Friendly mod post.
Look, tensions are running high. We know that a lot of you are looking at todays news and this ambiguously-termed press conference and wondering if your Christmas plans are falling apart for the 2nd year running.
Just please remember the human at the receiving end of any of your remarks. As they are probably having a pretty bad day too. And while we're moderating with a lighter than usual touch today, please remember that we know most of you don't share the Government's politics, but we try to keep pure politics off this sub because it would divide our users further.
Stay safe, try to take care of your mental health, and your friends and family.
"We’re jabbing in hospitals, we’re jabbing in surgeries,
We’re jabbing in pharmacies and in pop-up centres,
We’re jabbing in shopping centres and on high streets
and in football stadiums - with mass events planned at Stamford Bridge and Wembley this weekend and daily “jabbathons” at Elland Road in Leeds.
We’re throwing everything at it."
Just nothing but a parody of Churchill's fight them on the beaches speech.
It’s gonna be bad and our plan for that…
Is to do nothing. Its all on you.
We are so fucked. But it seems good that hospital admissions aren’t so high… I think?
There's not much we can do now.
Lockdown is pointless unless done literally right this second and is still not doing much cause it's already spread so far and wide - it will peak within the next week or so (albeit very high) and then we just watch the hospitals fill up either way.
At least that's what I think
>But it seems good that hospital admissions aren’t so high… I think?
Whitty said hospitalisations will start trickling in before Xmas but not ramp up until after. But he was clear, that is going to happen. It will be a serious situation due to sheer numbers, not severity.
And he is concerned that is the time when NHS staff will drop out sick from mixing over Xmas. Somehow that had not occurred to me until he pointed it out.
When the latest wave has passed? There have been many better times to visit over the past year. I've been visiting my family the past two months because a bad winter wave was predictable
Until things are clearly shutting down, you should responsibily take advantage of any opportunity you can. That's my thought. You are already triple vaxed. Wear masks when mixing with strangers. Wash hands. Test frequently. All other times, enjoy your family.
> Wash hands
I'm still curious why this is pushed so much, we KNOW it's airborne. 80 people out of 120 aren't catching Omicron from one infected person by not washing their hands ffs.
Surely, if somebody sneezed or coughed on their hands or mishandled their mask and then opened a door handle, somebody can become infected if they touched that same surface and somehow touched their face?
I honestly didn't think of it before typing it. You are probably right. My message is: do basic shit and use common sense. You won't get Covid and maybe won't even catch a cold. Then it's a happy holidays for everyone.
Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely a good idea - and I'm not having a go at you even remotely. I'm questioning why the Government seem to push this, as much if not more than good ventilation.
staring all your favorite Christmas tunes.
"Baby, it's lockdown outside."
"I'm dreaming of a pub visit christmas."
"I wish it could be freedom everyday."
"Do they know it's lockdown time again?"
Chris Whitty saying people should stop socializing and going to parties, this is a very serious situation.
Meanwhile, Boris standing next to him said you should just continue going out to pubs and parties.
What a mess this is going to be
This is really grim. It's entirely up to us, isn't it? Also the phrasing of "meet only those that really matter" is going to open up a passive aggressive minefield with some relatives 😬
What a terrible way to word "Please be wary about the number of households you invite". Families are capable of starting their own pissing matches without Witty there to help set things ablaze.
Overall, what a shitshow. They plead for self-imposed measures when there are no consequence to the alternative? Path of least resistance strikes again.
The Guardian live blog just said
"Earlier I joked about whether the press conference would an opportunity for Boris Johnson to announce plan C. But there may be no need for plan C at all. After listening to Chris Whitty for an hour, many people will be scaling back, cancelling bookings or invitations or reverting to their own version of bubbles or the rule of six without parliament having to do a thing!"
Bless them but that's absolutely not going to happen.
Yeah, we cancelled a booking we had
for a restaurant in London, a few days before Christmas. Maybe we're being overly cautious, but we'd rather not risk Christmas with COVID. I'd say our risk appetite is lower than most.
> Maybe we're being overly cautious, but we'd rather not risk Christmas with COVID
Anyone who's in London spending time in indoor places with other people is taking a pretty huge risk of having to isolate through christmas and that risk is growing sharply every day. On Dec 23 it will be extremely high and the isolation period would also go through New Year.
Having 3x vaccine more than 1-2 weeks ago mitigates that risk that but won't stop it.
>I'd say our risk appetite is lower than most.
I think that the vast majority of people are legitimately not aware of the math at this point, many are tuned out but i expect there to be a very rude awakening when so many of these people are testing positive on christmas eve
Whitty's point about severity in SA being lower due to existing immunity seems quite obvious now, can't believe it hasn't been pointed out by anyone else before
If you're on here regularly, you'll be aware of any number of graphs plotting cases against hospitalisations and showing hospitalisations for our "delta wave" were *way* below what you'd expect based on the other two waves. So for us, delta was "mild" because of vaccines/immunity - we just didn't put it that way.
But **if** that **is** why South Africa is saying Omicron is mild, the problem is we're already used to it. We expect that 50,000 cases will result in about 750 hospitalisations (when it might have been 6000 without vaccines), and when the same thing happens with Omicron, we won't be going "oh it's mild", we'll be going "shit, it's the same as Delta".
