Is Boris’s Lax Leadership Putting Us All in Danger ?

[Carana]

In the SAGE paper from 11 Feb, large gatherings weren't deemed to be much of a risk.

My jaw dropped when I read it, but in fact the "Patient 31" bombshell in South Korea was only discovered over 18-20 Feb.

So fair enough, they didn't know that much about the virus at the time (although they should have had a good idea how quickly it could be transmitted after the Hannah Fry documentary last year - and it's in their dossier).

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/873748/12-spi-m-o-consensus-view-on-public-gatherings.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_South_Korea#20_January_%E2%80%93_17_February

Then, I get to this:

12 March.
The main input from the nudge team re banning large public gatherings was that media coverage of them being banned elswhere but not in the UK might result in criticism of the government for not undertaking potentially effective measures. 

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/874289/13-spi-b-insights-on-public-gatherings-1.pdf

Now... where did I put my jaw?

[Mr Gray]

Justice
These socialist governments put the UK’s coronavirus response to shame
Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead
Yesterday
Are left-wing governments better at handling the Covid-19 crisis?


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Being able to count the number of new Covid-19 cases on one hand seems like a faraway dream for countries like the UK.

For New Zealanders though, it is a reality. While it is a much smaller country than the UK the news was still staggering: on the 27th of April, the country reported just five new Covid-19 cases, and said was ‘currently eliminated’ from its shores. It has justifiably elevated New Zealand to a status of global adoration and envy.

Announcing that New Zealand had “won the battle” against widespread community transmission, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the nation would continue to hunt down the last few cases.

Since she came into power in October 2017, NZ Labour’s Jacinda Ardern has advocated putting the wellbeing of citizens before traditional bottom-line measures like productivity and growth.

Referring to capitalism as a “blatant failure”, Ardern said measures used to gauge economic success “have to change” to take into account “people’s ability to actually have a meaningful life.”

The desire to put people before the economy has been evident in Ardern’s response to the pandemic. Their lockdown measures were introduced early in a bid to keep cases low.

And with fewer than 1,500 cases recorded and just 19 deaths, according to figures from the John Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Centre, New Zealand’s strict preventative measures appear to have been a success.

Disease elimination

A major driver in New Zealand’s success was its decision to pursue an elimination strategy rather than the mitigation approach.

In the mitigation approach, stricter interventions were introduced as the pandemic worsened to “flatten the curve.” But in the NZ ‘disease elimination’ approach, strict measures were implemented early on to thwart disease transmission.

Those measures continued for a month and, by doing so, essentially extinguished many chains of Covid-19 transmission.

This elimination strategy contrasts to the UK’s less decisive response, with the government’s delay in enforcing lockdown slammed as having cost lives. In contrast, the UK’s dithering start has led to a more chaos and deaths.

The preparedness of health systems around the world has been another defining component of the effectiveness of Covid-19 responses. Britain’s health service, which has been drastically underfunded in ten years of crippling Tory-imposed austerity, has been described as being “unprepared for a pandemic” with an insufficient number of beds, equipment and staff being linked to the country’s high number of Covid-19 death rates.

New Zealand’s well-funded healthcare system stands in marked contrast. In 2018, Ardern’s government announced a ‘people’s budget’ which saw billions more dollars put into health and education. The ‘people’s budget’ was focused on rebuilding vital public services, particularly the health care sector.

Portugal’s socialist government Covid-19 response success

Another relative pandemic ‘success’ story has been Portugal. Despite having third highest population in Europe of 80+ year-olds, Portugal has witnessed the lowest pandemic mortality in Europe.

Like New Zealand, Portugal has had a firmly progressive agenda since its left-wing government came into power in 2015. Unlike elsewhere in Europe, Portugal has reversed austerity policies while overseeing economic growth. 

Since 2015, Portugal has boldly cast austerity aside and has subsequently enjoyed a major economic revival. Similar to New Zealand, the nation’s anti-austerity approach has come at the benefit of the nation’s health service. An international survey into European national health systems conducted in 2017, found that Portugal’s National Health Service ranked higher than many other European nations, including the UK.

Jose Hernandez, assistant professor of sociology and a specialist in social health policies at the University of Cordoba in southern Spain, notes how, with a well performing health service, Portugal was better prepared for a pandemic than many of its European counterparts.

“Portugal’s greater recent investment in public health and a much more centralised health service have all helped, while greater levels of mass tourism in Spain and the high degree of mobility that goes with it could have encouraged the spread of coronavirus,” Hernandez commented.

As well as prioritising funding its healthcare system that would have helped the country be more prepared for a health crisis, like New Zealand, Portugal’s comparative coronavirus response success is pinned on its rapid lockdown response.

Unlike Britain, whose Tory government effectively squandered its “head start” over other European nations, Portugal acted quickly in enforcing restrictions on movement, putting the welfare of its people before economic agendas.

Free of the chains of austerity, and with an clear commitment to prioritise people over the markets, New Zealand and Portugal show what a socialist-inspired Covid response looks like.

https://leftfootforward.org/2020/04/how-these-socialist-governments-put-the-uks-coronavirus-response-to-shame/

strange isnt it that the only person on the forum who claims to have a confirmed case is Rob from New Zealand

[Carana]

strange isnt it that the only person on the forum who claims to have a confirmed case is Rob from New Zealand

Poor Rob, methinks he might have been a bit too enthusiastic about squirting H202 thinking it would help. Or else he already had it.

[Venturi Swirl]

strange isnt it that the only person on the forum who claims to have a confirmed case is Rob from New Zealand

Hmm, it is strange.  It’s also worth noting that NZ’s population density per sq km is 18 while England’s is 259, but I’m sure it’s only because of their nice “socialist” lady PM that they were all spared the covid nightmare.

