Blah Blah

Will be interesting to see if that number of 7 has risen after 14 days - the incubation period after catching the virus. That would be a useful measure of risk on flights that contain infected people.

France is beginning to see the start of an exponential increase in new cases and there is no reason to think that won't happen here or anywhere else. It matters who is getting infected also though. So hospital admissions and deaths have to be considered in assessing this.

This is why keeping an eye on local infection rates is the best way to manage risk. No-one wants to be the one that ends up in ICU or worse. But at the same time, it is a question of odds. We can do a lot to mitigate that risk in the behaviour we adopt, and I would say that on the whole, most people have done that.

Telling young people to throw caution to the wind when we still have no vaccine or effective treatment to prevent serious illness or death is dangerous. They are not the only people who have to go out, work, use public transport etc. There is evidence emerging that immunity drops significantly after five months. It could take two years to fully understand what this virus delivers in terms of immunity, and other impacts on the body, because it takes that long to monitor infection and reinfection rates properly. So again, claiming to know anything at this stage in absolute terms is dangerous. This is precisely why medical experts are making no such claims. Herd immunity in most cases requires use of a vaccine. Highly infectious diseases especially, require vaccine programmes to get there. We still have a winter to get through and a lot more will be learned from that. Covid mutates (just like influenza does) and we may well end up with a similar scenario where different versions of vaccines are needed to manage it. This is particularly problematic because this is not a seasonal virus in the way influenza is. And there is still a long way to go yet in finding vaccines that will work, and be safe for widespread use. Trials take as long as they take. People must not be lulled into a false security just because the infection rates are low. They are low precisely because of everything we have done and because they can be tracked. The fear is, that when seasonal coughs and colds emerge, covid will spread quicker than symptoms show themselves, leading to the fast exponential rise in infection that sent us into a global lockdown in the first place. So ultimately is is about balance and common sense. Finding that point at which life can be as normal as possible, but where infection rates remain manageable and containable. It might seem like there is no sense to the rules at present, but really there is. With every stage of easing, the infection data has to be closely monitored. The next big one will be the reopening of schools.

We are beholden to global markets just as the EU is. The sub-prime market crash was a US problem, but banks from every country were invested in it and its derivatives. That is why it was a global crash. The size of the city and financial sector as a percentage of our GDP alone, puts us at massive exposure. It accounts for 10 percent of it.

I am sorry TheCat, but leave voters (and yes it is a generalisation, but an accurate one) pretty much rejected every warning about the realities of trade deals and negotiations. No-one trades on WTO terms solely and there is a very good reason for that.

I think Uncle calling TheCat a lefty (and welcome to the club btw Cat lol) is a perfect example of how anyone who does not agree with Herr Uncle is a lefty. I'm not sure we'll see any election prematurely, because the Tory Party has such a healthy majority, that as long as they still have a reasonable amount of time in government, they will think they can get the party into a better electoral place. Change of leader however is always possible, although I would say there that the majority also makes Johnson rather untouchable, unless he majorly messes up. Cummings is the real PM anyway. He may well also be the fall guy in the end.

And just to add, self reflection isn't something narcissists do. Politics is dominated by narcissists at the moment, so I personally wouldn't hold out too much hope.

You are making a very good point TheCat, but the problem is that when a party is in the control of a more ideological faction, it becomes difficult to reign that in. You could argue the same about the Labour Party under Corbyn of course. There is a lack of practical realism with these kinds of leadership.

Sephiroth Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Complaining about Barnier/EU being "nasty" is almost as if some people don't know what international trade negotiations are like. You think China, India or USA are not going to be > hardnosed in negotiations with UK? You only have to look at the history of trade negotiations, and especially between those of vast differences in market size to see that. Experts in trade did try to warn about all of this, but leave voters weren't listening, denouncing everything as project fear. And anyone who thinks the US will allow us to leave healthcare and pharmaceuticals off the table, is also deluded. In fact, there are so many supporters of privatisation in cabinet positions, that a betrayal is almost inevitable.

Exactly that Diable Rouge, which is why I suspect the UK will concede on fishing as soon as they work out a way to square that with Brexit voters who were promised something else.

