Off Topic Thread 5.0

molloyjh wrote: »

Andrea Corr can feck off with that version of Lilac Wine. Feck. Right. Off.

What in the name of Christ are you watching?

molloyjh

Stheno wrote: »

What in the name of Christ are you watching?

The missus was watching that Tommy Tiernan show and she was on at the end of it. I just heard "Andrea Corr" and "Lilac Wine" and immediately tensed up. It was worse than I expected. Over pronouncing every word. Basically copying exactly what Jeff Buckley did vocally but in a far more boring manner. Awful stuff.

kuang1

Stheno wrote: »

That's not even close to positive swabs today there were 4502 today

We've a backlog of positive cases now approx 10k

Yeah it's already at levels of absolute horror.

My work brings me into contact with a good number of frontline workers, and it's been a very visible, measurable rate of decay in their own health in the last month or so.
A combination of the stress and intensity of their work itself, and the dread of what they see barrelling down the chute directly towards them, has resulted in a deterioration in how well they're able to carry out their work.

The next 3-4 weeks will be apocalyptic for them.

If you know anyone working in a hospital, a GP's, a nursing home, involved in any kind of health care; send them a text, give them a quick call, give them a shout-out on social media if that's your thing. Support them. Encourage them. Praise them.

Believe me, they need it.

Buer

aloooof wrote: »

You’d have to imagine so, can’t see how they can re-open schools at the current levels, and don’t see it being substantially better (if it all) by 11th.

The worry is, there’s probably likely to be less compliance this time round...

The next 3 or 4 days will determine a lot but I suspect they're already discussing plans to go into a hard lockdown.

We all know people have been ignoring the restrictions. It's pure ignorance with massive numbers of people taking the belief that they're just popping next door or visiting family etc. and it doesn't really count when it clearly does.

It's laughable to see some of the carry on first hand. I spent several days in Mayo over Christmas and there's certainly a relaxed attitude there generally. Much the same as we've seen in Dublin but with the added fact that loads of people got together to watch the All Ireland final. I know of one gathering where 30 lads met up to watch the game. The hosts have subsequently tested positive and did not tell the HSE contact tracers about the gathering. I'm totally unsurprised to see unprecedented levels of Covid now emerging there.

I've had conversations with people about how serious it is and they've fully agreed on how people need to be more careful and criticised others. Then I've seen photos of them at someone's house with other visitors the very next day. They cannot understand how their actions have consequences whatsoever. 500 people could die tomorrow and they wouldn't consider it anything to do with them.

The only thing that's going to work is a full lockdown, from what I can see. The government need to far less mealy mouthed on the topic and accept they're simply going to be (more) unpopular.

Former Former Former

Buer wrote: »

The only thing that's going to work is a full lockdown, from what I can see. The government need to far less mealy mouthed on the topic and accept they're simply going to be (more) unpopular.

I don't know if we can go any further.

The only thing that can realistically happen from here is that people change their own behaviour at an everyday level. That's not something the government can enforce and the recurring theme of this pandemic is that any thing which relies on personal responsibility will fail because ultimately, too many people are selfish and irresponsible.

There just isn't the fear that was there in March and April. The schools might be closed (and I can't see them opening on the 11th) but kids of all ages are still out playing and hanging around with their friends. As you say, people are still popping next door, going for walks in big groups, whatever.

I'm not sure what it will take at this point to get people to comply but beyond checkpoints on the motorway for the 5km rule, it's not something the Gardai can do.

I would give it 3-4 weeks before deciding if the lockdown can work.

I think most people I spoke to in November/December had a very strong feeling this would happen over christmas with people acting stupid. I'm not slightly surprised it has.

But now we're in January, holiday season has passed, and there is an actual clear longer-term lockdown in place, I think the numbers will come back down now.

sydthebeat

The Nov lockdown saw us get down to approx 300 cases per day as the base line.

Due to the wintery conditions and the realisation of how rampant it is now, I can see this lockdown working better and getting the cases down to about 100 per day in about 2 weeks.

I'm already seeing older people completely isolating to what the did in March.

Zzippy

sydthebeat wrote: »

The Nov lockdown saw us get down to approx 300 cases per day as the base line.

Due to the wintery conditions and the realisation of how rampant it is now, I can see this lockdown working better and getting the cases down to about 100 per day in about 2 weeks.

I'm already seeing older people completely isolating to what the did in March.

There's not a hope we get from 2-3,000 down to 100 in 2 weeks. The virus is currently uncontrolled and even if everyone stayed home newly infected people will be spreading it to the people they live with. Numbers will continue to rise until those people have been through it and haven't spread it. If the schools open that is not going to happen.

