By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley
First, the stupid and the innumerate. Here is a graphic being circulated by the failed far-Left cartoonist John Cook, he of the bogus “97.1% consensus” about global warming, whose own datafile showed he had marked only 0.5% of 11,944 peer-reviewed climate papers published in the 21 years 1991-2011 as saying that recent warming was mostly manmade.
Cook’s Twit account says: “I’ve been applying the critical thinking approach developed for climate misinformation to coronavirus misinformation.” Yeah, right.
Here is Cook’s latest piece of pseudo-statistical prestidigitation, posted recently on his Twit account (h/t the indefatigable Willie Soon, who reads everything and forgets nothing):
For once Cook is telling the truth, though the effect of his graphic, as captioned, is not to correct misinformation but grossly to mislead. The United States is indeed different from the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy or Spain. Its population is a lot larger.
So let us assist Mr Two-Orders-Of-Magnitude-Whoopsie by showing the same graphic corrected for population size. In the United States, deaths per million are the lowest among the five countries selected by Mr Nonsensus.
Chinese-virus confirmed cases and deaths per million population to April 26, 2020
As for the panicky, they fall into two categories: the elderly and infirm, who are afraid that the pandemic will spread uncontrollably and kill millions, and the young and wage-earning, who are afraid of the economic damage that lockdowns will cause. However, as the Book of Proverbs says, a false balance is abomination to the Lord, but a just weight is His delight. To put it another way, do the math, and do it dispassionately.
Doing the math during a pandemic isn’t easy, because the data, particularly in the early stages, are grossly inadequate. One must make the best of what little there is, while allowing for its insufficiency. At the outset, the daily compound rate of growth in confirmed cases is the key indicator. Globally outside China, in the three weeks before Mr Trump declared a national emergency, the case-growth rate was almost 20% a day. The death-growth rate was even higher.
That is why Dr Jerome Kim, director-general of the International Virological Institute, said in an excellent recent interview (h/t Mosher) that the Chinese virus is ten times more infectious than flu and ten times deadlier, and that it is the combination of high infectivity and high mortality that makes it so dangerous.
As the pandemic develops, the key indicator is the daily compound rate of growth or decline in active cases: those reported cases that have neither recovered nor died. Unfortunately, most countries’ capacity to count recovered cases is inadequate, and their methods of counting deaths vary widely.
Therefore, in the active-case graphs published here from now on, it has been assumed that everyone first reported as infected 21 days ago has either recovered or died by now. This 21-day figure is based on Verity et al. (Lancet, 2020), who find that the mean time from first symptoms to death is 17.8 days, and on an analysis of the first cohort of intensive-care cases by the Office for National Statistics.
For those who prefer a shorter period, I have included in the high-definition graphs linked at the end of this post an active-case graph assuming only 14 days from confirmation to closure of a case.
The Health Minister in the UK has admitted that at the outset HM Government had imagined the virus would be no worse than flu. If Ministers and their scientific advisors had kept a weather eye on the case-growth rate, they would have been disabused of that catastrophic notion very early on.
Finally, the virus punishes extremists on both sides of the political divide. It punishes the far Left because anyone with an open mind can see that it is the totalitarianism they espouse that caused this virus to spread worldwide. In the democracies they so hate it would have been notified to the global community within 24 hours, as the International Health Regulations require, and stopped in its tracks.
It punishes the far Right because they tend to put the economy before all things, and to ignore the daily growth rate, and thus not to take a pandemic of this kind seriously until it is far, far too late. Given that growth rate, the models that sought to maintain that the Chinese virus is no worse than the flu were manifestly wrong from the outset. No dispassionate observer should have placed – and still less should now place – any reliance upon them whatsoever.
The United States is a particularly interesting study, because the Left (as is their wont) have been clamouring for lockdowns while the Right (as is their wont) have been clamouring for deregulation. Lockdown policies vary from State to State, with the blue States locking down more actively than the Red States.
The one piece of good news that the advocates of continuing lockdowns have undervalued is the fact that those who are fit and under 60 are not at all likely to die of the virus. Now that it is known that more than nine-tenths of all deaths from the virus are in those over 60, particularly with comorbidities, it is legitimate to argue that for the vast majority of the population the virus will indeed be no worse than the flu.
Particularly since the threat of hospitals becoming overwhelmed has been averted, it is now possible to end lockdowns at once for the under-60s. Let them all go back to work, university or school, starting with those where the risk of infection is smallest, provided that they keep their distance where possible and wear face-masks so that their coughs and sneezes cannot spread the virus: the South Koreans are right about masks, as about much else.
And, now that the population are thoroughly educated in the dangers posed by the virus, let the old and the sick take whatever precautions they deem appropriate to avoid catching the virus. Since the initial data suggest that “herd immunity” may not be possible with this virus, the period of immunity in some cases having proven to be very short, there is no advantage in keeping anyone under indefinite house arrest. Let people decide for themselves how much risk they are willing to take.
In care homes, all staff and visitors should be carefully screened. There should be separate hospitals for Chinese-virus cases, to avoid nosocomial infections and thus to allow the ordinary hospitals to resume treatment of non-virus ailments at once: otherwise, mortality from failure to provide ordinary treatments could become significant.
Very large gatherings, particularly indoors, are best avoided for the time being. One beneficial effect of the Chinese virus is the cancelation of the UN climate gabfest in Glasgow this December.
With these and suchlike precautions, which are not unduly expensive, and with careful monitoring to detect and prevent a second wave such as that which struck the Japanese island of Hokkaido, leading to a second and fiercer lockdown, it should be possible to keep future deaths from the Chinese virus in the developed countries well below those from the annual flu. And keep watching the no-lockdown experiment in Sweden: its greatest test comes in May.
