Can you imagine the damage caused if we end up having to lock down again in 6 weeks time, both to the economy and socially. I foresee a clusterfuc k on the horizon and this time it'll be squarely on the government.

Social distancing not an option! Herpes and Corona combined would be an interesting mutation

We know that the death rate is highly correlated to both population and population density. This is a relationship that is so strong it transcends all scales (local, regional, national, international) and dominates over demography related factors (such as age - note that average age in each area is inversely correlated with death in the UK because areas with an elderly population tend to be less dense)

So the natural measure of how a country performed is: DA/P^2 where D is the number of deaths, A is the area of the country, P population. i.e the deaths is correlated linearly with both the population and the population density so it divides twice.

Under this  metric we have: (1E-8 deaths km^2 people^-2)

I'd call this the 'Q severity index'

Sweden: 1229.0

Belgium: 1173.3

USA: 662.2

Spain: 593.9

France: 308.8

Italy: 246.4

UK: 165.5

South Korea: 40.38

Germany: 36.1

Japan: 1.32

Singapore: 0.04

Hong Kong: 0.008

What this shows is that the UK is actually not doing too badly, Germany is the best in Europe. Singapore and Hong Kong unsuprisingly doing extremely well. Sweeden (no lockdown), Belgium and USA failing miserably.

I personally think the lockdown should be enforced until the end of the month. A bit more forceful than it has been. 

With a clear and transparent plan to begin easing the lockdown from 1st June onwards, but then only slowly. 

Farcical. a person could be infected by the time the result came back

Lesbos is one thing, but there is no reason for a single migrant to be in a miserable camp in Calais. Those who are there CHOOSE to be there, because they are illegal, economic migrants who want to get into the UK without its ID cards and with its massive black economy. That is the size of it.

Those who have a genuine claim to asylum, can claim it in any one of the European nations they have crossed to get to Calais. Those who have a proper claim to come to the UK can apply through the normal channels, even if they first register in another European country.

No, I have less than zero sympathy for those camping out illegally in the Pas de Calais - they have zero right to come to the UK - all the more so during the present crisis with the UK population in lockdown.

These countries have populations that are educated and responsible and who will follow social distancing guidelines. Also proper test and trace infrastructure and a lower base of infections to begin with

It could be that the sunshine and UV is having the desired effect in supressing the rate, so we can get back to some normality for a few months until the second wave in the Autumn

Polite request to PM and others: please stop using my Guardian article to claim we cannot make any international comparisons yet. I refer only to detailed league tables-of course we should now use other countries to try and learn why our numbers are high https://t.co/VQCwoYROK2

— David Spiegelhalter (@d_spiegel) May 6, 2020

Try this:

Though Widely Discredited, Bakersfield Doctors' COVID-19 Test Conclusions Spread Like Wildfire

But public health experts were quick to point out the major flaws in the doctors’ methodology – namely that only a tiny percentage of Californians have actually been tested, a group that is more likely to test positive and is not representative of the larger population.

But public health experts were quick to debunk the doctors’ findings as misguided and riddled with statistical errors — and an example of the kind of misleading information they are forced to waste precious time disputing.

https://www.kqed.org/news/11814749/bakersfield-doctors-dubious-covid-19-test-conclusions-spread-like-wildfire

So if you were in their situation and had family or friends in the UK, you wouldn’t attempt to join them? You know for certain that no one there might just have a case to apply to  reside in the UK? Sure, most probably won’t but as human beings surely they have some rights, atleast the right to apply...How you can say you have zero sympathy is quite beyond me! 

There is a reason why there are next to no Syrians in the Calais camps and that is because they have a legitimate claim to asylum which they naturally exercise well before getting to France. After all, if you have a legitimate claim, why would you spend months in the miserable conditions of the camps in northern France?

People have the right to apply to come to the UK of course they do - but from wherever they happen to be. If in France, register with the French authorities and lodge an application. That so few do, lends credence to the expectation that the majority in Calais are in it for the main chance to earn black money in the UK.

Anyhow, we are straying from the topic in question - except that infected migrants from Calais may be pushing up the positive rates in Kent - all illegal migrants who are detained by the authorities are tested for COVID-19.

As mentioned many times, this was wrong for Germany - they measure their deaths in the same way we do and they had been including deaths at care homes from the start. Do you have any source for Italy or the US? 

