Coronavirus Sars-CoV-2/Covid-19 Megathread

[Tamas]

Orban did a Facebook video to say he was talking to a "very special group of doctors" "pandemic mathematicians" who "look at trends to find out what awaits us in the near future" (imagine if Boris Johnson never went to Eton and instead grew up in a village but did get some education, that's Orban's rural-flavoured jovial condescending style).

He said he expects the next two weeks to be the worst of the entire pandemic, largely thanks to the new virus variants.

[Sheilbh]

Looking at the numbers in CEE it does look like there is another wave taking off ther:
https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data-explorer?zoomToSelection=true&time=2020-03-01..latest&country=CZE~HUN~BGR~POL~SVK~ROU&region=World&casesMetric=true&interval=smoothed&perCapita=true&smoothing=7&pickerMetric=location&pickerSort=asc

Does Orban intend to lock down hardly given the risk?

Edit: God I just checked deaths per capita and Czechia has had more deaths than the UK. I had no idea the situation was so bad there

[Tamas]

Does Orban intend to lock down hardly given the risk?

No hints at that.

They have just launched one of their "national consultancies" where they "ask the people" via a poll on how to handle the pandemic.

[Sheilbh]

Phase 2 prioritisation of vaccines have been announced. Phase 1 was basically the high and medium risk groups who are currently being vaccinated.

Phase 2 will follow and is the under 50s. It basically looks like it'll just be based on age, so older people get it first. There's no professional or job prioritisation. I think the age thing makes sense to an extent because basically every seven years doubles the risk of death for covid (from a very, very low base to a very dangerous disease for the elderly). But I think the main reason is probably ease and speed - NHS records include age, but they don't have a record of people's jobs. So rather than pause to collect that information it feels like they want to keep pace/speed by using information they already have.

[garbon]

Phase 2 prioritisation of vaccines have been announced. Phase 1 was basically the high and medium risk groups who are currently being vaccinated.

Phase 2 will follow and is the under 50s. It basically looks like it'll just be based on age, so older people get it first. There's no professional or job prioritisation. I think the age thing makes sense to an extent because basically every seven years doubles the risk of death for covid (from a very, very low base to a very dangerous disease for the elderly). But I think the main reason is probably ease and speed - NHS records include age, but they don't have a record of people's jobs. So rather than pause to collect that information it feels like they want to keep pace/speed by using information they already have.

Yeah and even if they had it, they would probably problem struggle. I still have in mind when my GP didn't know my ethnicity even though it was viewable in my patient record and challenged me on a treatment that had NHS guidance for olds or blacks.

[Josquius]

Phase 2 prioritisation of vaccines have been announced. Phase 1 was basically the high and medium risk groups who are currently being vaccinated.

Phase 2 will follow and is the under 50s. It basically looks like it'll just be based on age, so older people get it first. There's no professional or job prioritisation. I think the age thing makes sense to an extent because basically every seven years doubles the risk of death for covid (from a very, very low base to a very dangerous disease for the elderly). But I think the main reason is probably ease and speed - NHS records include age, but they don't have a record of people's jobs. So rather than pause to collect that information it feels like they want to keep pace/speed by using information they already have.

Makes sense with the last bit. Doing it by profession would be by far the best way if it could be easily done.... but that would reduce efficiency somewhat and considering they're aiming to have everyone done by summer anyway it is best to keep it simple.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah I wonder if one way to help that would maybe be publicity campagin, info about booking at the big vaccine centres in higher risk workplaces like supermarkets, delivery hubs etc?

Edit: Kind of lovely little video story of a Fijian Rugby League team. They were in quarantine in Australia and at the end of their quarantine all went to their windows to sing a hymn to thank the hotel staff - a very nice contrast to Djokovic's response to quarantine for the Australian Open:
https://www.fijitimes.com/fijian-rugby-league-club-team-sing-their-hearts-out-from-quarantine-hotel-balconies/

Edit: And on the timing point - yeah this seem defensible:

Professor Wei Shen Lim of JCVI says structuring the programme around occupation would be very difficult, could slow down the roll out and would probably only give anyone a jab about a week earlier.

[Tamas]

Phase 2 prioritisation of vaccines have been announced. Phase 1 was basically the high and medium risk groups who are currently being vaccinated.

Phase 2 will follow and is the under 50s. It basically looks like it'll just be based on age, so older people get it first. There's no professional or job prioritisation. I think the age thing makes sense to an extent because basically every seven years doubles the risk of death for covid (from a very, very low base to a very dangerous disease for the elderly). But I think the main reason is probably ease and speed - NHS records include age, but they don't have a record of people's jobs. So rather than pause to collect that information it feels like they want to keep pace/speed by using information they already have.

Makes sense with the last bit. Doing it by profession would be by far the best way if it could be easily done.... but that would reduce efficiency somewhat and considering they're aiming to have everyone done by summer anyway it is best to keep it simple.

Yeah I think it would be total chaos. Should be far easier to just push through based on age.

[Sheilbh]

Advisors to the FDA unanimously recommend emergency approval of the J&J one shot vaccine - which is great news.

Orban is looking at moving to delay second doses and Draghi has raised the same suggestion at the European Council - don't think I anticipated them ever suggesting the same idea I've said before but I think the argument for this is strong when facing tight supplies and growing cases.

Edit: Also this is a really impressive resource from the ONS:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19/latestinsights#overview

Interactive tool on all sorts of things including social indicators, antibodies, infections etc.

[celedhring]

Putin doesn't give a fuck   

[HVC]

I'm surprised Brazil was so honest

[Syt]

Case numbers going up fast now. 4th day in a row with over 2k cases, today close to 2500. Almost 1/1000 people in Austria have died from the virus. ICUs are starting to fill up (still under 50% full, but that margin is going down fast). Yet we talk about re-opening restaurants, bars and hotels.

Chancellor Kurz still says that "by summer" things will be back to normal ... vaccination campaign needs to pick up significant steam for that.

[The Larch]

It's surprising how a few places have more Covid deaths than expected deaths. 

[celedhring]

It's surprising how a few places have more Covid deaths than expected deaths. 

Two reasons I can see right off the bat. The disease killing people that would have died throughout 2020 anyway (since it's particularly deadly on the elderly and the infirm), and the flu season being snuffed out.

[Iormlund]

It's surprising how a few places have more Covid deaths than expected deaths. 

Two reasons I can see right off the bat. The disease killing people that would have died throughout 2020 anyway (since it's particularly deadly on the elderly and the infirm), and the flu season being snuffed out.

Also lack of work and motor-vehicle related deaths during lockdowns.