Covid 19 Part XXIII-33,444 in ROI(1,792 deaths) 9,541 in NI(577 deaths)(22/09)Read OP

GooglePlus wrote: »

The same case for us in younger groups. This pandemic has killed many young people and suicide reporting has taken a hit so we don't even know the full picture.

seamus wrote: »

There is also an issue of information overload. Too much information and people will pick and choose what they want to hear.

But there is at this stage a need to provide an updated risk assessment. Because the misinformation and rumour is starting to take over.

Since March, every single article that RTE publishes about Covid contains the rider;

But we know this is quite badly out of date. In an Irish context, 89% of cases don't require medical assistance. Of those that do, about 1 in 8 will end up in ICU. Which is more like "89% are mild, 10% require oxygen and 1% are critical".

Then you have the mismatching piece of a 6% death rate. 450 people have been in ICU with covid since March, but 1,784 people have died.

This is why there is growing dissatisfaction of the government's response. It seems like they're still churning out data but not taking the time to actually analyse it.

People still understand the main areas where risk lies, but there's no longer any coherent connection between daily numbers, 14-day incident rates, and the actual risk that Covid poses.

You have one group of people screaming that opening the schools was a precursor to the apocalypse, and a second group screaming that any restrictions are unnecessary. Neither of them are right, but the public doesn't have a clue which is closer to reality.

Sometimes it appears like NPHET have indeed updated their risk models and believe Covid poses less of a public health risk now, but they've failed (or refused) to communicate that to the public.

Net result is that people are increasingly confused and distressed.

There's a very clear fact emerging here. The rising number of cases now emerging is down to increased testing, and is considerably less serious than 6 months ago. For whatever reason.

On 1st May there were 6,179 active cases of Covid in Ireland, and 740 of them in hospital. That's 12%. Bloody serious and scary.
Yesterday, there were 5,837 active cases in Ireland, and 60 of them in hospital. 1%.

Whatever NPHET think is happening, it's time to tell the rest of us. We don't need reams of data. We just need an honest risk assessment, now that we're six months into this.