Idiots! Why are so many people incapable of understanding that religion is nothing to do with race. Race is what you are born with. Religion is the stupid crap that you choose to believe in and follow even when it could kill you and other people. The sooner religion is stripped of its protected status the better, before it drags us back to the bloody Stone Age. 

This 😯 blog from government advisor on life sciences, tweeted by a health minister, https://t.co/8jUui9tOfd sets out

** how all the antibody tests so far have failed

** why they’ve failed and it’s so hard

** it will take at least a month to develop / find a new test

See: pic.twitter.com/K4yN5YHhqz

— Sam Coates Sky (@SamCoatesSky) April 6, 2020

Yes, we are in credit where credit is due territory. It is no secret that I have a very low opinion of his views and the way he has conducted himself in the past. But I have felt that he has stepped up to the plate in this crisis with a degree of stature. Any early mistakes, if they were mistakes, were due to the advice given. On that I am in the camp that that if we had locked down earlier it may have caused more problems now, at the peak of the epidemic. I'm not sure and I doubt anybody was. Most of the problems of the unpreparedness lie at the foot of the previous Tory government. They spent no money on planning and ignored vital reports when this pandemic was well predicted in terms of likeleyhood and impact.

The usual Russian sites were saying this last night but take with a щепотка соли :)

Having said that the rumours yesterday long before the official announcement were proved correct.

I expect BJ is on something similar to this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-invasive_ventilation

In a semi conscious state last night in bed, not sure if I dreamed this or was just letting my imagination run away. It was about the virus where countries were very slow in opening their borders again, maybe for several years. They did not open their borders with China however who had not shown one crumb of compassion, no financial help, no measures to stop this happening again, they lost complete trust. China became a leper. This then led to tensions and with North Korea joining forces with China led to World War 3.

Bundle of fun eh?

This thread still not a place to get a dose of optimism from, I see.

It's all getting very worrying. Worried for my health; worried for the health of my family; worried for my parents; worried for my financial security going forwards; worried for the economy; worried about what the world is going to look like after this has been conquered; worried that it'll ever be conquered.

It's hard to retain a sense of perspective, and the isolation is just amplifying the sense of depression and doom.

Lockdown in Austria planned to end next week:

The Austrian Chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, has said the country is planning to let smaller shops reopen next week, with the aim of reopening all shops and malls from 1 May.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/apr/06/coronavirus-live-news-boris-johnson-admitted-to-hospital-as-trump-again-touts-hydroxychloroquine

The importance of vitamin D to the immune system is well understood I think.

https://www.nhs.uk/news/lifestyle-and-exercise/vitamin-d-immune-system-boost/

Which does make something of a nonsense of the policy of criticising people sunbathing at a safe distance in parks!

Sums up how most of us are feeling

I keep thinking iam going to wake up in a minute and be toddling off to work,looking forward to tonights footie and going fishing. Those normal things are just a dream now in this living dystopian nightmare. Just stay at home they say for the sake of the NHS,sounds easy,but we are being asked to pay a far far higher price.

There is dumb and there is dumber - reported in The Telegraph:

"Mobil network Three have reported that more of their phone masts have been damaged by conspiracy theorists who believe the spread of coronavirus is linked to the rollout of the 5G network. 

Engineers have also been abused. 

Read the full statement below: 

our networks are relied upon by the NHS, critical services and you. please take the time to read this 👇and help us protect the UK’s critical infrastructure alongside @O2 @EE & @VodafoneUK pic.twitter.com/s5mgXVHFZJ

— Three UK (@ThreeUK) April 5, 2020"

As bad as believing the big Sky Fairy can protect you from a virus - anyone who thinks 5G can spread a contagion is mentally deranged.

This is known to be happening in the West Midlands and health professionals are aware of it. The police will stop people from sunbathing in parks, even if they are yards away from anyone else, but they appear reluctant to enforce action on this topic - looks like the police have learned nothing from the grooming scandals!

I'm sure Michael will have a much clearer view of this?

Can somebody just confirm that the Scottish Medical Advisor who has now resigned and is uniformly suffering enormous vitriol is because she traveled unnecessarily? From a previous question about this a couple of weeks ago i was told the reason was because they wanted to cut down on traffic to prevent ambulances and hospital resources having to be used on RTAs. If this is the case I can see why there might need to be a blanket approach to prevent people who don't understand cross infection fully and doing extra things whilst traveling. I ask because I don't like bandwagons or witch hunts where they may not be valid. So trying to step back and considering the facts we have:-

1. She clearly broke the rule regarding unnecessary travelling.


2. She didn't break the rules on social distancing (Her own family, isolated in car, going to another house only used by themselves)


3. So no risk of cross infection because of above (other than the police knocking on her door rather than phoning)


4. Are RTA's known to be the biggest risk for ambulances being called? I suspect they are of those that can be reasonably reduced although there are many other social activities that lead to ambulances being called (e.g DIY accidents).

On balance I think she set a bad example and probably had to go. Does she deserve the level of hatred she is receiving. probably not, as nobody was hurt and as she didn't have an accident. I think there are far worse things going on out there and the police and media should be concentrating on those.

More on this from the NHS website:

'Add vitamin D to food to prevent colds and flu', say researchers

https://www.nhs.uk/news/food-and-diet/add-vitamin-d-to-food-to-prevent-colds-and-flu-say-researchers/

"In total, 25 RCTs from 14 countries, including the UK, were included. These involved a total of 11,321 participants, aged from 0-95 years.

After pooling the findings, vitamin D supplementation was found to reduce the risk of acute respiratory tract infection by 12% (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 0.88, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.81 to 0.96)."

That's the way I read it.

"Social media" is full of w*nkers.

Not much more to add really. Your immune system needs sufficient Vitamin D to function properly so any significant deficiency will weaken the immune system leaving you less able to fight infections effectively. However it doesn’t necessarily mean you will be able to avoid it just possibly be more likely to be able to fight it leading to less severe symptoms and lower chance of complications.

But how do they monitor who is in any particular house?

I would add to the bolded bit above that the level of uncertainty is also a big factor behind the pessimism. It's a cliché but we are in completely uncharted territory. However, I am convinced that it won't be as bad as many fear.

Perhaps I should be putting this in the Reasons to be Positive thread, but I am confident that we will begin to turn the corner on this by Easter and things will be looking a lot better by the end of the month. Obviously, health concerns are reasonable but if we do turn a corner on this soon, the vast majority of us will be fine(obviously that's little comfort to those unfortunate enough lose loved ones). There will be some restrictions in place for quite a while but the fact that the likes of Austria and Denmark are beginning to ease their restrictions should give us hope.

As for the economy, there will be a recession. However, I am determined to be as positive as I can. There are lots of predictions about a second Great Depression. However, it's more likely that Central Banks will ramp up spending enough to get us out of it. There will be an economic hangover but I don't think that we ought to awfulize about it all either. Personally, I am worried too. My practise could well go to the wall if things don't start to normalise by June. However, I think that we have to try to remain as positive as we can.   

That may certainly be an issue. However, they know which districts are the issue - the same ones providing the largest numbers of COVID-19 patients who need hospitalisation, so they need to patrol these areas, engage with the communities and enforce the rules where breaches are apparent.

Hospital workers and health professionals know the problem - they can tell the police where the clusters of patients are coming from (I presume they have already done that in any case).

That's good news at least. Glad he wasn't holidaying in his second holiday home!