Excellent news!  I was thinking about you and your friend earlier when I read about Mark's friend's friend dying from Covid-19.

Hopefully he will come through it without any lasting damage but I've heard that it can take months. Fingers crossed.

Yes, that's what they say.

Article here saying Singapore first used antibody tests on Feb 27th:

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/02/singapore-claims-first-use-antibody-test-track-coronavirus-infections

That is what our local authority have stated (after they said all food, garden and recycling waste collections had been suspended).

Latest UK figures for UK

New Deaths: 115
New Cases: 2129
Tests: 7.8K

Important: Yesterday’s confirmed death figures were from 9am 24 March to 5pm March.

Todays figures were 5pm 24 March to 5pm 25 March.

That is fantastic to hear. I’ve been looking for news from you but didn’t want to pester you with PMs!

In slightly less good news, I only started work this week (from home) and already one of my team has gone done with COVID-19 symptoms. She seems well enough at the moment but hopefully it won’t get worse  

I thought there wasn't going to be an announcement today?

Do we know what period this covers? (Deaths and tests)

PS: Test positives are ~27%. That sounds like quite a big hike IIRC. Quantum's model is way off IF this is a 24 hour period.

That's bad, but also I thought they said we weren't getting figures today as they were moving to morning updates.

The whole thing is shambolic.

Regarding the low death figure yesterday

Yesterday’s figures did not cover a full 24 hour period while we adjust to the new system. These figures comprised the period from 9am 24 March to 5pm on 24 March.

Figures issued today are recorded as of 5pm 24 March to 5pm 25 March.

— Department of Health and Social Care (@DHSCgovuk) March 26, 2020

The Telegraph has a story saying that they think “patient zero” for the UK was someone in Sussex who contracted it in Austria in mid January. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/uk-patient-zero-east-sussex-family-may-have-infected-coronavirus/?WT.mc_id=e_DM1225445&WT.tsrc=email&etype=Edi_Edi_New_Reg&utmsource=email&utm_medium=Edi_Edi_New_Reg20200326&utm_campaign=DM1225445

Especially when you consider the advice “catch coughs and sneezes in a tissue and bin it”....

Rubbish should be bagged up before it's put in the general waste bin though.

Today's figures are for a 32 hour period. So 2 obvious points:

1) Death rate is not a big jump

2) Daily test rate has hardly changed and we are still nowhere near 10,000 per day

Final observation is the positive test % seems to have increased substantially. This is a worrying aspect of today's data.

Todays figures are not for a 32hr period. They are from 5pm 24 March to 5pm 25 March. 

Figures from 5pm 25 March to 5pm 26 March will be published tomorrow 

Guardian saying otherwise but i agree it is a shambles:

But the department is changing the way it releases the figures so the death toll figure is a change from the figure at 9am yesterday to the figure at 5pm yesterday, not a change of 24 hours.

Perhaps we should pay the chinese communist party to gather and release our data, they might do a better job.

Just checked the South Cambs website and the same here from 23rd March until 4th May earliest.

"We do not have the staff to run all three bin collections at the moment..."

Also if you have CV symptoms "personal waste including used tissues and disposable cleaning cloths/wipes" must be double bagged in plastic and left securely on your property for 72 hours before putting them in collection bin.

I just updated my message above. Today’s figures were for a 24hr period. Yesterday’s were a very short window of 8hrs

Here is the video of Andrew Raynor of MEC Medical, a medical parts manufacturer, who says he had contacted HMG in order to make more ventilators, but he never heard back.

“The government should have given funding to existing ventilator manufacturers, and existing companies like us.”

Andrew Raynor of MEC Medical, a medical parts manufacturer, says “nothing” happened when he contacted the govt offering to make #Covid19 ventilators#Newsnight pic.twitter.com/n79KVpENbW

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) March 25, 2020

UK decides it can't do better on its own and will probably join the EU ventilator scheme after all. Another u-turn in the making.

The UK government was being hit with criticism earlier for not joining a EU scheme to get ventilators to the health providers that need them.

But it seems like it was just a case of the invite being lost in the mail.

The prime minister's spokesman said this morning that the UK was "making it's own efforts" to source more ventilators.

But this statement has now been updated to say: “Owing to an initial communication problem, the UK did not receive an invitation in time to join in four joint procurements in response to the coronavirus pandemic."

The spokesman says the European Commission has confirmed the UK is eligible to take part in any further procurements though during the so-called transition period after Brexit.

So, he adds: "We will consider participating in future procurement schemes on the basis of public health requirements at the time."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-52044452

Yes, just discovered that from our village website. A little irritating not having just tipped a load of weeds and stuff into the green bin yesterday.

They've also closed the recycling centres so that option is also out.

Given that there are rats in the fields we have major reservations about composting without a suitable container.

We had the same when we lived in Watford: £30 per annum or lug it down to the recycling centre.

Here the first green bin is free but you pay if you want a second one. As it's only an issue in the spring and summer months we take stuff down the road when necessary.