Zzippy wrote: »

There's not a hope we get from 2-3,000 down to 100 in 2 weeks. The virus is currently uncontrolled and even if everyone stayed home newly infected people will be spreading it to the people they live with. Numbers will continue to rise until those people have been through it and haven't spread it. If the schools open that is not going to happen.

Agreed, it'll take much longer unfortunately

Dave_The_Sheep

Part of it, they're allowing/keeping far too many businesses open, which means people have to go into the office and mix etc. The criteria for "essential" is far too broad and businesses are scraping for any excuse to stay open. If nothing is open bar actual essentials, people have far less reason to go out and those working at said businesses won't be spreading it to each other.

Suppose it's part of the problem of having politicians who rely on popularity in charge and them having to make hard decisions. Our current lot don't seem able to do that. It's wishy washy bull**** all the way.

On a personal level, my behaviour hasn't changed mush since March, though I'm one of the lucky ones able to 100% work from home. Still only go to the shops for food, might go sit outside my mother's place for a chat every couples of weeks, walk in the evening. I've been to a restaurant once since then, back when we were in low numbers, and I think we visited my partner's parents once - maybe twice? - for Christmas - since then, and into the datacenter for work twice. I've been inside my mother's house once, again during low numbers. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I've broken the rules, and that's even after chopping off several fingers. It's infuriating looking at the minority of absolute cretins out there absolutely f*cking things up for the rest of us.

Except now it seems that the minority might not actually be that small, or possibly even a minority. I'm hoping the numbers this week and in the next few scare people back to some form of compliance, otherwise things are going to get very ugly (uglier). With no enforcement being put in place, people will just continue to take the piss.

I see a lot of people trying to blame either a) personal responsibility or b) the government's handling of things, and only one of these. Why can't we blame both? Leadership starts at the top, and everyone has a resposibility to follow the rules. Unfortunately, leadership has been very poor since the new government came in and people have been incapable of acting responsibly themselves either as business owners or as individual people. I can 100% blame both*.

C*nts. Mini rant over.

*From my ivory tower, yeah, I know.

aloooof

sydthebeat wrote: »

The Nov lockdown saw us get down to approx 300 cases per day as the base line.

Due to the wintery conditions and the realisation of how rampant it is now, I can see this lockdown working better and getting the cases down to about 100 per day in about 2 weeks.

I'm already seeing older people completely isolating to what the did in March.

Like the others, I don't see how, syd. The further harder restrictions only came in on Dec 30th so, with the time it takes for symptoms onset etc. the next 2 weeks are already baked in, even with absolute compliance.

Colm Henry has even said the following today from here:

Dr Henry said that even with complete compliance and adherence to the restrictions, there is likely to be over 1,300 hospitalisations and over 130 cases in ICUs by the end of the month.

aloooof wrote: »

Like the others, I don't see how, syd. The further harder restrictions only came in on Dec 30th so, with the time it takes for symptoms onset etc. the next 2 weeks are already baked in, even with absolute compliance.

Colm Henry has even said the following today from here:

Yep id say mid to end of February before we see figures as low as 100 a day

The six weeks up to December didn't achieve that staring with a lower base

Hopefully rolling out the vaccines to HCWs and the nursing homes also has an impact in the same time

SqueakyKneecap wrote: »

I'd say mid March earliest, and that's me being optimistic.

I'm factoring in the vaccine reducing outbreaks in nursing homes and hospitals

66% of deaths in December were as a result of such outbreaks

Buer

We went from 700-1000 cases in mid-April to 100-200 cases by mid-May.

The peak of this wave is going to be much higher and the level of compliance will be much lower, I suspect. I think we could be in level 5 until March.

At that point, we will hopefully start to see warmer weather reduce people mixing indoors as well as some of the more vulnerable sections and front line workers being vaccinated. At that point, I would hope we could lift the restrictions and never have to re-enter level 5.

I'm very cynical about our ability to deliver the vaccine to the overall population quickly enough, however. Personally, I wouldn't be massively confident of receiving the vaccine before October or November.

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

Part of it, they're allowing/keeping far too many businesses open, which means people have to go into the office and mix etc. The criteria for "essential" is far too broad and businesses are scraping for any excuse to stay open. If nothing is open bar actual essentials, people have far less reason to go out and those working at said businesses won't be spreading it to each other.

Suppose it's part of the problem of having politicians who rely on popularity in charge and them having to make hard decisions. Our current lot don't seem able to do that. It's wishy washy bull**** all the way.

I'm not sure if this is fully backed up.

