So, coronavirus...

[tabascoboy]

Really noticeable this morning in the supermarket that many fewer people are wearing masks - not just shoppers but staff too. More than half I'd say. I wore mine but honestly may not bother for much longer.

[sturginho]

After two years successfully avoiding the fucker, I've finally caught the fucking rona....

Hope everyone is OK, sturginho.

At least you have the game on Sunday to cheer you up

Thanks for reminding me!

[convoluted]

Five (more) people with Covid-19 have died ... in New Zealand (yesterday) the Ministry of Health says ...'Our thoughts and condolences are with the patients' family and friends. Out of respect we will be making no further comment' the Ministry said.

Translation: "We will not inform the public that these five were rather elderly / very obese / very fragile / riddled with comorbidities / or possibly all four ... thereby allowing us to Maintain The Fear."

[JM2K6]

Yeah, fuck anyone who is fat or old or has literally any kind of health problem eh.

[dpedin]

Contrary to popular belief the dreaded covid hasn't gone away! I hear that some modelling is suggesting another potential wave, there are some serious concerns about some new variants emerging which seem to be more serious in causing ill health/hospitalisations running alongside the vaccine waning. Numbers are creeping up. Fingers crossed!

[sefton]

Contrary to popular belief the dreaded covid hasn't gone away! I hear that some modelling is suggesting another potential wave, there are some serious concerns about some new variants emerging which seem to be more serious in causing ill health/hospitalisations running alongside the vaccine waning. Numbers are creeping up. Fingers crossed!

Best hope there is nothing to this as this government will let it rip through the population before they make a move, their political issues in Parliament take priority.

[tc27]

Guessing we might see restrictions tightened in a devolved area first?

[dpedin]

Guessing we might see restrictions tightened in a devolved area first?

First time Scotland has had more cases per 100k than England since September last year, which was driven by earlier return of schools. Last 2 weeks has seen increase in cases in Scotland, suggestion I have heard is that this is being driven by new omicron variant and possibly waning of vaccinations? We now have to rely on ONS study as other testing data is unreliable ie not sure how many folk are reporting as positive LFT for example. Fortunately Scotland has the highest % of population vaccinated of all the UK countries, 6% more of eligible pop than in England for example, so hopefully the corresponding increase in case numbers won't see a big increase in hospitalisations and deaths. However there is an uptick in both in Scotland so this doesn't augur well for rest of UK. From what I have heard we will see similar across rest of UK.

[mat the expat]

I was speaking to my Mum back in the UK yesterday and mentioned there wasn't much in the news now that the Ukraine situation dominates.

Hong Kong possibly heading back to Lockdown again - what is the real go in the UK?

[Enzedder]

Five (more) people with Covid-19 have died ... in New Zealand (yesterday) the Ministry of Health says ...'Our thoughts and condolences are with the patients' family and friends. Out of respect we will be making no further comment' the Ministry said.

Translation: "We will not inform the public that these five were rather elderly / very obese / very fragile / riddled with comorbidities / or possibly all four ... thereby allowing us to Maintain The Fear."

Except of course everyone was mentioned with their co-morbidities and everyone died WITH covid. Just depends where you get your information from really.

[Guy Smiley]

Five (more) people with Covid-19 have died ... in New Zealand (yesterday) the Ministry of Health says ...'Our thoughts and condolences are with the patients' family and friends. Out of respect we will be making no further comment' the Ministry said.

Translation: "We will not inform the public that these five were rather elderly / very obese / very fragile / riddled with comorbidities / or possibly all four ... thereby allowing us to Maintain The Fear."

Except of course everyone was mentioned with their co-morbidities and everyone died WITH covid. Just depends where you get your information from really.

The Sonny Blount School of Doing Gooder in Life?

[SaintK]

After two years successfully avoiding the fucker, I've finally caught the fucking rona....

Yep, me too as of this morning. Slight sore throat and a snotty nose
Hosted a sponsors lunch at my club on Saturday and with 2 teams at home the club was very busy
Oh well!!!

[Mahoney]

Shit.

[CM11]

Number of people in hospital testing positive for covid is a meaningless statistic now that it's endemic.

We saw in Jan that up to 50%, if not more, covid hospital patients were not being treated for covid.

[CM11]

That said, any overall increase is still not positive and we're seeing it here too. As people become more and more comfortable with less and less vigilance this was bound to happen. The hope is that it doesn't have a huge impact and seasonality kicks in this year as the virus, hopefully, settles into a more obvious pattern.

What's ahead for winter is anyone's guess.

[Biffer]

Number of people in hospital testing positive for covid is a meaningless statistic now that it's endemic.

