To be honest I'm not sure any country would be in Catogary A right now and definitely not the UK (which as you say is in C).

Its a hypothetical that in a few months lets say there are no locally obtained cases. I think something like this CCU would be necessary if we wanted to return to normal life.

Is there any explanation as to why New York and Lombardy were so disproportionately affected compared with the rest of their respective countries? I thought there might be a stronger strain here?

No, this is good preparation for a no deal Brexit on Dec 31. Its written into law that we cannot extend transition, just as Maunder and Q wanted

We will be back to fighting in supermarkets over loo roll again, but this time the foreign nurses will be blamed and Priti will kick them out

Sorry - I meant expect us to carry on for a month 

I have heard no one with any scientific credence suggest  there are virulent and non virulent strains. The variations in strains appear to  be fairly trivial.  So far this thing seems to be remarkable  stable, which is damned good news for a vaccine.Long may this continue

I would hazard a guess that the badly hit areas are merely areas where the virus was allowed to run rampant before  lock-down was attempted.  Demographics also play a part in Italy for sure.

I think you need to look to testing policies,demographics, and small area concentration. The problem here is that the "well it MUST be because it's a worse strain", down the pub, "commonsenseinit" logic is, as usual, based on no actual expertise or research. And is usually wrong.

As to those who are bleating that it's the economy vs lives, and that the best thing for the economy is to loosen up lockdown, no surprises for guessing it's not that simple. The economy would be tanked far more from loosening resulting in infection sky rocketing:

https://twitter.com/jdportes/status/1249728401574944774?s=19

British journalist in France was surprised about giving specifics post lockdown 

👍

Spot on that Nick 👍

You should be glad about brexit

We would actually be in a worse situation if we hadn't stockpilled in preparation for no deal. Some of the PPE is actually coming directly from no deal stockpiles.

Everyone laughed at my millenium bug analogies but it turned out to be extra preciant. In the same way Y2K lessened the impact of 9/11 so does brexit lessen the impact (albeit in a small way) of COVID.

And before you ask, no I don't expect the transition period to end this year. It will get extended at the last minute in june.

Funny how 700 deaths a day is considered "good" when a month ago some media commentators and journalists were pointing and finger wagging at Italy about how badly they had handled it

And Birmingham and London with a high number of BAME deaths

Interesting how Handjob only got a sore throat but Boris got it bad. I assume some people are better at making antibodies? 

I thought Fauci's comments reported earlier were a suicide note.

Coronavirus: Trump retweets call to fire gov't expert Fauci

The apparent condemnation comes after Dr Fauci said more lives could have been saved with a stronger initial response.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/04/coronavirus-trump-retweets-call-fire-gov-expert-fauci-200413071754443.html

You'll have to post a link to where anyone has said that 700 deaths a day is considered 'good'.

Assuming you're just making it up again then this is in very poor taste.

👎👎

Yes, Trump doesn't like to be confronted with the truth.

But he'd be even more of an idiot than usual to kick Fauci out in the middle of the crisis.

I posted this in the Social Distancing thread earlier - it seems singularly appropriate

Macron was very frank with the french people. He admitted there had been issues with PPE and their logistics hadn’t been good.

I have to say reading through some of the quotes he has been very clear.

Other Key Points 

Lockdown extended by 4 weeks to 11 May
Phased Opening of Schools thereafter and only if appropriate
Restaurants, Bars etc, will remain closed even after 11 May
External borders closed until further notice
No gatherings or cultural events until at least mid July

So, no so much glad about Brexit as glad people could see what a fcking disaster Brexit would be - rather than the sunny uplands that were promised - and stockpiled accordingly. In short, we should be glad so many people understood what a calamity Brexit would be.

The press conference today for example,  a positive spin put on numbers of dead that were considered shocking when they happened in Italy 

"We are flattening the curve" is now the default setting. 

Michael Gove should not be out jogging within the 14 day quarantine period in fact he really shouldn’t jog in public ever pic.twitter.com/QydQWQ2wMo

— end of daves ❄️ 🥕 🧻 (@davemacladd) April 13, 2020

Vallance has just been interviewed by ITV and has said PHE got off to a good start in regards to testing by catching people who had it coming into the country?

Did they? I don’t remember being tested after I go back from Romania end of February.

https://www.itv.com/news/2020-04-13/coronavirus-testing-in-uk-not-ramped-up-as-quickly-as-it-should-have-been-government-s-chief-scientific-advisor-admits/

People panicked about brexit unnecessarily, people didn't panic enough about COVID.

Those who panicked about at least 1 of them are going to be in a better position now. It turned out there was a disaster, just not the one people thought there would be.

The odd thing is though, most of the predictions about Brexit did turn out to be right when it came to COVID. Planes no longer flying, economic devastation, thousands of people dying ect.

And if it wasn't for brexit and some preparations for December then we would be in a worse position now. In an odd sort of way, brexit couldn't have come at a better possible time.

You are delusional - brexit has left us with a shortage of nurses just when we need them most

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/nov/24/nhs-winter-crisis-thousands-eu-staff-quit

He is in denial.  Would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic.