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I am curious about the long term effects on the trust in medical specialists of the cluster fuck that's being made of the pandemic and now the vaccination drive.
How relevant is our expertise and how good is our system when we are performing so poorly compared to Asia?
Expectations can always be adjusted.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hazir
The 'expert advice' employed by a government has to be evaluated through the extent to which [s]monetary interests[s] political concerns have been allowed to affect it.
The UK government's repeated claims that 'we're just following the science' (as they solemnly announce their latest policy of dunking 8 year olds in a vat of covid like the Master in Fallout 1 then sending them to kiss grandma full on the lips or firing the country's entire vaccine stockpile at the moon) is really just a way of trying avoiding accountability for their consistently awful decision making, because in reality science isn't some settled, fact based thing (at least not this early) but a matter of probabilities and degrees of certainty and you can pretty much find an 'expert' willing to massage the data to say just about anything you need it to say. For example, an 'expert' said that vaccines cause autism so if it wished a government could say that it was following the science and banning vaccines. See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replication_crisis
At the beginning of the crisis there were plenty of scientists saying that what the government was doing (not locking down immediately) was basically completely wrong, but those scientists weren't on SAGE, the ones telling them that if they locked down too soon it would be worse in some nebulous way were.
It's too early to be certain but I'm going to go ahead and say, as we stare down covid numbers worse than fucking America, that history will not vindicate the government, or their advisors.
Releasing models & internal reports + mails would be a good start. At the very least, the scientific rationale can be assessed.
It'd be a start, but I wouldn't trust them to paint a full and accurate picture of how the decisions are actually reached.
Models and reports are frequently published. SAGE models have been released open source before now.
Seems the idea that the scientists were recommending mix and match doses was fake news. Suspected as much.
This is what the Green Book (Chapter 14a) actually says.
https://assets.publishing.service.go...ter_14a_v4.pdf
... If the course is interrupted or delayed, it should be resumed using the same vaccine but the first dose should not be repeated. There is no evidence on the interchangeability of the COVID-19 vaccines although studies are underway. Therefore, every effort should be made to determine which vaccine the individual received and to complete with the same vaccine. For individuals who started the schedule and who attend for vaccination at a site where the same vaccine is not available, or if the first product received is unknown, it is reasonable to offer one dose of the locally available product to complete the schedule. This option is preferred if the individual is likely to be at immediate high risk or is considered unlikely to attend again. In these circumstances, as both the vaccines are based on the spike protein, it is likely the second dose will help to boost the response to the first dose. For this reason, until additional information becomes available, further doses would not then be required...
PS if you want to Aimless you can read a full report there with citations etc
We know what we know and we know what we don't know. The British government consistently pretends to know things it does not. With dire consequences most of the time. It's basically policy created by Eton elites who've never in their life been punished for their mistakes while being generously rewarded for each success.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
This is kind of what I am afraid of; protocols VS reality somehow always makes reality look like being in the wrong. I for starters think it was close to moronic to treat the pandemic as a purely medical problem. Aside from the people who with massive support developed the vaccines medical professionals were very often as far ahead of the general public as a TA who survives on staying one chapter ahead of the class he's teaching. And it is kinda obvious by now that it wasn't doctors that ended Corona. And judging from what's going on in the Netherlands they are a delaying factor even in places that rely on the vaccines to get covid-19 under control.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
if you want to RandBlade you can read the article that started this tangent, in which that passage is quoted.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
If you scroll to the bottom, it does seem that most of the medical establishment in the UK is composed of pseudo-scientists. It certainly explains a lot.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...id-19-vaccines
The Guardian's explanation for why the US health authorities have rejected this approach is because we're litigious?!Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Is that the article behind the New York Times paywall? I don't have a New York Times subscription, so I read the bits that were actually quoted on this website which did not include that passage. So the idea that they're recommending some Frankenstein experimentation seems like nonsense, just that if it isn't possible for some reason to complete the regimen then the next best thing should be used - seems a logical safety net to me. Are you claiming this is without precedent?
Since nobody quoted the NYT paywall article, I will quote from the BBC despite it being not behind a paywall.
So it was New York Times bullshit. Hardly a surprise, the NYT under its current editor hates the way this country is going, Brexit and its government and has had a long series of absolutely misleading and bullshit articles of which this was one. I will take the BMJ over the NYT all day every day.Quote:
Coronavirus: BMJ urges NYT to correct vaccine 'mixing' article
The editor of the British Medical Journal has asked the New York Times to correct an article that claims UK guidelines allow two Covid-19 vaccines to be mixed.
The US publication reported that UK health officials were allowing patients to be given a second dose that is different to their first.
Fiona Godlee said there was no such recommendation to mix and match.
The UK has approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and the Oxford-AstraZeneca jab.
