My neighbours were bemoaning a canceled trip to Rome during the lock down but are now happy they can go on their main holiday at the end of August. Totally unconcerned about any risks. (Both are almost 60.) It's as if the pandemic was all over and done with.

Something many people don't seem to get. The epidemiologists aren't aiming for nobody at all to catch the virus this week. They're aiming for fewer people to catch it this week than last, and for that trend to continue. So long as that happens, they don't much care who gets it.

So as we open up, the idea is to limit risk so that the number of new infections isn't excessive. The fact that something is allowed, doesn't therefore mean that it is risk-free. Therefore individuals have to make a different risk assessment if they themselves do not want to catch the virus.

I like what's proposed in Scotland. The rule is 2 metres, except for children under the age of 11 out of doors. However certain premises are permitted to reduce this to one metre, with appropriate additional precautions such as perspex screens and improved ventilation. So you will be able to go to a pub or a restaurant and accept 1-metre distancing there, but it will be clearly signed what you are going into, and you will have to leave your contact details in case they're needed for contact tracing later.

This will work in epidemiological terms because realistically very few people in Scotland are infectious now, and the few clusters that arise as a result of one or two of them going into a 1-metre space should be able to be dealt with by the public health teams. But if you personally don't want to be part of a cluster, don't go there.

No 10. Tweeted

You can only meet people who don't live with you outside whatever the weather.

So, a contradiction in their 'Super Saturday' pub advice?

I'm talking about the proposals for later.

Here you go. 15th July. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotla...-fife-53284856

I like that it's structured and not a blanket sanction of 1 metre anywhere you happen to think 2 metres is too difficult. I was worried about going into shops if they allowed that, because I won't go closer than 2 metres, and if shops reduce to 2 metres that would be a problem. But it's going to be specific 1-metre zones for pubs and restaurants that put in extra precautions and you'll be informed what you're getting into when you enter.

Nigel Farage Tweeted a picture of himself in a pub drinking a pint and said

"12 o’clock, first customer in. Love it."

Shouldn't he still be in quarantine after coming back in from the USA?

Latest update on the Noble Caledonia website, the company with whom I'm booked on a Croatian cruise in September, says all cruises from 1st Sept onwards should be assumed to be going ahead, and they'll be in touch to confirm.

Croatia seem to have the virus pretty much under control, the main risk is that one of the (just 30 or so) passengers already has it or catches it on the flight. I won't have to pay the balance until they confirm, if they do I'll then have to decide whether to go or lose the deposit. I'd really like to go, but it will depend what the general situation is and what precautions (e.g. tests before boarding the plane) are in place.

The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee recently had a meeting on Covid and the response to it, transcript available here:

https://committees.parliament.uk/eve...dence-session/

It reads as quite positive on the whole and it seems that the Oxford University team are streets ahead of everyone else in their trials progress. Let's hope it turns out to be as effective as they think it will.

He certainly should.

Several replies to the tweet have tagged the police and pointed out where Farage is (The Queen's Head, Downe, apparently, or possibly the Blacksmith's Arms, Cudham) and that he was in the US 14 days ago.

When I checked the web site of the cruise company I usually go with (Cruise and Maritime Voyages) some time ago they were taking bookings for a range of cruises beginning this week - at least one was supposed to be sailing on 1st July. I thought this was massively over-optimistic and I certainly would not have booked, but people were booking and cabins were almost flying off the shelves.

However I just checked and all their ships are still berthed at Tilbury (except Marco Polo which is still in Avonmouth after getting back from the Grand Africa and India Voyage in late March - I am so glad we decided not to go on that one). The cruises now being offered for sale don't sail until the first half of September. Might have a better chance by then but it all depends on how things develop.

I see Marco Polo is doing the Baltic and St Petersburg cruise leaving from Newcastle. We did that one in 2016 and it was great. You wouldn't get me back on that ship with a herd of wild horses right now.

No, I wouldn't consider the Marco Polo for quite a while. Even the Noble Caledonia Sky ships, which take a maximum of about 100 passengers, would be too risky for me at the moment. But the Princess Eleganza, with a maximum of 36 passengers, might not be too great a risk in September if the situation continues to improve.

You have time to make a reasoned risk assessment nearer the time. At the moment my feeling is that I probably won't go back on a cruise ship (or on a plane or a large ferry) until I'm vaccinated. I love Marco Polo to bits and I hope the St Petersburg voyage is a success and people have as much fun as we had in 2016, but it's not for me.

Princess Eleganza looks like a lovey ship, I hope it's all go and you have a great time.

I guess we'll know about the risks of flying soon enough. Two days ago, a plane took a bunch of Swedes to Rhodes, and they were allowed to land because there had been some confusion about rules and regulations:

Efter förhandlingar – Greklandsflyget har landat (SVT.se, July 2, 2020)
After negotiations - the plane to Greece has landed

Kristinehamnare flög till Rhodos – blev intervjuad av grekisk TV (SVT.se, July 3, 2020)
Kristinehammere flew to Rhodes - was interviewed on TV in Greece

But in the meantime, they seem to have made up their mind that there will be no more Swedish tourists until July 15 - for now, I think. Greece refused to give a permit for three SAS planes to bring 374 Swedes to the country:

SAS nekades specialtillstånd till Grekland (SVT.se, July 4, 2020)
SAS was denied special permission to go to Greece

I don't think planes are as dangerous as one might imagine. If the risk of transmission there and in the airport is relatively low the epidemiologists might not be too worried about it. However on a personal level the risk is higher than I'm willing to take.

I was just going to ask if they had let him back in!

Farage says he's been back 14 days and had a test that was negative.