Today’s graphs show all countries’ graphs at a mean compound seven-day-averaged daily growth rate under 2%. It would be wisest to be particularly cautious with phasing out lockdowns in countries where the growth rate remains above zero.
Fig. 1. Mean compound daily growth rates in estimated active cases of COVID-19 for the world excluding China (red) and for several individual nations averaged over the successive seven-day periods ending on all dates from April 1 to April 26, 2020.
Fig. 2. Mean compound daily growth rates in cumulative COVID-19 deaths for the world excluding China (red) and for several individual nations averaged over the successive seven-day periods ending on all dates from April 8 to April 26, 2020.
Ø High-definition Figures 1 and 2 are here.
And finally …
Why Cook failed as a cartoonist
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Mr Astley’s link to the New York Times report is most helpful. The advantage of a pre-existing vaccine is that clinical trials to ensure safety are not needed. Trials to ensure efficacy are a rather quicker and less problematic process. It would indeed be very welcome news if the trials confirmed that BCG is the way forward.
Dear Christopher,
Children suffering, many who do not test positive to a virus.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8260399/NHS-issues-doctors-urgent-alert-coronavirus-related-condition-children.html
The symptoms are the same as for Carbon Monoxide poisoning. A common killer in a population confined in cold climates.
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/carbon-monoxide/symptoms-causes/syc-20370642
A link to an interesting PDF. Still at the source so have only glanced over it quickly.
chrome-extension://mhjfbmdgcfjbbpaeojofohoefgiehjai/index.html
My apologies for screwing the link up. Don’t know what I was thinking as it’s only my first wake up cup of coffee.
https://theinfectiousmyth.com/book/CoronavirusPanic.pdf
I agree that the test rate is surprising. In the UK we see the following reported as of yesterday:
Tests people positive deaths
Daily 37,024 26,355 4,310 360
Total 719,910 569,768 157,149 21,092
Some people, particularly health service people, are tested more than once. What this shows is that about 21% of those tested are positive.
These are all hospital tests.
To get tested at all you in the UK, until a few days ago, you had to be in effect diagnosed positive by a physician. Your initial contact either with emergency services or your physician will result in your presenting at hospital, and the hospital will then decide that you merit testing and will do it.
So it is very curious that with such apparently quite rigorous screening procedures prior to testing, the number confirmed positive is such a low percentage of those being tested. They are, after all, only testing those who are thought by competent medical staff to be probably infected.
I’m at a loss to explain this – and it will probably get worse in the coming weeks, because testing is being done on an increased scale and of people who are less, if at all, screened in advance.
In the link you offer much lower percentages of successful testing still. Don’t know where these come from, and these sections need updating.
All in the footnotes. Or is it some other particular anomaly not covered? Plus it is being regularly updated so perhaps any information you are looking for should show up when available.
This is indeed an interesting article, David, and it looks very similar to how HIV was handled back in the 80s. That never satisfied Koch’s postulates either, and the AIDS epidemic consequently also looks a lot more like a combination of non-infectious environmental assaults on people’s immune systems, mistreatment by doctors, and a lot of badly validated testing, than an inevitable consequence of a sexually transmitted retrovirus.
The pdf is not interesting it is just ignorant.
Just reading the summary and seeing the guy demanding tests and basing his suspicion on their absence where all of these tests he is demanding have been done already. Multiple times.
Viral particles have been isolated, their RNA matches the ones from the PCR tests, these particles can infect human cells in vitro and replicate and we have electron microscopy pictures from this virus which is btw the method how corona viruses first were described and classified and how you still could validate their existence in patients.
Then he confuses the problem for false positives which is indeed one for antibody tests to a problem for PCR-based tests where there is none if the test was carefully designed and in reality false negatives from badly collected samples and detection treshold are the real problem. Plus he obviously doesn’t have any idea how PCR results are analyzed and validated.
I enjoy reading Lord Monckton’s views and analysis of the world’s mass hysteria and how we need to respond to the latest madness that has overtaken an otherwise mostly stable world.
The only wish I have, is that we could embrace herd immunity with the same urgency that was pushed by the international political class, to achieve herd insanity.
It is easy to be clever after the facts are in, but some of us have been saying from the outset of this Sars Cov 2 crisis, the decision to stop wealth creation globally, just to maintain the life of those already knocking on deaths door by a few weeks or months seemed economically insane.
The world authority forum i.e. the UN was itself initially a good idea but has now evolved into a dangerous concept of questionable legitimacy.
Looking to such an organisation (through its agent the WHO), for guidance in this instance is a strange appeal to misguided authority, no one should be advocating.
Pan world threats require pan world actions, I get that. I also believe it is wise for world leaders to share their best individual scientific advisers views, one with another in forums such as the UN.
Where it goes wrong is the urge for the wise international council to tell everyone what they must do. That advice then becomes the bench mark, that nations feel obliged to follow or risk alienation.
Sadly and inevitably, the centralisation of advice by the WHO becomes ever more remote from the activities being considered, yet national leaders look to these bureaucrats for guidance on their own local matters?
This homogenisation of the world response, is a very dangerous progression towards a permanent totalitarian control mechanism.
Collective agreements to act in the best interests of the global community is what we need to achieve, and yes, bureaucracy is naturally involved in that.
What we don’t need and must not accept, is unauthorised global instruction from political place-men and women, occupying lofty positions in pan world organisations, simply seeking to further their authority.
We need to be very cautious.
We need to rediscover our own national sense of responsibility and authority to act, that addresses our local needs.
We need to quickly establish the background herd condition via random sampling of the population. We need to know how wide spread this Covid 19 actually is, and we need the antibody test to do it.
We still do not have a reliable test!!
