Covid - coming out of Lockdown 3 - no politics, less opinion and more facts and information.

[andyman7]

16 minutes ago, hayfield said:

To be fair Covid has proved that in the end it will get round the measures most if not all countries have imposed. If its not a school problem then why is there so much infection in the schools and their families ? 

Any cough/cold/bug will circulate strongly in schools/school settings. With Mrs being a teacher and the boy at school we pretty much get all  the year's bugs out of the way every autumn. But it is also building a strong lifelong resistance to SARS2-Covid which is part of the natural progression of moving beyond pandemic.

However, as was repeated again today on Channel 4 news, with Omicron, everyone will be exposed or infected. This whole idea that somehow it can be avoided in normal life, even with 'measures', is a fallacy. The only challenge is the trade off between getting it out of the way and dragging it out to manage healthcare capacity. The idea that school life is turned upside down to prevent infection as some would argue for is destructive to children's opportunities and futile in intent (I'm not arguing for or against some mitigating measures, but I am against the kind of things that restrict association, sports , extra curricular activities  and all the things that we has as we grew up, being throttled for years, let alone the whole exam disaster). 

 

Edited January 4, 2022 by andyman7

[andyman7]

7 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

I appreciate it may be inconvenient, but surely the mums could get together with a rota of some form ? and I think from what I see primary schools are more orderly than senior schools. But the simple fact is the schools like pubs and clubs were closed because they were unsafe places. We cannot hide from the fact that they are high risk environments for virus transmission  

Schools were closed because of an unseemly panic reaction that continues to have severe ramifications that will last years beyond Covid.  They were never unsafe for pupils.

[EddieB]

1 hour ago, Nearholmer said:

You need to be careful here, because the PM was talking about those reaching ICU, and to quote that article:

 

It’s possible that Dr Jones, Ms Kelly and Mr Kemp had been incorrectly referring to figures for Covid patients receiving intensive or other specialist care, since there is some evidence that most of these are unvaccinated.

But, I still can’t find the actual stats, so your final point holds.

Indeed - I try to be carefully with my phraseology, knowing they are quite different measures and it's easy to be misrepresented.  I do find it curious that a figure of 90% seems to cover everything from unvaccinated hospital admissions earlier in 2021 through to the unboosted in ICU in December. 

 

When challenged - not for the first time - the response has been that such figures are "anecdotal".  Hence my appeal for greater disclosure of true figures - even if such data do not convey the message perhaps as strongly as might be ideal or desirable.  

[hayfield]

7 minutes ago, andyman7 said:

Schools were closed because of an unseemly panic reaction that continues to have severe ramifications that will last years beyond Covid.  They were never unsafe for pupils.

 

It was the the effects of transmission into the wider population last year that they were shut, look at the heat maps from July to now and see the similarity. Thankfully for the UK  omicron seems a weaker strain and also the vaccination program has paid dividends. I am not saying close schools, but we need actions to reduce infection into the wider population. Don't forget for some children catching covid is very serious 

[andyman7]

4 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

It was the the effects of transmission into the wider population last year that they were shut, look at the heat maps from July to now and see the similarity. Thankfully for the UK  omicron seems a weaker strain and also the vaccination program has paid dividends. I am not saying close schools, but we need actions to reduce infection into the wider population. Don't forget for some children catching covid is very serious 

Yes, I understand, and also there are vulnerable teaching staff too. I do not argue for no measures or that the virus isn't serious. But the ramifications of school closures are very serious too and the effect of closures has probably been underestimated. Covid is a classic moral maze that doesn't respond well to black-and-white responses. 

 

I seriously suspect that in decades to come when the responses of various countries are analysed, no-one will come out with a perfect (or even a 'good') score and there will be a lot of learning all round

[Nearholmer]

Of course it spreads in schools, because they are a very challenging environment in which to prevent spread; it’s a testament to the way schools have been organised that it hasn’t spread more and faster. But that doesn’t make it “a school problem” - so far as I know Covid-19 in any of its variants didn’t spontaneously arise in schools.

 

It’s a society-wide problem, and if you shut every school in the world, while leaving everything else as normal, it would still spread like wildfire, but presumably any finger-pointing would then be at some other places of congregation. 
 

