SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)

They suggested albeit at a lesser extent that any illnesses didn't count as Covid and there was no testing in place whatsoever.

I remain unconvinced although I was sure I had it in February at one point everything matched. Friend back from Italy skiing trip and all the sympoms going.
Yeah definitely not short on anecdotal evidence. A mate from Uni came down with viral pneumonia in early January and took weeks and weeks to shift it.

Apparently H1N1 swine flu was doing the rounds in January, hence loads of people absolutely flattened by viral illnesses around that time. It’s a really nasty dose.

Makes no sense that covid was in the community then. As you say, it’s just not possible for it to lay low for two months before suddenly hospitalising thousands of people in March.
 
The thing I don’t get with this theory is why did it suddenly spike from March onwards and start killing thousands per day? Why wasn‘t it equally as contagious and have the same spread in January?
Isolated cases in Dec, hundreds of cases in Jan, 1k-10k in Feb, million in March. Math works quite well for doubling time of 3-4 days. With lots of travelling in end of Feb-early Mar.
 
Apparently H1N1 swine flu was doing the rounds in January, hence loads of people absolutely flattened by viral illnesses around that time. It’s a really nasty dose.

Makes no sense that covid was in the community then. As you say, it’s just not possible for it to lay low for two months before suddenly hospitalising thousands of people in March.

Funnily enough this is the first year I can remember where I haven’t come down with a cold and chest infection. I think I mentioned it very early in this thread that last year I had a particularly nasty cough that lasted for weeks and during a couple of really nasty coughing fits even brought up a bit of blood. I was pretty nervous about getting it for that reason but now I’m wondering whether I’m one of the lucky ones who some scientists have theorised have some level of immunity from previous strains of coronavirus.
 
Isolated cases in Dec, hundreds of cases in Jan, 1k-10k in Feb, million in March. Math works quite well for doubling time of 3-4 days. With lots of travelling in end of Feb-early Mar.

Doubling every 3 days, and assuming 1 solitary case on Dec 1st

January 1st ~1,000 cases
February 1st ~1,000,000 cases
Mid February: ~34,000,000 (Half the UK population)
 
Doubling every 3 days, and assuming 1 solitary case on Dec 1st

January 1st ~1,000 cases
February 1st ~1,000,000 cases
Mid February: ~34,000,000 (Half the UK population)

oooh you’re in trouble now, he loves a mathematical challenge this fella, no way he’s gotten it wrong. He’s probably jizzing in his pants at the challenge.
And he can’t see this.
 
Funnily enough this is the first year I can remember where I haven’t come down with a cold and chest infection. I think I mentioned it very early in this thread that last year I had a particularly nasty cough that lasted for weeks and during a couple of really nasty coughing fits even brought up a bit of blood. I was pretty nervous about getting it for that reason but now I’m wondering whether I’m one of the lucky ones who some scientists have theorised have some level of immunity from previous strains of coronavirus.

Previous strains of Coronavirus (apart from SARS and MERS, which didn’t reach the uk) only caused very mild illnesses. Basically a head cold. So the illness you had last year was most likely influenza, or possibly a bacterial pneumonia.
 
Doubling every 3 days, and assuming 1 solitary case on Dec 1st

January 1st ~1,000 cases
February 1st ~1,000,000 cases
Mid February: ~34,000,000 (Half the UK population)
Who said first of Dec? Now do 4 days with starting from 25.12.

It's a back of the envelope calculation done in 2 mins. Seems close enough for me.
 
Previous strains of Coronavirus (apart from SARS and MERS, which didn’t reach the uk) only caused very mild illnesses. Basically a head cold. So the illness you had last year was most likely influenza, or possibly a bacterial pneumonia.

Whatever it was I don’t want it again! It was the same flavour each time, as soon as I became a bit run down it would rear it’s ugly head
 
https://www.statnews.com/2020/09/09/astrazeneca-covid19-vaccine-trial-hold-patient-report/

So one person developed MS(deemed to be unrelated to the vaccine) and one person now has a spinal inflammatory condition?

I am not an alarmist, but this doesn't make for good reading, does it?

If the MS is deemed unrelated then we it most likely is unrelated. The case of Transverse Myelitis is a kick in the teeth. One of those rare nasty side effects that can be caused by a vaccine. Be interesting to see what happens from here but could be curtains for this vaccine. To be honest we were always going to lose some candidates during phase 3, so it wouldn’t be a huge shock. As I’ve been saying all along, we should expect some attrition. These things take a long time and set-backs and disappointments are to be expected. No matter how badly we want everything to go smoothly.
 
There is alot of assumption in your post. But I'll say the same to you as I did to Manuarfa.

Pinning people down, physically or economically, is not an ethical way to convince them.

Governments do it all the time (not physically which nobody is suggesting) especially when people's actions harm themselves and particularly others.

Vaccinations are already often required for many things in many parts of the world - visas, school enrolment, Uni enrolment etc
 

We already have covid marshalls in pubs here.

However if Boris thinks it is a good idea it has to be a bad one. I have visions of the local busybody curtain twitcher in a fluro jacket getting battered in the street by an enraged neighbor.
 