Rod : you write
-“Collective agreements to act in the best interests of the global community is what we need to achieve, and yes, bureaucracy is naturally involved in that.”-
I was beginning to think similarly in that one lesson from this emergency is that some scientific work is so potentially hazardous that it should only be conducted under conditions that have been globally agreed by the world’s best experts.
My analogy is the H Bomb testing in the atmosphere in the 50s and 60s. Apart from demonstrations of national military might they were, effectively , experiments. However they resulted in a growing cloud of radioactive pollution that affected everyone , everywhere, just like the leaking of the SARS -COV2 virus has done. It eventually led to a globally agreed test ban treaty , with monitoring , that stopped all atmospheric tests. No – one today would consider atmospheric tests of nuclear bombs.
A similar protocol established for virological and bacteriological experiments could surely reduce the likelihood of a recurrence of this current pandemic .
10 times more contagious and 10 times more deadly than common flu. I guess that means that there would be 100 times more deaths than in a normal flu season.
I won’t argue about how long ‘China knew’. In fact, the longer they knew makes it curioser and curioser about some things. There was a delay in the West’s response for various reasons.
I will now move on to the curious part. For a period of months after the initial outbreak, it was business as usual as far as transport of humans in all countries was concerned. In China, there are millions of people (sorry, hundreds of millions) in public transport every single day. They are cheek to jowl in many instances. Thousands travelled from one province to another, daily. It didn’t really matter what time of year. It just happened to be crazier at various times of the year- special festivals, spring festival. Every surface you touch would have been touched by others. You would have been breathed upon. In effect you would have been in contact with thousands of people, indirectly. Airports internationally would be the same.
Why are there so few(relatively speaking) cases of this highly contagious (10 times) virus? Based on international and local travel there would have been at least a billion connections between people?
How do you determine whether something is 10 times more contagious than normal flu? How do you determine that covid -19 is 10 times more deadly? Is there some lab experiment? Is it an opinion based on who knows what?
Just curious.
Alex
I have asked MoB essentially the same question about his 10X claims. In the past, he has avoided answering hard ball questions. Let’s see if he responds to our concerns.
Should be in multiples of pi. Much more scientific-sounding. 10 times is something a kid would say.
You can outsmart the virus by giving you drugs that work the opposite way.
By attaching to the ACE2 enzyme, the Cov-2 virus inactivates it.
Thus, the ACE2 enzyme that dilates the blood vessels stops working. This is the greatest malignancy of the Cov-2 virus.
The narrowing of blood vessels in the lungs is the cause of widespread pneumonia in Covid-19 disease. Even in asymptomatic people, lung fibrosis is observed.
Recombinant human ACE2 (rhACE2) is surmised to be a novel therapy for acute lung injury, and appeared to improve pulmonary hemodynamics[clarification needed] and oxygen saturation in piglets with a lipopolysaccharide-induced acute respiratory distress syndrome.[43] The half-life of rhACE2 in human beings is about 10 hours and the onset of action is 30 minutes in addition to the course of effect (duration) of 24 hours.[43] Several findings suggest that rhACE2 may be a promising drug for those with intolerance to classic renin-angiotensin system inhibitors (RAS inhibitors) or in diseases where circulating angiotensin II is elevated.[43]
Infused rhACE2 has been evaluated in clinical trials for the treatment of acute respiratory distress syndrome.[44]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angiotensin-converting_enzyme_2?fbclid=IwAR1lcxfEnh4x32AOdGv2qNGrmFc3WJN4Wd-0MAbGZtvWQktZRfeDfrCvvLk
If I get Covid I will be sure to point them to your post. Doctors just love Dr Google.
You’d better do it earlier. Information is very valuable now.
Because of such insidious Cov-2 activity, you can’t count on herd immunity, because even young people can have permanent lung damage.
The prevailing view is that coronavirus resistance is short-lived, so a drug should be sought.
Abstract
Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), discovered as a homologue of ACE, acts as its physiological counterbalance providing homeostatic regulation of circulating angiotensin II (Ang II) levels. ACE2 is a zinc metalloenzyme and carboxypeptidase located as an ectoenzyme on the surface of endothelial and other cells. While its primary substrate appears to be Ang II, it can hydrolyze a number of other physiological substrates. Additionally, ACE2 functions in other noncatalytic cellular roles including the regulation of intestinal neutral amino acid transport. It also serendipitously acts as the receptor for the severe acute respiratory syndrome virus. Upregulation of ACE2 expression and function is increasingly recognized as a potential therapeutic strategy in hypertension and cardiovascular disease, diabetes, lung injury, and fibrotic disorders. ACE2 is regulated at multiple levels including transcriptional, posttranscriptional (miRNA and epigenetic), and posttranslational through its shedding from the cell surface.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780128013649000250
“In summary, ACE2 is a multifunctional protein in health and disease, which serves as a counterregulatory component of the RAS functioning in a cardioprotective role. Hence, its transcriptional upregulation, activation of its catalytic activity, or administration of the recombinant protein47 could well provide new strategies in hypertension and heart failure. Additionally, ACE2 modulation (and hence alteration of the circulating Ang II/Ang-(1-7) balance) may have relevance to diabetes, acute lung injury and fibrotic disease, and even dystrophic muscular conditions.48 But much still remains to be explored in terms of the basic aspects of ACE2 cellular function and its regulation to be able to exploit these opportunities effectively and safely.”
