COVID19

[Marky147]

Booked in for the bloodclotter dose II next Friday.

Could have gone Saturday to make it exactly 12 weeks, but wanted the extra day in case I get the same icky 36 hours as last time.

Went to the barber yesterday, which was a most enjoyable experience after over 4 months away.

Gym on Monday, which I'm sure is likely to be the opposite

2nd dose was worse for me and the mrs. I just felt very tired the next day, mrs had full on flu symptoms but lasted less than two days

I had what your Mrs had with the first, though not full on. I had some night chills on the night of the jab, as well as being fluey/achey. Slept 12, and then 10 hours, but was right as rain by the Monday.

[Doobs]

Wednesday update.

Deaths have carried on falling, but there is now a lot of fluctuation day to day.  The rate of improvement each week is around 30% a week, with roughly 20 deaths a day a week ago vs roughly 30 a day the week before.

Infections and cases still seem to be falling, but rates of improvement are now down to about 15% a week (Easter caused some interuptions, so it isn't that clear).  I saw someone claiming that R was now 1.4 or so last week.  There are cranks on both sides it seems, as that seems very unlikey on what I have seen.

Vaccinations are interesting, as first doses have fallen off a cliff.  The 7 day average has collapsed from 500k a day, 2 or 3 weeks ago, to 100k a day last week.  Most of the vaccination doses are now been used for second vaccinations of elderly people (300k a day or so).  There hasn't been a massive fall off in total vaccination doses yet.

So not much going on to justify the continuation of UK restrictions, though the following this morning from John Roberts is interesting. 

https://twitter.com/john_actuary/status/1382256588006813700

There is now some evidence that antbodies to Covid are falling among the elderly.  This might be corrected by 2nd dosed of the vaccines, and may nort reflect decreased immunity.  The elderly are already thought to have a lower benefit from vaccination.  Also the Astra Zenca vaccine has lower efiiciacy over the South African variant.  So not entirely out of the woods yet, but the levels of South African variant in the UK are still very low.  Moving to secoond doses for the vulnerable seems like very good timing in the circumstances.

There is a lot of variance in the daily numbers, but we seem to have hit a flat spot again.

Deaths in England are still around 20 a day and hospitalisations are about 200 a day.  Cases look like they are still falling, but only by about 10% over the last week. 

Vaccinations are about the same levels of last week, so still not much sign of a vaccine shortage yet.

I assume this all means that there is likely to be an increase in cases and hospitalisations as we open up, but deaths should be nothing like the first two waves.

Moving on to something else.

I have seen this before, but another study shows smoking seems to be a positive for avoiding dying of Covid.

...yet another study finds smokers much less likely to be hospitalised with COVID-19.

https://twitter.com/cjsnowdon/status/1384802146474921984

When I first saw similar in the early days of Covid, I just assumed it was bad smoking data, but am pretty sure it is a real effect now. 

I wouldn't recommend smoking going forward, even if this is shown to be true.  In the future post vaccination world, cancer and heart disease are likely to reclaim their status as the top 2 killers, and smoking signiifcantly increasesf mortality for both.  But for brief periods in the last 12 months, smoking may have been almost good for you.  It is still way more likely to give you blood clots than vaccination too.

 

Deaths are still coming down nicely

7 day average was 30 last week and now its 22

Obviously dependent where/what you are looking at

I think it is likely just timing differences.  I looked at the week up until last Wednesday to make sure there weren't any late reports.  If you look at the week until yesterday, you might see clearer falls, but you may also be just seeing missing data.  These low numbers mean variance is higher anyway, so it is probably better to look at trends from cases and hospitalisations going forward.

I have gone back and checked this.  I think it was probably just a combination of some late Easter reports and a small error (one number was 10 out) meant my numbers barely changed orginally. 

I have just refreshed everything with up to date numbers and now there is a fall from 193 cases a week to 177.  So that is an 8% drop, but statistically you wouldn't have enough evidence to claim a drop.  It may easily just be 185 cases a week with random fluctuation.  It always feels a bit of a stretch to claim changes off small data sizes; I'd much prefer to see a larger drop (say 20%) or much more data. 