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He died on January 30th. He might have fallen ill with a different illness (influenza?) then picked up covid on top of that in hospital, shortly before he died.
So make that middle January maybe? Still way earlier than anyone thought possible - even last week of January.
 
So make that middle January maybe? Still way earlier than anyone thought possible - even last week of January.

True. It sounds like there might have been isolated cases in late January. But the big wave was kicked off by hundreds (thousands?) of people flying into the UK from affected regions through Feb and into March.
 
True. It sounds like there might have been isolated cases in late January. But the big wave was kicked off by hundreds (thousands?) of people flying into the UK from affected regions through Feb and into March.

Yep Spain and France primarily. The first declared death date was 5th of March, and that guy was admitted on the 5th of January.
 
He died on January 30th. He might have fallen ill with a different illness (influenza?) then picked up covid on top of that in hospital, shortly before he died.
Any chance the sample was contaminated somewhere?
 
So make that middle January maybe? Still way earlier than anyone thought possible - even last week of January.

Ist case in China confirned was Dec1 and suspected mid-Nov. So it wouldn't be suprising if a traveller took the virus with them in Jan.
 
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Ist case in China confirned us Dec1 and suspected mid-Nov. So it wouldn't be suprising if a traveller took the virus with them in Jan.
And there was covid in sewage water in Turin and Milan on 18.12.
 
This thing is a bugger to control even with the best testing and contact tracing. One major problem, as everyone here is pointing out, is the general public even when there is a reasonable level of public compliance. We have our second outbreak going on here right now and its a slow tail that will tick over for even longer than expected because a small church here didnt believe the virus was a problem and ignored all govt requests.
This second outbreak started when a Worker took 9 days off as he was sick which was what was being asked of everyone but then took his family on a week long holiday around various parts of the upper North island. If he had stayed home as was expected then this current outbreak wouldnt be lasting as long. We then get to the point where community cases have started to drop away to just 2-4 a day and a fresh outbreak starts up. Fortunately the authorities have been working hard to trace everything and were able to identify the source of the new cases which turns out to be a Christian Fundamentalist church who were intent on doing what they wanted. They are linked to the original second outbreak which reduces a small amount of concern. The problem is of course as everyone knows it only takes one or two individuals being stupid to derail even the more fortuitous situations.
 
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Seems to be around 40% actually, those are not percentages. Good data nonetheless, especially the breakdown with-in 10-19 year-olds.

Sorry yes you're correct, absolute case numbers by the 100k, not the percentage. The interesting data will be in the next 2-4 weeks of the 0-9 age groups, as it might give some indication on what, if any, impact has happened with schools re-opening.
 
Just coming back to this point, an interesting take on case load by age group (page 2 on the PDF). Just under 65% of cases found between 10-29 year olds.

https://assets.publishing.service.g..._Press_Conference_Slides111__-__Read-Only.pdf

When did creches reopen in the UK? I know that schools have only just opened but haven’t very young kids been going to childcare together for a while now? Reassuring to see primary aged and younger incidence flat-lining, if so. Would confirm what we’ve been hearing about young kids not being important vectors.

Obviously, we can’t say the same about teenagers...
 
A quick “pregnancy” style test that is reliable is the biggest game changer in all of this other than a vaccine or good therapeutic. Want to go to a wedding? Take a test and see if you’re safe. Want to go to a football match? Same. I actually think the test itself and the manufacture is the easy part - proving without doubt to whatever ground, facility, restaurant etc that you are negative is gonna be the hard part.
The sensitivities of rapid kits are always unsatisfactory. There's no way they could be regarded as safe passes.
 
The sensitivities of rapid kits are always unsatisfactory. There's no way they could be regarded as safe passes.
Is it possible to increase the sensitivity by compromising on specificity?

It sounds like a strategy worth conducting a feasibility study for, but worrying that the UK government seems to be pinning hopes on it, and too early. I'm not convinced it would work as desired even if the testing was possible.

Would also need mass-rollout of scanning technology and infrastructure to communicate test results / valid 'bio-passes'. To otherwise rely on all individuals to be responsible and honest would be a futile effort.
 
The sensitivities of rapid kits are always unsatisfactory. There's no way they could be regarded as safe passes.

Read a good take on this by an economist. Don’t have the link handy but at the levels of differences in sensitivity and specificity, his view was that it didn’t matter. What mattered in the case of comparison was testing regimes and not test metrics because a cheaper, faster test allows you to both scale enormously and inform the user much faster that the final metrics that matter - total infection spreading through the population, total deaths and the potential upside of a quick pregnancy style test in restoring normality, the rapid test regime would win easily. Tend to agree with that view.

It is evident that testing rapidly at low cost is one way to significantly slow down the pandemic. The way I think about it is if you tested no one, the pandemic would go about undetected fastest but if every single person in a country could get tested and get their result back every day, you ideally wouldn’t have a pandemic(apparently you would though because people are cnuts and would go out drinking even if they’re positive is what recent experience tells me but ignoring that..). It is a monotonic function but needs unprecedented scale.
 