The government backed themselves into this corner all on their own by promising things that could never be delivered. And with the chickens about to come home to roost you have Brexiteers swallowing the trash of the Express and blaming the EU for it. Tell me Seenbeen, when you cancel you subscription to anything, do you still expect to have access to the services offered by that subscription? No you don't. We chose to leave the EU. They don't have to give us anything. And FYI, the Withdrawal Agreement is not a trade deal. It is simply the terms for the withdrawal. And while you are at it, how much do you understand about road haulage? Because that is going to be the first headache in your no deal Brexit when 80 percent of haulage can't get hold of the permit they need to drive goods into and across the EU.

There is government advice, based on core science. Either businesses and customers follow it or they don't. Ok, so you are the one that takes the risk and goes to the packed restaurant. Only it is not only your risk is it? One person has covid in that restaurant and two people catch it. Only they don't know they've caught it for at least a week by which time they have infected four other people. Four other people who thought better of ever risking going to a packed restaurant. That is how epidemics spread, that is exponential growth.

???? Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > whilst that's true BB, a Labour government under > Corbyn with would have put massive strings > attached to any business supported eg workers on > boards, governemnt shareholding and nationalised > vast swathes of industry under the cloak of Covid. > What we have now is temporarily nationalisation, > thank god, and even this is going to be paid for > for years by us the taxpayer, and our kids. That's a huge stretch. While you might like to entertain the idea that a Corbyn government would have held business to ransom for the money bailed out, no government would ever have gotten away with that. Why? Because any legislation like that (and it WOULD need legislation) would have to have pass both the House and Lords. It is baseless nonsense.

You say that DF, but a Corbyn Government would also have been hit right away with this pandemic. Have you forgotten how much money Sunak has had to borrow over the past six months? Makes the Labour manifesto now look like chicken feed. No government would have had time for anything else but this pandemic and all its impacts.

Hopefully it is all smelling rather better now :)

And yes TE44, if this virus were the only thing out that that has to faced, that would be fine. But it is not, and there will be indirect consequences for all the reasons you state. For governments, it is a question of balance (with one eye on re-election). For the individual it is also a question of balance, and what is personally at risk for you. A pandemic is like war. We can't stop the destruction, only mitigate it, until it ends.

There is no evidence that this virus was lab created, and bear in mind there are plenty of governments in the world who would love to be able to prove it was. And I second the point on badly designed, if intent is being looked for, as in the case of conspiracy theories. Viruses are complex science and part of the problem is in trying to help a public understand some essence of that complexity. As for range of symptoms, the ACE2 receptors that this virus latches onto are found in many parts of the body, so it is not easy to know who might suffer from what in absolute terms. Cytokine Storms are also unpredictable but there are some patterns emerging in terms of risk. Older people have more ACE2 receptors than younger people, so that is likely to be one explanation in the major divergence across age. People who are very overweight tend to have poorer respiratory health, meaning that inflammation of the lungs will be more significant. But it also seems that higher rates of stroke are being observed in covid carrying patients who have no other symptoms. Again, work is being done to understand what is going on there. It could take years to fully understand the range and risk level of a whole range of conditions that present in parallel with covid. And there is research emerging that patients who had the virus at the peak in April, have already lost 50% of any immunity. That means any idea of herd immunity without a vaccine is looking very unlikely. We have yet to see and measure the results of people being infected for a second time. This is also why second waves can be worse (infection rates aside), as those already recovering with weakened immune systems, become reinfected. All of these things are good reasons to be cautious even if hindsight proves to show we were overly so. One of the many complications in vaccine development, is finding vaccines for viruses that leave low imprints on immune system memory. Basically speaking, with most viral and bacterial infections, the body successfully fights them off, and then remembers for next time, how to produce that antibody to do the same job. A vaccine is designed to do the same thing, teach the body how to produce an antibody and leave a long term memory of that. So how do you produce a vaccine for these low imprint viruses? The development at Oxford, by the team led by Prof Sarah Gilbert, uses a harmless weakened adenovirus (found in chimpanzees) that provokes a known strong immune response, which they have genetically modified with the genetic sequence of the surface spike protein found on the covid virus. It is what we call a pseudovirus, and it contains the information the virus needs to provoke the right immune response, but does not contain the information the source virus has that causes the resulting illness. This is why they are safe to test and work on. In theory, this would induce an immune response, that would be remembered for the next time the virus infects the body. If it works, then this vaccine could reduce covid to the level of a regular chest infection, with modifiable vaccines available for those at most risk if it changes from time to time. It is a development process that this team have used before for flu, Zika, MERS and Ebola. Low immune response viruses are their area of research. And there are basically three stages to testing a new vaccine. In the first stage, the vaccine is given to a small sample of healthy people (around 1000) to test for any side effects, and to measure if it produces a good immune response. If it passes that stage, then in the second stage, the vaccine is expanded to people of all ages and the observation there, it to look for the same results as stage one across age groups. Children would be tested at the end of that phase, only once all adult data is showing a safe response. Phase three is the stage at which a vaccine is tested for final use and involves testing in multiple locations (and countries) and tests reinfection rates too. And that means going to somewhere where the virus is spreading unchecked, so as critical as the world is of Brazil for example, it is the perfect location to test a phase three vaccine. There are then additional phases to test those left out of earlier phases, like pregnant women, or those with serious underlying conditions. All of these stages take time and can't be rushed. Announcements that we could have a vaccine by Christmas, were always foolish and deliberately misleading. And even though most vaccines fail at any of these stages, any news of a vaccine going to stage three is worth keeping an eye on. Governments are also pre-ordering huge batches of stage three vaccines for that reason, just in case. Scaling up any vaccine that works is going to be an additional challenge though.

