love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

It’s not incredibly convincing is it
https://i.postimg.cc/dVHsTyLY/D9-E66904-5-A8-F-4608-92-A7-27922967-FBE5.jpg

I had to go out (don't @ me) and it is definitely much quieter out there today. bank was only letting people in one at a time too; lots of places shuttered.

Lots of places only allowing 5/6 ppl at a time:

https://twitter.com/LeftieStats/status/1242439336878055428?s=20

Boris Johnson's favourability rating, via @YouGov, 22-23 March (changes since 17-18 March):

Favourable: 55% (+12)
Unfavourable: 35% (-11)
Don't know: 9% (-3)

— Stats for Lefties 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️ (#RLB2020) (@LeftieStats) March 24, 2020

Lol thanks don't know what happened to the link.

Obviously plenty of time for all that to come down.

I have seen plenty of "we should support the prime minister at this difficult time" around Facebook, of course later on it will be "all in the past and time to move on" and he will never be held accountable.

This is day one of this partial lockdown, give it time.

Aldi had got 2 metre individual zones marked out in tape by the tills. it was v quiet anyway

This is day one of this partial lockdown, give it time.

yeah just wait till neighborhood watch have had their bayonet training

I don't know why we're even looking at approval ratings, there's nearly five years left to run until an election, in all probability.

There are still two months left to run on the Parliamentary term that Cameron run in 2015.

I was talking to a Boris loving teaching assistant on the phone earlier who was saying nothing can prepare a country for something like this, you can't blame the PM. yep, best just copying countries that did it disastrously wrong and then try and blame it on the disobedient population when the bodies start predictably piling up. Goddamn Tory shithole country.

i've seen genuinely decent but nicey-nice Labour members giving the government the thumbs up over this shit, this is why i hate blitz spirit, people need to stay strong and hold onto their hate

i imagine what johnson and cummings are counting on is that no matter how terrible things get, johnson will still be PM when this has run its course, and will then take credit for steering us through to the other side, 'sent the virus packing' etc

FWIW I think a similar thing happened with the Tory front benches during the 2008 financial crisis, there definitely seemed to be a suspension of hostilities during the height of the emergency and Cameron seemed onboard with everything Brown did.

Open season once the dust had settled, obviously.

"I don't know why we're even looking at approval ratings, there's nearly five years left to run until an election, in all probability."

It's interesting to see what might happen to that figure as the pandemic and lockdown go on, especially at the 65+ breakdown.

Jesus Christ

76,628! I've just been sent this from someone trying to apply for universal credit UC. pic.twitter.com/DbpivvrpTv

— (((Dawn Butler))) (@DawnButlerBrent) March 24, 2020

people wise that's more than the sold-out capacity at old trafford

The wage support application site for businesses is almost certainly going to crash when it's up and running as well.

Universal Credit was already a well documented nightmare for people who are not very online, don't have a passport etc. So many staff have been cut by the DWP in the last decade it's hardly surprising its practically dysfunctional during such high demand. Whole fucking carbuncle needs burning to the ground, obv with IDS at the top of the bonfire.

They're turning the Excel Centre into a temporary hospital, which anyone who has been there will tell you is a nightmarish prospect.

why'd they shut down the fucken emirates cable car then, i'll have to get there from woolwich arsenal dlr like a normal person ffs

The idea of a gigantic exhibition shed filled with long lines of beds containing Covid sufferers is almost uniquely horrifying to me.

I want to die going in there in the best of times; to actually die in there ...

Likely to be something along the lines of this:

Serbia set up a field hospital with 3000 beds for the people that get tested positive for corona. Mass testing will start very soon on everyone. Currently we have 3 deaths, but I'm glad they reacted way faster than a lot of the other countries did pic.twitter.com/5zO4aLFxEq

— Aleksandar Krstic (@BeastyqtSC2) March 24, 2020

it's a good move to set something up, but god, how bleak to be in there, no privacy, no family visits, no space for personal belongings, constant dry coughing from all around at all times, people moaning and being sick and dying...

er, good luck, everyone

(this post brought to you from Pointing Out The Very Obvious posting services, 2020)

Serbian field hospital looks like the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony minus the people

This fucking shitshow of a government

But on Tuesday, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said those who cannot work from home should go to work "to keep the country running".

