Worrying times

[John Moore]

Mick, would you rather have had Corbyn and his cronies. At least, the current lot have had the good sense to rely on the scientific advice.

[Nick Ivell]

This crisis is going to change the world, in large ways and small.

Chess? I've no appetite for the online stuff. OTB? For a start, I can see the courtesy handshake going out the window.

Hindu-style namaste, anyone? Let's face it, even in pre-Corona times, it was a recipe for spreading flu. We should always have worried about that more.

Nothing will be the same again.

[Matt Bridgeman]

Perhaps the Torries will stop blocking NHS pay rises after we get through this crisis. The footage of them chortling away on the Conservative benches last time was particularly galling.

[Jon Mahony]

Perhaps the Torries will stop blocking NHS pay rises after we get through this crisis. The footage of them chortling away on the Conservative benches last time was particularly galling.

Would be very nice! I've not had a decent pay rise in years, when we get it, its something insulting like £20 a month.

[Jonathan Rogers]

Mick, would you rather have had Corbyn and his cronies. At least, the current lot have had the good sense to rely on the scientific advice.

All scientific advice included testing people as much as possible, I should imagine - NOT followed for a long time

And more generally it seems as though they chose which advice to follow, because theirs seemed to differ from advice given and followed elsewhere. There was only ever talk of "herd immunity" in the UK.

[David Sedgwick]

Matt Hancock has now tested positive.

Whether the country would run better without him, Johnson and some of the others is a good question; they wouldn't be on my list of key workers

They are members of the elected Government. Moreover, at present you still live in a country where you are at liberty to make the comment which I have quoted.

If you think that a different set-up would serve the nation better, be careful what you wish for. I have heard some pretty horrifying reports about the potential outcome in Iran.

[NickFaulks]

There was only ever talk of "herd immunity" in the UK.

Sweden are persevering with it, and they're The Guardian's favourite country.

[David Gilbert]

If we want to compare where we are internationally it might best be expressed as the number of deaths, where the underlying cause is COVID-19, per million population...

International Classification of Diseases version 10 (known as ICD-10) is used for coding diagnosis and deaths. Figures for the actual number of people admitted to hospital and the number of deaths will be recorded using two emergency ICD-10 codes for COVID-19 issued in the last few days by the World Health Organisation. U07.1 for cases confirmed by pathology and U07.2 where the virus has been diagnosed without pathology confirmation. In England these data will be collected as part of the Hospital Episode Statistics, known as HES.

But do the new codes attribute the cause of death to Covid-19 or do they merely say that a deceased person tested positive for Covid-19?

The NHS is reliant on its small army of clinical coders to get this right. They are the real experts (that's to say, not me). The emergency codes are used to collect data on the reason for hospital admissions and for use on death certificates. So for admissions U07.1 is used for people who’s diagnosis for COVIS-19 has been confirmed by pathology and U07.2 is used where the virus has has been diagnosed without pathology (with three subsets for clinically-epidemiologically; probable; and suspected COVID-19). At the end of all this we should be able to use the data to match, through the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), COVID-19 admissions to discharges (a proxy for recovery) and deaths.

There is likely to be data on clinical tests, but that was never part of my remit.

[Jonathan Rogers]

David's comment reminds me of one of the funnier Frasier scenes (where Frasier is protesting against an upstairs neighbour draping his American flag over his window, and is accused of being unpatriotic and exhorted to move to Iraq).

It is a bit much to imply that the only alternative to the present government is life in Iran. I could agree that life under Corbyn was not exactly a tempting alternative either. But maybe a viable alternative will emerge, and if/when it does, the difficult questions may mount up for the present administration.

[Jonathan Rogers]

There was only ever talk of "herd immunity" in the UK.

Sweden are persevering with it, and they're The Guardian's favourite country.

I stand corrected on THAT then; SWEDEN!

But the point remains that a variety of scientific advice was out there, and our government initially went for one of the minority options, not one pursued by any country with actual experience of mass contagion, and changed its mind when it became (even more) discredited.

[Angus French]

If we want to compare where we are internationally it might best be expressed as the number of deaths, where the underlying cause is COVID-19, per million population...

International Classification of Diseases version 10 (known as ICD-10) is used for coding diagnosis and deaths. Figures for the actual number of people admitted to hospital and the number of deaths will be recorded using two emergency ICD-10 codes for COVID-19 issued in the last few days by the World Health Organisation. U07.1 for cases confirmed by pathology and U07.2 where the virus has been diagnosed without pathology confirmation. In England these data will be collected as part of the Hospital Episode Statistics, known as HES.

But do the new codes attribute the cause of death to Covid-19 or do they merely say that a deceased person tested positive for Covid-19?

The NHS is reliant on its small army of clinical coders to get this right. They are the real experts (that's to say, not me). The emergency codes are used to collect data on the reason for hospital admissions and for use on death certificates. So for admissions U07.1 is used for people who’s diagnosis for COVIS-19 has been confirmed by pathology and U07.2 is used where the virus has has been diagnosed without pathology (with three subsets for clinically-epidemiologically; probable; and suspected COVID-19). At the end of all this we should be able to use the data to match, through the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), COVID-19 admissions to discharges (a proxy for recovery) and deaths.

There is likely to be data on clinical tests, but that was never part of my remit.

So, the reason for death would be attributed to code UO7.1 or code U07.2, indicating Covid-19, regardless of whether the deceased also had say, cancer, motor neurone disease or another serious disease? I ask because it's presumably important to know how deaths are classified when interpreting mortality rates.

[David Sedgwick]

David's comment reminds me of one of the funnier Frasier scenes (where Frasier is protesting against an upstairs neighbour draping his American flag over his window, and is accused of being unpatriotic and exhorted to move to Iraq).

It is a bit much to imply that the only alternative to the present government is life in Iran. I could agree that life under Corbyn was not exactly a tempting alternative either. But maybe a viable alternative will emerge, and if/when it does, the difficult questions may mount up for the present administration.

That is a reasonable argument if you are postulating an alternative emerging by democratic means.

But when someone suggests, as Mick did, that the elected leaders of our country are not key workers, then I start to feel nervous.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Mick, would you rather have had Corbyn and his cronies. At least, the current lot have had the good sense to rely on the scientific advice.

Including when eugenicist Cummings decided that "advice" was "herd immunity"?

Being totally serious, I expect a Labour government *would* have acted more quickly - because both the control and financial measures would have come more naturally to them, rather than counter to four decades of entrenched ideology.

[David Robertson]

There was only ever talk of "herd immunity" in the UK.

Sweden are persevering with it, and they're The Guardian's favourite country

I stand corrected on THAT then

No need. Usual bo**ocks; usual source. Didn't take too much checking

Swedish authorities have said they are not explicitly pursuing a strategy of “herd immunity”, where a large segment of the population contracts the virus in order for society to build up immunity. The UK’s chief scientific adviser had previously suggested that Britain adopt such an approach before the government backtracked. Sweden is instead seeking to slow the spread of infections and ensure that its health system does not become overwhelmed. Mr Bildt said the situation on the streets of Stockholm had changed “dramatically” in recent weeks despite the absence of legal restrictions, with far fewer people going outside. But Mr Rocklov said it was not yet known how long immunity to Covid-19 would last. “There is a big risk that Sweden would have to go into quarantine when the health system goes into crisis,” he added

[Tim Spanton]

Nick Triggle at the BBC giving his two pennies' worth:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51979654

https://beauchess.blogspot.com/