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Buses: I took the 218 from Hammersmith to Acton yesterday. Packed with secondary school children not wearing a mask, on the balance of probabilities one or two will currently have covid. Glad I wore an fpp2 mask instead of a surgical mask I would usually wear. Cases: hard to compare numbers,yes we do a lot of testing, but last time I looked our positivity rates weren’t lower than other Western European countries (high positivity rates imply insufficient testing)Hospitalisations: whilst vaccination reduces risks of infection, hospitalisation (more so) and deaths (even more so) the vast majority in hospital have been double vaccinated. Most are over 80, but even for 50-59 year olds over 70% of hospitalisations are for those double vaccinated. For 60-69 year olds it’s 80 %. And this is not due to low raw numbers but hundreds a week.  Even for deaths about half of 50-59 year olds were double vaccinated. Counting deaths: also problematic yes, but if we look at excess deaths in 2020 it looks like,if anything, we undercounted those dying due to covid. For me, simple mitigation’s such as mask wearing in shops/on transport, some distancing or covid passports would not be too burdensome at all. In fact I would  feel a greater sense of freedom. I’d be happier to go out more, and spend more money. There must be many who think like me. I think not only would there be less people in hospital, less deaths but it would also be better for business and the economy.

David Turner ● 892d

In response to Alan’s post: All the data shows a recent widening gap between the UK and other Western/Northern European countries for cases, hospitalisations and deaths. eg see the FT analysis https://www.ft.com/content/34582534-4510-4d45-bcba-2f9e04005309Part of the reason for our high number of cases is because cases have rocketed in secondary school children since the start of school in September but of course few of these cases end up in hospital (though I read recently that 2 or 3 children are dying each week in the UK from covid which if true seems to have gone largely unnoticed). Inevitably some of these children have given covid to other family members which is probably why case numbers for adults in their forties has risen, and there are early signs that this is now reaching over 60s. It is interesting that numbers in hospital (not hospitalisations) in France are on a par with ours. Part of that may be a lag effect: case numbers between us and Europe have only really widened since the summer and it takes a few weeks from infection to becoming so ill that someone is admitted. I wonder also if average hospital stay is longer in France. The reasons for the diverging trends between us and europe etc is obvious. 1) we are relying almost entirely on vaccination, rather than additional mitigations such as masks, covid passports, distancing.2) we were late to start vaccinating teenagers who are now rapidly spreading the virus in schools (where there are few if any mitigations, unlike comparable EU countries)There is also a suggestion that the AZ vaccine, which we used more widely than the EU, is less effective than Pfizer in preventing transmission of the delta variant. I do wonder what the government strategy truly is and suspect it might be along the lines of herd immunity/live with it and a hope that cases etc stabilise at the levels they’ve now reached. But I fear we are heading for a very tough winter, already the NHS emergency response service is overwhelmed, and it can only get worse.

David Turner ● 894d