Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Sheilbh]

Hopefully people will go through all of Netflix's library while quarantined and I'll have a job when this ends... All TV/film production has completely stopped though.

I want some video game companies and TV production companies to be quarantined together just to keep some things going

Seen some properly 28 Days Later pictures of London and the Tube today - it is weird.

In really interesting news, Italian authorities tested an entire small town. They found that 50-75% of positive cases were asymptomatic (but contagious), which is a lot, lot higher than the estimates in China and would change the picture. Also shows the importance of wider testing and the backward-looking test too.

[bogh]

Interesting how the virus is presenting itself in the UK, to some extent it currently appears to be a disease of the wealthy and the well travelled judging by the latest figures.

The chief medical officer today said the UK was about 4 weeks behind Italy, but that London was in advance of the rest of the country, so maybe 3 weeks.

I used the govt look up table to find results for different counties and borough and true enough counties like Hereford, Ceredigion, Carmanthanshire miles from london have one, tow or three cases, whereas nearer counties like Hampshire here have 55, though it's a much larger place with 1.6 million people.

There's no overall figure for greater london, but there seems to be quite a variance between boroughs:
There are 43 cases in Kensington and Chelsea, out of a local population of 156,197
There are 37 cases in Westminster, out of a local population of 255,324

The above two maybe the wealthiest London boroughs excluding the City.

Yet I think the most ethnically diverse borough Brent has noticeably less:
There are 20 cases in Brent, out of a local population of 330,795
As does Haringey:
There are 16 cases in Haringey, out of a local population of 270,624

edit:
I made a cases per 100 thou table:

Boroughs   Population   Cases   Cases per 100 thou.   
Haringey   270,624                  16     5.91   
Brent   330,795                  20     6.05   
Westmin.   255,324                  37   14.49   
Kens,Che   156,197                43   27.53

Yeah, the well off and physically fit brought it back from ski trips to Denmark and now it is gradually spreading outwards from there to the more vulnerable groups.

[Sheilbh]

I wonder how much of those figures also reflect UK testing priorities in hospitals - the big hospitals in London are more in the central boroughs than the outer boroughs.

Also my entire company in the UK is wfh from close of business today - one downside of the announcement coming at about 5pm yesterday.

[Josquius]

I think it's more likely there that the rich and well travelled are also more likely to be educated and are getting tested, and more likely to be in jobs where work from home is an option.
Amongst regular people I'm still seeing a disturbing amount of brexity style attitudes of its all a load of nothing, who cares if I have a bit of a cold, etc...
Quite a lot of disturbing Facebook posts going around on the weekend celebrating how Britain hasn't surrendered the way other countries have.

[celedhring]

Best "quarantined at the worst possible moment" story I have is this friend of mine that was getting separated and was supposed to move out this week, but now he can't...

I smell a screenplay.

Love is in the air (so put your face mask on).

[garbon]

I think it's more likely there that the rich and well travelled are also more likely to be educated and are getting tested, and more likely to be in jobs where work from home is an option.
Amongst regular people I'm still seeing a disturbing amount of brexity style attitudes of its all a load of nothing, who cares if I have a bit of a cold, etc...
Quite a lot of disturbing Facebook posts going around on the weekend celebrating how Britain hasn't surrendered the way other countries have.

[Agelastus]

Leicester station seems to have at least a similar proportional reduction to the number of passengers waiting for the train or changing trains as I saw earlier.

The train from London was early...

Not surprising as it has maybe a tenth or less of the passengers on it I would expect.

Also, neither train has had catering facilities; while they are not admitting it I suspect the decision has been made that having a trolley repeatedly go up and down the train is a bad idea.

[celedhring]

Up 17% today to 11k infected, which is actually a "decent" figure %-wise. However, I believe that testing just can't keep up at this point and our confirmed cases figure is not reliable. # of dead is up nearly 50% to 491 which is much more significant, however it appears there's a large component of figures catching up to reality because #of deaths reported yesterday was in comparison quite low. 563 UCI patients (our total capacity is 4,400 UCI beds but I'm not sure how many were available)

[alfred russel]

You think your government's response is better because you have less infections. Maybe you even take strong enough actions that the cases go to almost zero. The problem is that once you resume life as normal it will come back--even if in a theoretical world you drove them to zero a traveler would bring them back. You can go with rolling lockdowns - a month on lockdown and then when it seems under control open back up, only as cases start expanding you have to lock down again. I don't think that will be tenable either.

You can see the actual mortality rates from what Sheilbh posted. They aren't worth destroying society to avoid.

Than you have death panels

Assuming Languish as our sample, and assuming the sample if of sufficient quality to represent the population (age, medical condition,etc, all relevent factor), than close to 7% of us would die, since we do nothing.

Who dies here?  You get to pick the names   I'll make it simple, I'll assume that no matter whom you pick is the one that wouldn't make it in real life conditions, because that would be the older or the sicker of the patients in an overcrowded ICU.

Why do you keep talking about death panels? This won't be the first time an event overwhelms a medical system, and it won't be the last. Triage procedures have a long history and are a part of basic medical education.

If you really think that 7% of us are going to die, you are absurdly misinformed probably by a fear mongering media looking for ratings. Look at the rates Sheilbh posted from actual scientists.

[Sheilbh]

On the insurance point apparently most business interruption insurance doesn't cover closure by the government - that's an extension like notifiable disease cover.

As I say I think we just need bail outs now, not relying on insurance. This is beyond that.

[garbon]

Just finishing my hopefully last public transport journey in some time. London Bridge was freaky quiet both times I passed through it.

[Zanza]

Yeah, I was thinking of buying as well, but fuck me. I don't know if I'll have a job. I'm guessing buying a new car isn't in many people's minds right now.

Same here, the company I work for is massively exposed and there are discussions on how to just survive.

[crazy canuck]

On the insurance point apparently most business interruption insurance doesn't cover closure by the government - that's an extension like notifiable disease cover.

As I say I think we just need bail outs now, not relying on insurance. This is beyond that.

Yes, this cannot be an insurance issue - even if these perils were covered insurance companies do not have the assets needed.

[Sheilbh]

Agreed and I think in terms of our political culture we would be better off bailing out businesses and people directly than even allowing insurance to pay out and then bailing out another, broadly anonymous and unpopular bit of the financial sector.

[Tamas]

Agreed and I think in terms of our political culture we would be better off bailing out businesses and people directly than even allowing insurance to pay out and then bailing out another, broadly anonymous and unpopular bit of the financial sector.

Good point.