Many people, if the alternative is to be restricted to your house all day.

TBH David Icke could be the leader of the New Brexit Party and its acolytes would still hoover up the drivel unquestioningly. 

Seems to me he looks at the evidence and comes to a view.

Anyway, from tomorrow I can go out and spread the virus without the slightest care in the world - all I have to do now is stay alert while I do it. A better slogan would be:  'In the 1940s we fought for five year and never surrendered, in the 2020s we 'fought' for five weeks and it was all just too difficult for the govt to lead us so we surrendered'.

Here is a decent analysis of that message.

https://www.pscp.tv/w/1YpJkQzVwRMKj

Yup

Bang on. Explained very succinctly 

The responsibility moves to the public from tomorrow.

I'm aware that tonight's "speech" is pre-recorded but I would love Boris to say "Oh b***ocks to all this, if you think you can do a f***ing better job, I quit!".

That would be so British and my respect for him would go up a million fold. 

Maybe we British are indeed more 'I quitian' than 'Churchillian' these days....

Ontario cases down and a small amount of re-opening https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ontario-covid-19-may-10-1.5563581

Tentatively this looks encouraging. If we can visit provincial parks from tomorrow that would be a major plus for the kids although we'll probably have to be pretty careful. Some hardware stores are now open and interestingly we were able to purchase a small number of face masks at one without difficulty. On the negative side the care home situation is shameful, some terrible stories.

Also although this report talks about an outbreak in a hospital there is a possibly significant number from the mass testing of staff

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-western-hospital-declares-another-covid-19-outbreak-1.5563524

From the article "...they believe Toronto Western is doing the most testing of any hospital in the country. She says about three per cent of all tests done on staff come back positive." The bit in italics is interesting - I would expect health workers to be more likely to have COVID-19 than the general population and so that number seems low. This would suggest to me that it's not at all widespread in the general population here.

Italy

• 802 new cases


• 165 new deaths

No, should be if you think you see you next Tuesday's can do a lot better. Would love that.

What? Is it the way I tell em!

Looks like they're on top of it now. Will be interesting to see how they fare with the phased removal of their lockdown

Your assumption in the first paragraph is undermined by what follows, isn't it?  If the R value is already above one then any easing can only push it higher and Germany will be staring at a second wave within 2-3 weeks and having to tighten the rules again within a month.

I see no reason to think any country will defy the basic arithmetic associated with the SARS-Cov2 virus.  Obviously a vaccine is the magic key but until then the virus remains contagious and R>1 spells bad news.

Yep, and even the official ones are to an extent if looked at in isolation. We have absolutely no idea how many young and other asymptomatic people have had it, possibly worldwide. Until we have a portion of the population tested for anti-bodies that is statistically significant we are pissing in the wind.

Well he realises he can't. It would completely ruin the whole legacy he has been trying to create for himself, almost since birth. Churchill didn't quit under far greater pressures and dilemmas which means he can't. 

Yes I agree that is the likely outcome. The UK should watch and learn. 

I have no idea why you think the musings of a climate scientist should carry such weight in an entirely different field of science where he has no expertise whatsoever.

But that aside, the actual paper on which he bases that piece is hugely more nuanced in its conclusions.

"As severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) spreads, the susceptible subpopulation is depleted causing the rate at which new cases occur to decline. Variation in individual susceptibility or exposure to infection exacerbates this effect. Individuals that are frailer, and therefore more susceptible or more exposed, have higher probabilities of being infected, depleting the susceptible subpopulation of those who are at higher risk of infection, and thus intensifying the deceleration in occurrence of new cases. Eventually, susceptible numbers become low enough to prevent epidemic growth or, in other words, herd immunity is attained. Although estimates vary, it is currently believed that herd immunity to SARS-CoV-2 requires 60-70% of the population to be immune. Here we show that variation in susceptibility or exposure to infection can reduce these estimates. Achieving accurate estimates of heterogeneity for SARS-CoV-2 is therefore of paramount importance in controlling the COVID-19 pandemic."

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.27.20081893v1

Today's report from Germany's RKI

The current estimate is R= 1.13 (95% prediction interval: 0.94- 1.35)

Since yesterday, the estimate of the reproduction number R is greater than 1. The interpretation of this development must take into account that these estimates are linked to a degree of uncertainty as reflected by the prediction interval published daily together with the reproduction number. Due to statistical fluctuations, which are amplified by the overall lower number of cases, it is therefore still not possible to assess whether the decreasing trend in the number of incident cases observed over the past few weeks will continue or whether case numbers will again increase. The increase in the reproduction number R makes it necessary to observe the development very closely over the coming days.

https://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ/N/Neuartiges_Coronavirus/Situationsberichte/2020-05-10-en.pdf?__blob=publicationFile