Coronavirus update - NO MORE RESTRICTIONS

[xsnaggle]

Probably due to population density and number of cases

Understand about popiulation but they said it would take longer to set up the 0n-line programme in Wales. Why didn't they just use the same programme as England? I really don't get it,. It's like the north Wales Trust 'deciding' not to use the system rolled out by the welsh governemtn. Why is that even allowed to happen?

[xsnaggle]

Test kits are been centrally administered by Public Health England so you better ask the English butt, they were accused of stealing our test kits as they didn't have hardly any at the time and we would have had loads in comparison after the ensuing row Westminster put Public Health England in charge of coordinatating test kits for the four home countries.
It has to be said this Westminster Government are really making a mess of this crisis and it's costing lives.

I'm not talking about the test kits but i knew you'd explain to me why its England's fault. But I see you use the word "Alleged" so it is an accusation not a fact, thanks for that.

The point I was making is that the computer based booking system that the English NHS rolled out last week was deemed by someone in the Welsh governemnt not to be suitable for Wales and they had to test and approve a different one, which is only coming on line now and that only in the Cardiff area? The west and North don't get it until Thursday (if that happens).
So the question was why didn't they just use the same computer booking system as england?

[trampie09]

I'm not talking about the test kits but i knew you'd explain to me why its England's fault. But I see you use the word "Alleged" so it is an accusation not a fact, thanks for that.

The point I was making is that the computer based booking system that the English NHS rolled out last week was deemed by someone in the Welsh governemnt not to be suitable for Wales and they had to test and approve a different one, which is only coming on line now and that only in the Cardiff area? The west and North don't get it until Thursday (if that happens).
So the question was why didn't they just use the same computer booking system as england?

Don't you mean 'accused' ?

The English had nightmares butt with an IT system a few years ago, described as the biggest IT failure ever and all that, I think it cost the tax payer £10 billion.
You can see why the Welsh would be reluctant to follow them.

[xsnaggle]

The English had nightmares butt with an IT system a few years ago, described as the biggest IT failure ever and all that, I think it cost the tax payer £10 billion.
You can see why the Welsh would be reluctant to follow them.

The English Fighter plane planners had a nightmare in about 1942 and swansea got bombed.
Sarcasm aside it still means that North Wales, thanks to the Welsh Government might get a service on Thursday that by then the English will have had the benefit of for a week,

[the other bob wilson]

Scotland breaks ranks with the rest of the UK;-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-52457324

[xsnaggle]

Scotland breaks ranks with the rest of the UK;-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-52457324

Leaving themselves wide open for a "Fail" when everyone starts complaining there are no face masks available and people trying to flog them for a fortune on the black economy.

[trampie09]

The English Fighter plane planners had a nightmare in about 1942 and swansea got bombed.
Sarcasm aside it still means that North Wales, thanks to the Welsh Government might get a service on Thursday that by then the English will have had the benefit of for a week,

The Swansea blitz was in 1941 butt.

[xsnaggle]

The Swansea blitz was in 1941 butt.

lol There you are, the english reacting too late again. (nice google by the way)
Still doesn't explain why the Welsh Administration is a week late does it butt?

[trampie09]

Scotland breaks ranks with the rest of the UK;-

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-52457324

I've actually seen it regularly written English people saying they wish Nicola Sturgeon could be their Prime Minster.

[xsnaggle]

I've actually seen it regularly written English people saying they wish Nicola Sturgeon could be their Prime Minster.

lol you are just amazing lmfao

[trampie09]

lol There you are, the english reacting too late again. (nice google by the way)
Still doesn't explain why the Welsh Administration is a week late does it butt?

Trust in the system working, the English authorities have form with IT NHS systems failing catastrophically.

[xsnaggle]

Trust in the system working, the English authorities have form with IT NHS systems failing catastrophically.

