Should restrictions be eased fully if Indian Variant case rates do not decline before June 21st?

[Bantamzen]

He cant go out much if the moron thinks that the population of Wales wants social distancing to continue. I was in Wales for a week back in May and saw very little social distancing.

Very few people round here follow it either. Still got the odd plank or 2 who still leap in the road when you pass them though.

I get the impression Drakeford doesn't like the outside much.

 

[NorthOxonian]

He cant go out much if the moron thinks that the population of Wales wants social distancing to continue. I was in Wales for a week back in May and saw very little social distancing.

Very few people round here follow it either. Still got the odd plank or 2 who still leap in the road when you pass them though.

If he tries to continue social distancing for the rest of the year, I expect Gloucester and Chester will become very busy. Particularly with Welsh young people enjoying distinctly undistanced nightclubs!

 

[westv]

You are all granny killers!!

 

[Andyh82]

At that point you have to start asking what the long term plan is. Are the proponents of social distancing seriously suggesting it should contine for another year? Another 5 years? Forever?

I'm glad at least that he is being upfront about the fact he doesn't intend to drop social distancing this year (it's always easier to push these things through as "short extensions"). But he seems to be totally detached from everyday reality if he thinks that there is no appetite for it to be scrapped. Perhaps he should speak to pub landlords and see what they think.

If the media was doing its job right, you’d now hear from landlords, festival organisers etc who won’t be able to survive if social distancing continues, but you won’t, the reporting angle will be that Drakeford’s response is correct, then Sturgeon will do the same, and any kick back won’t come until Johnson suggests the same.

 

[52290]

Mark Drakeford now dropping hints that Social Distancing likely to remain in Wales to the end of 2021.



If it continues beyond the summer the chances of it ending at the end of the year are zero. In the middle of winter. I know it will then be "we cannot relax restrictions at a time when the NHS is under most pressure". Glad I don't live in Wales and I certainly won't be holidaying there. Trouble is I expect Sturgeon to follow suit which will then put pressure on Boris to do likewise and in my experience he always caves into pressure.

It should be either, Mark, Nicola or Boris or Drakeford, Sturgeon or Johnson.

 

[brad465]

Here we go, the ONS infection survey, after many weeks of not getting significant media coverage, is now because cases are up two thirds and the now named "Delta variant" is dominant in that:

Covid infections rise by two-thirds in UK - ONS

Increasing numbers of infections are likely to be caused by the so-called Indian, or Delta, variant.

www.bbc.co.uk

The number of people infected with coronavirus in the UK has risen by as much as two-thirds, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) says.

It estimates that around 100,000 people tested positive in the week to 29 May, or one in 660 people - up from 60,000 the previous week.

A growing proportion looked like they were the Delta variant, first detected in India, the ONS said.

Infections were rising most steeply in England and Wales.

A further 6,278 confirmed cases in the UK were announced by the government in official figures on Friday, with 954 people in hospital with Covid and 11 deaths recorded.

This equates to a large increase in cases from a low base, but hospital admissions and deaths are down slightly compared to last week.

Increased testing for the so-called Indian variant, or Delta variant, as it's been named by the World Health Organization, in hotspot areas may mean this spike looks larger than it really is.

The article does recognise surge testing in hotspot areas makes the spike look larger than it actually is, but that's not in the click-bait.

 

[duncanp]

Looking at today's dashboard, cases are up nearly 40% week on week, but hospitalisations and deaths are down (-2.2% and -5.2% respectively)

This suggests to me that the vaccines are having a significant effect in keeping people out of hospital, and preventing serious illness and death for those that are admitted to hospital.

I do wonder whether the time has come, or will come shortly, when it is no longer appropriate to routinely test people who don't have any symptoms.

Perhaps this will happen after all adults have been offered one dose of the vaccine.

This will presumably affect the figures, and I would be interested to know what proportion of the cases who tested positive yesterday were asymptomatic.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Looking at today's dashboard, cases are up nearly 40% week on week, but hospitalisations and deaths are down (-2.2% and -5.2% respectively)

This suggests to me that the vaccines are having a significant effect in keeping people out of hospital, and preventing serious illness and death for those that are admitted to hospital.

I do wonder whether the time has come, or will come shortly, when it is no longer appropriate to routinely test people who don't have any symptoms.

Perhaps this will happen after all adults have been offered one dose of the vaccine.

This will presumably affect the figures, and I would be interested to know what proportion of the cases who tested positive yesterday were asymptomatic.