Human recombinant ACE2 (rhACE2)
Preclinical studies have demonstrated that recombinant human ACE2 (rhACE2) has a half-life of ~ 8.5 h in mice (Wysocki et al., 2010) and that rhACE2 exerts beneficial effects in murine models of cardiac hypertrophy, myocardial fibrosis and cardiac dysfunction (Zhong et al., 2010). Furthermore, in male mice, rhACE2 was able to prevent angiotensin II-induced hypertension (Wysocki et al., 2010). This effect was primarily attributed to circulating ACE2 activity and the lowering of plasma angiotensin II rather than the associated increase in plasma angiotensin-(1–7) (Wysocki et al., 2010). Furthermore, in a model of diabetic nephropathy, rhACE2 reduced tubulointerstitial fibrosis and albuminuria and normalized blood pressure (Oudit et al., 2010). Aside from its effects in cardiovascular and renal diseases, rhACE2 may be a novel therapy for acute lung injury. ACE2 deficient mice develop severe lung injury, which is ameliorated by treatment with rhACE2 (Gu et al., 2016). Similarly, systemic administration of rhACE2 improved pulmonary hemodynamics and oxygenation in a lipopolysaccharide-induced model of acute respiratory distress syndrome in piglets (Treml et al., 2010).
In 2013, the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamics characteristics of rhACE2 were first described in healthy men and women (Haschke et al., 2013). The half-life of rhACE2 was ~ 10 h and in both men and women, rhACE2 reduced plasma angiotensin II and increased plasma angiotensin-(1–7) (Haschke et al., 2013). This effect was apparent within 30 min of administration of rhACE2 and persisted for 24 h. Moreover, these effects were mediated without alterations in blood pressure or heart rate (Haschke et al., 2013). However, it is important to note that this study was not powered to detect acute differences in physiology, rather, it was a proof of principle study. In 2017, a second clinical study with rhACE2 was reported in patients with acute pulmonary injury (Khan et al., 2017). In this study, rhACE2 favorably altered the circulating RAS profile, reducing plasma angiotensin II and increasing angiotensin-(1–7) levels. However, rhACE2 did not improve physiological or clinical measures of acute respiratory distress syndrome. Consistent with the in vivo data, ex vivo treatment with rhACE2 effectively reduced angiotensin II levels and increased angiotensin-(1–9) and angiotensin-(1–7) levels in plasma and cardiac tissue samples collected from heart failure patients (Basu et al., 2017). Collectively, these findings suggest that rhACE2 may be a promising drug for treatment of patients with intolerance to classical RAS inhibitors or in diseases where circulating angiotensin II is elevated.
Mas receptor agonists
Angiotensin-(1–7) has a short plasma half-life and is rapidly degraded in the gastrointestinal tract when given orally. The combination of hydroxylpropyl-β-cyclodextrin (HPβCD) with angiotensin-(1–7) (HPβCD/angiotensin-(1–7)) protects angiotensin-(1–7) from enzymatic degradation allowing angiotensin-(1–7) to be administered orally. Chronic oral administration of HPβCD/angiotensin-(1–7) lowered blood pressure and reduced markers of fibrosis (TGFβ1 and collagen type I) in rats following ischemia–reperfusion injury (Marques et al., 2012). Moreover, HPβCD/angiotensin-(1–7) has been shown to have antiinflammatory effects in a model of atherosclerosis (Fraga-Silva et al., 2014), and improved insulin sensitivity in a model of type 2 diabetes (Santos et al., 2014). In humans, the HPβCD/angiotensin-(1–7) formulation allows the absorption of angiotensin-(1–7), and is safe and well-tolerated. Future clinical trials are now needed with HPβCD/angiotensin-(1–7) to determine its efficacy as a novel treatment for cardiovascular and renal diseases.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-biology/angiotensin-converting-enzyme-2
“Even in asymptomatic people, lung fibrosis is observed.”
The Wuhan virus is not just another flu virus. It seems to do damage to the human body even if you don’t have symptoms, so the question is does Wuhan virus do permanent damage to your body even though you get over the disease?
Due to the regulating function of ACE2, its reduction leads to damage throughout the human body, which may be irreversible. It is enough to realize that the factor that causes panic in the body (angiotensin II) has no brake.
How long does the Wuhan virus remain inside an asymptomatic person?
My guess is the longer the virus is inside you, the more damage it is doing. Or is there a difference in the level of damage it is doing in an asymptomatic stage? I know asymptomatic people don’t show any upper respiratory problems at all, so apparently little or no damage is occurring there in this case, but what about the other organs and blood vessels in the body? What is happening to them?
It looks like a scary virus. You may not want to get this whether you get over it or not. You may not get over it even if you have gotten over it. It might have longterm detrimental health effects.
China’s leadership has a lot to answer for.
LONDON (Reuters) – Some children in the United Kingdom with no underlying health conditions have died from a rare inflammatory syndrome which researchers believe to be linked to COVID-19, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Tuesday.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-britain-children/uk-says-some-children-have-died-from-syndrome-linked-to-covid-19-idUSKCN22A0XW
Hokkaido’s second spike
By April 9—exactly three weeks after Hokkaido’s first lockdown was lifted—there was a record number of new cases: 18 in one day. “Officials thought about people coming from overseas but never considered that domestic migration could bring the virus back,” said Hironori Sasada, professor of Japanese politics at Hokkaido University.
On April 14, Hokkaido announced a state of emergency for a second time. The island had 279 reported cases, an increase of about 80% from when the governor lifted the first lockdown less than a month before. As of 27 April, there are 495 cases in Hokkaido. That’s out of a population of 5.3 million.
If the Japanese think that wrecking their social life and their economy because 0.0093755859741234% of them have the virus, then that is their decision.
Talk about overreaction.
Japan has a lot of hospital beds but a low number of ICUs, ventilators and ECMOs for its population. Therefore they have to be very careful to not overload those.
And they are not testing vigorously so you could expect their reported cases are mainly the more serious/critical ones.
Aren’t the critical ones more likely to end up in an ICU?
I was implying that Japan’s numbers are mainly those that need hospitalization so even seamingly “low” numbers could prove difficult for the health care system.