Thats not a reason its a cop out. The system is up and working, the welsh one isn't and still wont be for another 2 days. No excuse for that
I think the real reason is that they stopped it because they know they wouyldn't be able to do the tests because there are no testing stations in the right places. Again a responsibilty of the Welsh government. They were offered Army assistance to do this some time ago and said they didn't need it.
Bit like Jenkins and his 5000 tests a day fiasco.

[trampie09]

Thats not a reason its a cop out. The system is up and working, the welsh one isn't and still wont be for another 2 days. No excuse for that
I think the real reason is that they stopped it because they know they wouyldn't be able to do the tests because there are no testing stations in the right places. Again a responsibilty of the Welsh government. They were offered Army assistance to do this some time ago and said they didn't need it.
Bit like Jenkins and his 5000 tests a day fiasco.

The army are helping the Welsh NHS, I seen the Welsh secretary praise them the other week.

Who is this Jenkins person you speak of anyway ?

[xsnaggle]

The army are helping the Welsh NHS, I seen the Welsh secretary praise them the other week.

Who is this Jenkins person you speak of anyway ?

Mea Cupla Gethin

[xsnaggle]

I see yet another Heath Trust has been under reporting by not bothering to use the Govenemt on line procedure. Amazing!!!

[Elwood Blues]

It's tough to work out what sort of figure we're talking about here. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here, but my understanding is that the running total figure of deaths we hear at the daily briefings includes up to date figures for care home deaths in Scotland and Wales, but not England and Northern Ireland. So, if that's right, then the current figure of 21,092 includes care home deaths in Scotland and Wales, but not those in England and Northern Ireland from 17 April onwards - apparently, the daily figures being shown now up to that date include care home deaths in England and Northern Ireland.

With the announcement today of care home deaths for the fortnight 10-24 April, it's hard to get any accuracy on what this means for that 21,092 figure, but here's what the head of the health analysis and life events division at the ONS had to say this morning as reported in the Guardian's rolling Live COVID19 coverage;-

"Nick Stripe, head of the health analysis and life events division at the ONS, has been speaking to the BBC about today’s coronavirus death figures released this morning. He said there have now been around 27,000 excess deaths - that is more deaths than you would expect on average for this time of year - in the four most recent weeks for which figures are available.

Of the 12,000 excess deaths in the most recent week (see 9.42am), he said that around 25% of those did not involve coronavirus being mentioned on the death certificate.

He also said that there total number of coronavirus deaths in care homes in England was probably now at least 5,500 - which is higher than the official most recent ONS figure. (See 9.55am.) He explained:

In care homes we are now seeing over three times more deaths in total in care homes, in that last week, than we saw four weeks previously. And 28% of those deaths are from Covid.

Now, we’ve also taken data from the Care Quality Commission over the last few days. The Care Quality Commission collects death notifications of all deaths of care home residents. And we have been able to compare that data against our death registrations data, and it’s a good match.

So from the 10 to 17 April, for example, we can see a very close match.

If you take that data, we can see the Care Quality Commission has figures for England of 4,343 deaths in care homes between 10 and 24 April, so much more current, that’s last Friday.

And we know that we had 1,000 deaths registered in care homes prior to 10 April.

So in total we are looking at around at least 5,500 deaths in care homes in England related to Covid by 24 April."

I see from the link Veg 1960 posted at 12.17 that the Guardian is saying that this morning's figures put the total deaths figure for the UK at over 25,000 which would put us above Spain and France leaving only the USA and Italy in front of us.

I don't think Spain's figures include nursing homes either (at least that was the case in mid April according to the Financial Times which said that Spain's real total then was over 27,000)

France does include nursing homes but I am not sure about Italy.

Nonetheless they are grim figures for all of them

[surge]

Revealed: the inside story of the UK's Covid-19 crisis: https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...P=share_btn_tw

[the other bob wilson]

Revealed: the inside story of the UK's Covid-19 crisis: https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...P=share_btn_tw

Just read that, it's very long, but worth persevering with in my opinion because it includes quotes from people at the heart of the decision making processes and I think it tries to be fair, rather than just knocking people for the sake of it.

