The World Health Organisation and many other eminent expert bodies are saying that the COVID19 Pandemic is still a long way from being dealt with, 15 months on from the first proven cases of the disease.
Estimates vary depending on who is presenting a narrative and where they are presenting from.
More cases is always the result of increased transmission, lower cases is always the result of lowered transmission. It is that simple.
source for this graphic : zerocovid.uk
Right now, as I am typing, zero community transmission strategies are protecting the lives and economies of 1.8 billion people across East Asia and Oceania. In these countries deaths from COVID-19 have been kept to a minimum. In these countries they have not been subjected to repeated National level shutdowns. In these countries the people's economies are robust and thriving, given the global circumstances. These are the effects of zero community transmission strategies.
Granted international tourism is shut down. International passenger travel is shut down. Some people's livelihoods in tourism are adversely impacted, and they are mostly getting support from their governments to get through the pandemic.
Across East Asia and Oceania children are attending school, young adults are attending universities, the bars and restaurants are open, local tourism is open, shopping malls are open. Weddings, funerals and wakes are happening. Life goes on, pretty much as 'normal'.
1.8 billion people.
Protected by an evidence led set of strategies, without the utility of a vaccine.
Protected by an evidence led set of strategies, without the utility of a vaccine.
People still wear masks. People living in East Asia and New Zealand are aware that any outbreak that occurs must be suppressed, and they are well are informed and fully engaged thus when outbreaks do emerge, they and their Governments, local and national, take the appropriate action and suppress the transmission until all cases are traced, all contacts quarantined, the ill are given best possible treatment and all of this is carried out until the virus dies out due to finding no new hosts.
Zero Community Transmission not complicated, it is complex, it is expensive yet cheaper than high fatalities, high long covid rates and repeated economic shocks - it is epidemiology and public health practice at its best, and it is not an extreme set of actions and behaviours, it is mostly a matter of common and collective caring.
It is not rocket science.
It is not rocket science.
Right now, in the USA and UK and EU and Brazil, a different set of strategies are being deployed and these strategies and policies have caused millions of avoidable horrific deaths, millions of avoidable long term chronic disease cases (1 in 10 of all disease level infections), vast economic harms all of which have disproportionally impacted and afflicted the low income, the poor, the destitute, the chronically unwell and the vulnerable and disabled cohorts of their populations.
Evidence ignored, opinion and belief promoted, every single wheel re-invented turned out to be square, appalling death tolls, long term sequalae for hundreds of thousands of people, vast economic harms.
Evidence ignored, opinion and belief promoted, every single wheel re-invented turned out to be square, appalling death tolls, long term sequalae for hundreds of thousands of people, vast economic harms.
These slow spread herd immunity strategies are causing immense psychological and emotional harm to hundreds of millions of people through badly managed lockdowns, followed by openings, surges of transmission and yet more lockdowns, with no end in sight and barely 20% of the UK population (where I live) exposed to the virus, as these governments push their populations towards a mythical herd immunity in order to 'protect the economy'. It's utter nonsense to claim they are protecting their economies with these strategies.
These strategies have cause wholly avoidable economic damage - from small businesses to self employed, from the live entertainment industry to international tourism we see millions of job losses, businesses going to the wall, entire industries failing.
Here, in the UK where I live, rocket science is nowhere to be seen, and neither is common sense epidemiology.
There is a pattern where those in power and others online cite the harms caused by bad management to argue for worse management rather than better management as in epidemiologically sound, proven and reliable zero community transmission strategies.
Behavioural Science, Data Modelling and Economics.
There is a pattern where those in power and others online cite the harms caused by bad management to argue for worse management rather than better management as in epidemiologically sound, proven and reliable zero community transmission strategies.
Behavioural Science, Data Modelling and Economics.
Government Scientists and Advisor cite behavioural science and data modelling as the source of their policy strategies. They do not cite epidemiology, they do not cite virology and they do not cite best practice public health. The UK Government have claimed all along that they are protecting the British Economy, that "having a strong economy is the best way to ensure a strong National Health Service".
They are failing even in that simplistic task.
They are failing even in that simplistic task.
Here where I live we have seen multiple waves, shutdowns followed by opening up while community is active, followed by shutdowns as hospitals are over whelmed, and the death toll rises. Cycles of death and harm, all totally avoidable. Yes, the NHS has managed to deal with being pushed to it's limits again, but at the cost of the general service that it provides. Meanwhile American insurance firms buy up local health providers paving the road of insurance schemers 'good intentions'.
Each and every death by covid19 is a horrific, tortured death. 140,000 and rising horrible, painful and very stressed lonely deaths.