New FT piece says:

The new coronavirus may already have infected far more people in the UK than scientists had previously estimated — perhaps as much as half the population — according to modelling by researchers at the University of Oxford.

If the results are confirmed, they imply that fewer than one in a thousand of those infected with Covid-19 become ill enough to need hospital treatment, said Sunetra Gupta, professor of theoretical epidemiology, who led the study. The vast majority develop very mild symptoms or none at all.

“We need immediately to begin large-scale serological surveys — antibody testing — to assess what stage of the epidemic we are in now,” she said.

‘theoretical epidemiology’ u say

To provide the necessary evidence, the Oxford group is working with colleagues at the Universities of Cambridge and Kent to start antibody testing on the general population as soon as possible, using specialised “neutralisation assays which provide reliable readout of protective immunity,” Prof Gupta said. They hope to start testing later this week and obtain preliminary results within a few days.

huge if true, obv, but it’s not going to stop the nhs being overwhelmed in the short term is it

Yeah, even “just” 1 in a thousand needing hospital treatment is still 67k in a really short space of time.

how does this square with like whole families getting ill one after another? just a statistical outlier in the hundreds of millions who’ve been infected?

but then the vo’ study was showing something not dissimilar, right? bad time to be an armchair epidemiologist, really

Anything that leads to widespread and reliable antibody testing is alright with me.

well, yeah

Italian death toll went up again to 743 in the last 24 hours.

fuckin’ hell

:(

oh I saw an Oxford research group recruiting people with blood assay experience, but I didn't realise it was for a new research angle rather than just keeping up with existing diagnosis needs and getting some measurements for research along the way - interesting. I don't really dare to hope mass immunity already exists tbh, but very glad research is happening and very glad of anything which leads to more testing

and yes, :( re Italian death toll

seems hard to reconcile these two things, "millions of people may already have had it without knowing" and "hundreds of people are still dying of it in a country which is likely a fortnight ahead of us infection-wise"

seems hard to reconcile these two things, "millions of people may already have had it without knowing" and "hundreds of people are still dying of it in a country which is likely a fortnight ahead of us infection-wise"

This is why I'd rather not put too much stock in these statistical models, encouraging though they may be.

A housing crisis underway today. Despite @mhclg advice below, Travel Lodge is closing hotels today, (when had said Thursday), throwing out the hundreds of homeless families put there for emergency accommodation by councils. Notes under doors earlier today. pic.twitter.com/EzkpMyR7Mv

— Nearly Legal (@nearlylegal) March 24, 2020

it's all good, all be forgotten, businesses gonna business

I'd like "widespread and reliable antibody testing" but Tories have been going on about everyone getting their antibody test and going back to work and I think we need to be really sure of the "reliable" part tbh

I mean, if I was told tomorrow I'd already had it (v v unlikely, but perhaps not 100% impossible) then I'd find that interesting and reassuring for my own personal prospects, of course - but I'd want to be very, very sure I couldn't possibly be contagious (still, or likely ever again) before I went to visit my vulnerable self-isolating mother, and should we really treat going to work etc with that much less caution?

x(x)p oh dear

how does this square with like whole families getting ill one after another? just a statistical outlier in the hundreds of millions who’ve been infected?

― a struggle to make meat-snacking fit (bizarro gazzara), Tuesday, 24 March 2020 18:36 (forty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Viral load? whole families living in close proximity means increased exposure and more serious infection. Getting exposed in passing from idk a door handle could lead to minor or asymptomatic infection.

One of the 18 patients didn’t develop symptoms, yet the viral load was similar to that of the symptomatic patients, the researchers said, “which suggests the transmission potential of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic patients.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-22/one-third-of-coronavirus-cases-may-show-no-symptom-scmp-reports

Guardian reporting that 21 people died in a single London Hospital Trust in the last 24 hours - Northwick Park, which announced it had run out of critical care beds last week

Sir Quiff's almost unreadably calm and meaningless tweets explained, then? https://t.co/6txwWP13dJ

— Owen Hatherley (@owenhatherley) March 24, 2020

Soldout Boy Tell 'Em

Christ that reminds me I still need to send off my ballot vote for not this guy