I was expecting things to be much worse by now than they are. My family are laughing at me saying "i told you so". Anyone else thinking the UK might not ever see the numbers that Italy have had?
Posted Mar 10, 2020, 3:42 PM UTC
1250
We're lagging behind by about 10 days from Italy, around 7 from Germany, France and Spain.
18
We kind of aren't. UK is doing aggressive contact tracing which appears to be paying dividends and limiting the spread outside London. Its around the 250/300 mark in all the other big European countries where it started to jump, while its fairly linear each day in the UK. Its what has kept the numbers low in SK, but they are being even more aggressive with the contact tracing and along with ramping up the testing.
There will be a jump tomorrow though given the change to test anyone with Pneumonia symptoms, irrespective of them being in ICU.
Big problem UK has is that our closest neighbours i.e. France, NL, are doing very little to limit it, so we will have a 'Italy' as a neighbour within a week.
11
It is anything but linear, the number of tests have nearly halved over the past few days.
We're also only testing patients in critical care or people that have come in contact. Other suspected cases are just self isolating meaning we'll naturally have lower figures. The US for example is doing nearly no testing but community transmission if widespread.
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Unless you also stop travel internally, that wouldn't help, it's already here and spreading
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Actually, no... we are https://mobile.twitter.com/MarkJHandley/status/1237119688578138112
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It is not accurate to compare sporadic spread across England with a concentrated outbreak in Lombardy. Better to compare Greater London. I figure we're 2-3 weeks behind Italy.
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[deleted]
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Do you know where i can find the number of cases Italy had 10 days ago?
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24/02 - 229
25/02 - 322
26/02 - 453
27/02 - 655
28/02 - 888....
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Looking at day to day increases/decreases is wrong, its better to look at overall trends.
18
Wait until we start testing more people. Bear in mind that in a lot of cases, people aren't being tested until they need serious medical intervention. The Wolverhampton patient who passed away yesterday wasn't even in Sunday's statistics, so had not been confirmed until after 9am Sunday, but was dead by 4pm Monday. Which suggests that people exhibiting milder symptoms, not requiring hospitalisation, may be drastically under-represented at present. Once we start seeing test results coming through from the expanded testing criteria that have just been introduced, it may be that we get a clearer picture of how many cases there are.
In other words, your expectations may be accurate - it could be that the detection of cases is not keeping up with reality.
We should have a clearer picture emerging in the next few days. Hopefully our fears won't be realised and it will all blow over, but it isn't really helpful for people to laugh at people's fears and act superior when it is the preventative actions of the more cautious, through handwashing and social distancing, that will actually slow the spread. It's like the people who claim that the Millennium Bug wasn't real because most electronics were fine - when it was actually the preparedness and precautions taken by those who foresaw problems and took action to prevent them that led to things being fine, not an inherently lower risk than they anticipated.
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And especially after that doctor in Liverpool or whatever didn't self quarantine when he should and could have treated 400+ patients while infected, should expect better from a "professional"
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But he would have gave his hands a bloody good washing while singing happy birthday.......
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Don't forget for the full deep clean needed to stay infection free...... when your done singing, sing it again. We'll be rid if this nasty germ in no time!
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The UK will be under national lockdown in less than a month.
12
Would you like to bet on this?
With our culture and lifestyle, a national lockdown will never happen
When was the last time the army enforced a nationwide curfew in the UK
Telling entire cities to stay at home and not go into work would absolutely end our economy
-9
That isn't the lockdown I meant. I was referring to the same as Italy. Going to work and groceries allowed. But no intercity travel etc or gatherings with police patrols.
This I will happily bet on.
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It had never happened in Italy since WWII.
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I'm more concerned about keeping people alive than the economy. Huh, maybe that's me being weird though.
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Unfortunately our government doesn’t work that way.
You do know, the first thing to happen is people lose their jobs. This is already happening at some airlines
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Can't work if you're dead though.
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We have community spread. Give it a couple of weeks.
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Your family may laugh now but it is way too early for 'I told you so', in Wales someone had posted they have only tested around 600 people, and it took around 5 weeks approximately for other European countries to hit their peak, it may even be longer, we are still learning about this virus and definitely NOT thinking we might not ever see the same numbers in Italy. The likelihood is that we will.
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We're pretty much on track to match Italy if the government doesn't start taking some serious action.
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Give it 2 weeks.
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London and soon the north east is about to explode. They'll see soon enough
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Why the North East in particular? Relatively few cases found there at the minute.
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One person who was diagnosed got it via transmission spread possibly at a local doctor's. The government around this area has been particularly lax and there's been no mention of contact tracing in the area.
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Thanks for confirming. I don’t disagree, but I’m sure there’s plenty community transmission elsewhere too.
I thought your answer might relate to the Metro system (Newcastle’s tube) which is rammed everyday and presumably infected people are using every day. Or we could believe Sadiq and declare the Metro/Tube risk free...
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I wasn't talking about newcastle. Sunderland to be exact. As for Sadiq, i'm left leaning and even i think he's a complete ignorant twat.
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... And our test results currently have a four day lag due to backlogs.
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Didn't know this?
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Test results targets are 1-2 days but have slipped to up to four days
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No source provided. Assume bullshit.
-5
Lol we will be soon
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I dunno, extended testing & 10 or so days should tell.
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I fucking hope so I’m much rather look like a paranoid twat than endure what’s happening in Italy.
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Absolutely, i am feeling hopeful these past few days.
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Well, I'm not feeling your optimism, but I really hope you are right.
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We've not peaked here yet, but I was reading an article today written by a scientist.. He was saying to expect similar numbers to Italy in the coming weeks.
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I wish you were right, but it is too soon to celebrate.
Have a look at this tweet for how long we are lagging behind Italy: https://mobile.twitter.com/MarkJHandley/status/1237119688578138112
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I am led by evidence. So far it seems the number of new cases in UK is lower than I predicted it might be. This is good.
Factors could be
- Good contract tracing
- Natural British social distancing. We do not hug or kiss much.
- That cases were caught early so no big cluster spreading.
- Hand washing message more effective
0†
I'd love to believe this, but the proportion of positives today was the highest yet, and the number of tests done was low (1200ish). I think we need to wait a little longer to see how we differ from Italy.
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The UK is doing a decent job so far as testing is broad and the numbers remain low all the same. Things could still get worse, just more slowly than has done in Italy.
-2
They have admitted it's spreading in the community but refuse to test people unless they have been abroad or had contact with a confirmed case, or are seriously ill in hospital. The real numbers are more than that. They are not testing as many people as they did 2/3 days ago.
The first we'll know is a spike in deaths, not in confirmed cases
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Then why haven't we seen a rise similar to France and Germany who have tested similar amounts?
3
Good question, the doc in the ama said that it was obvious that community transmittion was occuring in UK 7 days ago, and we are now 2 dozen severe cases away from being overwhelmed already. This would mean most are going to developing symptoms soon.
We're going to see a big spike, just a matter of when. Could it be France/Germany had more patient zeros? Everything is speculation at the moment but lessons from China and Italy are worrying.
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This has barely begun. It would be a great relief to not see Italy's numbers but I fear thats not the case. Infact with the steps (or lack of) our government are taking I wouldn't be surprised to see us overtake Italy's numbers. Our layout of towns and cities differs quite substantially from Northern Italy's. It's very easy to isolate the mountain towns as they are fairly spaced out and usually only have a few roads in and out. In the UK our towns tend to merge into each other somewhat and have multiple roads and back roads in and out. Our population density is over double vs Italy too.
No one should be saying 'I told you so' at this stage. Not one of us knows for sure how this is going to pan out.