The comment about Christmas being in the winter for a reason is just about the most ridiculous, unthinking, narrow minded, self-centered .... I could go on ... 🤯 ... @Pat E in Australia is preparing for Christmas just as we are .... totally bonkers statement. 🤪
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Christmas for us has traditionally been for all the kids to spend the morning swimming and playing at the local beach and then home for a roast dinner (lunch) with all the trimmings. lovely plum pudding with hot custard. 😁😁
In short, Dovefromabove my concern is that those articles are predisposed and positioned to stoke fear. You yourself couched it in "be careful if you're 50" terms, but the article no more supports being careful at 50 than mine supports being lackadaisical at 108. Indeed I have regularly seen posts on this forum from people asking if plant x will poison their pet because they read an article, and other members responding to dismiss the risk.
That's habituation. It's a human defense mechanism to deal with risk, because long term exposure to raised levels of anxiety is highly dangerous. If we as a society keep perpetuating the doom, we'll be nervous wrecks.
That lack of habituation is why people are so fixated. In general terms, flu, pneumonia, etc can kill a vulnerable person yet we don't spend each winter in a state of near panic. A significant proportion of flu infections are asymptomatic. In a bad year, the flu vaccine was less than 40% effective and 20,000 people died from it directly. Flu kills, yet we don't all panic. (Yes, I understand the difference, I'm simply referring to society's perceptions of two common viruses that can kill).
We must get our fears under control and in proportion to the risk.
Punkdoc - I understand why you say that about a little fear, but I can't ever accept that approach. Facts and supporting evidence, and honesty about assumptions, are non negotiable essentials to build credibility and trust. Obfuscation and hyperbole will always be found out, and trust will be eroded. £350 million on the side of a bus, anyone?
Even when statements/conclusions may be factually correct, if they are arrived at for the wrong reasons then they are also suspect. The BBC infographic (based on gov numbers) of deaths and hospital admissions are a case in point - stoking fear without context. It should come with a disclaimer that says "this data is wrong and the methodology is flawed".
I'm sure we all remember being told to "show our workings" in school exercise books!
Does it matter that it's called Covid? Isn't the problem the NHS pool? There is limited resource - irrespective of what the illness is, you can't (or can you?) have the NHS resource taken up by a single illness.
This particular illness has a 1:3 expansion rate (or whatever you call it) - so it doesn't take long before cases become hospitalisations that then swamp the resource.
Luckily, we already have a vaccine for flu, yet still 'n'000 die every year from it - and we all have seen in non Covid years the NHS being pressed for resource. It's not 'fear' of Covid per se (any more than it's fear of traffic that makes people use crossings) - it's being sensible and realising the resource is finite.
Figures from Wales in the last week, where COVID is now the commonest cause of death, accounting for 21% of all deaths.
You know you can't authoritatively state that it "accounts for" 21% of all deaths, unless you have access to some additional unpublished data that proves this. Co-morbidity vs mortality.
Maybe 21% is right. Maybe it's too high. Maybe it's too low. Nobody knows, because the published numbers includes people who got hit by a bus.
The virus is indeed a serious problem, I'm not arguing against that. What I'm pointing out is that, because we are not yet habituated to the risk, and the media continue the doom laden reporting, misinterpretation and over reaction is rife. This is going to cause all sorts of problems down the line. We must maintain a sense of proportion to enable us to live with this virus long term.
Whether they died WITH COVID or OF COVID, 21% is a very big number. If we want to be absolutely sure of causes of death, then we have a problem, because for many conditions [ including most cancers ] we have no idea whether they were truly the cause of death. Probably 70% of men over 75 have prostate cancer, all those men will die, is the cause of death prostate cancer?
How can you lie there and think of England When you don't even know who's in the team
Post hoc ergo propter hoc. I knew that Latin I learned in school would come in useful one day. Now, if only I could find someone who wants to know how ox bow lakes are formed and who wants a brick picking up from the bottom of their swimming pool while I’m wearing pyjamas and I feel my education will not have been wasted.