Gavin said test results take up to 7 days to come through but he quoted the following:

UK data

• Number of tests - 64,463


• People tested - 57,006


• Positive - 6,111

Confirmed rate for positive tests has increased to 10.72%

Lets be careful here. Your quite correct that these tests are taking place outside of hospital - however, let’s not forget what can appear mild at the start could become problematic later on. Those positives over the last few days could see an increase in hospital admissions in 10-14 days. We saw with BJ that initially he reported mild symptoms and within 10 days he was in intensive care.

With positives tests still in the high 4ks I think it’s a terrible mistake we are going to make. Germany have eased their lockdown because they are reporting less that a 1000 cases a day AND they are testing far more than us.

Here are some charts for Germany:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/germany/

Our charts for new cases are alarming, when you look at the 7 day moving average.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/

Very true, Caz.

I have to be honest and say that prior to early March, while I was very aware as many people were at that time of what was going on with the virus overseas, at that point I wasn't really that worried at all about it being a problem in this country. There again, I am not a member of the government any more than anyone else here is and even if I or anyone else had been really concerned, there wasn't really anything that I & others could have done other than write to our MP to express our views. I seem to recall MM saying in one of the early threads that he did so in February wrt the issue of borders and whether or not they should have been closed.

That said, I still think, as I have done since March, that more attention should have been paid by HMG to the horrendous situation that was developing in northern Italy back in late Feb/early March. That was the real warning shot for me that the virus was capable of doing the same damage to human life in any European nation and developed western country as was the case in the far east. My own belief is that if HMG had taken the same kind of action as, for example, the Germans did and at the same time they did, we may well not have ended up with the kind of very high death toll that we now have in this country.

HMG’s coronavirus response has been an utter catastrophe. Reading the overseas media it is clear that our friends abroad are aghast at the incomprehensible failures of our government which have condemned tens of thousands of people to unnecessary deaths.

Some of us warned back in February and early March that a calamitous debacle was coming thanks to Johnson’s insouciance. We were ridiculed by the usual apologists. That disaster has now unfolded and there will be many more than 100,000 excess deaths before this is over.

Johnson should be on trial or dragged from Downing St by the mob. Instead, the apologists fete him and tell us that comparisons with other countries are ‘pointless’. Others try to spin this as the fault of the NHS. Others try to tell us that it’s all down to population density or present some nonsensical equation. Such bollox is an insult to the thousands who have risked their lives fighting this completely avoidable tragedy and those who have perished.

This is the most shameful and sad episode for this country in my lifetime. I am so angry about this I can barely speak about it.

Agree. And what's more, the increase in new cases coincides with the lockdown fraying at the edges. Our cases are simply not low enough to ease restrictions.

As I said, in 6 weeks time we could be in big trouble again. Where would we go from there?

Report from Imperial on Italy's exit strategy...

New report models Italy's potential exit strategy from COVID-19 lockdown

It finds that if the country returns to just 20% of mobility levels before the lockdown – mobility being a measure of people going to work, shops, visiting friends and family etc. – then deaths could rise again within just three weeks.

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/189351/new-report-models-italys-potential-exit/

(will it be widely discredited because of their philandering lockdown breaking Professor?)

I admire your passion Justin and I broadly agree with much of what you're saying.

I hope there will be an inquiry once this is (as close to as it can be) over. I think regardless of how it went and who's in charge that should be standard practice anyway. I just hope if that were to happen it wouldn't be the usual dragged out obfuscated affair that the public forgets about and findings quietly hidden away.

Ours is a shambles.. go back read the reply i left you after this one, Germany certainly are not recording deaths in the way we do!!

Highly doubt Germany are recording deaths in the way we are. It's an utter shambles the way we do it, and its no wonder our death rate is so high! 

We have to ease restrictions or there won't be an economy - lives versus livelihoods, soon becomes just lives, since a broken economy leads to poverty, sickness and death in itself.

The Government needs to make sure the resources are there for all the testing and contact tracing we need, since that is the only way to prevent cases from ballooning once more.

Ik*a are arguably the least essential shop on the planet in that they sell absolutely nothing anyone needs and lots of stuff that can be bought cheaper elsewhere,   They are the Amazon of the high street