During the November lockdown there was a lot more business open than during the March one and the numbers dropped massively. What was similar to both lockdowns was restrictions on visiting other peoples houses. This is what I think is the main factor.

I think there isn't enough interrogation of NPHETs recommendations and that's an issue. If the vast majority of transmission is in people's homes it doesn't matter how many businesses are open or closed.

I'm going out on a limb here but I'd guess that the vast majority of transmission over the Christmas period won't be in pubs, restaurants, or shops.

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm not sure if this is fully backed up.

During the November lockdown there was a lot more business open than during the March one and the numbers dropped massively. What was similar to both lockdowns was restrictions on visiting other peoples houses. This is what I think is the main factor.

I think there isn't enough interrogation of NPHETs recommendations and that's an issue. If the vast majority of transmission is in people's homes it doesn't matter how many businesses are open or closed.

I'm going out on a limb here but I'd guess that the vast majority of transmission over the Christmas period won't be in pubs, restaurants, or shops.

Who exactly do you think should "interrogate" the experts?

The reality is the vast majority of people who question the decision don't have remotely enough understanding of it to know what a valid question really is. A complete waste of time.

Unless there are public health experts who are also the ones asking the questions of course.

There's a reason that public health experts across the entire world are recommending very similar things when presented with similar situations. If NPHET were miles out of line with international expertise then maybe there might be SOME sense in listening to complaints from lay people.

Former Former Former

It's all of these things. It's anywhere that people congregate in close proximity.

So while mixing in houses is a huge factor, the pubs and restaurants were definitely an issue. They had to be. It was a very bad call to allow them to reopen for two reasons, firstly the transmission that would have occurred on site but also the message it sent out that we could have a "normal" Christmas and so too many people relaxed on all fronts. The mentality of "sure the pub is open, it must be grand" was rife and the idea that you have social distancing in pubs was laughable from day one.

I know it's easy to be wise now but we loosened the restrictions way too much, too early.

Add in all the people travelling around the country and to/from abroad, it was a perfect storm. And so here we are.

CatFromHue wrote: »

I think there isn't enough interrogation of NPHETs recommendations and that's an issue. If the vast majority of transmission is in people's homes it doesn't matter how many businesses are open or closed.

I'm going out on a limb here but I'd guess that the vast majority of transmission over the Christmas period won't be in pubs, restaurants, or shops.

I agree about NPHET

On the explosion of cases anecdotally from reading the covid thread and people posting details, it appears the vast majority of cases there are due to multiple households meeting up for Christmas and spreading infection

molloyjh

Yeah, part column A and part column B. The messaging from the Gov simply hasn't been strong enough. I saw RTE doing some so-called comic round up of the year last night. One of the jokes was about how often Leo was making speeches. Sure, people get fed up with that, but it keeps the messaging on track which does help.

That said, adults should still be capable of making responsible, grown up decisions. I'm sure we all know people who have gone into the office when they really didn't need to, who have been out staying with friends (or having friends stay with them), who have had their kids on play dates. Or heard stories of people not wearing masks in the office (ah theres only a few of us, its grand), people walking into shops with masks on only to take them off once they are in there.

I'd love to have done some of those things over the last 9-10 months. But with a daughter in pre-school and a dependence on in-laws for childcare in the afternoons we have seen barely anyone in that time. My parents are 20 mins away, but for 6-7 months of last year they may as well have been on the other side of the world as we're in Wicklow and they're in Dublin. We saw them a bit during the summer when things calmed down and then twice over the Christmas period when restrictions eased. Its been tough for everyone as she's the only grandchild and she's used to being with them 2 days a week. To have restricted our movements so much (we did go to a literally cabin in the woods for a week in August, just the 3 of us) and have to pay the price of others not doing so is beyond frustrating at this stage.

molloyjh

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm not sure if this is fully backed up.

During the November lockdown there was a lot more business open than during the March one and the numbers dropped massively. What was similar to both lockdowns was restrictions on visiting other peoples houses. This is what I think is the main factor.

I think there isn't enough interrogation of NPHETs recommendations and that's an issue. If the vast majority of transmission is in people's homes it doesn't matter how many businesses are open or closed.

I'm going out on a limb here but I'd guess that the vast majority of transmission over the Christmas period won't be in pubs, restaurants, or shops.

The problem with this line of thought is that while transmission in homes is a massive issue, it doesn't originate in people's homes. It has to get in there in the first place. And unfortunately while the activity in private homes cannot be controlled in reality (even strict laws would require enforcement, and how is it even possible to police every house and apartment in the country?), activity in places of public gatherings can be controlled. So they are ultimately controlling things in as much as they can. It is on people then to behave responsibly when it comes to how they do or don't visit others homes. But the more people can contract the virus outside the home, the more will bring it into the home.