NHS England publish daily figures here (dashboard lags 24hrs and more over weekends) and whilst admissions, hospitalisations and mechanically ventilated have stopped declining over last few weeks they aren't showing an overall uptrend. Actually metrics have become quite erratic up one day back down next and even in North West there is no definitive up trend.

Below is age profile of recent cases upto 30/5 should be giving govt good confidence that the vaccination programme is doing exactly as the scientists said it would and actually getting young people natural immunisation takes away the moral dilemma about whether they should be vaccinated.



Govt need to sit tight and no need to say anything for another 10 days by which time they will have accumulated another 1 to 1.25m with full protection.

 

[brad465]

Looking at today's dashboard, cases are up nearly 40% week on week, but hospitalisations and deaths are down (-2.2% and -5.2% respectively)

This suggests to me that the vaccines are having a significant effect in keeping people out of hospital, and preventing serious illness and death for those that are admitted to hospital.

I do wonder whether the time has come, or will come shortly, when it is no longer appropriate to routinely test people who don't have any symptoms.

Perhaps this will happen after all adults have been offered one dose of the vaccine.

This will presumably affect the figures, and I would be interested to know what proportion of the cases who tested positive yesterday were asymptomatic.

Tests carried out have notably dropped off in recent days, probably because of half term. What will be interesting is how much they go back up by afterwards as an indication of how much people care about this now; testing peaked between schools returning in March and Easter, but never returned to those levels after the Easter holidays, even though the twice weekly free tests' initiative was introduced by then.

Hospital admissions will need more time to see if there's a trend, but if a return to declines over the next few days emerges, or at least flatlining relative to rising cases, this will certainly look good.

 

[Bald Rick]

Govt need to sit tight and no need to say anything for another 10 days by which time they will have accumulated another 1 to 1.25m with full protection.

By the time the announcement is expected on June 14th, there will be another 3.5m people with full protection compared to now, ie those who have had their second doses between 15-24 May (and allowing the three weeks to take effect). Plus 1.9m people who had their first vaccination in the same time frame.

Hospital admissions will need more time to see if there's a trend, but if a return to declines over the next few days emerges, or at least flatlining relative to rising cases, this will certainly look good.

It is hospital occupancy that is the key measure, not admissions; I think it is unlikely we will see a decline anytime soon. It has been hovering between 870 and 960 for the last three weeks, and there’s hasn’t been time for the recent notable increase in infections to feed through. However I think if the increase is relatively small, then we’ll be ok. The interesting thing is hospital occupancy in the areas most affected. Occupancy in th North West has increased by 20-25% in the past 2 weeks, whereas for the rest of England it is broadly static or even falling slightly. Given what infection rates have done for the last couple of weeks in the North West I’d guess that hospital occupation will rise another 25-50%. If that happened nationwide it wouldn’t be an issue, in my view.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

It is hospital occupancy that is the key measure, not admissions; I think it is unlikely we will see a decline anytime soon. It has been hovering between 870 and 960 for the last three weeks, and there’s hasn’t been time for the recent notable increase in infections to feed through. However I think if the increase is relatively small, then we’ll be ok. The interesting thing is hospital occupancy in the areas most affected. Occupancy in th North West has increased by 20-25% in the past 2 weeks, whereas for the rest of England it is broadly static or even falling slightly. Given what infection rates have done for the last couple of weeks in the North West I’d guess that hospital occupation will rise another 25-50%. If that happened nationwide it wouldn’t be an issue, in my view.

Mechanical ventilation has been broadly static in England over the last two weeks and whilst not declining like it has been it demonstrates the vaccine is moderating the worst impacts of the virus as forecast by the scientists. To my mind this variant arriving is inconvenient but actually it is helpful because it demonstrates we are building resilience and this should give scientists and govt confidence that unlocking won't have the terrible consequences we saw previously.

 

[johncrossley]

On the Last Leg on Channel 4 they mentioned there are contingency plans being drawn up to delay the next unlocking by two weeks.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

On the Last Leg on Channel 4 they mentioned there are contingency plans being drawn up to delay the next unlocking by two weeks.

Not appeared in broadsheets yet though as headline. DT is headlining that over 25's will be invited for vaccination from next week and in same article it mentions that a two week delay has been discussed by govt as a contingency so lets see if that is testing the water.

 

[Andyh82]

On the Last Leg on Channel 4 they mentioned there are contingency plans being drawn up to delay the next unlocking by two weeks.