Ms Godlee said the paper's report was "seriously misleading and requires urgent correction".
She said the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) does not make any recommendation to mix and match.
Dr Mary Ramsay, Public Health England's head of immunisations, said: "We do not recommend mixing the Covid-19 vaccines - if your first dose is the Pfizer vaccine you should not be given the AstraZeneca vaccine for your second dose and vice versa."
Dr Ramsay added that on the "extremely rare occasions" where the same vaccine is unavailable or it is unknown which jab the patient received, it is "better to give a second dose of another vaccine than not at all".
Ms Godlee urged the New York Times to print a "highly visible correction" as soon as possible.
I'm sure the fact this was NYT bullshit will get a serious retraction from you all who jumped all over Frankenstein lies rather than waiting for the truth to come out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
It's literally in the article, which can be read even without a subscription. The problem is that you're pretending the article—and the posters on this forum—have said something that they have not. The issue is not that UK authorities are cheerfully encouraging physicians to give people two different vaccines; the issue is that they're stating that it is permissible to mix two different types of vaccine—about/with which we have little knowledge/experience, and that have been authorized for emergency use—against a novel illness, in a way that is not in the least bit supported by the evidence. You offer a quote where someone implies that this is only applicable to "extremely rare occasions", and that it is, on such occasions, "better" to mix than to forgo the second dose—but this is a meaningless statement, because we do not know how rare these occasions will be, and we do not know that it is better. The problem is greatly exacerbated by the decision to delay the second dose by 9 weeks compared to the protocol, increasing the likelihood of incomplete vaccination as well as the likelihood of not being able to determine which vaccine was first administered—not to mention the uncertainty wrt the possible medical consequences.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Really?Quote:
So it was New York Times bullshit. Hardly a surprise, the NYT under its current editor hates the way this country is going, Brexit and its government and has had a long series of absolutely misleading and bullshit articles of which this was one. I will take the BMJ over the NYT all day every day.
Go ahead then: https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2020/12/23...m-the-science/
Sorry if I was unclear but I was specifically referring to the issue of some doctors here saying nursing home staff & other HCWs should be vaccinated first—prioritized over frail elderly nursing home residents—because that would protect nursing home residents, specifically by preventing the virus from getting in to those facilities. I believe those specific arguments partly stem from a lack of awareness of what the data shows and does not show (as well as from a lack of clear thinking about risks).Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
I don't think any country or, indeed, any prominent group or actor has treated the pandemic as if it were a purely medical problem; on the contrary, [too] many people have tried to combine medical, epidemiological, economical and even cultural & political perspectives, often with unfortunate consequences for the debate as well as for the policy outcomes. By examining the basis for these latest controversial expert recommendations, we can hopefully get a better idea of what assumptions are being made about reality, and how robust their reasoning is to uncertainty in/changes to those assumptions. It might also help us understand—later on—where and how we fucked up. Real world outcomes will be the basis for the final grading of these decisions; it's only in Sweden that expert authorities are allowed to argue that the science was brilliant, but that reality was dumb :downcast:Quote:
Originally Posted by Hazir
And other vulnerable people who are treated as expendable. :(Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
We've also learned that anti-science and anti-expert attitudes have grown like a virus, infecting society in profound ways. Especially in the US -- by portraying universal healthcare as evil SSSocialism, for example. Meanwhile, we had Florida's senior citizens lining up in lawn chairs before dawn, waiting for hours to get their vaccine, because it was first-come-first-serve. Then it changed to appointment only. Hooray for federalism?
Y'all can argue about governmental failures til the cows come home, but American Exceptionalism is still a myth. :donkey:
I asked YOU because you know more about US Law and its processes (including unintended entanglements and consequences) than I do....and I value your opinion. Excuse me for asking a rhetorical question in a forum designed for discussing "unanswerable" problems. :donkey:Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleFuzzy
BTW, it's not my "gut" or emotions that led me to ask you those questions, but an observation of how fucked up things have played out in reality. I won't apologize for trying to understand it all, and ask questions. My mistake was assuming you're a problem-solver, and not just a pedantic curmudgeon. My bad. :bored:
Things are looking pretty grim in the UK at the moment.
Huge pressure on the UK government to initiate another national lockdown, including school closures.
Johnson seems to be resisting at the moment, meaning well probably lockdown again by the end of the week.
I do appreciate that he's clearly reluctant to restrict our liberties, but he doesn't seem to be learning from previous mistakes.
I was desperately hoping we wouldn't close schools again. It wasn't an easy time last year with my current situation.
Feeling really low and depressed by it all.