[Rjk]

Just read that, it's very long, but worth persevering with in my opinion because it includes quotes from people at the heart of the decision making processes and I think it tries to be fair, rather than just knocking people for the sake of it.

Yes interesting article. Hopefully there will be more transparency on this once the situation improves.

[Gofer Blue]

Good to see that Astra Zeneca are joining forces with the team from Oxford who are working on a vaccine. As I said previously it is critical that we have folk with actual hands-on experience of bulk sterile products manufacturing. The prof in charge has admitted that capacity for vaccine manufacture in the UK is limited - see quote from BBC news website below. I reckon it'll take a Nightingale hospital type approach to build a facility from scratch, the planning for which is hopefully starting right now!

The partnership with AstraZeneca aims to build capacity to produce tens of millions of doses by the end of the year if the treatment is effective. "Our manufacturing capacity in the UK for vaccines isn't where it needs to be, and we're going to work together with AstraZeneca to improve that considerably," Prof Bell added. Business Secretary Alok Sharma said that the agreement was a "vital step" that could "advance" any manufacturing process. "It will also ensure that, should the vaccine being developed by Oxford University's Jenner Institute work, it will be available as early as possible, helping to protect thousands of lives from this disease," he added.

[surge]

.

[jon1959]

Here is a very powerful and personal piece by Tony Lloyd MP who survived Covid 19:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...saved-his-life

Worth reading!

[splott parker]

Here is a very powerful and personal piece by Tony Lloyd MP who survived Covid 19:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...saved-his-life

Worth reading!

Well worth reading, thanks for that

[surge]

Wales will continue its testing strategy in care homes while seeking clarification on England's latest changes, the chief medical officer says.

The new strategy in England this week will mean all staff and residents in care homes can be tested for the virus.
However the Welsh NHS is only testing those are showing symptoms.

Dr Frank Atherton said: "We're still trying to reach across to England to understand the exact rationale for the changes that they've made in various categories, given that they've made a number of changes all at the same time.

"Our approach in Wales has consistently been to follow the science, and the science is the science - it's the same across the four nations.

"So choices are made based on the interpretation of that science."

Earlier, Welsh Health Minister Vaughan Gething told a virtual meeting of the assembly's health committee he did not understand "the rationale" for how England's new testing policy would keep the public safer.

It's amazing how "the science" seems to follow each nation's capability. When England had run out of PPE it appeared that "the science" said much less PPE was needed, now England is much further ahead in testing than Wales it's appears "the science" has separated again. There's an article in The Spectator which says next step is to follow South Korea, and reason we haven't before was that state was not equipped to do so, but we know the UK was "following the science" at at the start of March when acting very differently to South Korea - perhaps something to do with not wanting to link lack of preparation to ideological Brexit or slow response to ideological shrinking of state.

I'm bored of the catchphrases. The WHO says that testing, tracing and isolating is needed and if the UK "science" says different then don't we get to know why ours is a different interpretation? Or are we just going to become more and more WHO like not as "the science" evolves but as UK develops the capability to act that way?

[surge]

The Welsh Government’s chief scientific advisor, Dr Rob Orford, has said greater testing would not have made much difference to how the coronavirus pandemic was managed in Wales.

He said the advice to socially distance, and to isolate if you or family members have symptoms, had been very effective in suppressing the spread of the disease.

And he denied that low testing numbers meant the government could not properly track the spread of coronavirus.

“We also use measures like hospital admissions, ICU beds and calls to 111,” he said.

“We have introduced the Zoe tracker app which enables people themselves to upload their symptoms. We have got over 100,000 people in Wales using that app.

“Some of the narrative in the media would suggest that we don’t have surveillance systems in place, when we do.”

I hope people know about this and are downloading it. The more people who use it the quicker we are able to think abut easing lockdown safely.