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JackRiddler » Thu May 28, 2020 1:38 pm wrote:JackRiddler » Wed May 27, 2020 9:25 pm wrote:.
The case for UNDERCOUNT.
Facebook link, sorry.
https://www.facebook.com/johnhaller/pos ... 1160085416
The New York City area has seen the majority of American transit worker deaths, with 68 fatalities among employees of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority as of Friday afternoon. Nearly 2,500 MTA transit employees had tested positive, and more than 4,000 were in quarantine, a spokesman said.
I am a doctor, and I work primarily in a hospital setting. Initially, way back in March, I was ambivalent towards the lockdown – I was concerned regarding the precedent it set – and felt very uncomfortable with such a stringent curtailment of rights. However, a lot of my colleagues were sharing pictures etc from Italy, and COVID at that point was an unknown risk – to me at least. Amongst young, fit doctors like me there was a genuine worry that we might become seriously unwell. I was asked to update my next of kin by the trust I worked at, some of my colleagues made wills. There was much anxiety in the medical profession. So I bought into it. I naively believed the lockdown would be a stop gap measure, lasting only a few weeks, as reasonably no country could keep everyone in their house for such a long time period – and no electorate would allow such a thing, right?
As the first three weeks passed, I saw first hand quite how quiet the hospitals were, and how few non-COVID patients we were seeing. Whole wards were empty. On some days, I saw more suicide attempts than COVID. Combined with this was the growing body of information regarding the lethality of this coronavirus – the likely IFR, the propensity for mortality in high risk groups, but not in the young, and the clear evidence of the profound and deleterious effects of lockdown on the population. My mindset shifted, and I no longer saw lockdown as a necessary evil, and coronavirus was no longer an existential threat. I naively assumed that society was having the same realisation. This was not the case.
Over the last few weeks I have become increasingly frustrated and horrified by what has occurred. I cannot understand how we can continue such a wholesale curtailment of freedom, without any real backlash. I am livid at the lack of treatment for cancer patients, and quite how little society seems to care about anything other than COVID. I believe that the effects of lockdown will be far, far more significant than COVID. I am also angry about the fetishisation of the NHS, clap for carers, the TikTok videos and all of the nonsense that has taken place around this. I am involved in none of it, and resent my colleagues that are, because they should know how underserved that praise is, and how much they are letting down patients.
I am angry at the complete lack of empathy shown by huge sections of society. People bleat for more lockdown and the “new normal” to defend themselves against a mild virus. In the meantime, they ignore domestic violence victims locked in houses, children needing education, patients needing treatment that has been withheld, the mental health of millions. It’s so cruel and ruthless. I know fear corrodes empathy, but I am genuinely surprised about how callous people can seem to be.
I am thinking of the new laws regarding sex being illegal between people from different households – surely this is plainly absurd, and a level of intrusion into private lives never seen before. How have people accepted this? I also think about the 2m distancing requirements everywhere – even though this will destroy large sections of the economy. How has there not been a national outcry? What is wrong with people? The rules themselves are horrifying, but more terrifying to me is the complete acceptance of said rules.
I have discussed this with several medical colleagues and they seem to fall into several categories: those that believe the rules should continue and see no issue with them (startling and worrying, considering these are supposed to be rational, empathetic people); those who believe in lockdown, but then are happy to break it, and to suggest that I break it (these are hypocrites); and finally those who also agree that this is mad, but somehow don’t find it all as deeply distressing and as enraging as I do.
Some of my friends (who hold the same views as me) have told me the “new normal” will never be tolerated. That people will revert back to normal, and that society will see how ludicrous this all is. But I no longer trust that to be the case. If in January you had told me that I would be shut in my house for weeks, unable to see anyone aside from at work, I would’ve said that was madness. But we have accepted such a thing wholesale. I no longer trust in the rationality of society to get us out of this, and that scares me.
I have attempted to speak to some people in the media, despite this being forbidden by the trust I work for, but I have had no replies – no one seems interested in my story as it doesn’t fit the narrative.
The final straw was when I myself contracted COVID. I had minimal symptoms aside from a slight cold and a slight a loss of taste and smell. Normally I would not even pay attention to such symptoms. Many of my friends refused to believe it was COVID, as they said I would be sicker. I got a swab anyway and was positive. I was told by pro-lockdown friends that I was very lucky to have it so mildly – I replied saying no, I was the norm. People did not listen. People do not listen to anything that contradicts their view. They are brainwashed.