Japan has 7 ICU beds per 100,000 so only 371 for Hokkaido.
Numbers make only sense when you know what to compare them to.
Was I the only one that noticed the graphic says SpaiM. I really liked the graph but *long pause*
50% correct 😀
Douglas Altman, who has died in 2018 (aged 69), waged a long-running campaign to improve the use of statistics in medical research.
A professor of statistics in medicine at the University of Oxford, in 1998 Altman described the problem as follows: “The majority of statistical analyses are performed by people with an inadequate understanding of statistical methods. They are then peer reviewed by people who are generally no more knowledgeable. Sadly, much research may benefit researchers rather more than patients, especially when it is carried out primarily as a ridiculous career necessity.” (My emphasis)
Sadly, this problem persists and has perhaps gotten worse. I do not even want to contemplate the consequences for the next ten to twenty years.
Christopher, I agree with you that measures are working. Some weeks ago I wrote you about positive impact of wearing face masks in Slovakia as first country in Europe and America which started to wear face masks. From this time nothing changed. Together with mild voluntary moving restrictions, measures in shops and closed human contact businesses, it was possible to push R0 of Covid-19 under 1.
Plus mass testing in risky communities, like gypsy settlements and retirement homes.
Thorough searching and testing contacts of Covid-19 positives, quarantining of them either in state or at home quarantine.
Mandatory 14 days quarantine of all people crossing borders, state quarantine till test result, if negative rest of quarantine at home.
Hospital staff testing and immediate quarantine if positive of all contacts.
Result is that last 4 days we had 14, 6, 2 and today 3 new positive cases of Covid-19.
If this trend will continue, it is possible to eradicate Covid-19 at all.
Similar trend with delay is visible in neighboring countries Czechia, Poland, Austria, Hungary, Latvia, Estonia, Croatia.
When they eradicate virus, borders will fully reopen. This will create cluster of countries with eradicated virus, where economy will be free to grow again.
Other more affected countries like Germany, Italy, Spain, France will have no other choice just eradicate virus too to join club of virus free countries.
Countries which propagated herd immunity will be the most affected and will join this club as last.
But good message is that we will all get there finally. It is possible for country get rid of Coronavirus in 2 months with decent measures, testing, tracking of positives and mandatory face masks.
On the other side it seams that it is practically impossible to get herd immunity for Covid-19, because of short term immunity. It is impossible to immunize whole population fast enough, because hospitals overload and slow immunization is not possible due to short term immunity.
There is one rule for this virus, not adequate or lack of measures on start are bringing more serious measures later to compensate.
“And, now that the population are thoroughly educated in the dangers posed by the virus, let the old and the sick take whatever precautions they deem appropriate to avoid catching the virus. Since the initial data suggest that “herd immunity” may not be possible with this virus, the period of immunity in some cases having proven to be very short, there is no advantage in keeping anyone under indefinite house arrest. Let people decide for themselves how much risk they are willing to take.”
If immunity is short lived then the only way the virus will burn out is to let it off the leash – thankfully it is highly infectious.
Lockdowns are the worst possible strategy, trash the economy AND enter a groundhog day of flatten the curve and surge the curve.
“The one piece of good news that the advocates of continuing lockdowns have undervalued is the fact that those who are fit and under 60 are not at all likely to die of the virus. Now that it is known that more than nine-tenths of all deaths from the virus are in those over 60, particularly with comorbidities, it is legitimate to argue that for the vast majority of the population the virus will indeed be no worse than the flu.”
Well it took you time, some of us has mentioned that a looooong time ago… That is why lockdown was not necessary !
People who are infected with coronavirus may never regain full health if they have pulmonary fibrosis. I feel sorry for athletes and divers who may never return to their profession.
Lockdowns were necessary in countries with high population densities to prevent the hospitals from being overwhelmed.
“The one piece of good news that the advocates of continuing lockdowns have undervalued is the fact that those who are fit and under 60 are not at all likely to die of the virus. Now that it is known that more than nine-tenths of all deaths from the virus are in those over 60, particularly with comorbidities, it is legitimate to argue that for the vast majority of the population the virus will indeed be no worse than the flu.”
I disagree. The numbers are clearly indicating that SARS-CoV-2 is taken a death toll from the people <65y which is unprecedented from any other flu year (especially in the UK) and even people in their 20's, 30's and 40's have to be hospitalized and would therefore clog emergency rooms and ICUs if the virus is allowed to spread freely. As Spain, France and Italy told us.
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps
You seem to be misreading the graphs Ron.
the 15-65y graph does show a higher peak but in weekly deaths but it is total excess deaths : ie the area under the peak which you need to look at to make the “death toll” conclusion you are seeking.
By eye, I would estimate the current peak is on a par with 2017 and less than the extended peak of 2018.
What you say does not contradict the statement you are trying to contradict.
The vast majority of the working population should be back at work now. Yet many govts are still running round in circles wondering how they can get out of the mess they have created.
My apologize, but you make assumptions that are invalid.
The graph from cumulated deaths is giving you 11,324 excess deaths until week 16 for this year and 12,697 total for 2018. To back up your claim deaths by COVID-19 have to stop nearly immediately to not reach this number. But the pandemic is still on and not over. The number is probably already higher as reported deaths can be lag by three weeks.
The Z-score peak for 15-65y is double as it ever was and it is foolish to think it would decrease immediately and not with a slope.
At last, you are ignoring my point that younger people also need to get hospitalized in an unprecedented rate although they are usually surviving if treated accordingly. If you clog your emergency rooms with those people as well you have to do triage like it happened in Italy, Spain and France.
But let’s just do some numbers:
You need 70% for herd immunity.
From New York State numbers the ages 20-50y make up 5.5% of deaths.