Trump's rally was Saturday, June 20, in Tulsa. That was two weeks ago today in the evening, Tulsa time. If Farage was at the rally, he hasn't been back two weeks.

All very well, except it’s not possible for him to have been back for 14 days, and there’s nothing in the regulations that says a negative test absolves you from the need for quarantine.

Apparently counting to 14 is not a skill they teach at Dulwich College.

Predictable scenes of huge crowds around the country. Soho was the best, shoulder to shoulder in every street and bar.

Pub in Bradford called Five Lane ends shut down after police turned up and counted over 200 people inside.
Our local 'Sports Club' had a 'Family Fun Day' with BBQ, Bouncy Castle and a disco on the function room.It was rammed out all day from 10 AM and didn't knock off until 11 at night.

This is exactly Johnson plan.
He told us behave and we didn't listen, therefore when all goes tits up we cannot hold him or government accountable for our own actions.

Still, all the pubs and bars will have detailed records of everyone buying drink so the world beating track and trace system can trace anyone there and all the people they stood next to for 15 mins or more.

I am starting to understand why it took so long for the UK to obtain PPE.

It takes time for conservative MPs advisors and Cabinet Ministers to become directors of shell companies so they can win unchallenged tenders, offshore the profit and complicate basic supply chains whilst the country dies.

Meanwhile, Israel relaxed its lockdown on May 28th after an initally good response to coronavirus.

This is what the cumulative cases look like at the moment.

I took the data from the ECDC website: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/geogra...019-ncov-cases

Attachment 42524

ETA: It's the left hand axis for this graph

That's disturbing, and judging by the performance of English boozers getting jam-packed into their favourite haunts at the earliest opportunity I can see exactly the same happening there.

I think, as ever, that we are seeing the worst examples in the media. I’ve seen a number of reports of pubs that had a very orderly Saturday night, but that doesn’t make exciting headlines.

It's a numbers game. Disease control people aren't aiming for zero new cases next week (although they would take that if they could get it!), they're aiming for fewer new cases next week than this week, and to continue in that vein. Time will tell whether there is sufficient bad behaviour to jeopardise this goal. Given the way this virus behaves I'm concerned that there is.

Yes, if there's an average 0.5% prevalence at the moment, then it doesn't need very many lax people who are infectious to cause a sharp spike.

I seriously hope there is not a 0.5% prevalence at the moment. That would be 290,000 infectious people in England. I think the estimates are around 80,000, which is bad enough.

The R number has drifted up a bit, possible over 1 in London now, and that's before the pubs re-opened.

England regions:

Region	R	Growth rate % per day
England	0.8-0.9	-5 to -2
East of England	0.7-0.9	-5 to 0
London	0.8-1.1	-4 to +2
Midlands	0.8-1.0	-4 to 0
North East and Yorkshire	0.8-1.0	-5 to 0
North West	0.7-0.9	-4 to 0
South East	0.7-1.0	-5 to 0
South West	0.7-1.0	-7 to +2

I heard our wonderful (OK mine) health secretary tell me there is only a 1 in 2000 chance that anyone I come into contact will be infected, so that's good odds!

Can't be the case else we'd be back to 4 on the "here is something we scribbled on the back of a Starbucks coaster" scale which would mean we'd be back into lockdown.

It might be a bit high for the average, but in some localities the figure is much higher. https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...rthern-ireland

Area	Cases	Per 100k
Leicester	3,850	1083.8
Merthyr Tydfil	540	897.3
Oldham	1,833	777.9
Bradford	4,168	775.9
Barnsley	1,884	768.4
Denbighshire	718	753.2

Of course, cases is not the same as infectious people.

I got that number by scaling up from the estimate that there are 1,500 infectious people in Scotland at the moment, and the comment that the prevalence is five times higher in England. However there are nearly 500 people in hospital in Scotland with the virus, which suggests only about 1,000 free in the community and frankly a decent proportion of them should be self-isolating.

I think 1 in 2000 is only about 29,000 infectious people, but he may be assuming that most people who are infectious are either in hospital or self-isolating, so you wouldn't come into contact with them. It would be interesting to know where he got the figure from.

If that's confirmed cases since the start, it's irrelevant. The vast majority of them will have recovered by now.

I was eyeballing this:

https://covid.joinzoe.com/data#interactive-map - and thinking that it's peaks that are disproportionately important.

I don't honestly think that's any use at all now. It was showing some useful trends earlier in the epidemic but it's showing nothing helpful now.

I'd disagree. The sheer number of people reporting in most constituencies means that they are probably the earliest to spot upturns in the data.

Whether they are presenting the data in the most useful fashion, I would question

I think they're mostly picking up low-grade allergic rhinitis now.

Neither political party takes C19 seriously. They're all rallying and spreading the pandemic because they hate each other. The government should pay people to quarantine and give no funds to people who refuse to shelter in place.

Which country are you talking about ?

If you're talking about the US, you're in the wrong thread - this is "Non-USA & General Politics".

If you're talking about another country then please be specific. I'm not sure that other countries are having political rallies.

This is an interesting graph showing the constituent parts of the UK over the past three weeks. It's death data so less amenable to manipulation than infection rates (though of course there's a lag of about three weeks between infection and death) and it's expressed per million population so the figures are comparable.



The problems in Wales are likely to be related to the slaughterhouse clusters. NI is doing well but seems to have stalled a bit. Scotland continues to decline. Scotland's death rate is only 12.5% of the rate in England. It's against this background that people protesting at the border yesterday were called racists for wanting some restrictions placed on leisure travel between Scotland and England.

The way things were looking in England on Saturday, and with Scotland opening up indoor spaces next week, I think it will be a miracle if any of these downward trends continue much longer.