Corona virus testing

I went to Bristol airport today to the coronavirus drive through station. I was not impressed, there were no signs whatsoever on the A38 and the testing area was not visible from the road. I was lucky and chose the correct entrance (the southern one in case anybody reading this has to go there), and only realised I was in the right area when getting a glimpse of some of the tent like covers which I had seen on tv. There were a large number of "assistants" milling around and trying to direct the few cars that were there. I was third in the queue, but it took 25 minutes to get through and back on the road. The testers were NHS people and soldiers who were the only people who were actually earning their pay. At the present rate of testing there is no possible way that the governments promises of numbers that will be tested will be realised.

Hopefully soon there will be quite a few stations. Mostly run by the Army.

Steve.

Actually there are two answers:

1. This didn't come out of the blue like a massive meteorite hitting the Earth (predictable but only in long time frame). A pandemic was both predictable and predicted in a short-term (few decades) time frame. As such, governments had a duty to prepare for it. Instead they were completely caught on the wrong foot and unprepared.

Pre-ordained emergency plans should have been drawn up years ago instead of the mishmash of hastily conceived ideas that we've had foisted on us. At the very least, as soon as it became obvious that something was afoot, there should have been plans to immediately halt all international travel while they stood back and assessed the situation.

IMO the lack of action in the preceding years amounts to criminal liability for thousands of (avoidable) deaths.

2. I couldn't build a brick wall so I'd employ a professional bricklayer to do so. He would charge me accordingly. If the wall falls down is any bystander legitimately able to say "could you do any better?"

Edited By JasonB on 24/04/2020 07:08:57

WOW--I must have missed something in the rules for posting on this web site that indicates items should be on TOPIC---ME etc. Must be some computer glitch on the WWW that allows this!

Heaven above only knows we have enough of CV info 24 hrs per day on this side of the pond without having to view it from your side of the pond also.

Hats off to all EM, testing, treating and advising persons in your part of the world. These individuals are doing a tremendous job here and are risking their lives daily to perform their jobs to care for the multitudes.

If your not infected give thanks and rejoice in that FACT!

As it happens Pandemic Response was planned for - Operation Cygnus UK published 2014 and it's counterpart USA (don't remember the date etc there). Pandemic response UK

I haven't read the full details of either but I'll take a fair bet that it was watered down 'to save money' and delayed in being acted on by politicians 'worried about the economy' (AKA didn't want to take the blame for crying wolf).

As for virus testing - It's not a magic bullet for solving things. it's a data gathering excercise that may give more information about the extent of infection in the general populaton (asymptomatic and symptomatic) and may lead to better understanding of how long any immunity may last, communicability may last - but of itself does nothing to halt the spread unless combined with draconian measures to isolate all in-contacts and by being compulsory for everyone on some cyclic re-testing with numbers way above the proposed 100K per day. Its impossible to monitor 65million citizens when it takes 2 years to test them all once. You'ld have to geofence chunks of the UK ringed with the army, clear all infected folk out etc and then add the next chunk with total quarantine. Not something a democracy can do.

All the current indicators are that a magic vaccine or magic cure aren't going to happen for a VERY long time. the best theory is to slowly let everyone catch the thing and survive or die without overwhelming hospitals. Even that is doomed to failure if immunity doesn't persist and it keeps recycling.

Its not too much too a stretch to just accepting the horror of letting it go rife with the survival of the fittest (that's me dead then) then being re-immunised by the reservoir of infected people around them

pgk

Hi Mr. Robert Eggleston,

You wrote:
"Heaven above only knows we have enough of CV info 24 hrs per day on this side of the pond without having to view it from your side of the pond also."

If I understand correctly what you mean, I, who am the main side of the channel, opposite to your side, am in doubt as to whether your segregating will also applies to those on this side?

Dias Costa

Edited By dcosta on 24/04/2020 09:59:55

Headlines today say up to 10 million key workers are now able to book a test. Not too clever - even if 100,000 tests per day are achieved, it would take 100 days to test those key workers and some (many) may need re-tests.

Over three months possible waiting list is not too inviting for those that consider themselves eligible for the tests. Against that the number of tests per day has increased rapidly this month, so the time may well be reduced?

What happens if 10 million try to book a test today? Reality rules, but journalism lags a long way behind.

Hi Robert

Perhaps you could fill in your profile then we would know which side of which pond you live.

Russell

They don't want the public using it Old Mart! At present, Key Workers in the area have been told to get tested:

1. Only in the first 5 days of symptoms, and
2. After getting management approval
3. Then they have to get themselves to Bristol Airport

Politicians think its only necessary to say what people want to hear, and far less important to actually deliver anything. They get away with this most of the time, but 'spinning' misfires badly when the gap between promises and reality becomes obvious to the public.