CFR from Iceland, Taiwan and South Korea is at least 1% and that is also the newest upper projection for Europe as more data comes in. Prof. Woo-Joo Kim even estimates 2-4% but let’s just hope he is wrong (though he was right about most things so far…).
So the death rate for this specific group would be 0.00055%.
From 308 million Americans ~40% are 20-50y.
308 x 0.4 x 0.7 x 0.00055 makes 47,432 deaths.
I don’t think so many people <50y die from the flu annually.
Thanks Ron, I did not know what graphs you were referring to. 15-65 week graph shows it is down close to annual average now, so cumulative total will not go much higher. Cumulative total for that group shows it is just past 2018 level.
The presentation of annual totals is not that helpful. It cuts the flu epidemics in half . We can see that end of 2018 was a weak flu season and does not make up for the strong end to 2017.
If you click 2017 into the cumulative graph you see that 2017 (15-65 )ends up the same as 2020 currently is ( as I noted it is now back to near normal death rates ).
So bottom line is that I was not far wrong with my earlier statements.
“15-65 week graph shows it is down close to annual average now, so cumulative total will not go much higher. Cumulative total for that group shows it is just past 2018 level.”
Let’s just wait and see but I disagree that the number will stay like this.
Reported deaths are often delayed and deaths are way more likely to increase in an pandemic. Especially as their forecast and adjustments for delayed reported cases are based on previous data but previous data didn’t include a pandemic.
“The presentation of annual totals is not that helpful. It cuts the flu epidemics in half . We can see that end of 2018 was a weak flu season and does not make up for the strong end to 2017.”
Are we really looking at the same graphs? 🙂
But anyway, one can estimate the excess death cases from the 2017 part of the 2017/18 from the cumulated death numbers from week 48 in 2017 on until week 16 of 2018 which is ~25,000 + ~114,000 hence ~139,000 for flu season 2017/2018.
2020 is already above with 140,000 (seems to be have been updated recently). And it took just 7 weeks to get where the flu season 2017/18 lasted 23 weeks.
The 15-65 category is a deceitful metric that is heavily weighted towards the 65 end. I bet 80-90% is between 55-65.
Crude estimate from the numbers available is ~67% but that doesn’t address the fact that those people usually DON’T DIE WITH THESE NUMBERS AT ALL!
And it doesn’t change my calculation above that you can estimate 47,432 deaths of people <50y if you go down the path to herd immunity given that it will work at all.
Those people usually don’t die because they usually aren’t put on ventilators that end up ki!lling them like they are now. Policies have changed to forbid less harmful ventilation methods because of fear of infection.
Those people don’t have to get into intensive care at all without SARS-CoV-2 to begin with. You are evading the argument.
Before (with flu or something else) they would receive CPAP or HFNC or something less deadly than intubation (unless they had chronic lung injury). Now (with covid) they are all sent to ICU and tubed because doctors and hospital policy makers don’t want higher risk of hospital staff infection via aerosolization. It’s all fear driven.
https://twitter.com/signaturedoc/status/1250072724057264128
Hospital policy has changed forbidding use of less harmful ventilation. Patient mortality goes up as a result.
Just a thought. . . over the Easter weekend much was made of a large number (around 1000?) of parties going on in Manchester. Having achieved the desired effect of making us all wag our morally-outraged finger at the stupidity, no further mention has been made of it. So how many attended these parties? Were they tracked thereafter? Was there a spike in hospital admissions in the area a few days later? Have such new cases been interviewed to see if they attended (or have been in contact with attendees)? Is there any evidence that this has begun to filter into the morbidity figures (in Manchester)? Would this not be useful additional information?
But the news cycle thunders on and the Easter ‘outrage’ is forgotten. And the more it thunders the less we learn.
Like others, I would question both the morbidity attribution statistics and the CT-PCR test’s efficacy, leaving us with many questions still to answer. Surely events like this might give a clue as to the effects if easing lockdown.
Anybody here know any more about this?
Yes, it would be interesting to get data from Manchester. I have no idea if that exists or is available.
What we do have is Italy’s mild unlock ( kids clothing stores, bookshops and other small commerce )
It does seem to have disrupted the surprisingly stable weekly cycle which existed during total confinement but there is no net up or downward movement in the rate of change in daily cases which remains in slow decline over the week.
We should be keeping a close eye on Italy and Spain as they unlock and acting quickly ourselves.
Yes, it would be interesting to get data from Manchester. I have no idea if that exists or is available.
This site provides links to CSV data files (below map) which might help
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/#local-authorities
The format of the files is a bit of a pain but if you sort by Area Name you should be able to collect Manchester & e.g. Trafford data and make comparisons. If there is a spike from Easter it should start to become evident about now (i.e 2 weeks). I suspect it will be difficult to detect.
Cheers, will keep an eye on that. However, not so useful, as no. of cases depends on amount of testing (unknown) and efficiency of the test (unknown). Also, cumulative cases wont show the progression over time. I couldnt see any spike on the gov. graph for the NW, but again thats something of a blunt instrument. That seems to have been a recurrent problem – we have no idea how good the data are. I suspect not very. . .
Sweden says its “no-lockdown” strategy is successful
Sweden’s decision not to lock down its economy – allowing the coronavirus to run its course while the population reaches herd immunity is working, according to the Scandinavian nation’s chief epidemiologist Anders Tegnell. He predicted herd immunity, when about 60% of a population is immune, will be reached in the capital, Stockholm, within two to three weeks.
Government officials have encouraged social distancing, banning gatherings of more than 50, and urge people over 70 or in a high-risk group to stay home but they have not forced businesses, restaurants and schools to close, arguing people can be trusted to follow guidelines: “In major parts of Sweden, around Stockholm, we have reached a plateau (in new cases) and we’re already seeing the effect of herd immunity and in a few weeks’ time we’ll see even more of the effects of that. And in the rest of the country, the situation is stable,” Tegnell, the chief epidemiologist at Sweden’s Public Health Agency, told CNBC.