We saw in Jan that up to 50%, if not more, covid hospital patients were not being treated for covid.

Nevertheless, you don't want any respiratory disease running loose across a hospital environment, so it puts extra load onto the system.

[Biffer]

That said, any overall increase is still not positive and we're seeing it here too. As people become more and more comfortable with less and less vigilance this was bound to happen. The hope is that it doesn't have a huge impact and seasonality kicks in this year as the virus, hopefully, settles into a more obvious pattern.

What's ahead for winter is anyone's guess.

I'd be surprised if there aren't some light restrictions brought back in at some point this winter for a short time.

[Mahoney]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

[CM11]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

[Slick]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

Don't! Not worth it, even in the face of a plague

[CM11]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

Don't! Not worth it, even in the face of a plague

That's my thinking alright!

I know I'll be able to resist posting initially but there'll be some day that I'll be weak and can't help myself and that'll be that.

[Slick]

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

Don't! Not worth it, even in the face of a plague

That's my thinking alright!

I know I'll be able to resist posting initially but there'll be some day that I'll be weak and can't help myself and that'll be that.

It's happening to me in slow motion, and I know it's happening. I told someone to fuck off yesterday and that's the dam broken really, I'll have to delete my account and try again in 6 months

[Marylandolorian]

Yeah, fuck anyone who is fat or old or has literally any kind of health problem eh.

and people with type A blood.

https://newatlas.com/health-wellbeing/c ... tic-study/

[dpedin]

Number of people in hospital testing positive for covid is a meaningless statistic now that it's endemic.

We saw in Jan that up to 50%, if not more, covid hospital patients were not being treated for covid.

Agree case numbers are now a meaningless statistic, the dismantling of testing and relaxing of requirement to isolate if infected means we have no track of real case numbers. However we are still in the pandemic phase of covid with local/regional/national peaks and troughs driven by new and emerging variants. Endemic means a steady state of equilibrium without large peaks of disease but we are seeing significant outbreaks in Hong Kong and Denmark at the moment, for example. It is more wishful thinking rather than PH expert opinion. Also becoming endemic doesn't mean covid severity gets lower, it could be exactly the opposite and get higher. Omicron was said to be 'milder' but that was when compared to Delta, it isn't milder than the original or Alpha variants - vaccination is doing the heavy lifting now.

[Ymx]

Is omicron not milder to the un-vaxed? Really??

Blimey I haven’t thought about covid for such a long time.

Crazy world. Each year seems to try and outdo the last.

[Guy Smiley]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

So reassuring to hear that I'm not alone. In my weaker moments I... it just feels sometimes that giving in would be easier. Just like going to sleep.

[CM11]

Number of people in hospital testing positive for covid is a meaningless statistic now that it's endemic.

We saw in Jan that up to 50%, if not more, covid hospital patients were not being treated for covid.

Agree case numbers are now a meaningless statistic, the dismantling of testing and relaxing of requirement to isolate if infected means we have no track of real case numbers. However we are still in the pandemic phase of covid with local/regional/national peaks and troughs driven by new and emerging variants. Endemic means a steady state of equilibrium without large peaks of disease but we are seeing significant outbreaks in Hong Kong and Denmark at the moment, for example. It is more wishful thinking rather than PH expert opinion. Also becoming endemic doesn't mean covid severity gets lower, it could be exactly the opposite and get higher. Omicron was said to be 'milder' but that was when compared to Delta, it isn't milder than the original or Alpha variants - vaccination is doing the heavy lifting now.

I was referring mostly to the UK and Ireland but fair post.

It doesn't feel very pandemicy at all here. Hospital numbers crept up without much fanfare and we've all but dismantled our emergency PH team.

[CM11]

He discusses the possibilities at length in the thread.

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

So reassuring to hear that I'm not alone. In my weaker moments I... it just feels sometimes that giving in would be easier. Just like going to sleep.

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

[Tichtheid]

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

So reassuring to hear that I'm not alone. In my weaker moments I... it just feels sometimes that giving in would be easier. Just like going to sleep.

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

I have Scottish folk musicians and Scottish rugby feeds on Twitter and very little else, oh some stuff on trees and guitar making too.

One of the above has a negative impact on my mental well-being.

[dpedin]

Number of people in hospital testing positive for covid is a meaningless statistic now that it's endemic.

We saw in Jan that up to 50%, if not more, covid hospital patients were not being treated for covid.