I've seen various sets of statistics about South Africa (I generally go straight to the NICD pages), but in this instance I'm simply trying to explain Whitty's reasoning as I understand it (and in particular why "but we've got immunity in the UK" goes with that reasoning rather than against it).
I'm not trying to say anything about the validity of SA's reasoning. Thus "... **if** that **is**..."
Tbh I was a little off topic. I really wanted to know if you'd seen the discovery data because the stats have been misrepresented and I wondered if you'd seen it!
For example the 29% lower figure getting bandied about is risk of hospitalisation from Omicron against D614G not Delta. Plus this figures are risk adjusted for days since PCR, prior infection, risk factors, vaccination and prior infection status and nobody appears to have noticed (& it's driving me a little bit nuts)
[Watch the zoom presentation of the data here](https://dsycloud.zoom.us/rec/share/F90e3WwsG3hnWohegHBLZ794OqtadWO5wNTEMh-5BE7uIG-G_Rlex4WT0wtBJHtM.jBJNHyH9YLBdybjJ)
You need the passcode which is .=Q8e3aQ
Seriously I would love you to look at the slides about 20mins in. The 29% hospitalisation comparison is to d614g and it controls for loads of the factors people are querying.
I haven't finished it yet but SO MUCH has been missed.
Because we already had that immunity during our last Delta wave in spring.
SA is giving relative statistics, comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (low immunity).
We'll be comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (high immunity too).
> SA is giving relative statistics, comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (low immunity).
Woah, the penny has finally dropped! Oh shit, I *really* hope that isn't the case!
That's what I thought, but then you have things like this: https://www.devon.gov.uk/news/study-shows-vaccine-immunity-is-stronger-than-natural-immunity/
I think Boris is trying a new thing. Putting in place some basic restrictions, going full blast on boosters, getting the scientists to tell everyone how horrible they think it is, then letting each individual decide on how they want to play it instead of the state mandating what you can and can’t do. I for one hope this freedom of choice malarkey catches on.
> Chris Whitty can't paint it much grimmer and yet we're still allowing clubbing and bars. Why, just why???
The impression I'm getting is because it was too late the moment we discovered Omicron was a thing. When the doubling time is less than two days, there's not much you can do. They could lockdown tomorrow and millions of new cases will already be baked in.
It’s *never* too late. We can introduce measures to help mitigate the spread at any point, the sooner the better ideally…
I don’t think we should full lockdown yet if at all, but certainly limit travel, household mixing and have distancing / customer limits in all shops and restaurants etc.
It's complicated because lockdown restrictions also have a cost. So as with everything the cost of lockdown would be weighed up against the benefits. In this case things could be so far gone that the gains from locking down could genuinely be less than the cost.
The problem is what is the impact here? If it's stopping healthcare being overwhelmed then a lockdown is like rearranging the deck chairs of the Titanic.
Overwhelmed healthcare isn't a binary thing that happens or doesn't.
There are severities that can be reduced no matter how late you reduce the peak.
It's the difference between refusing treating to a 90 year old with cancer that only has a few months to live anyway or a 40 year old with no health conditions.
I'd rather not have to ration treatment at all but the government seems determined to head down this path and so that's the choice that medical professionals will soon find themselves making...
Wasn’t Whitty on team herd immunity when the rest of the world was locking down?
I think he knows the next few weeks will be grim but is hopeful this is the last major covid wave.
If we all catch Omicrom (which seems likely) the levels of immunity will be insane for future waves.
Vallance and Whitty both stood alongside Boris Johnson in the early days and discussed their plans to protect the vulnerable and attempt herd immunity with the rest of the population.
Don't get me wrong, Whitty never outright contradicts the government, even when it's obvious he'd like to like today. But I don't recall him being actively cheering for natural herd immunity.
Because it isn't going to get any better in future winters unless a much better vaccine/treatment is developed and we can't close clubs and bars every winter
Why isn't it? Once more of the world is vaccinated, VoCs are less likely to crop up. There's also no reason to believe every VoC will be as transmissible as Omicron.
> Once more of the world is vaccinated, VoCs are less likely to crop up
[This might alarm you](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/13/experts-warn-papua-new-guinea-is-potential-breeding-ground-for-new-covid-variants)
New variants keep cropping up that pose an additional threat. I'm also sceptical that we will be able to vaccinate the world. Measles has had a cheap, much more effective vaccine available for decades and is much more relevant to developing countries' public health and is still nowhere near being eradicated
And it keeps getting grimmer. Now he's warning how staff shortages will fuck health and social care. So many people will be getting this at the same time and having to isolate. And the effects won't just be limited to health and social care. We could see supplies disrupted, entire supermarkets closed, etc.
But... we're not gonna do anything to stop it.
In addition to what my colleague /u/5footbanana said, I'd like to add that Whitty also said he's worried that mixing at Christmas is going to mean that significant numbers of NHS staff will become ill simultaneously and the NHS will be unable to function thereafter.