Sweden’s number of deaths is higher than in other Nordic countries, with 16,700 cases and more than 2,000 deaths in a population of about 10 million. Denmark, with a population of 6 million, has reported about 8,000 cases and 394 deaths. Among Norway’s 5 million people, 7,400 cases and 194 deaths have been counted. Tegnell said the health system “has been able to cope.” He also said that about 15 to 20% of people in Stockholm have reached a level of immunity that would “slow down the spread” of a second wave of the virus.
Swedish resident Johan Norberg, a senior fellow at the CATO Institute, argued in a Fox News interview that the total lockdown approach of most nations aimed at “flattening the curve” only postpones the deaths. The lockdown nations, including the US, “won’t avoid them because there is still no argument that has been made that suddenly this disease will go away after their lockdowns are over.” Ingraham played a clip from a web interview with Swedish epidemiologist Johan Giesecke who said: “Some countries do this and some countries do that, and some countries don’t do that, and in the end there will be very little difference.”
Norberg said it could take several years to develop a vaccine “And no society can be shut down completely and shut down the economy for more than a year without ruining society and the economy entirely. And that will kill many more people than the virus does. Sweden will get through this while protecting the vulnerable and the health care system. Can we manage to mitigate the disease? We can’t suppress it. Can we mitigate it to the extent that we can take care of all cases and make sure that they get the best treatment? Well, in that case Sweden might be through this in a couple of months while you (the “lockdown” countries) have it ahead of you.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/22/no-lockdown-in-sweden-but-stockholm-could-see-herd-immunity-in-weeks.html
It looks that immunity for this virus lasts around 3 to 6 months only. If 20% of Sweden has immunity already, that means those 20% will not have it in 3 to 6 months and Sweden is in continuous cycle of reinfection…
Nobody knows that.
What researchers know is that people have relatively low antibody titers compared to other infections and that the ability of the antibodies of recovered patients if isolated to prevent infections varies greatly. Might be that the unlucky ones with the very inefficient antibodies could be infected a second time but real prove for that is lacking.
The challenge for a vaccine would be to generate a long lasting and effective immunity. First studies in monkeys indicate at least the latter is possible.
Fact is that from 10,000 cases in South Korea 100 people had relapse. That is 1% man. And this is far earlier than 3 months. This virus has HIV RNA sequences. What if it can hide inside of cells like HIV and reappear? We don’t know that. So let whole population get virus is extreme risk. Correct way here is take measures, protect people and wait until we know.
The possibility that those “relapse” cases have just still be infected but the virus was under the detection threshold at the side of where the swap was done can’t be ruled out. New swap, new side, positive “again”. From all we know so far this is more likely at the moment.
“This virus has HIV RNA sequences. What if it can hide inside of cells like HIV and reappear?”
Nope. This virus lacks a reverse transcriptase.
On a day when we in the UK hold a minutes silence commemorate the deaths of health professionals and all those who gave their lives for their community and patients, Monkcton sneers from the sideline with the suggestion that they were stupid and panicky. Monckton, you are beneath contempt.
You should also give a minute of silence to the millions of non-essentials who have sacrificed.
Where did he say that?
One can only conclude that Gareth Phillips has not been following this series of articles in which Monckton of Brenchley has emphatically and repeatedly stated his view that lockdowns were necessary in order to protect health services (and implicitly those striving within). Even in the context of this single article the comment is without basis and entirely unjustified; being merely laughably and offensively stupid. A retraction and apology would be a good way forward.
I think we should look at the coronavirus cases by region it is not uniform the areas close to seaports and airports have far more cases, it is possible that many contracted this virus abroad and brought it back into this country therefore it is not our true infection rate which is much lower.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavirus?ocid=spartandhp
If one were to extrapolate from the Spanish death stats of 15764 to the world total it would suggest that around 80 children of those 19 and younger have died out of a total of 212337 deaths. For those between 20 and 49 it suggests 3312 deaths. If we exclude those whose immunity was seriously compromised from this group the numbers will be much lower. As the virus spreads in third world countries in Africa and elsewhere the percentages might increase but we simply do not yet know.
I believe that looking back in a year or two we will see this has been a futile and foolish exercise. I do not believe that politicians and the medical experts carefully considered both the costs and consequences of shutting down economies of whole nations. If they had, we would have studies and recommendations, which we do not. The media has been shameful in pushing the coronavirus alarmism but not asking hard questions about likely unintended consequences nor about alternative responses to avert these.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:2019%E2%80%9320_coronavirus_pandemic_data/Spain_medical_cases/By_age_and_gender
It was to protect the Health Services from being overwhelmed, which would cause much higher numbers.
What is not being attributed to COVID-19 are those dying of non COVID-19 illness because they either can’t or are too scared to get Hospital treatment.
If SARS-CoV-2 is not efficiently suppressed by UV and humidity we will see a high death toll in HIV infested countries in Africa.
It may be early days for Africa but there is something odd. China is involved in various African countries and this includes having Chinese working there. Why would these not have transmitted the virus there earlier? While the statistics may not be reliable, I cannot believe they would be able to hide a surge in deaths. Perhaps there are other factors. We do not know if the BCG vaccination and malaria medication has played any role. As I write, South Africa has one of the highest numbers, yet has less than 5000 cases and 100 deaths.
This is not going to end well-
“We were conveniently not told that Obama had authorized $3.7 million U.S. tax dollars to be used at the Wuhan Institute of Virology to utilize corona viruses in bats in 2015 — but that’s yet another deception of omission.”
https://townhall.com/columnists/kevinmccullough/2020/04/23/antibody-testing-proves-weve-been-had-n2567516
Us stats and probably these have been overcooked-
US stats-
The rate of death for people 18 to 45 years old is 0.01 percent, or 10 per 100,000 in the population.