If the MS is deemed unrelated then we it most likely is unrelated. The case of Transverse Myelitis is a kick in the teeth. One of those rare nasty side effects that can be caused by a vaccine. Be interesting to see what happens from here but could be curtains for this vaccine. To be honest we were always going to lose some candidates during phase 3, so it wouldn’t be a huge shock. As I’ve been saying all along, we should expect some attrition. These things take a long time and set-backs and disappointments are to be expected. No matter how badly we want everything to go smoothly.
Just seen on reddit that the AZ CEO has committed to binning all manufactured vaccines till date if causality is proven.

I would be very disappointed if it turns out to be a dud. I hear what you’re saying about no guarantee of success but this is the vaccine that is being manufactured at scale pre-approval for developing countries like mine. The largest manufacturer of vaccines in the world, based in India, was on track to produce 400m by December with half reserved for India and another 100m for other developing countries. Guess we are likely to be waiting longer.
 
Is it possible to increase the sensitivity by compromising on specificity?

It sounds like a strategy worth conducting a feasibility study for, but worrying that the UK government seems to be pinning hopes on it, and too early. I'm not convinced it would work as desired even if the testing was possible.

Would also need mass-rollout of scanning technology and infrastructure to communicate test results / valid 'bio-passes'. To otherwise rely on all individuals to be responsible and honest would be a futile effort.
It's highly unlikely. A lack of amplification process in rapid kits means low viral loads can hardly be detected, especially when the sample quality is poor (sample is not collected by professionals). That's why PCR is always the gold standard for many virus detections. Even for well-established viruses like flu A/B, the performances of rapid kits are still unsatisfactory, and I don't see why we can suddenly develop a good one for this novel coronavirus.
 
It's highly unlikely. A lack of amplification process in rapid kits means low viral loads can hardly be detected, especially when the sample quality is poor (sample is not collected by professionals). That's why PCR is always the gold standard for many virus detections. Even for well-established viruses like flu A/B, the performances of rapid kits are still unsatisfactory, and I don't see why we can suddenly develop a good one for this novel coronavirus.
Cheers that's interesting.
Makes sense why I've read "the technology doesn't exist yet". Hopefully they put a sensible number of eggs in sensible numbers of baskets.
 
Read a good take on this by an economist. Don’t have the link handy but at the levels of differences in sensitivity and specificity, his view was that it didn’t matter. What mattered in the case of comparison was testing regimes and not test metrics because a cheaper, faster test allows you to both scale enormously and inform the user much faster that the final metrics that matter - total infection spreading through the population, total deaths and the potential upside of a quick pregnancy style test in restoring normality, the rapid test regime would win easily. Tend to agree with that view.

It is evident that testing rapidly at low cost is one way to significantly slow down the pandemic. The way I think about it is if you tested no one, the pandemic would go about undetected fastest but if every single person in a country could get tested and get their result back every day, you ideally wouldn’t have a pandemic(apparently you would though because people are cnuts and would go out drinking even if they’re positive is what recent experience tells me but ignoring that..). It is a monotonic function but needs unprecedented scale.
No offense but that's why he's an economist, not a biomedical scientist. What he's missing is the implication of every false positive or negative result, which inevitably leads to wrong patient management and makes things worse. A healthy individual with a false positive result may be treated with real patients and contracted the virus unnecessarily; an asymptomatic carrier may regard a false negative result as a safe pass and spread the virus everywhere. Just to name a few.

From a scientific point of view, it's always better to do nothing than to use a kit with poor sensitivity and specificity. That's why sensitivity and specificity have always been important indicators to performances of diagnostic tools. Of course large-scale testing is useful in slowing down the pandemic and no one is suggesting that we shouldn't test, but the prerequisite is that the method is robust and the result is reliable.
 
No offense but that's why he's an economist, not a biomedical scientist. What he's missing is the implication of every false positive or negative result, which inevitably leads to wrong patient management and makes things worse. A healthy individual with a false positive result may be treated with real patients and contracted the virus unnecessarily; an asymptomatic carrier may regard a false negative result as a safe pass and spread the virus everywhere. Just to name a few.

From a scientific point of view, it's always better to do nothing than to use a kit with poor sensitivity and specificity. That's why sensitivity and specificity have always been important indicators to performances of diagnostic tools. Of course large-scale testing is useful in slowing down the pandemic and no one is suggesting that we shouldn't test, but the prerequisite is that the method is robust and the result is reliable.

I think the point is that these are screening tests only. Any “positive “ would need to be confirmed by a PCR.

Obviously, a false negative would be problematic but, at a population level, mass screening like this would still identify many more cases than you would without these tests. The idea being that you’re testing people who wouldn’t be tested at all otherwise, so a false negative isn’t actually that harmful. If someone was sick enough that they would be tested using conventional means then, by all means, test them conventionally. What the screening would try and pick up is cases that would otherwise fly completely beneath the radar.

The aim is to complement the very expensive and time consuming (yet highly sensitive/specific) tests we already have, rather than replace them.