The questions to ask are:

 

- how much spread and resultant illness can be tolerated; and,

 

- having decided that, then how is the tolerable spread to be “divvied-up” among activities that involve people congregating?

 

Back in March 2020, we had to have a fairly severe lockdown, because the disease wasn’t well understood, nobody was vaccinated, and barely any spread could be tolerated (just that which occurred through truly essential workers and through truly essential shopping); last winter a tiny bit more could be tolerated; this winter a great deal more. Of that greater spread which can now be tolerated, because vaccination is on our side, and omicron is milder, a slice is allocated to schools. Good, and long may it remain so.

 

Put another way: we shouldn’t be closing schools now, because we don’t need to, because current spread is tolerable, and if spread threatens to exceed what is tolerable, then we should be looking very hard at other ways of capping it before looking to close schools again.
 

I’m beginning to sound like a government spokesman, which is really worrying, so I’d better stop there!

 

 

[Bon Accord]

2 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

I would have thought the main gain re- the wearing of masks in classrooms  is not the pupils - its their teachers!

 

Just as you cannot staff a hospital without Doctors / Nurses / cleaners,. the same is true of schools and teachers.

 

Think of it like this - if an individual child comes down with Covid thats one person having their education disrupted / put on hold/.

 

If its a teacher then thats 33 children having their education disrupted / put on hold / forced to stay home (and thus potentially cause childcare issues). Which is going to be more disruptive overall...

 

 

Except that if one pupil has it then basically the entire class and teachers are in reality close contacts because the kids aren't giving a toss, with all the consequent disruption that causes.

My youngest cousin is a languages teacher at a secondary school and she was seeing entire yeargroups being wiped out every other week causing mayhem.

Teachers and ancillary staff were in despair because they had no choice but to run with it due to Government instructions/indifference.

In her school a number of older teachers simply gave up the job because they couldn't chance the (rampant) risk of infection due to their age/health, leaving the school further short staffed causing larger class sizes, more infections etc.

Standby for it all to be repeated over the next month or so.

[Andy Hayter]

53 minutes ago, EddieB said:

 

 

 Hence my appeal for greater disclosure of true figures - even if such data do not convey the message perhaps as strongly as might be ideal or desirable.  

 

 

I could well imagine that the data is deliberately being withheld from the public at large because in the hands of the unscrupulous or those who have no real knowledge or understanding of statistics they will seem to present a very different picture to the actual truth.

 

Call this conspiracy theory if you will but I can think of no other reason why data that is surely recorded has not been released and we are left with the anecdotal numbers for individual sites.  

[Nearholmer]

43 minutes ago, hayfield said:

but we need actions to reduce infection into the wider population.

 

The 100 Million Dollar question is: do we, and if so, why?

 

Which takes us to my "tolerable spread" point. 

 

Counterintuitive as it is after two years of trying to keep spread down, it does now seem conceivable that a quite astonishing amount of spread is tolerable, because the current iteration of the bug is slightly less beastly, and because vaccination is effective, and hence pressure on health services just about tolerable.

 

To me, it isnt anything like clear yet that we will "get away with it", by which I mean that the health services could yet be tipped over the brink by a combination of staff absence (covid and sheer exhaustion) and the sheer number of people needing treatment. Fingers crossed.

[Nearholmer]

28 minutes ago, Bon Accord said:

Standby for it all to be repeated over the next month or so.

 

It will be.

 

The only question is: to what extent?

 

A few weeks ago, I posited that January would see "national lockdown by default" due to staff sickness, not just in schools, but across logistics, hospitals etc, and that does still seem possible, but much less likely than I first thought, because the spread-rate is lower than I exected for several reasons.

 

If a small percentage of pupils are impacted by it, and the duration is pretty short, that will still be a far better outcome than all pupils being impacted for a long duration, which is what lockdown school closures cause. 

 

What it does all trade upon, of course, is something bordering upon abuse by the public of the good will of school staff, in just the same way that the wider strategy trades upon abuse by the public of the good will of medical staff. I wonder how long it will take for significant swathes of the public to forget the debt it owes to public servants?

[phil-b259]

31 minutes ago, Bon Accord said:

Except that if one pupil has it then basically the entire class and teachers are in reality close contacts because the kids aren't giving a toss, with all the consequent disruption that causes.

