COVID-19 (Coronavirus) discussion

SexyGreyFox said:
You said the other day you weren't five, make that 4.
Honestly if you still believe after all this time that Covid isn't a thing then there's no hope for you.
OK if we go down your route of 'a version of the flu' do you accept it was a really bad version of the flu or do you think me and my colleagues are paid actors and told lies for the Government?
Oh and we're still telling lies about this 'version of the flu'.
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It wasn't a really bad version of flu just another variation.
 
GIBURROWS said:
It wasn't a really bad version of flu just another variation.
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Considering flu can polish off 10s of thousands a year in the UK with a widespread vaccination program of the vulnerable even "just flu" is pretty bad in an unprotected population.

But no COVID isn't another variation of flu. Different pathogen, different disease.
 
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GIBURROWS said:
It wasn't a really bad version of flu just another variation.
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Troll, you really are a nasty piece of work.
When was the last time you knew of hospital mortuary's full to the brim?
When did you see hospital pharmacy freezers & fridges emptied to get dead patients in them?
When was the last time you saw 15 plus wards full to the brim of flu patients?
When did you last see a hospital come to a halt with all outpatient appointments cancelled and non urgent surgery cancelled?
When did you last see at least 50% of the hospital workforce on sick leave for flu?
You have zero idea what went on.
 
Rroff said:
Something which seems to have been largely lost sight of with COVID - there was 2 variants early on in Wuhan (S and L), one of those was causing much more serious disease and is the source of many of those early scenes of lines of people on supplemental oxygen, etc. - I can't remember exact numbers now but it peaked at like 17% of cases in the UK or something and similar in Europe and was virtually extinct by December 2020 losing out to the Alpha and then Delta variants for domination. Additionally we now have a better understanding of the disease and can save more people.

Additionally something I've said before I think there is a factor there that there was(is) a proportion of the population more vulnerable to the disease, not through existing health or age but more like genetics, who've largely either now died or recovered with some immunity - a lot of early modelling of the disease looked at the impact as if a more uniform thing across the population.

I don't think we are any better, possibly actually worse, prepared should a similar disease emerge which was more deadly but just as capable of spreading, far too many people just can't envision the reality of it I think and in some ways COVID will have made some people even more complacent.
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Yes I remember. The very first wave hit those infected quite severely from reports but I'm unsure as to why. As you said, it could be a certain genetic profile but I'd have hoped there would have been some answers for that by now. Our bodies are quite complex though so it's understandable if it takes a long time to clarify what triggered a more severe outcome initially.

As for our preparedness level, you're probably correct. I can envision less compliance if we were to go through some sort of lockdown again. I might invest in a storage unit for toilet roll and make myself filthy rich.
 
Roar87 said:
The early strain of Covid was brutal, if you knew someone who got it you wouldn't be saying that, a lot of perfectly healthy people needed oxygen and hospital treatment. The later strains were absolutely milder.
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There was reports from people who got the S strain early on where they'd go through ~3 weeks of what most of us had in ~5 days with COVID, which puts an absolutely brutal strain on the body. I really hope I don't ever get it with 1-2 weeks of fever and heavy night sweats that is just nasty - I was fortunate I only had a couple of hours of that, some of my family had a couple of days.
 
Minstadave said:
Considering flu can polish off 10s of thousands a year in the UK with a widespread vaccination program of the vulnerable even "just flu" is pretty bad in an unprotected population.

But no COVID isn't another variation of flu. Different pathogen, different disease.
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Proper, actual Flu is brutal.
 
Rroff said:
There was reports from people who got the S strain early on where they'd go through ~3 weeks of what most of us had in ~5 days with COVID, which puts an absolutely brutal strain on the body. I really hope I don't ever get it with 1-2 weeks of fever and heavy night sweats that is just nasty - I was fortunate I only had a couple of hours of that, some of my family had a couple of days.
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Currently off having tested positive and it's no where near as bad as a couple of years ago.
 
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Rroff said:
There was reports from people who got the S strain early on where they'd go through ~3 weeks of what most of us had in ~5 days with COVID, which puts an absolutely brutal strain on the body. I really hope I don't ever get it with 1-2 weeks of fever and heavy night sweats that is just nasty - I was fortunate I only had a couple of hours of that, some of my family had a couple of days.
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Yeah it was just over 2 weeks of her being about as sick as someone can get without being in hospital. She tested positive 5th May 2020 but had it late April. I've had flu and been in bed for a week with a fever and this was far worse, this was a coin flip for a lot of people.
 
Minstadave said:
Currently off having tested positive and it's no where near as bad as a couple if years ago.
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Possibly due to vaccinations and people having built up some immune response but I remember the first people going down with it, especially those at work, and they'd need all of the enforced isolation period and more to get back on their feet and would come back looking absolutely wiped out for the first 1-2 weeks - my boss went from marathon fit to barely making it through a day at work on his feet. The last time my boss had it he was only bad for 2 days really and aside from the first day back you wouldn't have known he'd been ill.