Dave_The_Sheep

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm not sure if this is fully backed up.

During the November lockdown there was a lot more business open than during the March one and the numbers dropped massively. What was similar to both lockdowns was restrictions on visiting other peoples houses. This is what I think is the main factor.

We got down to double (sometimes single) digit figures back in May after the initial lockdown. During the November one, we were still in triple digit figures and often above 200. I don't think you can really compare the two, one was more successful and it wasn't the November one. Now of course, that's not down to businesses, I'm not saying it is. I'm saying it's part of it. Of course household and school transmissions are higher. But everything plays it's part.

The thing is, household transmissions cannot be controlled. We can't stop people visiting each other in homes without massive buy in from the population (which I can't see us getting - maybe unless people are scared sh*tless). We can try control the spread in businesses, be they shops and pubs etc. And people have to get Covid somewhere for them to bring it to a household - let's try limit the places they can do that.

CatFromHue wrote: »

I'm going out on a limb here but I'd guess that the vast majority of transmission over the Christmas period won't be in pubs, restaurants, or shops.

I don't think track and trace is accurate enough (definitely not these days as they're getting pummelled) to say where the cases are coming from. Like, if someone goes to the shops or a kid goes to school, gets Covid and then goes home and spreads it to their family, that's a household case? Nah. That's caused directly by going to the shop or school. But it wasn't being recorded like that.

I do think we need a March style lockdown though - which includes closing all non-essential businesses but also schools for a while at least (given the new version). The reason I brought up business was that it wasn't really being discussed on the thread and I thought it relevant. I don't think they're the primary driver, but they're definitely a large part of it (again, more contagious strain has to be taken into account here).

molloyjh wrote: »

The problem with this line of thought is that while transmission in homes is a massive issue, it doesn't originate in people's homes. It has to get in there in the first place. And unfortunately while the activity in private homes cannot be controlled in reality (even strict laws would require enforcement, and how is it even possible to police every house and apartment in the country?), activity in places of public gatherings can be controlled. So they are ultimately controlling things in as much as they can. It is on people then to behave responsibly when it comes to how they do or don't visit others homes. But the more people can contract the virus outside the home, the more will bring it into the home.

There is also no test that can tell anyone where they actually caught the virus, and I’m sure it’s considerably more difficult to trace an infection that happened in a shop/restaurant than one that happened in a house.

I’m sure there are people who’ve been infected who were exposed in all sorts of mixtures of locations

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Who exactly do you think should "interrogate" the experts?

The reality is the vast majority of people who question the decision don't have remotely enough understanding of it to know what a valid question really is. A complete waste of time.

Unless there are public health experts who are also the ones asking the questions of course.

There's a reason that public health experts across the entire world are recommending very similar things when presented with similar situations. If NPHET were miles out of line with international expertise then maybe there might be SOME sense in listening to complaints from lay people.

The same people who interrogate the govts handling should also be doing the same for NPHET's advice.

From the HSE website
https://www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/surveillance/covid-19outbreaksclustersinireland/COVID-19%20Weekly%20Outbreak%20Report_Week522020_v0.1_29122020_WebVersion.pdf

Summary (week 32-52, 2020)
8,344 outbreaks have been reported from week 32 onwards (week beginning 02/08/2020; the
second wave of COVID-19 infection in Ireland) and key outbreak locations are as follows:
• 6,483 (78%) were in private houses
• 119 (1.4%) were reported in hospitals
• 114 (1.4%) were reported in nursing homes
• 122 (1.5%) were reported in residential institutions
• 1,497 (18%) were reported in a range of other settings, including workplaces (n=293; 4%),
restaurant/cafés (n=47; 0.6%) and travel/transport related settings (n=48; 0.6%).

I'm not anti NPHET or anti vax or whatever but there's legitimate questions asked as to why closing businesses and shops is such a good idea if over 80% of transmission happens elsewhere.

They may have a good reason for doing this but I think it's a problem if that question isn't asked.

Dave_The_Sheep

Former Former Former wrote: »

I know it's easy to be wise now but we loosened the restrictions way too much, too early.

Add in all the people travelling around the country and to/from abroad, it was a perfect storm. And so here we are.

It was very easy back then as well to know how things were going to go. It would have been one thing if we were getting ~10/20 cases a day and starting from there. But were were starting from ~200. It was lunacy.

But it was the easy political decision to make, not the hard one. And we're paying for that now, as you say.

Former Former Former

CatFromHue wrote: »

The same people who interrogate the govts handling should also be doing the same for NPHET's advice.