 

 

But thats the point of facemasks being worn in classrooms. While I agree they are no magic bullet scientists say is helps reduce the range of Covid laden breath. As such a teacher standing at the head of the class teaching should be at less risk of catching Covid than in a classroom where pupils are unmasked, particularly if the room is well ventilated (which I accept many classrooms are not).

 

Equally, unless things have changed significantly from my day, teachers do not generally hang around with pupils if they can help it. If they are not teaching they usually retire to their staff room where they can Covid precautions are more likely to be followed.

 

The big dangers are therefore mainly if teachers need to move between classrooms at the same time as pupils and in subjects where teaching of certain subjects requires them to get up close a personal with pupils.

 

Now thats not to say that things will be fine - I'm sure there will be plenty of pupil to teacher transmission going on this term, BUT it is quite frankly the lesser of two evils. There is an overwhelming body of evidence which proves the educational lockdowns over the past two years have caused lasting damage to children's education - particularly those from low income or deprived areas whose home life is not able to compensate anything like as much as the better off in society.

 

As such we owe it to future generations to try and keep schools open as much as is possible.

[Zero Gravitas]

2 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

I appreciate it may be inconvenient, but surely the mums could get together with a rota of some form ? and I think from what I see primary schools are more orderly than senior schools. But the simple fact is the schools like pubs and clubs were closed because they were unsafe places. We cannot hide from the fact that they are high risk environments for virus transmission  

 

So the mums should sort out the rota before going home to do the housework and cook their husbands’ tea for when they get home from a hard day at work?

 

I’m sorry, but I’d really like to hope that in 2022 we’ve moved beyond these outdated ideas of gender roles.

[Crisis Rail]

9 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

 

The 100 Million Dollar question is: do we, and if so, why?

 

Which takes us to my "tolerable spread" point. 

 

Counterintuitive as it is after two years of trying to keep spread down, it does now seem conceivable that a quite astonishing amount of spread is tolerable, because the current iteration of the bug is slightly less beastly, and because vaccination is effective, and hence pressure on health services just about tolerable.

 

To me, it isnt anything like clear yet that we will "get away with it", by which I mean that the health services could yet be tipped over the brink by a combination of staff absence (covid and sheer exhaustion) and the sheer number of people needing treatment. Fingers crossed.

 

Well yesterday was quite refreshing what with the planet not having resources  to be jabbed every six months and  Johnson proclaiming we can "crack on" and "live with it" - most probably the smartest thing he has said in 2 years. Maybe a touch of saving his employment? 

 

Infection Graph off the scale though.

 

As regards January  - absences do tend to be on the high side after all the festive excitement and depression kicks in  - luckily I'm newly finished but feeling a touch Bi-Polar this morning.

 

Really it is time now for people to make their own choices.

 

[Neil]

9 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

 

So the mums should sort out the rota before going home to do the housework and cook their husbands’ tea for when they get home from a hard day at work?

 

I’m sorry, but I’d really like to hope that in 2022 we’ve moved beyond these outdated ideas of gender roles.

 

To be fair to John, his comment was in response to mine about the difficulties my daughter would have with staggered school days so I think his comment was a 'why don't the other mums try' type of thing. I've done the school run with my daughter a good number of times pre Covid and there's always been mix of mums, dads and grandparents waiting in the playground for classes to be dismissed. 

 

The school actually tried staggered days it but it proved unworkable and there was just as much mixing in the playground at leaving time as was the case with all finishing at the same time.

[Dunsignalling]

11 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

 

What it does all trade upon, of course, is something bordering upon abuse by the public of the good will of school staff, in just the same way that the wider strategy trades upon abuse by the public of the good will of medical staff. I wonder how long it will take for significant swathes of the public to forget the debt it owes to public servants?

 

Or, alternatively, how soon an unmanageable number of said public servants just decide enough is enough and pack their jobs in.

 

After all, there's no shortage of vacancies in other fields, and a lorry cab, for instance, is a much safer working environment (Covid-wise) than a school or hospital. Most of the time, less stressful, too.....

 

John 

Edited January 5, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[Hobby]

11 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

I could well imagine that the data is deliberately being withheld from the public at large because in the hands of  those who have no real knowledge or understanding of statistics they will seem to present a very different picture to the actual truth.