The death statistic includes anyone who died, for any reason, in the 28 days following a positive test.
If you test positive, you must isolate for only 10 days.
If you pop into A&E due to a broken leg, contract covid from your visit, recover after 10 days then fall down the stairs on day 27 and break your neck, you are still a covid death.
The error in logic is blatant.
And if we're conflating "with covid" and "due to covid", should we also include all the people who haven't been infected but died because cancer screening was suspended "due to" covid? Or do we only combine them when it suits? Isn't that "make the numbers fit the argument" exactly the thing that people rail against the government for on many topics?
The entire methodology is flawed. If you sold a health product on the same flawed claim basis, you'd be in court pretty fast. But we're all ok with that?
Sorry if this feels vociferous, but it's a bugbear of mine.
Posts
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
lovely plum pudding with hot custard. 😁😁
So @Dovefromabove @punkdoc my apologies, I did reply to you but it's vanished.
In short, Dovefromabove my concern is that those articles are predisposed and positioned to stoke fear. You yourself couched it in "be careful if you're 50" terms, but the article no more supports being careful at 50 than mine supports being lackadaisical at 108. Indeed I have regularly seen posts on this forum from people asking if plant x will poison their pet because they read an article, and other members responding to dismiss the risk.
That's habituation. It's a human defense mechanism to deal with risk, because long term exposure to raised levels of anxiety is highly dangerous. If we as a society keep perpetuating the doom, we'll be nervous wrecks.
That lack of habituation is why people are so fixated. In general terms, flu, pneumonia, etc can kill a vulnerable person yet we don't spend each winter in a state of near panic. A significant proportion of flu infections are asymptomatic. In a bad year, the flu vaccine was less than 40% effective and 20,000 people died from it directly. Flu kills, yet we don't all panic. (Yes, I understand the difference, I'm simply referring to society's perceptions of two common viruses that can kill).
We must get our fears under control and in proportion to the risk.
Punkdoc - I understand why you say that about a little fear, but I can't ever accept that approach. Facts and supporting evidence, and honesty about assumptions, are non negotiable essentials to build credibility and trust. Obfuscation and hyperbole will always be found out, and trust will be eroded. £350 million on the side of a bus, anyone?
Even when statements/conclusions may be factually correct, if they are arrived at for the wrong reasons then they are also suspect. The BBC infographic (based on gov numbers) of deaths and hospital admissions are a case in point - stoking fear without context. It should come with a disclaimer that says "this data is wrong and the methodology is flawed".
I'm sure we all remember being told to "show our workings" in school exercise books!
Figures from Wales in the last week, where COVID is now the commonest cause of death, accounting for 21% of all deaths.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
Maybe 21% is right. Maybe it's too high. Maybe it's too low. Nobody knows, because the published numbers includes people who got hit by a bus.
The virus is indeed a serious problem, I'm not arguing against that. What I'm pointing out is that, because we are not yet habituated to the risk, and the media continue the doom laden reporting, misinterpretation and over reaction is rife. This is going to cause all sorts of problems down the line. We must maintain a sense of proportion to enable us to live with this virus long term.
If we want to be absolutely sure of causes of death, then we have a problem, because for many conditions [ including most cancers ] we have no idea whether they were truly the cause of death.
Probably 70% of men over 75 have prostate cancer, all those men will die, is the cause of death prostate cancer?
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
If you test positive, you must isolate for only 10 days.
If you pop into A&E due to a broken leg, contract covid from your visit, recover after 10 days then fall down the stairs on day 27 and break your neck, you are still a covid death.
The error in logic is blatant.
And if we're conflating "with covid" and "due to covid", should we also include all the people who haven't been infected but died because cancer screening was suspended "due to" covid? Or do we only combine them when it suits? Isn't that "make the numbers fit the argument" exactly the thing that people rail against the government for on many topics?
The entire methodology is flawed. If you sold a health product on the same flawed claim basis, you'd be in court pretty fast. But we're all ok with that?
Sorry if this feels vociferous, but it's a bugbear of mine.