EDIT: I don't consider it basically a cold though - for every person who more or less recovers from it fine after a few days there are still a lot of people having longer term implications, and even those who think they've bounced back fine might have underlying issues they've not realised [yet].
 
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J.D said:
We have had decades of excercises like "Excercise Cygnus", The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security "Clade X" and "Event 201" plus near misses with H1N1 and MERS but still failed terribly in many critical areas. Some lessons will be learned from this but I'm almost certain it will not be enough for something with a higher CFR. Look at where Covid-19 is on this list https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_human_disease_case_fatality_rates - Now, imagine we dealt with something more menacing, the world would probably resemble an apocalyptic movie today.

As for a power back up. I bought a relatively cheap unit for power cuts, I paid £999 for it just under a year ago but you can get it for £799 now https://maxoak.uk/products/bluetti-eb240-portable-power-station - I was looking at more expensive units with a larger inverter as that's only 1000w but it's for emergency use only plus it's 2400Wh. Will run my fridge-freezer, modem, PC (browsing only), TV and a couple lights for close to 8 hours.
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Should there be some apocalyptic movie type scenario, what would a backup power source really achieve? Running a fridge? For what. To keep some perishables edible for a few days? A modem? To connect to an ISP that doesn't exist any more?. Put your lights on and your neighbours will just loot you anyway lol.

I spose doomsday prepping is all about living a bit longer than those around you in the hope that some even better prepared doomsday preppers come to rescue you.

All sounds a bit futile to me. I think growing veg and making some kind of ground well is probably better in a survival situation than having a pint of milk in your battery fridge for a week. :D
 
Hedge said:
Should there be some apocalyptic movie type scenario, what would a backup power source really achieve? Running a fridge? For what. To keep some perishables edible for a few days? A modem? To connect to an ISP that doesn't exist any more?. Put your lights on and your neighbours will just loot you anyway lol.

I spose doomsday prepping is all about living a bit longer than those around you in the hope that some even better prepared doomsday preppers come to rescue you.

All sounds a bit futile to me. I think growing veg and making some kind of ground well is probably better in a survival situation than having a pint of milk in your battery fridge for a week. :D
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There are potentially scenarios in-between that to be fair, but in an actual apocalyptic scenario yeah you are better being prepared to go to ground and live off the land kind of thing.

COVID had a very real prospect of being a highly disruptive disease on society though, where essential services might have been impossible to maintain for weeks until we'd adapted around/to it, etc. fortunately it didn't pan out like that so far.
 
Rroff said:
There are potentially scenarios in-between that to be fair, but in an actual apocalyptic scenario yeah you are better being prepared to go to ground and live off the land kind of thing.

COVID had a very real prospect of being a highly disruptive disease on society though, where essential services might have been impossible to maintain for weeks until we'd adapted around/to it, etc. fortunately it didn't pan out like that so far.
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You saw how hostile people got over bog roll, if **** hit the fan like a zombie movie then your only hope is to learn to defend yourself and hunt for food. Or roll over and be someone's dinner.

Silly OT chat though I suppose. Let's just hope we don't have to experience anything mental like that :)
 
Hedge said:
Should there be some apocalyptic movie type scenario, what would a backup power source really achieve? Running a fridge? For what. To keep some perishables edible for a few days? A modem? To connect to an ISP that doesn't exist any more?. Put your lights on and your neighbours will just loot you anyway lol.

I spose doomsday prepping is all about living a bit longer than those around you in the hope that some even better prepared doomsday preppers come to rescue you.

All sounds a bit futile to me. I think growing veg and making some kind of ground well is probably better in a survival situation than having a pint of milk in your battery fridge for a week. :D
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Probably best to have read what I've replied to first plus I did mention in that quote it was bought for emergency use for a power cut. It was nothing to do with an apocalyptic scenario as I'd rather have a loaf of bread. :D
 
Hedge said:
You saw how hostile people got over bog roll, if **** hit the fan like a zombie movie then your only hope is to learn to defend yourself and hunt for food. Or roll over and be someone's dinner.

Silly OT chat though I suppose. Let's just hope we don't have to experience anything mental like that :)
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Would be interesting around here - the farmers and/or some of the bigger estates are about as well armed as anyone in the country.

EDIT: Also kind of interesting that we are one of the highest areas for firearm density in the country (only behind some of the rural parts of Wales and Yorkshire), and the lowest for firearms incidents.
 
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sigma said:
Proper, actual Flu is brutal.
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The trouble with comparing "flu" and "Covid" is that we only call the flu "the flu" when it causes a severe version of the disease, but actually 80% of "colds" during flu season are caused by one of the influenza family of viruses (which, btw, is why you don't go and visit vulnerable elderly relatives with a cold because there's a decent chance it won't be "just" a cold if they catch it from you), and there are also many cases of infection by one of the flu viruses that are "asymptomatic". But with Covid we're talking about all the infections, including those which are mild, those which are nasty, those which hospitalise people, and those which kill. Because we've only experienced Covid in the era of molecular testing our understanding of it as a disease is quite difference from our common understanding of influenza as a disease.
 
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