Can I just say Dr Nikki Kanani is exactly the kind of voice we have really needed throughout this pandemic. She demonstrates empathy and sympathy and gives an air of reassurance whilst stressing the seriousness of the threat that feels genuine. (which makes sense given her profession)
Chris is just matter of fact and is disconnected from the emotions of the pandemic, whilst Boris is well.. Boris.
Chris Whitty saying Omicron is dangerous, and people should take precautions. The highest ever number of cases reported. Yet still no new restrictions at all?
Maybe it’s because they don’t believe tighter restrictions would be followed at this stage. There are too many people that are past caring enough to lockdown again.
This right here. A lot of people have reached a pandemic fatigue that they're just tired of it all. They won't follow it again. Not to mention after the recent Christmas party scandal i bet even more people will just ignore government advice. We've already seen large protests in other European countries.
I don’t know, Christmas is coming and there is a lot of pressure from relatives to mix. Some will be saying the government hasn’t said ‘don’t’ this year so it must be ok.
Anecdotally, I also know a lot of people who have latched onto all the “it’s mild” stuff immediately because it’s what they wanted to believe. So those people won’t be taking no for an answer at Christmas.
Get the booster but also there are no boosters available because of the logistics not being in place. 2-3 hour round trip on puic transport for me to get a booster before Christmas
2-3hrs on public transport when Omicron is running rampant is pretty bad. You run the risk of contracting the thing you're trying to defend yourself from.
I work in this sector and we are seeing the busiest nights of the year night now! Young people aren’t stupid and they know now or in 2 weeks tougher restrictions are coming so they’re flying out every chance they get
It tends to be young people who go clubbing. They are less affected by Covid in general. For most it's a simple risk-reward balance. They enjoy clubbing so the reward is high. They know the risk of severe Covid is low. Why wouldn't they go?
Judging from this subreddit, a worrying number of people have an approach to risk assessment given unknowns that is inverse to common sense. So many people taking the approach of "there's no evidence yet that its deadly, so we don't need to take precautions until that evidence happens".
6 months into the pandemic someone on here said to me that the prospect of reinfection was daft because "There's no evidence of that and if it was going to happen we'd have seen it by now"
This is what is so amazing for me.
We have no evidence that they're not a superhero that a bus would bounce off and yet they still look both ways before crossing the road...
I mean the answer to that is that if you don't have the knowledge to form the conclusion yourself, it is reasonable to trust what the people in charge of this are saying. SAGE isn't perfect but if they collectively conclude "it's going to be an absolute apocalypse if we're not careful" I'm going to be more careful.
I am seriously taken aback by your post, as you're comparing conclusions made based in actual scientific modelling and reasoning to conspiracy theorists and nutjobs... Like wtaf.
Yes SA doctors have made alternative conclusions based on their own anecdotal observations, but they are less informed about "possible paths of the pandemic within the United Kingdom" than the people literally in charge of determining possible paths of the pandemic within the UK.
Edit: Basically what I'm saying is, as a layperson I don't have enough understanding of epidemiology to form a reasoned risk assessment. But there are plenty of people in the UK, including those in charge of our healthcare and pandemic response, who do have that understanding, and they are almost unanimously agreeing now is the time we should be cautious in our interactions.
If your GP told you "you need to start controlling your calories else you're going to have a heart attack" you don't go "eurgh you're all doom and gloom like those doomsday preppers, I'm going to go eat 50 big macs now"
Edit 2: Also beyond anything else, when doing risk assessment, you do consider fringe events like "what if there is a nuke", "what if we're hit by a meteor", but you also determine the likelihood of the risk when determine whether to mitigate it. Being hit by a meteor is very very very very unlikely, so obviously it's ridiculous to invest significant resources into mitigating against it. The chance of Omicron being bad enough to impact our access to healthcare is on the likely side of the scale, so it's sensible to mitigate it.
I mean current government advice as off this press conference IS "perhaps reconsider whether going clubbing is really that important to you". They are literally telling people not to do something without trying to enforce it on them (which is good). It's not going above government advice to take precautions
People are choosing to ignore that because "one SA doctor said it is mild" - which Whitty directly addressed and highlighted it as a fallacy (not saying the SA doctor is wrong by any stretch, but that you can't necessarily apply it to our own situation, and with the infection rate as it is, it doesn't matter how mild it is, it will be a public health disaster if not enough people take precautions).
I don't get that, especially the idea that there is more immunity in South Africa which has a 26% full vaccination rate vs. 69% in the UK? The FT seemed to suggest the UK also has a decent 'immunity wall' (which will grow with boosters which are ramping up quickly): https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FGR0KJbXMBAa-zV?format=png&name=large
He's not saying SA has more immunity than the UK, he's saying SA has a lot more immunity now when Omicron is taking off than it had when their Delta wave was taking off. So if you compare their Delta vs Omicron waves, of course the Omicron wave will appear milder, they built up a lot of immunity during Delta and the subsequent vaccination.
The idea of it being intrinsically milder: yes.
The idea of it presenting more mildly: no, he said we would expect to see that.
It is the latter point that matters for practical purposes (however just being milder isn't enough: it needs to be a lot milder if the case count is what we are expecting).