[faithlilly]

strange isnt it that the only person on the forum who claims to have a confirmed case is Rob from New Zealand

I have two friends, both care workers, who have had it. One is still ill after a month. I also have a friend whose grandfather had it, thankfully he recovered.

[Venturi Swirl]

Gosh, New Zealand isn’t absolutely perfect

“Others, while supportive of the restrictions, have criticised New Zealand’s general health preparedness, highlighting the country’s extremely low intensive care capacity. The number of ICU beds per 100,000 people was 5.14 in New Zealand, compared to 8.92 in Australia and 12.5 in Italy.

The low ICU capacity perhaps bolstered the government’s case for swift action, lest the nation’s hospitals be overrun.

Yet because of this, New Zealand’s entire public health system has come under fire. The system is highly devolved, with power largely ceded to 20 elected District Health Boards.

As the crisis wore on, these health districts - and the government - copped flak for not knowing how many ventilators they had and mismanaging the distribution of crucial PPE to frontline health workers, among other problems.

The problem became so acute, the Auditor-General was hauled in to investigate.

And that was before the largely invisible Health Minister David Clark was demoted by Ardern after admitting he took his family to the beach during the lockdown.


Then on Monday the government quietly released a report slamming its early contact tracing efforts. The report found a system so threadbare that it became overloaded by fewer than 100 daily cases in the early days of the pandemic. "The timeliness of the process was poor," the report said, detailing a two-day average lag between a positive COVID-19 test and contacts being told to self-isolate.

Politically, none of this is helped by the fact that Australia seems to have tackled COVID-19 just as well as New Zealand without closing down every Bunnings, McDonald’s drive-through and takeaway coffee cart in the country.

Even at the slightly more relaxed level three lockdown - which will start on Tuesday - hairdressers will still be closed as will normal shopping. Businesses can open, but transactions must be contactless, this means online ordering and pick up or deliveries. The cash will be a lifeline for some small businesses, but for many it will be too little, too late.”

[Mr Gray]

i saw areport today which unfortunately i disnt save.....it claims that the results from autopsies in italy show that the  appraoch by the medical profession is wrong. Respirators are not the answer...anti imflamatories are. The rate amongst those suffering rheumatoid arthritis is low because tehya re already taking anti imflamatories. The damage in the lungs is caused by blood clotting so anti imflamatories and blood thinnners are the way forward.

if its true then we cant blame Boris if the whole medical profession has it wrong

[Carana]

I don't care what party she's from, I just think she's handled it well. The fact that it was spreading through Asia might have been a red flag before it was elsewhere. The fact that it has a low population density has no doubt helped as well.

[Venturi Swirl]

I don't care what party she's from, I just think she's handled it well. The fact that it was spreading through Asia might have been a red flag before it was elsewhere. The fact that it has a low population density has no doubt helped as well.

She has handled it well but NZ is a very different country from the UK in very many ways, and what worked for them may not have worked so well for us.  Is South Korea a socialist country?  I don’t think so, and they seem to have coped quite well too.  Trying to score cheap political points out of this crisis continues to make me heave.

[Carana]

i saw areport today which unfortunately i disnt save.....it claims that the results from autopsies in italy show that the  appraoch by the medical profession is wrong. Respirators are not the answer...anti imflamatories are. The rate amongst those suffering rheumatoid arthritis is low because tehya re already taking anti imflamatories. The damage in the lungs is caused by blood clotting so anti imflamatories and blood thinnners are the way forward.

if its true then we cant blame Boris if the whole medical profession has it wrong

I remember Fauci (possibly someone else?) addressing the issue recently as well. I can't remember all of it - but there were cases where people seemed to be on the mend then deteriorated within hours and died. Thrombi and cardiac arrests come to mind.

In the UK, doctors networking found that if patients had to be intubated, there was a substantially better outcome if they were placed on their stomachs. I'm not sure if it was only ventilated patients who ended up with thrombi, though. I zap around too much.

[Carana]

Welll, I'm an Obama kind of girl. He's a Democrat, but I find he was fairly centrist.

He got both Obamacare through AND pulled the US out of the recession.

AND he warned about the need to prepare for a pandemic years ago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBVAnaHxHbM

I find Merkel and Trudeau have been sensible as well, over the years.

[Carana]

Brietta will appreciate this one. 

What Do Countries With The Best Coronavirus Responses Have In Common?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/avivahwittenbergcox/2020/04/13/what-do-countries-with-the-best-coronavirus-reponses-have-in-common-women-leaders/#5e6713be3dec

[Carana]

In politics, centrism is a political outlook or specific position that involves acceptance or support of a balance of a degree of social equality and a degree of social hierarchy, while opposing political changes which would result in a significant shift of society strongly to either the left or the right.[1]

Wiki.

I don't have a problem with that definition.

[Venturi Swirl]

“The government should not be frightened to admit it has made mistakes and tried things that may not have worked. When a scientific experiment fails, its findings can still be useful and lead to better, successful experiments. We do not yet know why Britain appears to be having a worse pandemic than other countries. To what extent does having the most densely populated city in Europe, and a hub of international travel to boot, make us more vulnerable? How important, relatively speaking, will it turn out to be that we place so many of our old people in care homes? Maybe it was wrong to abandon testing and tracing in March but, as we did not have the capacity to continue, it sounds like a strictly theoretical objection. Did we lock down too late and is that the biggest error? Perhaps. I don’t know. Neither do you.”
Philip Collins, today’s Times

[Carana]

That resonates with me, VS.

Paradoxically, perhaps, I feel more reassured by someone / or a body (a name that springs to mind is Andrew Cuomo) - who states the reality of the situation and the projected solution, than others who are so defensive or spin-oriented that I no longer have a clue what the reality actually is.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm alone in thinking that...

No, I'm rereading that...