Long Covid is estimated to affect 1 in ten of disease level cases.
Asymptomatic cases account for 20% of infections, and these people spread the infection without knowing they are doing so.
There is, within the UK, no effective localised contact trace system.
There is, within the UK, no effective, localised quarantine support system.
There is, within the UK, no effective, localised isolation treatment system.
Some people are being paid to not go to work, others must work and be exposed to risks because they are 'key workers' - shop staff, services staff, police, fire brigade, ambulance, sanitation staff, meat processing staff, Amazon staff, factory workers and builders, and many others.
And there are others who are forced to work because the economic support systems are inadequate for low wage earners - people who are low earners who become symptomatic choose to work because the support for quarantine is inadequate, slow and cumbersome. Food banks are feeding hundreds of thousands of families. The charities and their workers are forced to take risks.
This week, 8th March, 2021, we see the UK Government coercing students, parents and teachers to return to fully open schools whilst community transmission is at levels above 23rd March 2020 when the first shutdown was imposed.
A year later we see no shift to an evidence based epidemiologically sound strategy. A year later we see the continuation of policy options that are causing avoidable fatalities and long term harms to the people of the UK and to our economies.
The evidence of the lived experience in the UK is that the policies of the UK Government are causing vast harms, and when compared to countries following zero community transmission strategies, the variation in policy and outcome is clear.
In simple terms the difference is between opinion and evidence.
Opinion is lethal, evidence saves lives.
Opinion, belief and ideology is lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives.
Gavin Williamsons opinion is that schools are safe for full attendance re-opening. Williamson cites a .002% case rate among students during the September re-opening period. Sounds like a small figure. .002% of 8.9 million students is 17,800+ cases. That is not a small number. Factor in the inadequacies of a centralised contact tracing system that has failed on almost every metric then we have a situation where were do not know how many infections are linked to those cases, what their index cases were, where the virus was transmitted... Gavin Williamson is playing tricks with numbers to push a deliberately egregious policy.
A recent study on school safety makes this clear.
"On Feb 22, 2021, the UK Government announced that schools in England would fully reopen on March 8, 2021.
Opinion, belief and ideology is lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives.
Gavin Williamsons opinion is that schools are safe for full attendance re-opening. Williamson cites a .002% case rate among students during the September re-opening period. Sounds like a small figure. .002% of 8.9 million students is 17,800+ cases. That is not a small number. Factor in the inadequacies of a centralised contact tracing system that has failed on almost every metric then we have a situation where were do not know how many infections are linked to those cases, what their index cases were, where the virus was transmitted... Gavin Williamson is playing tricks with numbers to push a deliberately egregious policy.
A recent study on school safety makes this clear.
"On Feb 22, 2021, the UK Government announced that schools in England would fully reopen on March 8, 2021.
While returning to school as soon as possible is imperative for the education, social development, and mental and physical welfare of children, not enough has been done to make schools safer for students and staff.
Without additional mitigations, increases in transmission are likely, this time with more infectious and possibly more virulent variants, resulting in further lockdowns, school closures, and absenteeism. Even when schools were supposed to be fully open, at points of high community transmission, 22% of secondary school children were not attending due to self-isolation.
In some areas, attendance was as low as 61%.
Arguments that schools do not contribute to community transmission and that the overall risk to children from COVID-19 is very small have meant that mitigations in schools have received low priority. Yet the evidence cited for these arguments has serious limitations.,
Primary and secondary school closures have been associated with substantial reductions over time in the effective reproduction number (Rt) across many countries (including England) and time periods.,
In contrast, data from the Office for National Statistics' (ONS) 2020 COVID-19 Infection Survey show that the prevalence of infection among children aged 2–10 years (2%) and 11–16 years (3%) rose above the prevalence for all other age groups before the 2020 Christmas break (appendix p 4).
Both modelling and real-world data in preprint showing rising cases in regions where the SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7 variant was prevalent during the lockdown in November, 2020 (when schools were open),, suggest that opening all schools now without robust mitigatory measures in place will probably lead to Rt rising above 1 in almost all scenarios. Modelling data by the University of Warwick and Imperial College London suggest that at least 30 000 more deaths from COVID-19 are estimated under the proposed reopening scenarios.
Throughout February, 2021, despite fewer students being in school at this time, teaching staff were at higher risk of infection. Recent school outbreaks in northern Italy, where the B.1.1.7 variant is prevalent, are also concerning."
The study goes on to outline a series of mitigation steps to suppress transmission within the school community.
None of which is currently provided as logistical support or funded by central government at this time.