The number of deaths is likely to still be falling, but not by as much as they were (we were seeing 40% falls each week not long ago).  And a 40% drop when you are seeing 1,000+ cases a week is much more likely to be genuine than a 9% drop when you seeing less than 200. 

FWIW I have been looking at deaths by date of death, if you look at them by date registered these numbers will be different.

[StuartHopkin]

Wednesday update.

Deaths have carried on falling, but there is now a lot of fluctuation day to day.  The rate of improvement each week is around 30% a week, with roughly 20 deaths a day a week ago vs roughly 30 a day the week before.

Infections and cases still seem to be falling, but rates of improvement are now down to about 15% a week (Easter caused some interuptions, so it isn't that clear).  I saw someone claiming that R was now 1.4 or so last week.  There are cranks on both sides it seems, as that seems very unlikey on what I have seen.

Vaccinations are interesting, as first doses have fallen off a cliff.  The 7 day average has collapsed from 500k a day, 2 or 3 weeks ago, to 100k a day last week.  Most of the vaccination doses are now been used for second vaccinations of elderly people (300k a day or so).  There hasn't been a massive fall off in total vaccination doses yet.

So not much going on to justify the continuation of UK restrictions, though the following this morning from John Roberts is interesting. 

https://twitter.com/john_actuary/status/1382256588006813700

There is now some evidence that antbodies to Covid are falling among the elderly.  This might be corrected by 2nd dosed of the vaccines, and may nort reflect decreased immunity.  The elderly are already thought to have a lower benefit from vaccination.  Also the Astra Zenca vaccine has lower efiiciacy over the South African variant.  So not entirely out of the woods yet, but the levels of South African variant in the UK are still very low.  Moving to secoond doses for the vulnerable seems like very good timing in the circumstances.

There is a lot of variance in the daily numbers, but we seem to have hit a flat spot again.

Deaths in England are still around 20 a day and hospitalisations are about 200 a day.  Cases look like they are still falling, but only by about 10% over the last week. 

Vaccinations are about the same levels of last week, so still not much sign of a vaccine shortage yet.

I assume this all means that there is likely to be an increase in cases and hospitalisations as we open up, but deaths should be nothing like the first two waves.

Moving on to something else.

I have seen this before, but another study shows smoking seems to be a positive for avoiding dying of Covid.

...yet another study finds smokers much less likely to be hospitalised with COVID-19.

https://twitter.com/cjsnowdon/status/1384802146474921984

When I first saw similar in the early days of Covid, I just assumed it was bad smoking data, but am pretty sure it is a real effect now. 

I wouldn't recommend smoking going forward, even if this is shown to be true.  In the future post vaccination world, cancer and heart disease are likely to reclaim their status as the top 2 killers, and smoking signiifcantly increasesf mortality for both.  But for brief periods in the last 12 months, smoking may have been almost good for you.  It is still way more likely to give you blood clots than vaccination too.

 

Deaths are still coming down nicely

7 day average was 30 last week and now its 22

Obviously dependent where/what you are looking at

I think it is likely just timing differences.  I looked at the week up until last Wednesday to make sure there weren't any late reports.  If you look at the week until yesterday, you might see clearer falls, but you may also be just seeing missing data.  These low numbers mean variance is higher anyway, so it is probably better to look at trends from cases and hospitalisations going forward.

I have gone back and checked this.  I think it was probably just a combination of some late Easter reports and a small error (one number was 10 out) meant my numbers barely changed orginally. 

I have just refreshed everything with up to date numbers and now there is a fall from 193 cases a week to 177.  So that is an 8% drop, but statistically you wouldn't have enough evidence to claim a drop.  It may easily just be 185 cases a week with random fluctuation.  It always feels a bit of a stretch to claim changes off small data sizes; I'd much prefer to see a larger drop (say 20%) or much more data. 

The number of deaths is likely to still be falling, but not by as much as they were (we were seeing 40% falls each week not long ago).  And a 40% drop when you are seeing 1,000+ cases a week is much more likely to be genuine than a 9% drop when you seeing less than 200. 

FWIW I have been looking at deaths by date of death, if you look at them by date registered these numbers will be different.