The discussion that followed wouldn’t go down well here, basically saying Boris was wrong to want to proceed with the 21st June when a ‘third wave’ is just starting, and Wales and Scotland are not proceeding.

 

[Jonny]

The discussion that followed wouldn’t go down well here, basically saying Boris was wrong to want to proceed with the 21st June when a ‘third wave’ is just starting, and Wales and Scotland are not proceeding.

At least one of those devolved nations is probably aiming for zero covid on the sly. Sadly, that is not happening.

 

[big_rig]

At least one of those devolved nations is probably aiming for zero covid on the sly. Sadly, that is not happening.

The biggest lie so far in this in my opinion has been politicians saying they aren’t going for zero covid, and that case numbers don’t matter. All of the leaders in the UK have said this now yet they continually go for the panic button when push comes to shove.

 

[bramling]

The biggest lie so far in this in my opinion has been politicians saying they aren’t going for zero covid, and that case numbers don’t matter. All of the leaders in the UK have said this now yet they continually go for the panic button when push comes to shove.

Boris simply doesn’t have the right mind to be able to defend a position, his whole career is based on making people laugh, and this simply doesn’t work for a health pandemic, let alone one where over 100k people have died (especially when a yardstick of 20k deaths was declared as a good outcome). So for over a year we’ve essentially gone wherever the wind has blown us. “Follow the science” just doesn’t work as science will essentially deliver whatever outcome is asked of it, which therefore means politicians have to make decisions.

As for the other two, I suspect Sturgeon has, at times at least, been playing a “Scotland could have eliminated this within its borders if only it wasn’t for England/the Tories/Westminster” - and we all know what the logical next step from that is.

This leaves Wales, where to be fair Drakeford does seem to be doing what he thinks is genuinely right. Just that I think this is increasingly disconnected from what people are actually doing. Neither has it been any more successful - the firebreak was a disaster, and the more populated parts of Wales have fared just the same as England if not worse. Whilst someone could probably construct an argument to say this is somehow England’s fault, this might stand up to scrutiny in Newport, but not in Merthyr or Swansea!

 

[brad465]

On the Last Leg on Channel 4 they mentioned there are contingency plans being drawn up to delay the next unlocking by two weeks.

Not appeared in broadsheets yet though as headline. DT is headlining that over 25's will be invited for vaccination from next week and in same article it mentions that a two week delay has been discussed by govt as a contingency so lets see if that is testing the water.

The front page of the i comes closest to this description:



Most other papers reporting on this are focusing more on accelerating vaccine rollouts than any potential reopening delays.

 

[johnnychips]

Boris simply doesn’t have the right mind to be able to defend a position, his whole career is based on making people laugh, and this simply doesn’t work for a health pandemic, let alone one where over 100k people have died (especially when a yardstick of 20k deaths was declared as a good outcome)

But he does, though I disagree with it. He has increased his votes in mid-term elections, won a by-election and is popular: people have short-term memories and the vaccination programme is undoubtedly and especially successful.

What has Labour got to offer: ‘We completely agree with you but perhaps you should have done it a week or two before’

 

[takno]

But he does, though I disagree with it. He has increased his votes in mid-term elections, won a by-election and is popular: people have short-term memories and the vaccination programme is undoubtedly and especially successful.

What has Labour got to offer: ‘We completely agree with you but perhaps you should have done it a week or two before’

So he can still win elections mostly due to a poor opposition and a lot of luck in timing. Meanwhile there's basically no grownups running the government at all, which is kind of the more important job he needs to be doing

 

[bramling]

But he does, though I disagree with it. He has increased his votes in mid-term elections, won a by-election and is popular: people have short-term memories and the vaccination programme is undoubtedly and especially successful.

What has Labour got to offer: ‘We completely agree with you but perhaps you should have done it a week or two before’

This says more about the quality of the opposition parties than it does about Johnson. You’re right though, he does seem to have held up a certain amount of popularity - goodness knows how.

Then again, people are easily fobbed off.

 

[londonteacher]

Delaying opening up until every adult has been offered their first dose of the vaccine is probably not a bad thing. It would be a week or two at the most at current vaccination rates and seems a good compromise to, as people on here and the marches in London put it, regain our freedoms.

 

[yorksrob]

I think that if they do decide to extend measures longer term (I would be very much against this) there really needs to be dispensation for hospitality to operate at capacity.

 

[philosopher]

But he does, though I disagree with it. He has increased his votes in mid-term elections, won a by-election and is popular: people have short-term memories and the vaccination programme is undoubtedly and especially successful.