A former OSTED chief urged teachers to put their lives on the line, for the future of the children they are teaching.
I saw the interview and to my mind he was impatient and dismissive rather than attentive to the needs of the teachers and the students. He was not calmly presenting evidence.
Mary Bousted, of the NEU, corrected his assertion that schools were not functioning, which was a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts - she pointed out that teachers are in already in schools teaching key workers children and vulnerable children, and are helping children in a variety of ways to make up for the fall off in social services provision, as well as running remote online tuition.
Ideology, belief and opinion are lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives.
More from the study...
"Although COVID-19 is unlikely to cause severe disease in children, estimates of the prevalence of long COVID symptoms based on the ONS Infection Survey suggest that 13% of children aged 2–10 year and 15% of those aged 12–16 years have at least one persistent symptom 5 weeks after testing positive.
Given uncertainty around the long-term health effects of SARS-CoV-2 infection, it would be unwise to let the virus circulate in children, with consequent risk to their families. Reopening fully in the setting of high community transmission without appropriate safeguards risks depriving many children of education and social interaction again, worsening existing inequalities.
By contributing to high community transmission, it also provides fertile ground for virus evolution and new variants."
What kind of person demands that children take these risks? The same kind who launched a war against a country based on a careful set of obvious lies, claiming that they are bringing Democracy to an oppressed people? That went well.... not!
Ideology, belief and opinion are lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives
This country really needs a Union of Teachers, Parents and Students who are studying the evidence, who are learning about the evidence base for zero community transmission strategies, because it directly affects their lives now and into the future to confront this situation and to support the NHS by confronting MPs, local councils, local media, national media and any other arena's of influence with the evidence.
The study goes on to outline a series of mitigation steps to suppress transmission within the school community.
None of which is currently provided as logistical support or funded by central government at this time.
A former OSTED chief urged teachers to put their lives on the line, for the future of the children they are teaching.
I saw the interview and to my mind he was impatient and dismissive rather than attentive to the needs of the teachers and the students. He was not calmly presenting evidence.
Mary Bousted, of the NEU, corrected his assertion that schools were not functioning, which was a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts - she pointed out that teachers are in already in schools teaching key workers children and vulnerable children, and are helping children in a variety of ways to make up for the fall off in social services provision, as well as running remote online tuition.
Ideology, belief and opinion are lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives.
More from the study...
"Although COVID-19 is unlikely to cause severe disease in children, estimates of the prevalence of long COVID symptoms based on the ONS Infection Survey suggest that 13% of children aged 2–10 year and 15% of those aged 12–16 years have at least one persistent symptom 5 weeks after testing positive.
Given uncertainty around the long-term health effects of SARS-CoV-2 infection, it would be unwise to let the virus circulate in children, with consequent risk to their families. Reopening fully in the setting of high community transmission without appropriate safeguards risks depriving many children of education and social interaction again, worsening existing inequalities.
By contributing to high community transmission, it also provides fertile ground for virus evolution and new variants."
What kind of person demands that children take these risks? The same kind who launched a war against a country based on a careful set of obvious lies, claiming that they are bringing Democracy to an oppressed people? That went well.... not!
Ideology, belief and opinion are lethal, honesty and evidence saves lives
This country really needs a Union of Teachers, Parents and Students who are studying the evidence, who are learning about the evidence base for zero community transmission strategies, because it directly affects their lives now and into the future to confront this situation and to support the NHS by confronting MPs, local councils, local media, national media and any other arena's of influence with the evidence.
We cannot leave that study to the News Media or The Government. They are deliberate in their failure to present accurate and timely evidence since last December 2019.
We need the 8.9 million school children, the 2.38 million university students to be studying the evidence that exists on zero community transmission strategies. We need their parents to be on board, as learners in this.
We cannot trust the UK Government to be honest, so we must be the voices of honesty within the UK.
We need this cohort to engage with NHS staff and with other representing organisations to co-ordinate a push back at every level of society, aware that the Government and Media will not support this push back and will actively resist the most honest, evidence based analysis.
If I have repeated myself, and I have, it is only because the frustration of seeing what is possible being deliberately ignored by so many for such little purpose with so much harm attendant that I persist.
Not yet blue in the face, not yet breathless, I will continue to posit zero community transmission strategy until it is in place. It is the only strategy that makes humane sense.
If I have repeated myself, and I have, it is only because the frustration of seeing what is possible being deliberately ignored by so many for such little purpose with so much harm attendant that I persist.
Not yet blue in the face, not yet breathless, I will continue to posit zero community transmission strategy until it is in place. It is the only strategy that makes humane sense.
Corneilius
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