Well Done Boris

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Re: Well Done Boris

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Re: Well Done Boris

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Dangerous to compare raw numbers. I continue to be amazed at the poor reporting in the media and by govt using raw numbers for comparison purposes. These have to be adjusted for population size, which is the convention when comparing any other public health or societal measure across nations like births, deaths, divorces etc.

Spain has around 27k deaths and a population of ~47M, so ~574 deaths per Million of population.
UK has around 34k deaths (38k if you look at ONS data), and a population of 66M. So UK has 515 deaths (or 575 using ONS data) per Million of population. Given other uncertainties and variations, it basically means we are currently about the same level of catastrophy as Spain and Italy as a single snapshot of the numbers.

However, a single snapshot is also misleading: we are on a predictable curve following a time-evolving process. That curve is now sufficiently advanced to see where the endpoints for different nations may be, in terms of minimal deaths (ignoring a now likely UK second wave). e.g. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/202 ... untry.html

Spain and Italy are both ahead of us on the curve, so the metrics above for deaths per mill of population can also be time-adjusted, so it can be safely predicted that the UK will be significantly worst hit, adjusted per Mill of population, than Spain or Italy once we get down to levels of a few% deaths above the 5 year average.

The European outlier to this is Belgium who apparently has a very high death rate. However, my understanding is that in Belgium, anyone suspected of dying form Covid, or having Covid-related complications prior to death gets counted, whereas in the UK Covid has to appear on the death certificate as the cause of death to b counted.

It seems only Germany and Eastern European countries have handled this crisis 'well' compared to the worst hit countries, which at th moment are mainly in the West. It seems the real lessons lie in learning the successful approaches taken in Australia, NZ, South Korea (only ever had a partial lockdown) and Taiwan in safe guarding their populations and their economies from the virus.
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peterc
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Re: Well Done Boris

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Lies, dammed lies and statistics. That’s the phase isn’t it.
What you can be certain of is that it’s pretty dam serious and knows no age boundary.
Also despite all the publicity in the media some people still don’t know what 2 metres looks like. Ironically I had to shout at three Chinese students who were returning to the Uni from Tesco’s and were walking three abreast and all but blocking the underpass. If I hadn’t shouted when they got to within 3 metres of me I feel sure they would have continued and all but bumped into me. They soon understood what was required.
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Re: Well Done Boris

Post by KevinW »

Peter - sorry to hear that - care free young people feeling invincible worry me. I can probably assure you that there will be very few students in October, unless there is a minor miracle. There are very few left on campus with teaching on-line and all labs currently closed, apart from those making PPE for the NHS.
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peterc
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Re: Well Done Boris

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I think we have a number of students that were trapped here or didn’t want to leave for fear of not getting back. There is certainly a fair number of students of all nationalities still around.
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clive
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Re: Well Done Boris

Post by clive »

Well, following on from Nicola's statement today, it appears that we won't be getting out of lockdown for at least another two weeks up here. Hopefully you guys are all enjoying the warm, dry weather.
Cheers, Clive.

(If I'm not here I'm in my workshop or on the golf course!)
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peterc
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Re: Well Done Boris

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Yes, but only in the garden. Gardening jobs diverting me away from finishing the rebuild of the top end of my engine.
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Phil Riley
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Re: Well Done Boris

Post by Phil Riley »

Us guys here in the Peak District had the pleasure of a visitor yesterday. A short road trip just had to be done – Under strict distancing rules, of course!

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