Coronavirus

[Gwaredd]

You lot must live in some shitty areas, I see nothing but compliance wherever I go from businesses and individuals.

How about all those people being turned away from the Brecon Beacons today. Loads from tier 4 areas. Unbelievable.

[Simon]

Has anyone looked into effectively killing patients by inducing coma and putting them on a ventilator?

Gosh, there is a lot to unpack here.

Yes, being on a ventilator is terrible for you. All the muscles in your body atrophy from lying in the bed and when you are 'fully' ventilated (i.e. paralysed and the ventilator doing all the breathing for you), then the breathing muscles atrophy too. For a week of being fully ventilated, you are looking at 2 or more to wean you back off the ventilator after the disease has passed, just re-training the muscles. If you are too frail to begin with, that weaning process will simply not be possible. And of course, you are at risk of ventilator acquired pneumonias, DVTs and all the other mischief that goes along with being critically unwell picking you off.

That's why you should only go on a ventilator if you are going to benefit from it - i.e. you are sick enough that you will die without it but not so frail that it will kill you. Working this out is where experience comes in but we have various scoring systems backed up by research that can guide us. Ventilation definitely saves lives, when used on the right person at the right time. I know a lot of people I ventilated in the first wave made it and are alive and kicking today (our unit actually had one of the best survival rates at round about 75% when we checked in November).

Unfortunately, a chunk of my job is telling people that their loved one is not going to benefit from being ventilated and we're not going to do it. Sorry: I know "he's always been a fighter" - but he's 85, obese, he's smoked all his life and he doesn't have the lungs to make it through. It's not willpower, it's not penny-pinching, it's just putting him on the vent will mean he spends 3 days in a coma being ventilated and dying in an uncontrolled fashion rather than dying today with analgesia and surrounded by family.

I would definitely agree that people catch covid in hospitals and it's one reason why why need to be vaccinating hospital staff as soon as we possibly can as in general it's the people looking after you who are picking up the 'rona asymptomatically and passing it on as they move from patient to patient. We're better at isolating patients from each other than we used to be.

That's all well and good, but I'll get my medical facts from Broccer's thanks very much, not someone who claims to know what they're talking about.

[duncs500]

You lot must live in some shitty areas, I see nothing but compliance wherever I go from businesses and individuals.

How about all those people being turned away from the Brecon Beacons today. Loads from tier 4 areas. Unbelievable.

Well I wasn't there, maybe you were, but (not having a go at you here) if you base your sample of how people are behaving on media reports then you're only going to find that almost everyone everywhere is an idiot. Based on my experience that is not the case at all.

I know I've laboured this point before, but everybody seems to judge the country's actions on media reports of what I believe / hope are a relatively small minority.

[mr_jon]

Tough gig, keep it up Mr Newt. In another life I'd have liked to work as a nurse or paramedic type person. Unfortunately 41 is too old to re-train.

[Broccers]

I enjoyed reading the replies. I'm sure the NHS is doing their best.

[Gwaredd]

You lot must live in some shitty areas, I see nothing but compliance wherever I go from businesses and individuals.

How about all those people being turned away from the Brecon Beacons today. Loads from tier 4 areas. Unbelievable.

Well I wasn't there, maybe you were, but (not having a go at you here) if you base your sample of how people are behaving on media reports then you're only going to find that almost everyone everywhere is an idiot. Based on my experience that is not the case at all.

I know I've laboured this point before, but everybody seems to judge the country's actions on media reports of what I believe / hope are a relatively small minority.

Absolutely not. I'm not straying from my village area at the moment. All my observations are viewed from my own experience. I was merely highlighting the brecon beacons incident as a great example of the entitlement I was referring to earlier.

[duncs500]

AZ/Ox vaccine approved and 4 million doses ready to go apparently. Supposedly they're going to give them all, as you can leave a longer than 3 week gap to the second dose and one dose reduces hospitalisation (nobody in the trail was hospitalised after one dose).

This feels like great news to me.

[Beany]

Remember, with media reports, if it bleeds, it leads. So 'rona reports are always going to be the worst case. And obviously, in all of southwestern england, you're going to have some fucking dickheads who think 'essential travel for exercise' means topping up the thermos and going to take a dander up the Brecons in midwinter, because that's how society works.

Apparently the police issued 'education where appropriate'. I mean, I think some of them needed education with a length of lead pipe, but you know me and my eugenics.....german blood, innit

[Swervin_Mervin]

Trafford Centre was at capacity for at least 3 days from Boxing Day. I mean that's hell on earth at the best of times let alone at Christmas.

I went to the tip today as our bins haven't been emptied this week (a light dusting of snow is enough to keep Amey at home), and have to cross the A56. It was like a typical weekend - utterly rammed. This despite the snow, ice, sub zero temps and that other thing that's been going on all year.

[integrale_evo]

I’ve popped to the post box at the main post office twice this week and other than a few trucks the roads have been deserted.

[Simon]

@Explosive Newt do you know if you had the vaccine yet? I see someone on Twitter was unblinded by contacting them for clarification after being offered the Pzifer vaccine.

[Ascender]

Oxford vaccine being approved means reasons to be optimistic right?

[Gavin]

My sister and niece have been vaccinated, both work in NHS.

[integrale_evo]

Oxford vaccine being approved means reasons to be optimistic right?

Long term, yes.

Short term, things are going to be pretty nasty for the next month or so I expect.

[Explosive Newt]

@Explosive Newt do you know if you had the vaccine yet? I see someone on Twitter was unblinded by contacting them for clarification after being offered the Pzifer vaccine.

Asked to be unblinded and it turns out I have had the placebo, so I am getting some Pfizer in my arm this Saturday afternoon.

The roll out across NHS has been really patchy. It seems like the same amount of vaccine has gone out to all areas so anywhere with a large care home / elderly population has been unable to vaccinate front line staff.

Things are really starting to kick off and will only get worse over the next few weeks, it’s not looking good.

[Simon]

Interesting. Do you know what the placebo was? Have you grown a third arm or anything weird?

[integrale_evo]

My mrs was just sent a link to book her vaccine, seems like everyone at the hospital got their links at the same time because the system kept crashing.

[Sundayjumper]

I know it makes it sound incompetent, but the alternative is staggering the invites and then you get people bitching that <x> got an invite before <y>.

They can't win.

[Mito Man]

I see that what I speculated a while ago is now going to happen as it is supported by the revised modelling. They’re going to vaccinate twice the number of people with the vaccine rather than holding them back to guarantee 2 vaccines per person within 3 weeks. Simple statistics after all.

[Simon]

The problem is that that hasn't been tested. It's guesswork.