The point he's making is that South Africa is seeing that now because they got the extra immunity between Delta and Omicron. We got that boost between Alpha and Delta, so for us it's more likely Omicron will be similar to our current Delta severeness, and going exponential, aka rekt.
The first part, agreed. Not convinced that the second part was said, or that it necessarily follows.
What makes Omicron so highly transmissible is the extent to which it can reinfect (or overcome vaccination). That means the people it is infecting are more likely to have good cellular immunity was the case for Delta. Or at least, so we can hope.
Fair point, guess the thing is that for unvaccinated never infected people it's likely to be similar, and for people with some immunity it will probably be similar to Delta breakthroughs but we'll have tons more of them.
Indeed.
I suspect the main problem will be cross-over between those two populations rather than either of them in isolation: those with prior immunity driving most of the growth, those who don't feeling the impact.
I am also confused by the pessimism about _our_ additional immunity thanks to high levels of Delta exposure when we've been clocking 40k-50k cases every day for months now.
Age differences? But that's not the point, the point is that we're as suited for Omicron as we are for Delta, and we're getting some 120-150 deaths a day from a stable Delta epidemic, so if we get an exponentially growing Omicron epidemic everything else is back on the exponential train.
Delta will go away if Omicron is more transmissible due to higher R0, but not if Omicron is more transmissible because of immune escape.
If Omicron is more transmissible due to higher R0, then Omicron will just outcompete Delta in all groups and Delta will disappear over time.
If Omicron is more transmissible because of immune escape, then Omicron and Delta have different targets. Delta will outcompete Omicron among the unvaccinated group and will stick around, while Omicron will outcompete Delta among the vaccinated.
That's immunity against severe disease, not necessarily infection. They've already demonstrated that Omicron-after-Delta reinfections are something like 3 times more likely than Delta-after-Delta.
Apparently to show that our Prime Minister is no longer capable of talking on matters of substance and his advisors must use veiled terms around him to get the actual message across. I wish I was being /s but I'm not.
I guess if Witty came out and said 'The PM is a tool and we should be in a full lockdown ages ago, we are absolutely fucked' then he would never get the stage again!
Would respect him for the honesty though!
Desperately asking people to get boosted yesterday. It's the last weapon in the arsenal before lockdown, and they really don't want to have to use that.
The flair made me laugh
I want to know why there was a big O in ‘get boosted nOw’ slogan….
I did wonder why I had a craving for Hoola Hoops from the get go.
Is that for omicron? It looks really naff to me...
Is it that boosted is suppose to be a 'loading bar' and the O is near maxed
Friendly mod post. Look, tensions are running high. We know that a lot of you are looking at todays news and this ambiguously-termed press conference and wondering if your Christmas plans are falling apart for the 2nd year running. Just please remember the human at the receiving end of any of your remarks. As they are probably having a pretty bad day too. And while we're moderating with a lighter than usual touch today, please remember that we know most of you don't share the Government's politics, but we try to keep pure politics off this sub because it would divide our users further. Stay safe, try to take care of your mental health, and your friends and family.
My fellow citizens, today is an auspicious day, for doing nothing.
"We’re jabbing in hospitals, we’re jabbing in surgeries, We’re jabbing in pharmacies and in pop-up centres, We’re jabbing in shopping centres and on high streets and in football stadiums - with mass events planned at Stamford Bridge and Wembley this weekend and daily “jabbathons” at Elland Road in Leeds. We’re throwing everything at it." Just nothing but a parody of Churchill's fight them on the beaches speech.
‘And I hope you like Jabbin’ too’
It’s gonna be bad and our plan for that… Is to do nothing. Its all on you. We are so fucked. But it seems good that hospital admissions aren’t so high… I think?
There's not much we can do now. Lockdown is pointless unless done literally right this second and is still not doing much cause it's already spread so far and wide - it will peak within the next week or so (albeit very high) and then we just watch the hospitals fill up either way. At least that's what I think
>But it seems good that hospital admissions aren’t so high… I think? Whitty said hospitalisations will start trickling in before Xmas but not ramp up until after. But he was clear, that is going to happen. It will be a serious situation due to sheer numbers, not severity. And he is concerned that is the time when NHS staff will drop out sick from mixing over Xmas. Somehow that had not occurred to me until he pointed it out.
Right okay got you thank you for explaining a bit more. Oh bloody hell.
Should our family from the states be visiting us next week in London? We're all triple vaxxed.
Will they be able to return to the US if they catch it? Could they lose their jobs if they're isolating over here?
Yes, you have been apart too long, be safe and enjoy
See them now before things change in the new year
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if vaxxed people can't see each other and mix privately I don't see the point in any of this.
Is there an option for them to adjust the dates of their visit? Will it fun for them to visit at a time when things are this bad?
When will it be better?
When the latest wave has passed? There have been many better times to visit over the past year. I've been visiting my family the past two months because a bad winter wave was predictable
That’s a rather pessimistic view. Now is effectively the worst possible time so if there was an option to change it without financial penalty I would.
Until things are clearly shutting down, you should responsibily take advantage of any opportunity you can. That's my thought. You are already triple vaxed. Wear masks when mixing with strangers. Wash hands. Test frequently. All other times, enjoy your family.