What has Labour got to offer: ‘We completely agree with you but perhaps you should have done it a week or two before’

Labour in my opinion, should be heavily attacking the Tories on why England is in a position where the 21st June easing looks like it either will be delayed or watered down to the extent it is rather meaningless.

I would have thought criticising Boris Johnson over his delay on putting India on the red list for what appears to have been an attempt to save a trade summit with the Indian PM would be a very easy target for Labour. However Sir Kier Starmer seems to have been completely silent on this.

Putting India on the red list earlier would probably not have prevented the Delta variant becoming dominant, however it may have delayed it by a few weeks, buying extra time to vaccinate more people which would have allowed the roadmap to stay on target.

 

[takno]

Labour in my opinion, should be heavily attacking the Tories on why England is in a position where the 21st June easing looks like it either will be delayed or watered down to the extent it is rather meaningless.

I would have thought criticising Boris Johnson over his delay on putting India on the red list for what appears to have been an attempt to save a trade summit with the Indian PM would be a very easy target for Labour. However Sir Kier Starmer seems to have been completely silent on this.

Putting India on the red list earlier would probably not have prevented the Delta variant becoming dominant, however it may have delayed it by a few weeks, buying extra time to vaccinate more people which would have allowed the roadmap to stay on target.

I've not been following the news particularly closely, but isn't this exactly what they have been doing?

 

[birchesgreen]

I've not been following the news particularly closely, but isn't this exactly what they have been doing?

Indeed they have been doing it repeatedly.

 

[westv]

But he does, though I disagree with it. He has increased his votes in mid-term elections, won a by-election and is popular: people have short-term memories and the vaccination programme is undoubtedly and especially successful.

mid term elections?

 

[bramling]

Labour in my opinion, should be heavily attacking the Tories on why England is in a position where the 21st June easing looks like it either will be delayed or watered down to the extent it is rather meaningless.

I would have thought criticising Boris Johnson over his delay on putting India on the red list for what appears to have been an attempt to save a trade summit with the Indian PM would be a very easy target for Labour. However Sir Kier Starmer seems to have been completely silent on this.

Putting India on the red list earlier would probably not have prevented the Delta variant becoming dominant, however it may have delayed it by a few weeks, buying extra time to vaccinate more people which would have allowed the roadmap to stay on target.

It does seem to have been an open goal for Labour - regardless of how much truth there may or may not be to it, I'd have thought constructing a narrative which blames the current impasse on Johnson failing to secure the border to people arriving from India would have worked quite well politically.

 

[brad465]

This says more about the quality of the opposition parties than it does about Johnson. You’re right though, he does seem to have held up a certain amount of popularity - goodness knows how.

Then again, people are easily fobbed off.

I put it down to our education system and his personality being somewhat "lovable". Our education system, bar maybe in Grammar schools, does not teach enough critical thinking, nor how to analyse, challenge, debate and come up with solutions to problems and information. I expect this is deliberate to keep a certain class of politicians and lobby groups holding the balance of power, and Johnson's personality getting him elected is a perfect symptom of the consequences. Anyone who looks up his career history (i.e. dismissals for lying and proposing brilliant ideas that don't get anywhere near to being delivered) knows he's far from suitable for politics, and certainly not leading a genuine crisis like a pandemic.

The same flaws in our education system perhaps could also have prevented many of the restrictions being put in place, as more of the population would have wanted to see evidence they do more good than harm, assessed their sustainability and not fallen for soundbites and media scaremongering. I wouldn't be surprised if Sweden having less restrictions in place over the whole pandemic to date is a demonstration of this.

Whether restrictions are eased on June 21st depends a lot on who sways Johnson the most (like with every other decision to date during all this). If SAGE and the media throttle a strong narrative to delay proceedings he'll cave in and delay, but if enough of a Tory rebellion brews to try and stop a delay, and the media overall are negative about a delay, then he might just go ahead as planned.

 

[Jonny]

Delaying opening up until every adult has been offered their first dose of the vaccine is probably not a bad thing. It would be a week or two at the most at current vaccination rates and seems a good compromise to, as people on here and the marches in London put it, regain our freedoms.

I think you misunderstand the point of the marches. The point, ultimately, is that the restrictions are the choice of a politician or, rather, politicians. The point is to get politicians to stop impinging on liberty, or seeking to impose conditions on it. Some of them are on a zero-covid ego/power trip, I can only speculate as to their underlying agenda (but most likely to get more votes or look ^compassionate^).