In this case, its been implied that the testing problem is fixed, which isn't true. There is a shortage of tests. And, in response to questions about severe ongoing PPE shortages, the government chose to announce yesterday how much money they've allocated to the problem, rather than explaining when PPE will actually be available at the front-line. Also been saying they're following 'scientific advice', which I think is certainly blame shifting.

Good news, the UK isn't the worst performing Corana country, but neither is it the best. When the dust settles, awkward questions will have to be answered, for example, why are Brits three times more likely to die than Germans? As of yesterday:

Germany, 153,183 cases, 5575 deaths (3.6%)
UK, 138,078 cases, 18738 deaths (13.5%)

Too early to draw any conclusions but it appears UK government (and others) did the planning but failed to prepare for an actual event. There's also been some bad judgements, like the UK choosing to go it alone rather than join the European emergency PPE and Ventilator procurement scheme. We're expected to believe this wasn't a Brexit related political decision taken at Cabinet level, rather the EU is blamed for sending E-mails to the wrong address! Yeah, right.

I have some sympathy with politicians because hindsight is wonderful! They're also criticised for wasting money on emergencies that never happen.

Dave

SOD,

As I understand it there are 3 flavours of this virus. UK mostly has type C and some type A whereas Germany has mostly type B. Whether that is reflected in mortality is a different question. The other issue with your numbers is the scale of testing. If you test large numbers randomly then you are more likely to pick up less serious cases as a proportion. Final issue is at what point do you deem a case sufficiently bad for ITU - stick the milder cases in 'cos you have capacity and your success rate appears to go up.

We should be grateful we don't have leadership with suggestions such as injecting disinfectants or irradiating patients with UV !

I once had to treat a Corgi whose owner decided it had kidney disease and had been making it drink TCP to disinfect them. I can only assume some of her ancestors emigrated to the US.

pgk

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What you missed, robert, is the fact that this is a Tea Room topic

https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/threads.asp?t=410

and the Tea Room was created especially for items that are NOT on ME TOPIC.

There is no computer glitch involved ... simply a user error at your workstation.

MichaelG.

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Edit: a description of The Tea Room can be found here:

https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 24/04/2020 12:23:22

When the dust settles, awkward questions will have to be answered, for example, why are Brits three times more likely to die than Germans?

One simple reason, apparent to most, if one thinks about it carefully. Testing and number of infections cf deaths.

Germany infections include other than already hospitalised patients.

UK only reports those that are already poorly enough to be admitted to hospital, none of those that have the infection but are not seriously ill. Those admitted to hospital are (generally) from the older age groups - and their susceptibility to death from this virus is far higher than those younger members of the population who have shown symptoms and have been tested positive. Underlying medical conditions generally increase with age group, as well.

Hence, the number comparison in the news is severely flawed. It needs rather better analysis than that applied thus far.

Well I never - here is the latest from the news:

The website opened on Friday but appeared to close by mid-morning with some users met by an "applications closed" message.

Predictable or not?

It seems our leaders may have carried out the planning for a pandemic but omitted to allocate any funds, a bit like arranging your house insurance then deciding not to pay the premium and hoping nothing will happen to your house.
Dave W

Probably on this side at a guess.

Probably on this side at a guess.

Which side would that be? If only everyone filled in their profile we would know where the whining came from (whether Yanks, Poms, Aussies, Kiwis or any other variety fot that matter).

It’s the “Tea Room” section which one can ignore if one wishes.

Given the almost overwhelming UK-centricity of this site, I think it's a little obvious.

As for profiles ... topic done to death already.

Let me add a few more things about my experiences yesterday. I didn't qualify for testing myself, I was just the chauffeur for Christine, an RGN who works in a care home. She has had a cough for several months which is not likely to be connected with CO19. She does not drive, and only people in cars are eligible for testing, no taxis, busses of pedestrians are allowed. Christine was not the only staff member from the same care home who was tested, but they weren't allowed to travel together. Because of the lack of signposting, the other nurse tried the other two entrances to the airport before finding the southern one. On the tv last night, I heard something interesting, apparently all the other members of the household of a key worker who is tested are supposed to be tested also.

I hope that the efficiency of the testing centres improves drastically, at present, if the queue was 50 cars, it would take several hours to process people through, and there are no toilet facilities available.

Actually , I think the older patients are in care homes and the stats don't count these at all. Apparently the total for these deaths is about another 40-50% of those reported for NHS hospitals

I was unlucky enough to get a very nasty but 'conventional' infection which required hospital treatment. I've just got out having spent almost a week in a 'shielded' ward.

I obviously didn't see everything that was going on but I saw more than enough to convince me that everyone is doing the very best they possibly can - including the government (UK).

We need to stop guessing and wait for the proper stats.