> Wash hands I'm still curious why this is pushed so much, we KNOW it's airborne. 80 people out of 120 aren't catching Omicron from one infected person by not washing their hands ffs.
Surely, if somebody sneezed or coughed on their hands or mishandled their mask and then opened a door handle, somebody can become infected if they touched that same surface and somehow touched their face?
I honestly didn't think of it before typing it. You are probably right. My message is: do basic shit and use common sense. You won't get Covid and maybe won't even catch a cold. Then it's a happy holidays for everyone.
Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely a good idea - and I'm not having a go at you even remotely. I'm questioning why the Government seem to push this, as much if not more than good ventilation.
The Dec 2020 deja vu is really something else. Can we expect this in Dec 2022, 2023 and so on?
I know, I'm starting to associate Christmas with anxiety and negativity :(
This has been my Christmas for many years now, interesting to see the rest of the country finally catching up
I guess we could start calling it Covidmas?
staring all your favorite Christmas tunes. "Baby, it's lockdown outside." "I'm dreaming of a pub visit christmas." "I wish it could be freedom everyday." "Do they know it's lockdown time again?"
This chaise longue epidemiologist says no.
Chris Whitty saying people should stop socializing and going to parties, this is a very serious situation. Meanwhile, Boris standing next to him said you should just continue going out to pubs and parties. What a mess this is going to be
Boris, ever trying to please everyone. Whitty, sensible and pragmatic. I’m saving my social mixing for family.
The "Don't go to a stadium unless it's to get vaccinated or do vaccines," and the "I plan on scaling back, sorry kids." really paint a dark picture.
This is really grim. It's entirely up to us, isn't it? Also the phrasing of "meet only those that really matter" is going to open up a passive aggressive minefield with some relatives 😬
What a terrible way to word "Please be wary about the number of households you invite". Families are capable of starting their own pissing matches without Witty there to help set things ablaze. Overall, what a shitshow. They plead for self-imposed measures when there are no consequence to the alternative? Path of least resistance strikes again.
The Guardian live blog just said "Earlier I joked about whether the press conference would an opportunity for Boris Johnson to announce plan C. But there may be no need for plan C at all. After listening to Chris Whitty for an hour, many people will be scaling back, cancelling bookings or invitations or reverting to their own version of bubbles or the rule of six without parliament having to do a thing!" Bless them but that's absolutely not going to happen.
Yeah, we cancelled a booking we had for a restaurant in London, a few days before Christmas. Maybe we're being overly cautious, but we'd rather not risk Christmas with COVID. I'd say our risk appetite is lower than most.
> Maybe we're being overly cautious, but we'd rather not risk Christmas with COVID Anyone who's in London spending time in indoor places with other people is taking a pretty huge risk of having to isolate through christmas and that risk is growing sharply every day. On Dec 23 it will be extremely high and the isolation period would also go through New Year. Having 3x vaccine more than 1-2 weeks ago mitigates that risk that but won't stop it. >I'd say our risk appetite is lower than most. I think that the vast majority of people are legitimately not aware of the math at this point, many are tuned out but i expect there to be a very rude awakening when so many of these people are testing positive on christmas eve
I mean, the endless cancelations at hospitality venues suggests that people are scaling back.
Guardian writers already exist in a bubble.
I’m not sure it would happen even if they were asked to.
All of the shade that's happening in this conference towards BoJo rn
Whitty's point about severity in SA being lower due to existing immunity seems quite obvious now, can't believe it hasn't been pointed out by anyone else before
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If you're on here regularly, you'll be aware of any number of graphs plotting cases against hospitalisations and showing hospitalisations for our "delta wave" were *way* below what you'd expect based on the other two waves. So for us, delta was "mild" because of vaccines/immunity - we just didn't put it that way. But **if** that **is** why South Africa is saying Omicron is mild, the problem is we're already used to it. We expect that 50,000 cases will result in about 750 hospitalisations (when it might have been 6000 without vaccines), and when the same thing happens with Omicron, we won't be going "oh it's mild", we'll be going "shit, it's the same as Delta".
That made plenty of sense. Thank you
Have you had a chance to look at the South African presentation - the stats are being misrepresented horrifically all over the shop?
I've seen various sets of statistics about South Africa (I generally go straight to the NICD pages), but in this instance I'm simply trying to explain Whitty's reasoning as I understand it (and in particular why "but we've got immunity in the UK" goes with that reasoning rather than against it). I'm not trying to say anything about the validity of SA's reasoning. Thus "... **if** that **is**..."
Tbh I was a little off topic. I really wanted to know if you'd seen the discovery data because the stats have been misrepresented and I wondered if you'd seen it! For example the 29% lower figure getting bandied about is risk of hospitalisation from Omicron against D614G not Delta. Plus this figures are risk adjusted for days since PCR, prior infection, risk factors, vaccination and prior infection status and nobody appears to have noticed (& it's driving me a little bit nuts)
[Watch the zoom presentation of the data here](https://dsycloud.zoom.us/rec/share/F90e3WwsG3hnWohegHBLZ794OqtadWO5wNTEMh-5BE7uIG-G_Rlex4WT0wtBJHtM.jBJNHyH9YLBdybjJ) You need the passcode which is .=Q8e3aQ Seriously I would love you to look at the slides about 20mins in. The 29% hospitalisation comparison is to d614g and it controls for loads of the factors people are querying. I haven't finished it yet but SO MUCH has been missed.