From the HSE website
https://www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/surveillance/covid-19outbreaksclustersinireland/COVID-19%20Weekly%20Outbreak%20Report_Week522020_v0.1_29122020_WebVersion.pdf

I'm not anti NPHET or anti vax or whatever but there's legitimate questions asked as to why closing businesses and shops is such a good idea if over 80% of transmission happens elsewhere.

They may have a good reason for doing this but I think it's a problem if that question isn't asked.

The question has been asked over and over again, by the vintners and the hoteliers and whoever else has a vested interest.

I'm not sure why you're so anti NPHET when everything they predicted has come to pass. If the government had followed their advice to the letter, things wouldn't be so bad right now. We got a few weeks of business for the hospitality sector but the money generated will be dwarfed by the cost.

The problem with those outbreak stats is that if I unknowingly get Covid from a stranger in a pub, how will that ever show up in the stats? It won't. Or if people go to a pub when they should be self isolating, do you think they're telling the contact tracers that? Of course not.

Dubinusa

100 plus co workers have tested positive for covid. I've been tested 4 times since mid November. My daughter has it now. It's a crapstorm. It really has dampened our way of life. It's destroyed businesses and people are suffering. People are dying! It's awful. Stay safe everyone.

CatFromHue wrote: »

The same people who interrogate the govts handling should also be doing the same for NPHET's advice.

From the HSE website
https://www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/surveillance/covid-19outbreaksclustersinireland/COVID-19%20Weekly%20Outbreak%20Report_Week522020_v0.1_29122020_WebVersion.pdf

I'm not anti NPHET or anti vax or whatever but there's legitimate questions asked as to why closing businesses and shops is such a good idea if over 80% of transmission happens elsewhere.

They may have a good reason for doing this but I think it's a problem if that question isn't asked.

How do you think the virus is getting into private houses?

Lay people interrogating NPHET would be akin to Leo Cullen or Van Graan having to field questions from a group of people with no playing or coaching experience after every match. Except they have more combined education and experience and are dealing with considerably more difficult problems.

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

We got down to double (sometimes single) digit figures back in May after the initial lockdown. During the November one, we were still in triple digit figures and often above 200. I don't think you can really compare the two, one was more successful and it wasn't the November one. Now of course, that's not down to businesses, I'm not saying it is. I'm saying it's part of it. Of course household and school transmissions are higher. But everything plays it's part.

The thing is, household transmissions cannot be controlled. We can't stop people visiting each other in homes without massive buy in from the population (which I can't see us getting - maybe unless people are scared sh*tless). We can try control the spread in businesses, be they shops and pubs etc. And people have to get Covid somewhere for them to bring it to a household - let's try limit the places they can do that.

I don't think track and trace is accurate enough (definitely not these days as they're getting pummelled) to say where the cases are coming from. Like, if someone goes to the shops or a kid goes to school, gets Covid and then goes home and spreads it to their family, that's a household case? Nah. That's caused directly by going to the shop or school. But it wasn't being recorded like that.

I do think we need a March style lockdown though - which includes closing all non-essential businesses but also schools for a while at least (given the new version). The reason I brought up business was that it wasn't really being discussed on the thread and I thought it relevant. I don't think they're the primary driver, but they're definitely a large part of it (again, more contagious strain has to be taken into account here).

They're a part but I'm not sure if they're a large part. You're right on the track and trace, when the daily numbers go above a certain level they're over whelmed and we went over that number before Christmas.

What I think worked so well in March was that no one visited other people's houses.

From the HSE website

Close contact can mean:

spending more than 15 minutes of face-to-face contact within 2 metres of someone who has COVID-19, indoors or outdoors

living in the same house or shared accommodation as someone who has COVID-19

sitting within 2 seats of someone who has COVID-19 on public transport or an airplane

Spending more than 2 hours in an indoor space with someone who has COVID-19 will sometimes count as close or casual contact. This could be an office or a classroom. But it will depend on the size of the room and other factors.

The first one just doesn't happen in retail for the customer, and can be managed for the staff.

Again I don't know if I'm talking bollix but I do think it's a problem if this stuff isn't being asked. Think about how cases has come for staff or customers in essential retail for example.

swiwi_

Dubinusa wrote: »

100 plus co workers have tested positive for covid. I've been tested 4 times since mid November. My daughter has it now. It's a crapstorm. It really has dampened our way of life. It's destroyed businesses and people are suffering. People are dying! It's awful. Stay safe everyone.

Lucky your favourite president has been doing a sterling job. Really being proactive despite the disappointment of conceding the election and tweeting his support for democratic processes.