My daughter's (6 and 4) have had enough of not going to school. My six year old says she "hates Boris Johnson" because in her mind all the restrictions are due to him and him alone. :haha: If she sees him on the news she gets angry because he won't let her "touch [her] friends". She can't stand when she can't go to school and during the holidays were counting down the days until today when they got to go back. They are not going to enjoy if its cancelled further.
My youngest, four, was OK in the March lockdown but then she had only recently started going to Nursery when it got locked down so it didn't make much difference to her. But now she has started school she is really upset she can't have playdates with any of her friends. She's got friends now at school and wants to invite them to our house and gets annoyed that she can't. They both jsut want to play with their friends and have birthday parties etc
Also almost like a child version of PTSD they get upset during holidays and weekends like they're not going to be able to go back to school again. From Boxing Day onwards they were like "we've had Christmas now, why can't we go to school?" There seems almost a fear in them that we're going to tell them they can't go back for months on end again.
I love the fact they love school, we've always tried to encourage a love of reading, education and school in them. They're glad to be back today, but it won't surprise me if there's another lockdown closing them again soon.
Off the topic of schools, this is a good thread:
Twitter Link
Good news today that the Oxford rollout has begun. Hopefully between the two programmes and with the new 12 week schedule they will really be able to ramp out the first doses to as many people as humanly possible as fast as possible. This really needs a sort of total war effort to help eradicate the virus as best as possible. Getting vaccines into arms really is the most important thing in society right now to get back to normal.
The thread misrepresents the criticism, uses a double standard wrt expert opinion, and glosses over a number of important mitigations & remedies.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
This was clearly written by someone who works in a field where you have to make unsubstantiated assumptions on a regular basis... and likely by someone who hasn't had the frequent experience of making extremely well-informed hypotheses about a biological or clinical outcome only to be roundly disproven after the data is in due to the stunning complexity of biology. I can't tell you the number of times I have been surprised by an outcome, only to learn fundamentally important things that changed my model. I literally just got some data on Thursday that was shocking to me based on a series of previous experiments that had suggested an alternative likely result, and because I tested it (rather than relying on intuition and logic and extrapolating from previous results) I am now redesigning a portion of my technology's process to enhance its safety profile.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
People are absolutely right to say they have no data if there is in fact no data. There may be inferences and assumptions we can make based on our experiences, and that informs our hypotheses and trial designs. Science is not performed in a vacuum. But we have the recognize that the level of certainty we have about an outcome is fairly low before we have tested it, especially in a poorly controlled real world context like a clinical intervention. I recognize that in times of great urgency there is value in acting as soon as possible even if all of the data is not yet in - that was the argument much of this forum made when I expressed skepticism about the likely efficacy of widespread cloth facemask usage by members of the public. Yet as the magnitude of the intervention and the attendant risks increases, the reason for caution also increases.
Scotland goes into lockdown from midnight tonight for at least January. They are apparently behind England in terms of the scale of problem with this new strain (I haven't verified this), so surely it's just a matter of time now until England do as well.
:(
And there we go. Johnson to address the nation tonight.
Lockdown.
If the schools are closed as of tomorrow its going to be hard to explain that to our girls.
But under the circumstances I don't mind, it needs to be done I think - but close the bloody borders! People going on holidays during a bloody pandemic is less important than our children's education. If you can't have kids go to school then you can't go to Ibiza FFS.
In these trying times, we have to think outside the box. Someone proposed keeping the pubs open, but only for children.
LOL!Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
FT reporting schools closed until February half-term. Grim but logical IMO. Very grim.
If they close the schools and they don't do anything about people going on holidays then I'm going to be very pissed off.
Agreed.
What's annoyed me most, perhaps, in all of this is the lack of support for schools. Our primary school really struggled last year and they were not set up, at all, for remote learning. My kids were given the bare minimum if work, usually just exercises found on third party websites that were meant to last a week but realistically lasted a couple of days. There was no marking, no calling and no student teacher interaction.
I'm concerned that nothing has really changed.
We should have prepared for this eventually happening again. I see no reason why our curriculum can't be delivered by a centralised service, a few teachers and some webcams. Oak Academy is alright, but it lacks the routine and still requires a lot of parent time.
I can't stand Gavin Williamson. He should have been replaced months ago with somebody with some creativity, imagination and drive to plug the gap. It's not beyond us.
Gavin Williamson is shit. I'd gladly see the back of him.
Our kids primary school was almost exclusively third party website exercises too but it still felt like they had a personal touch. Each week there'd be a subject theme (eg a book, or animals etc) and as many of the exercises as possible would tie into that. There'd be a message from the teacher each day linking many things together.
Possibly easier with Year One when you can do a theme around "We're going on a bear hunt" etc
F*ck. :(
Schools closed, likely for months from the way he spoke. F*ck f*ck f*ck this is not good.
This new variant is a real bugger that even Tier 4 isn't working on it.