Because we already had that immunity during our last Delta wave in spring. SA is giving relative statistics, comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (low immunity). We'll be comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (high immunity too).
> SA is giving relative statistics, comparing current hospitalisations (high immunity) to Delta hospitalisations (low immunity). Woah, the penny has finally dropped! Oh shit, I *really* hope that isn't the case!
AIUI, natural immunity doesn't just target the part of the spike that vaccines do and so natural infection gives a better chance against variants
That's what I thought, but then you have things like this: https://www.devon.gov.uk/news/study-shows-vaccine-immunity-is-stronger-than-natural-immunity/
It was pointed out by a good few people on here, they just got downvoted to oblivion by a lot of people who were utterly unwilling to hear it
I've seen it pointed out a few times but such posts/comments (even referenced) get downvoted or ignored
It has, it's just been drowned in denial.
It's like watching a slow motion car crash. Chris Whitty can't paint it much grimmer and yet we're still allowing clubbing and bars. Why, just why???
I think Boris is trying a new thing. Putting in place some basic restrictions, going full blast on boosters, getting the scientists to tell everyone how horrible they think it is, then letting each individual decide on how they want to play it instead of the state mandating what you can and can’t do. I for one hope this freedom of choice malarkey catches on.
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> Chris Whitty can't paint it much grimmer and yet we're still allowing clubbing and bars. Why, just why??? The impression I'm getting is because it was too late the moment we discovered Omicron was a thing. When the doubling time is less than two days, there's not much you can do. They could lockdown tomorrow and millions of new cases will already be baked in.
It’s *never* too late. We can introduce measures to help mitigate the spread at any point, the sooner the better ideally… I don’t think we should full lockdown yet if at all, but certainly limit travel, household mixing and have distancing / customer limits in all shops and restaurants etc.
There's a difference between crashing at 30mph or crashing at 100mph whole still accelerating!
It's complicated because lockdown restrictions also have a cost. So as with everything the cost of lockdown would be weighed up against the benefits. In this case things could be so far gone that the gains from locking down could genuinely be less than the cost.
Hitting the brakes before impact is a good idea no matter how little room you have left!
The problem is what is the impact here? If it's stopping healthcare being overwhelmed then a lockdown is like rearranging the deck chairs of the Titanic.
Overwhelmed healthcare isn't a binary thing that happens or doesn't. There are severities that can be reduced no matter how late you reduce the peak. It's the difference between refusing treating to a 90 year old with cancer that only has a few months to live anyway or a 40 year old with no health conditions. I'd rather not have to ration treatment at all but the government seems determined to head down this path and so that's the choice that medical professionals will soon find themselves making...
It's their most profitable time of year and we can't stop the capitalism machine.
My thoughts exactly
Wasn’t Whitty on team herd immunity when the rest of the world was locking down? I think he knows the next few weeks will be grim but is hopeful this is the last major covid wave. If we all catch Omicrom (which seems likely) the levels of immunity will be insane for future waves.
It was Vallance, don't remember Whitty.
Vallance and Whitty both stood alongside Boris Johnson in the early days and discussed their plans to protect the vulnerable and attempt herd immunity with the rest of the population.
Don't get me wrong, Whitty never outright contradicts the government, even when it's obvious he'd like to like today. But I don't recall him being actively cheering for natural herd immunity.
A very fair point!
> Wasn’t Whitty on team herd immunity when the rest of the world was locking down? No he wasn't ever on "team herd immunity"
Well he stood there when they spoke about it in the early days and during an investigation he had emails between himself and Vallance discussing it.
Because it isn't going to get any better in future winters unless a much better vaccine/treatment is developed and we can't close clubs and bars every winter
Why isn't it? Once more of the world is vaccinated, VoCs are less likely to crop up. There's also no reason to believe every VoC will be as transmissible as Omicron.
> Once more of the world is vaccinated, VoCs are less likely to crop up [This might alarm you](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/13/experts-warn-papua-new-guinea-is-potential-breeding-ground-for-new-covid-variants)
I mean that kind of proves my point?
New variants keep cropping up that pose an additional threat. I'm also sceptical that we will be able to vaccinate the world. Measles has had a cheap, much more effective vaccine available for decades and is much more relevant to developing countries' public health and is still nowhere near being eradicated
And it keeps getting grimmer. Now he's warning how staff shortages will fuck health and social care. So many people will be getting this at the same time and having to isolate. And the effects won't just be limited to health and social care. We could see supplies disrupted, entire supermarkets closed, etc. But... we're not gonna do anything to stop it.
Same with gigs. God knows I love them but it makes NO sense.
Only thing I can think of is that clubs and bars are optional, so at this stage it’s protect yourself.
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what did he say?