Essentially stag beetles need wet wood that is partially (and rotting) underground. As you've discovered, the beetle stage is actually the end of their lives from the larvae stage. A female will almost certainly lay her eggs near to rotting wood, so you may see another crop emerge next year :)

I agree with all of that. Whilst a more deadly mutation could be less likely than a less deadly one, we don't to miss the first emergence of such a change, hence all the ongoing monitoring and research.

Just to add, if it is a chest freezer, so you are looking down into a sealed tank. Could just fill it with cold water and dissolve a bag of that into it. Leave it overnight and empty it tm. That should get rid of the smell as well.

For the smell, mix sodium bicarbonate with cold water into a paste, and coat the affect areas with that. Leave it for at least 30-40 mins before cleaning it off. It neutralises odours. Good for soaking laundry that animals have peed on too. You can order a good sized bag online and have it delivered tm if you are quick; https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sodium-Bicarbonate-Soda-Cooking-Cleaning/dp/B003S3WQBW

Rate of new cases is up almost 50% on two days ago. It takes about four weeks for rises in new infections to show after easing of lockdown measures, hence having to look at what changed four weeks ago to get some sense of the causes. If this trend continues over the next 7-14 days, Boris is going to have some decisions to make. Theaters and other high density confined spaces are due to open this week, with social distancing, but I sadly can't see them being open long. Edited to add that the figures are 1,441 new cases today, compared to 1,009 new cases two days ago. Even though they are small figures, it is the exponential growth that is the issue.

So you are asking me to agree with opinion that is factually incorrect because you have a different set of life experiences to me? That is not how science works. All that matters in science is a that a set of experiments, or processes, can be repeated again and again and get the same results. When science uses different processes to try and achieve the same thing, it is always looking for corroboration. Your articles don't actually conflict each other either. The second one, which discusses isolates specifically, is not actually denying that different strains exist. What it is arguing is that the differences are so small that no impact is made on the behaviour of the virus, and that it is misleading to talk about those differences in the term of there being different versions of this virus. It also acknowledges that claims are being made in pre-prints. That means papers awaiting peer review. Remember that explanation I gave you of antigenic shift vs drift? His criticism is in the use of language that leads to the inference of the existence of different versions of the virus before evidence is corroborated. And it is a fair note of caution, because mutation, or significant drift, would make this virus more dangerous if we can not create a modifiable vaccine for it, so everyone is looking for evidence of it at every stage. In that environment, it is easy for small changes to be overplayed as something they are not really. And if you look in the comments section, several comments point out that papers claiming to have identified different strains (with measurable different properties) are still waiting to be peer reviewed. So different strains may well already exist. More importantly though, the scientific community is constantly checking itself, corroborating and sharing findings. Making allegations of corruption isn't helpful.

You are finally posting articles that confirm the covid virus can be isolated TE44. Does that mean you have progressed on that point? And then you go on some journey that starts with conspiracy theory and ends with an incoherent point about death so I am not sure what point you are really trying to make there. Suicide is a rather complex subject. Most people who take that step, have a prior history of depressive illness, which can be short term, or go back years. Hi Effra, I take your point, but I also think it more useful to challenge and debunk conspiracy theories in the open, even if my patience is tested at times ;)