For people under 18 years old, the rate of death is zero per 100,000.
Of all fatal cases in New York state, two-thirds were in patients over 70 years of age; more than 95 percent were over 50 years of age; and about 90 percent of all fatal cases had an underlying illness. Of 6,570 confirmed COVID-19 deaths fully investigated for underlying conditions to date, 6,520, or 99.2 percent, had an underlying illness.
For those under 18 years of age, hospitalization from the virus is 0.01 percent, or 11 per 100,000 people; for those 18 to 44 years old, hospitalization is 0.1 percent.
Half of all people testing positive for infection have no symptoms at all. The vast majority of younger, otherwise healthy people do not need significant medical care if they catch this infection.
a vaccine only needed for the old and vaccines do not work well on the old.
https://news.expats.cz/weekly-czech-news/breaking-prague-court-cancels-czech-anti-coronavirus-measures-on-free-movement-retail-sales/
This is only formality, nobody in Czech Republic is undermining need of taken measures, they were only ordered wrong way:
“The court confirmed our concerns that the government acted illegally when it stopped making decisions under the Crisis Management Act and proceeded under the Public Protection Act.”
“The government will have the opportunity to re-implement them in a different manner, i.e. under the Crisis Act, before the ruling takes effect. The government has until April 27 to do so.”
Czech Republic is one of countries which are handling coronavirus pandemic best.
They are currently enjoying easing of measures, because virus spread is under control. Number of daily cases declining from 350 to 50 in last two weeks.
They are on track to eradicate Covid-19 virus.
“They are on track to eradicate Covid-19 virus.”
You misunderstand what confinement does, it does NOT “erradicate” the virus, it just delays when you population gets infected !
yep, it is going to have to work its way around everyone. Best to get it over and not suffer another lock down.
“You misunderstand what confinement does, it does NOT “erradicate” the virus, it just delays when you population gets infected !”
I beg to differ, of course this strategy can work as it did so for SARS.
As widespread as SARS-CoV-2 is and with all the global connection and traveling it is just way more challenging to keep your country’s population free of it once it was eradicated. So your economy should better be not dependent on tourism if you try this strategy cause you have to quarantine and check all people who enter your country.
Yes, you are right. One more comment, if your economy relies on tourism and you have Covid-19 circling in population, it is screwed anyway.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/22/no-lockdown-in-sweden-but-stockholm-could-see-herd-immunity-in-weeks.html
I doubt that Sweden is near herd immunity , though they did flatten the curve with minimal disruption.
Please, Monckton…no more. You are now really lost and are trying to defend your model. Forget it, it doesn’t work, it doesn’t show anything and certainly doesn’t support any observed reality. Give it up and go back to what you know best and stop trying to position yourself as some sort of “expert” on this.
In regard to the correctness of showing deaths per million of population…no sh*t Digby! Most of us have been using this for a few weeks now.
death per million is not a sensible metric.
e.g. Use Andorra as an example
population 77,000
Deaths 40
Deaths/million = 519
not a good place to be !!!
Maybe that shows that Andorra is not a good place to be.
The principality is a very small territory, dense population, with very little infrastructure other than being one giant shopping mall. It is not even near a major french city with a large hospital.
Events per million are a standard metric. Get used to it.
Here is fun little scientific puzzle that is explains why blacks are more than twice as likely to die of covid.
This is the problem situation.
Our bodies (bare skin) when exposed to sunlight produce a chemical that is required by 200 microbiology processes in our body.
Less than 10% of this key component is available in our diet. (Exception daily fish eaters).
There is insufficient sunlight in Canada, the UK, and in US Northern States to produce this key chemical, at the level which has been shown to reduce the incidence of most common diseases, including cancer by more than 50%, for roughly six months of the year.
Increasing this key chemical in our body has been shown to also reduce the incidence of multiple scleroses and type 1 diabetes by more than 60%.
Our bodies evolved to lose the skin pigment to enable white skin people, to produce sufficient Vitamin D, to live at higher latitudes, where there is less direct sunlight to produce ‘Vitamin’ D.
Humans now work long hours indoors which explains why such a large portion of our population is deficient in ‘Vitamin’ D.
This single graph, summarize the key facts and findings concern disease reduction if the Vitamin D population deficiency is corrected.
https://www.grassrootshealth.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/disease-incidence-prev-chart-051317.pdf
The ‘recommended’ daily allowance of ‘Vitamin’ D is 600 IU.
Based on the science the recommended daily allowance of ‘Vitamin’ D should be 4000 IU to 6000 IU based on body mass.
A glass of milk has 110 IU of vitamin D. Cow’s milk is fortified with a small amount of Vitamin D.
A Statistical Error in the Estimation of the Recommended Dietary Allowance for Vitamin D
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4210929/pdf/nutrients-06-04472.pdf
Letter to Veugelers, P.J. and Ekwaru, J.P., A Statistical Error in the Estimation of the Recommended Dietary Allowance for Vitamin D. Nutrients 2014,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4377874/pdf/nutrients-07-01688.pdf
The Vitamin D scandal explains why blacks in the US are more than twice as likely to die from Covid and HIV as white skin people.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/12/health/black-americans-hiv-coronavirus-blake/index.html
https://www.cdc.gov/hiv/group/racialethnic/africanamericans/index.html
HIV and African Americans
Blacks/African Americans account for a higher proportion of new HIV diagnoses and people with HIV, compared to other races/ethnicities. In 2018, blacks/African Americans accounted for 13% of the US population but 42% of the 37,832 new HIV diagnoses in the United States and dependent areas.