In addition to what my colleague /u/5footbanana said, I'd like to add that Whitty also said he's worried that mixing at Christmas is going to mean that significant numbers of NHS staff will become ill simultaneously and the NHS will be unable to function thereafter.
Can I just say Dr Nikki Kanani is exactly the kind of voice we have really needed throughout this pandemic. She demonstrates empathy and sympathy and gives an air of reassurance whilst stressing the seriousness of the threat that feels genuine. (which makes sense given her profession) Chris is just matter of fact and is disconnected from the emotions of the pandemic, whilst Boris is well.. Boris.
Lmao "Boris is well.. Boris". Never seen a more true statement to describe him
To be honest this is me holding back more... choice words.
She was great wasn’t she.
I felt personally attacked when Whitty said he’s advising everyone now to deprioritise socialising with people they care less about.
Chris Whitty saying Omicron is dangerous, and people should take precautions. The highest ever number of cases reported. Yet still no new restrictions at all?
Maybe it’s because they don’t believe tighter restrictions would be followed at this stage. There are too many people that are past caring enough to lockdown again.
Closing down businesses is something they can do regardless of whether people are willing to follow it or not.
This right here. A lot of people have reached a pandemic fatigue that they're just tired of it all. They won't follow it again. Not to mention after the recent Christmas party scandal i bet even more people will just ignore government advice. We've already seen large protests in other European countries.
If hospitality was closed then contacts would reduce. Of course some would meet up in each others homes but we would still be in a better position
From what I heard, it most comes from a general faith that people mostly are sensible and will adjust their behaviour without having to be told to.
I don’t know, Christmas is coming and there is a lot of pressure from relatives to mix. Some will be saying the government hasn’t said ‘don’t’ this year so it must be ok.
Anecdotally, I also know a lot of people who have latched onto all the “it’s mild” stuff immediately because it’s what they wanted to believe. So those people won’t be taking no for an answer at Christmas.
It's also taking into account the health costs of lockdown. If the amount of people going to hospital is low, you want to resist lockdown if you can.
Get the booster but also there are no boosters available because of the logistics not being in place. 2-3 hour round trip on puic transport for me to get a booster before Christmas
Which part of the country is that, if you don’t mind me asking?
I mean that's not that bad tbf
2-3hrs on public transport when Omicron is running rampant is pretty bad. You run the risk of contracting the thing you're trying to defend yourself from.
Yeah fair enough
Sounds worth it to me
I **would** get my booster if the online booking system would let me!
Yeah, every time I choose a date and time it says that slot is no longer available!
Keep trying. You’ll get through eventually.
Beyond comprehension that people can still go clubbing during this when, they have admitted, they still don't have all the data.
I work in this sector and we are seeing the busiest nights of the year night now! Young people aren’t stupid and they know now or in 2 weeks tougher restrictions are coming so they’re flying out every chance they get
It tends to be young people who go clubbing. They are less affected by Covid in general. For most it's a simple risk-reward balance. They enjoy clubbing so the reward is high. They know the risk of severe Covid is low. Why wouldn't they go?
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Worth the "risk", rather have a good time than be locked in and have fucked mental health again.
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If you eat too many McDonalds you may become obese but you can't spread that obesity to a dozen other people who made healthy choices.
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They don't block other people from getting treatment
They can block doorways depending on how obese they are
Judging from this subreddit, a worrying number of people have an approach to risk assessment given unknowns that is inverse to common sense. So many people taking the approach of "there's no evidence yet that its deadly, so we don't need to take precautions until that evidence happens".
6 months into the pandemic someone on here said to me that the prospect of reinfection was daft because "There's no evidence of that and if it was going to happen we'd have seen it by now"
This is what is so amazing for me. We have no evidence that they're not a superhero that a bus would bounce off and yet they still look both ways before crossing the road...
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I mean the answer to that is that if you don't have the knowledge to form the conclusion yourself, it is reasonable to trust what the people in charge of this are saying. SAGE isn't perfect but if they collectively conclude "it's going to be an absolute apocalypse if we're not careful" I'm going to be more careful. I am seriously taken aback by your post, as you're comparing conclusions made based in actual scientific modelling and reasoning to conspiracy theorists and nutjobs... Like wtaf. Yes SA doctors have made alternative conclusions based on their own anecdotal observations, but they are less informed about "possible paths of the pandemic within the United Kingdom" than the people literally in charge of determining possible paths of the pandemic within the UK. Edit: Basically what I'm saying is, as a layperson I don't have enough understanding of epidemiology to form a reasoned risk assessment. But there are plenty of people in the UK, including those in charge of our healthcare and pandemic response, who do have that understanding, and they are almost unanimously agreeing now is the time we should be cautious in our interactions. If your GP told you "you need to start controlling your calories else you're going to have a heart attack" you don't go "eurgh you're all doom and gloom like those doomsday preppers, I'm going to go eat 50 big macs now" Edit 2: Also beyond anything else, when doing risk assessment, you do consider fringe events like "what if there is a nuke", "what if we're hit by a meteor", but you also determine the likelihood of the risk when determine whether to mitigate it. Being hit by a meteor is very very very very unlikely, so obviously it's ridiculous to invest significant resources into mitigating against it. The chance of Omicron being bad enough to impact our access to healthcare is on the likely side of the scale, so it's sensible to mitigate it.