Agree case numbers are now a meaningless statistic, the dismantling of testing and relaxing of requirement to isolate if infected means we have no track of real case numbers. However we are still in the pandemic phase of covid with local/regional/national peaks and troughs driven by new and emerging variants. Endemic means a steady state of equilibrium without large peaks of disease but we are seeing significant outbreaks in Hong Kong and Denmark at the moment, for example. It is more wishful thinking rather than PH expert opinion. Also becoming endemic doesn't mean covid severity gets lower, it could be exactly the opposite and get higher. Omicron was said to be 'milder' but that was when compared to Delta, it isn't milder than the original or Alpha variants - vaccination is doing the heavy lifting now.

I was referring mostly to the UK and Ireland but fair post.

It doesn't feel very pandemicy at all here. Hospital numbers crept up without much fanfare and we've all but dismantled our emergency PH team.

In Scotland there are currently 1509 people in hospital who have recently tested positive for the virus - 69 more than yesterday, and 283 more than a week ago. This is back up to the numbers seen in mid January. Yes many will be in hospital for other reasons but the same could have been said last week or in January - the number of positives are going up by a good number. Thankfully ICU numbers aren't rising by as much but we need to watch to see for time lag. Currently averaging about 17 deaths a day, last week average was 12. Hopefully this is just a blip due to the relaxation of restrictions and the general 'covid has gone' attitude of many but ...

[CM11]

I don't want to come across as covid isn't a thing but if you looked at deaths per week for people with the common cold it wouldn't be zero. The ICU figures are telling and it's not clear to the layman how serious covid currently is. There's no impression here that it's a major concern over normal viruses in its current state but I don't know how reliant on vaccines that is and as we know vaccines wane quickly. Is the rise due to that or just everyone has it and are in hospital for unrelated reasons?

[C69]

As someome who works with extremely vulnerably patients and ventilation, Covid is a real problem for my cohort.
People are dying of it daily albeit in far less numbers and far less people getting really sick.

[GogLais]

Granted it’s anecdotal but I’m hearing about significantly more friends and friends of friends having the Covid in the last two or three weeks, although none seriously ill as far as I know.

[Calculon]

Is omicron not milder to the un-vaxed? Really??

Blimey I haven’t thought about covid for such a long time.

Crazy world. Each year seems to try and outdo the last.

Pretty sure there's been a few studies indicating that omicron is intrinsically milder than the original variant.

[MungoMan]

Twitter are forcing me to sign up to read more than a couple of posts. I'm not giving in. Yet.

Don't! Not worth it, even in the face of a plague

That's my thinking alright!

I know I'll be able to resist posting initially but there'll be some day that I'll be weak and can't help myself and that'll be that.

Moi auusi. tw@tter has thus far received a strident get fúcked from me and I cannot see that changing.

[MungoMan]

So reassuring to hear that I'm not alone. In my weaker moments I... it just feels sometimes that giving in would be easier. Just like going to sleep.

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

I have Scottish folk musicians and Scottish rugby feeds on Twitter and very little else, oh some stuff on trees and guitar making too.

One of the above has a negative impact on my mental well-being.

We chop down trees
We make guitars
We go to the lavat'ry
We listen to folk music
Then watch rugby after tea.

Which bit has you reaching for the shotgun?

[Biffer]

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

I have Scottish folk musicians and Scottish rugby feeds on Twitter and very little else, oh some stuff on trees and guitar making too.

One of the above has a negative impact on my mental well-being.

We chop down trees
We make guitars
We go to the lavat'ry
We listen to folk music
Then watch rugby after tea.

Which bit has you reaching for the shotgun?

Got to applaud that effort.

[Slick]

So reassuring to hear that I'm not alone. In my weaker moments I... it just feels sometimes that giving in would be easier. Just like going to sleep.

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

I have Scottish folk musicians and Scottish rugby feeds on Twitter and very little else, oh some stuff on trees and guitar making too.

One of the above has a negative impact on my mental well-being.

How do you keep the random tweets and “suggestions” away though? I set mine up specifically for hill walking and AF beer, then got drawn into rugby, but half the timeline is random and provocative stuff. Can’t keep on top of it spend half my time blocking and saying I’m not interested

[Biffer]

Twitter is one of the worst things that's happened to society in human history. It does have some great stuff but the pile ins far outweigh the good.

I have Scottish folk musicians and Scottish rugby feeds on Twitter and very little else, oh some stuff on trees and guitar making too.

One of the above has a negative impact on my mental well-being.

How do you keep the random tweets and “suggestions” away though? I set mine up specifically for hill walking and AF beer, then got drawn into rugby, but half the timeline is random and provocative stuff. Can’t keep on top of it spend half my time blocking and saying I’m not interested

Set to 'latest tweets' instead of 'home'. That helps massively I've found. Just get the tweets of the people I've followed, in order. Plus ads.

[Slick]

Genius Biffer! Thanks