cause ours are slightly better than Englands is hardly a badge of honour.

[Parklife]

7 minutes ago, phart said:

Well let's test it.

What did the UK government do that allowed us to put in the track and trace system we have? What was the mechanism they had to activate before we could do it?

What mechanism did the UK government set in motion about how care home residents in hospital were repatriated back to them?

Folk like to mock the too wee too stupid line, but can't have your cake and eat it with this one. Either we were too wee too stupid and couldn't have done anything sooner cause of WestMinster(or god forbid what would the unionist press say) or we could have done things differently. The British figures are terrible comparatively, just cause ours are slightly better than Englands is hardly a badge of honour.

Spot on. 

[Ally Bongo]

15 minutes ago, phart said:

Well let's test it.

What did the UK government do that allowed us to put in the track and trace system we have? What was the mechanism they had to activate before we could do it?

What mechanism did the UK government set in motion about how care home residents in hospital were repatriated back to them?

Folk like to mock the too wee too stupid line, but can't have your cake and eat it with this one. Either we were too wee too stupid and couldn't have done anything sooner cause of WestMinster(or god forbid what would the unionist press say) or we could have done things differently. The British figures are terrible comparatively, just cause ours are slightly better than Englands is hardly a badge of honour.

Scotland voted No in 2014

Despite the Scottish Government's policy of "acting as if we are Independent" the powers of the Scottish Parliament are extremely limited particularly when it comes to the Scottish economy.

It is nothing to do with what the Unionist press would say if the Scottish Government had the tools to do everything differently from the off - they didnt.

It was a UK wide approach right from the off

The devolved administrations had a little leeway in the timing of certain things but not in anything major despite Scottish Unionists even hating that

As Westminster control the purse strings how could we ?

 

Edited June 1, 2020 by Ally Bongo

[phart]

Policy decision on when to start a track and trace operation and policy decisions on how to repatriate care home residents from hospitals have nothing to do with purse strings or the results of a refererendum in 2014.