I have never been more disappointed. I was always maybe a touch idealistic, and went into medicine to help people. I genuinely believed society wouldn’t let people fall between the gaps, and would ultimately be caring and rational. I was a warm fuzzy liberal. I am so upset and angry with what has been permitted. I expected better. I have never been more disappointed to be a doctor, or to be a British citizen.
Under pressure, UK government releases NHS COVID data deals with big tech
Hours before openDemocracy was due to sue, government releases massive data-sharing contracts with Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Faculty and Palantir.
Mary Fitzgerald & Cori Crider - 5 June 2020
Hours before facing court proceedings from openDemocracy over its massive NHS COVID-19 data deal with private tech firms, the UK government has caved to pressure and released all the contracts governing its deals with Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and controversial AI firms Faculty and Palantir.
The contracts, released to openDemocracy and tech justice firm Foxglove today, reveal details of what has been described as an ‘unprecedented’ transfer of personal health information of millions of NHS users to these private tech firms.
Significantly, the contracts reveal that the Dominic Cummings-linked firm Faculty is being paid more than £1m to provide AI services for the NHS. The documents also show that terms of that deal were changed after initial demands for transparency were made by Foxglove under the Freedom of Information Act.
The contracts show that companies involved in the NHS datastore project, including Faculty and Palantir, were originally granted intellectual property rights (including the creation of databases), and were allowed to train their models and profit off their unprecedented access to NHS data.
Government lawyers have now claimed that a subsequent (undisclosed) amendment to the contract with Faculty has cured this problem, however they have not released the further contract. openDemocracy and Foxglove are demanding its immediate release. It is not clear if other contracts were altered as well.
The disclosures come after openDemocracy and Foxglove sent legal letters demanding transparency over the COVID datastore deal, and just hours before openDemocracy was due to issue proceedings in court.
Over the past few weeks, MPs have asked questions in parliament about the controversial deals and over 13,000 people joined a call for transparency.
Today, openDemocracy is publishing the contracts in full, in order to facilitate expert analysis and support public debate.
[...]
This file contains information on the deaths of patients who have died in hospitals in England and have tested positive for Covid-19. All deaths were reported during the period specified below.
All data up to 5pm 2 June 2020
[...]
[without] Pre existing condition
0 - 19 yrs : 3
20 - 39 : 32
40 - 59 : 255
60 - 79 : 551
80+ : 477
Total : 1,318
Daily coronavirus briefing: WHO backtracks on asymptomatic cases claim
By Staff, AccuWeather
June 9, 11:43 a.m.
https://www.accuweather.com/en/health-w ... rld/734987
The World Health Organization has cautioned that much is still unknown about COVID-19 and its asymptomatic spread. Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, the head of WHO's emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, has said that it is "a really complex question and much is still unknown." Van Kerkhove also said that WHO officials don't have an answer to how easily it can spread asymptomatically yet and that current estimates are anywhere between 6% and 41% of the population may be infected but show zero symptoms, according to CNBC.
The remarks were a clarification on what she said Monday during a press conference. “From the data we have, it seems to be rare that an asymptomatic person actually transmits onward to a secondary individual,” Van Kerkhove told reporters. On Tuesday, she said during a live social media broadcast that her comments on Monday had been in response to a question and she wasn't stating a specific WHO policy. “And in that [press conference], I used the phrase ‘very rare,’ and I think that that’s misunderstanding to state that asymptomatic transmission globally is very rare. I was referring to a small subset of studies,” she said, according to CNBC. “Some estimates of around 40% of transmission may be due to asymptomatic, but those are from models, so I didn’t include that in my answer yesterday, but wanted to make sure that I covered that here,” she said.
When 511 Epidemiologists Expect to Fly, Hug and Do 18 Other Everyday Activities Again
By Margot Sanger-Katz, Claire Cain Miller and Quoctrung Bui
June 8, 2020
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/202 ... virus.html
43% of U.S. Coronavirus Deaths Are Linked to Nursing Homes
By The New York Times
June 27, 2020
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/202 ... homes.html
43%
OF ALL U.S. DEATHS
54,000+
11%
OF ALL U.S. CASES
282,000+
At least 54,000 residents and workers have died from the coronavirus at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities for older adults in the United States, according to a New York Times database. As of June 26, the virus has infected more than 282,000 people at some 12,000 facilities.