 

Pot and Kettle for all of us on this thread, perhaps!

[Jol Wilkinson]

10 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

 

So the mums should sort out the rota before going home to do the housework and cook their husbands’ tea for when they get home from a hard day at work?

 

I’m sorry, but I’d really like to hope that in 2022 we’ve moved beyond these outdated ideas of gender roles.

Judging by the junior school in the village we moved from two years ago and the two near where we now live, it is still largely mothers who take the children to school. The difference from when I wasof school age is that they now do it by car, rather than walking. But then nearly everything has changed, some for the good, some not., 

[hayfield]

10 hours ago, Zero Gravitas said:

 

So the mums should sort out the rota before going home to do the housework and cook their husbands’ tea for when they get home from a hard day at work?

 

I’m sorry, but I’d really like to hope that in 2022 we’ve moved beyond these outdated ideas of gender roles.

 

Whether its mum's or dad's its the parents responsibilities to ensure their children's safety, however what was called the mum's network used to work very well, bringing political or PC arguments adds nothing to the discussion. 

 

As it happens, I would have swapped the pressure of replacing 2 peoples wages any day when my daughter was growing up, however I could have never replaced my wife's skills in bringing my daughter up.

[john new]

34 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

Or, alternatively, how soon an unmanageable number of said public servants just decide enough is enough and pack their jobs in.

 

Not related to the current crisis but that is exactly why I took early retirement as soon as I could (2008). A job situation where the constant expectation to do more, with budgets being cut by Whitehall to try and impose privatisation by stealth, became too stressful for me and I believe was responsible for major personal health issues (quad heart bypass).

 

Whether privatisation is a good or bad thing in the macro picture I am deliberately not commenting on, but the changes it imposes on staff can be very stressful. This isn’t just a government thing, my son in law is also going through exactly the same disruptive changes as the store chain he works for has just changed corporate owners with knock on changes right down the line.

 

The common factor is that this beeping virus is creating the type of workplace disturbances that if you are prone to stress will exacerbate it, over and above the problems if you actually catch it.

 

Edited January 5, 2022 by john new
Spelling

[Nearholmer]

Add into the mix the fact that we are an ageing population, more people reaching the end of the conveyor belt of working life than are being loaded on at the beginning, so that we either have a problem (not enough young people to service the needs of a stack of pensioners), or an opportunity (more jobs for young people than there are young people to fill them, which equals choice, and  the chance to lever better working conditions). Lorry driving is only the first obvious case. The care sector is the one where there is possibly the most massive mismatch between what is expected of staff, and their pay and conditions, traditionally ‘solved’ by employing women from overseas ….. as is the case in significant parts of the NHS.

 

 

Edited January 5, 2022 by Nearholmer

[Dunsignalling]

14 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Add into the mix the fact that we are an ageing population, more people reaching the end of the conveyor belt of working life than are being loaded on at the beginning, so that we either have a problem (not enough young people to service the needs of a stack of pensioners), or an opportunity (more jobs for young people than there are young people to fill them, which equals choice, and  the chance to lever better working conditions). Lorry driving is only the first obvious case.

Indeed, there was a radio discussion the other day as to how elderly care might need to be largely robotised in the surprisingly near future (as soon as technology permits) without drastic liberalisation of immigration.

 

The problem, of course, being that the latter can't happen without we oldies voting for a change of government, which doesn't seem all that likely....

 

Don't look at me, I live in a constituency so safe that it won't change hands before hell freezes over.

 

John

Edited January 5, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[Hobby]

46 minutes ago, john new said:

The common factor is that this beeping virus

 

If only it did, it would make it so much easier to avoid!

[Hobby]

28 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Don't look at me, I live in a constituency so safe that it won't change hands before hell freezes over.

 

Look at the recent (last 30 years) history of Wyre Forest, any majority can be overturned if the will is there.

[Dunsignalling]

2 minutes ago, Hobby said:

 

Look at the recent (last 30 years) history of Wyre Forest, any majority can be overturned if the will is there.

It would take something in excess of an 80% swing, here.

[Nearholmer]

President Macron causing a merd-storm by saying how he will hassle people to get vaccinated.

 

"The word used by Mr Macron - emmerder - is a vulgar term meaning to annoy"