Hi Doobs

Yes, I was looking at 'by date reported'

[Marky147]

Imagine what Twitter would have been like if we'd actually had a lockdown, and not just had boozers and salons shut

[Doobs]

I looked at this last night and it still seems mad that somebody who is a doctor and has gone to both Oxford and Cambridge can think like this.  She is like a one person exception that proves the rule that people who become doctors or go to Oxford/ Cambridge are usually the most intelligent peopke in society,

https://twitter.com/ClareCraigPath/status/1385260749094854663

Is there any explanation for the case fatality rate dropping like this, other than dilution with false positive results?

It is now, apparently, 1/5th as deadly as it was in February.

Assuming this is a genuine question, and it wasn't just some mad conspiracy theory that was introduced to play to the audience.  

If you vaccinate nearly all the most vulnerable people to a deadly disease, and your vaccine has good efficacy, then a lower proportion of the same people will die from the deadly disease.  In addition the people who are getting severe Covid will now be a lot younger on average, and the young have had a much better chance of surviving Covid than the old.  Now cases are very low we could see a false positive effect, but you wouldn't assume a CFR from tiny numbers of deaths was a reliable number anyway.  Well not if you were a "lover of data" anyway.

Going forward, we should see very low levels of Covid deaths in the UK even if hospitalisations do pick up.  And hopefully we'll keep on top of vaccinations, and keep on improving treatments, so we don't have to lockdown again because of this illness.  Though given the restrictions we currently still have, then having low mortality rates may not be the guarantee against lockdown I thought it was.

 

[Doobs]

Imagine what Twitter would have been like if we'd actually had a lockdown, and not just had boozers and salons shut

Barbers are open now?  I was just waiting for the rush to end before getting my hair sorted.

Click to see full-size image.

Don't think I'll be visiting many pubs whilst my hair looks like that.

[Doobs]

OMFG

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Get 50 grams of ground sheeps liver for £45 a pop.  You get 15g of kidney and some other cheap meats too.

Guess the £150k for the film, and the £5k a month from patreon wasn't enough?  Think of the children.

[Marky147]

OMFG

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Get 50 grams of ground sheeps liver for £45 a pop.  You get 15g of kidney and some other cheap meats too.

Guess the £150k for the film, and the £5k a month from patreon wasn't enough?  Think of the children.

That just takes me to his page.

Clare Craig is an absolute crackpot, and it's surely nailed on she is struck off by the time this is done.

[Doobs]

OMFG

https://twitter.com/FatEmperor?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Get 50 grams of ground sheeps liver for £45 a pop.  You get 15g of kidney and some other cheap meats too.

Guess the £150k for the film, and the £5k a month from patreon wasn't enough?  Think of the children.

That just takes me to his page.

Clare Craig is an absolute crackpot, and it's surely nailed on she is struck off by the time this is done.

Less than £50 Marky and 15% off if you click the link.

https://mobile.twitter.com/FatEmperor/status/1385584908542922753

[Marky147]

And nowwwwww, the end is near... 

[Doobs]

https://mobile.twitter.com/john_actuary/status/1385559945463140354

Numbers with Covid still falling according to ONS.

You can see the trend over the last month.  You can also see the problem with reporting trends going forward.  If the confidence level is 0.05% and the drop is 0.04% in England, then we can't confidently say if we are seeing drops or random noise.  Away from. England the confidence levels are much bigger.



Meanwhile, morons going to moron

https://mobile.twitter.com/LozzaFox/status/1385599199216013318

I’m busy that day, I’m afraid.
There’s no need to “vaccinate” the healthy.
Much as there was no need to quarantine the healthy.
This stupidity needs to stop.

[Marky147]

He's another moron, probably revelling in the fact he has anyone paying attention to him.

[Doobs]

He's another moron, probably revelling in the fact he has anyone paying attention to him.

Don't think many are; Count Binface is leading all the loony candidates in the polls.  Binface has the best policies anyway.  FACT

[Marky147]

He's another moron, probably revelling in the fact he has anyone paying attention to him.

Don't think many are; Count Binface is leading all the loony candidates in the polls.  Binface has the best policies anyway.  FACT

Who is Binface, some random that has thrown his hat in?

[Marky147]

Double.