Posts

Wednesday May 6th

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You might think that the main headline today would be that the UK now has the highest death rate in Europe. But you would be wrong. The big story is that Professor Neil Ferguson has been caught shagging and not from six feet. I may be missing the point here, but who cares? Nearly 30,000 people in the UK are dead from a virus for which there is no known cure. What a pity that they are not celebrities, footballers or members of the Royal Family for whom there would be an out-pouring of grief. They are just ordinary people, some of them NHS workers, who, on the whole, remain faceless. Whilst the PM agrees that it is tragic that they have died, he shows no remorse for his part in the deaths of a good many of them. By refusing to listen to scientists (even now disgraced ones) until it was too late he allowed the virus free rein to infect people in the UK. By failing to provide PPE he is responsible for the deaths of essential workers for whom he has a duty of care. Specu

Tuesday May 5th

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It seems highly likely that the UK lockdown will be eased this coming weekend. There is little in the way of agreement about what exactly this will mean. 12 countries - including Germany, Spain, Greece, Belgium, Lithuania, France, Nigeria and Lebanon - started to ease their lockdowns yesterday. In most countries this was to promote economic growth, but only some stores and industries were allowed to open. In Germany the easing of restrictions included allowing hairdressers and barbers to open. Both the infection rate (counted by positive tests for those who can get them) and deaths (where Covid-19 is included on the death certificate) continue to rise. As of yesterday, there were 28,734 deaths and 190,584 positive tests. Date Days since first death 04/05/2020 60 Deaths   UK (All deaths) 28,734 New deaths (official) 288 Death Rate (hospital deaths) 15.08 Increase in deaths over previous day (%) 1.0 Tests carried out UK Total tests carried out      

Friday May 1st

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The UK Government continue to regard themselves as having led a successful campaign against the virus This despite all the evidence suggesting otherwise The death rate continues to rise, whilst the PM tells us that the peak has been reached Meanwhile, there are now over 3 million confirmed cases of Covid-19 worldwide In the UK there are 171,253 confirmed cases But, this excludes all the people who have not been tested and have the virus In particular this means that older people in care homes, those most at risk of dying, are not being counted And, in case we forget (the media have moved on) despite the claps and the charity singles health workers continue to work without adequate PPE And the result of this is that more and more of them are contracting the virus and a small but significant number of them are dying The UK government, under some pressure, has finally agreed to include all deaths in the daily totals. UK total yesterday was 26,771

Wednesday April 29th

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Government ministers no longer want to be grilled by Piers Morgan They prefer to be buttered up by Keir Starmer Government is promising to include deaths in care homes in the daily figures - which begs the question why they hadn't thought to do this before. Confirmed cases worldwide have now surpassed 3 million Deaths worldwide are just short of 220,000. In the UK deaths in hospital are 21,678. If deaths outside hospital are included the figure is over 28,000, whilst the Financial Times model puts the number of deaths at 47,100. UK Stats Date Days since first death 28/04/2020 54 Deaths   UK (Hospital deaths) 21,678 UK deaths adjusted to include non-hospital deaths 28,001 New hospital deaths (official) 586 New deaths adjusted to include care homes 757 Death Rate (hospital deaths) 13.45 Adjusted death rate 17.38 Increase in deaths over previous day (%) 2.8 This chart shows the hospital deaths data (as provided by the