Nursing home populations are at a high risk of being infected by — and dying from — the coronavirus, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, is known to be particularly lethal to adults in their 60s and older who have underlying health conditions. And it can spread more easily through congregate facilities, where many people live in a confined environment and workers move from room to room.
While 11 percent of the country’s cases have occurred in long-term care facilities, deaths related to Covid-19 in these facilities account for more than 43 percent of the country’s pandemic fatalities.
In at least 24 states, a majority of deaths are linked to nursing homes.
[...map & more...]
The Results of Europe’s Lockdown Experiment Are In
By Elaine He
May 20, 2020
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2020 ... recession/
With governments across Europe reopening their economies for business, it’s a good moment to look back on the different paths taken to control Covid-19 outbreaks to try to see how effective they were.
The chart below shows the relative severity of Europe’s restrictions based on work done by the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, which tracks a range of measures and scores how stringent they’ve been each step of the way.
Reaction Time
For many European countries, stringency levels increased substantially after the World Health Organization declared a pandemic, even when their case loads were low
[graphic]
While not a gauge of whether the decisions taken were the right ones, nor of how strictly they were followed, the analysis gives a clear sense of each government’s strategy for containing the virus. Some — above all Italy and Spain — enforced prolonged and strict lockdowns after infections took off. Others — especially Sweden — preferred a much more relaxed approach. Portugal and Greece chose to close down while cases were relatively low. France and the U.K. took longer before deciding to impose the most restrictive measures.
But, as our next chart shows, there’s little correlation between the severity of a nation’s restrictions and whether it managed to curb excess fatalities — a measure that looks at the overall number of deaths compared with normal trends.
Deadly Outcomes
Deaths above normal ranges shows the European countries that struggled to contain their Covid-19 outbreaks
[graphic]
In Europe, roughly three groups of countries emerge in terms of fatalities. One group, including the U.K., the Netherlands and Spain, experienced extremely high excess mortality. Another, encompassing Sweden and Switzerland, suffered many more deaths than usual, but significantly less than the first group. Finally, there were countries where deaths remained within a normal range such as Greece and Germany.
Yet the data show that the relative strictness of a country’s containment measures had little bearing on its membership in any of the three groups above. While Germany had milder restrictions than Italy, it has been much more successful in containing the virus.
The overall impression is that while restrictions on movement were seen as a necessary tool to halt the spread of the virus, when and how they were wielded was more important than their severity. Early preparation, and plentiful health-care resources, were enough for several countries to avoid draconian lockdowns. Germany, with better testing and contact tracing and more intensive care units than its neighbors, could afford to keep the economy a bit more open. Greece, by acting quickly and surely, appears to have avoided the worst, so far.
As one would expect, the countries with the most intense lockdowns look likely to suffer the most economically. What’s not clear yet is how much economic benefit countries with relatively lax curbs really stand to gain, given the integrated and trade-driven nature of the European economy. The export-led Swedish economy is set to shrink 7% this year, its government said on Tuesday. Germany, whose economy was shrinking before the pandemic, is already in recession. These countries may bounce back earlier than others next year, but this is a painful moment for all.
The Economic Pain of Shutting Down
Early data show that countries with harsher responses to Covid-19 also suffered more economically
[more graphic - Irish & Greek production went up?! I guess anything's possible when you start small]
The economic data for the lockdown period are only just appearing, and they may be revised substantially in the future given the obvious difficulties of collecting data during a pandemic. Regardless, what the past few months suggest is that the economic cost is not the only downside to a draconian lockdown. The Covid-19 experience has taught us that it’s far better to respond quickly and smartly, with the right technology and mass testing and tracing, rather than only relying on the crudest of shutdowns. If there are second waves of the virus, we shouldn’t repeat the mistakes of the first.
Ferdinando Giugliano and Lionel Laurent contributed reporting.
Notes: Stringency is a composite measure of government containment policies, ranging from 0 to 100. Indicators include closing of schools, workplaces and public transport, cancellations of public events, restrictions on gathering size, internal movement and international travel, requirements on staying at home and public information campaigns. The index doesn't provide information on how well policies are enforced, nor does it capture demographic or cultural characteristics that may affect the spread of Covid-19. Excess mortality is measured in z-scores, which is the standard deviation from the mean. A score of 2 and below indicates that deaths are within normal patterns observed for that period; above 15 is considered extremely high excess mortality.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
To contact the author of this story: Elaine He at ehe36@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Melissa Pozsgay at mpozsgay@bloomberg.net
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