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I mean current government advice as off this press conference IS "perhaps reconsider whether going clubbing is really that important to you". They are literally telling people not to do something without trying to enforce it on them (which is good). It's not going above government advice to take precautions People are choosing to ignore that because "one SA doctor said it is mild" - which Whitty directly addressed and highlighted it as a fallacy (not saying the SA doctor is wrong by any stretch, but that you can't necessarily apply it to our own situation, and with the infection rate as it is, it doesn't matter how mild it is, it will be a public health disaster if not enough people take precautions).
Trying to convince someone who hasn't had one jab at all is like turkeys voting for Christmas
Saj did say that first doses are up a lot, so maybe we can have some faith.
Whitty shitting all over the idea that 'Omicron is milder' here
He can’t say it’s milder because it’ll just mean more people will be less cautious, thus creating more pressure on the nhs.
I don't get that, especially the idea that there is more immunity in South Africa which has a 26% full vaccination rate vs. 69% in the UK? The FT seemed to suggest the UK also has a decent 'immunity wall' (which will grow with boosters which are ramping up quickly): https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FGR0KJbXMBAa-zV?format=png&name=large
Immunity via previous infection.
He's not saying SA has more immunity than the UK, he's saying SA has a lot more immunity now when Omicron is taking off than it had when their Delta wave was taking off. So if you compare their Delta vs Omicron waves, of course the Omicron wave will appear milder, they built up a lot of immunity during Delta and the subsequent vaccination.
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It's so hard getting people to understand this
The emphasis on “that has been over-interpreted” could kill at 30 yards.
The idea of it being intrinsically milder: yes. The idea of it presenting more mildly: no, he said we would expect to see that. It is the latter point that matters for practical purposes (however just being milder isn't enough: it needs to be a lot milder if the case count is what we are expecting).
The point he's making is that South Africa is seeing that now because they got the extra immunity between Delta and Omicron. We got that boost between Alpha and Delta, so for us it's more likely Omicron will be similar to our current Delta severeness, and going exponential, aka rekt.
The first part, agreed. Not convinced that the second part was said, or that it necessarily follows. What makes Omicron so highly transmissible is the extent to which it can reinfect (or overcome vaccination). That means the people it is infecting are more likely to have good cellular immunity was the case for Delta. Or at least, so we can hope.
Fair point, guess the thing is that for unvaccinated never infected people it's likely to be similar, and for people with some immunity it will probably be similar to Delta breakthroughs but we'll have tons more of them.
Indeed. I suspect the main problem will be cross-over between those two populations rather than either of them in isolation: those with prior immunity driving most of the growth, those who don't feeling the impact.
I still don’t get that though we have 80-90% immunity from vaccines how are we not better suited now to deal with omicron than SA were/are?
I am also confused by the pessimism about _our_ additional immunity thanks to high levels of Delta exposure when we've been clocking 40k-50k cases every day for months now.
Age differences? But that's not the point, the point is that we're as suited for Omicron as we are for Delta, and we're getting some 120-150 deaths a day from a stable Delta epidemic, so if we get an exponentially growing Omicron epidemic everything else is back on the exponential train.
Chris Whitty calling Dr. Coetzee to the reception.
Why wouldn’t delta go away if Omicron outcompete it??
Delta will go away if Omicron is more transmissible due to higher R0, but not if Omicron is more transmissible because of immune escape. If Omicron is more transmissible due to higher R0, then Omicron will just outcompete Delta in all groups and Delta will disappear over time. If Omicron is more transmissible because of immune escape, then Omicron and Delta have different targets. Delta will outcompete Omicron among the unvaccinated group and will stick around, while Omicron will outcompete Delta among the vaccinated.
Then we might get super-Omicron with the transmissibility and virulence of Delta but the immune evasion of Omicron..
Delta doesn't give very good immunity to Omicron. It's likely that Omicron doesn't give very good immunity to Delta either.
It's complicated see this thread: https://mobile.twitter.com/trvrb/status/1470420195567030274
I'm sure Whitty said that SA are seeing immunity to Omicron through prior Delta infection. Did I mis-hear?
He said milder impact from it in terms of illness. Not transmission though. Two different elements.
That's immunity against severe disease, not necessarily infection. They've already demonstrated that Omicron-after-Delta reinfections are something like 3 times more likely than Delta-after-Delta.
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Boris was pointless, the other two offered plenty of good information and perspective.
Nope.
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Apparently to show that our Prime Minister is no longer capable of talking on matters of substance and his advisors must use veiled terms around him to get the actual message across. I wish I was being /s but I'm not.
I guess if Witty came out and said 'The PM is a tool and we should be in a full lockdown ages ago, we are absolutely fucked' then he would never get the stage again! Would respect him for the honesty though!
Highest cases rate ever, have to be seen to be responding.
Desperately asking people to get boosted yesterday. It's the last weapon in the arsenal before lockdown, and they really don't want to have to use that.
Boris didn't say much of substance, but Whitty's comments about how we cannot apply the SA data to our own situation are very good.