I was going to wait until late in the day to give a final update before Christmas of where we are with hospitalisations but it's clear now the number are rising across the whole country and most importantly in London. The reason why London is key to understanding what is happening is because they were hit so hard the 1st time there was a hope that a level of immunity had set in that would reduce the impact.
As of the 23rd we had just over 18k in hospital in England, the peak in April was just under 19k - we'll pass that today or tomorrow. We locked down the whole country on the 23rd March when we had 3,183 in hospital, we have 6 times that amount now and still haven't locked down, fuck knows what's going on any more.
There is a thread on Twitter from an Intensive Care Doctor in London that says a lot more than we can on here so I thought it was worth sharing:
Situation in London continuing to deteriorate as expected. Many doctors are worried that other parts of the UK will follow. A lot of misinformation around, so some fairly blunt observations here, for which I apologise. But we all need to understand the equation.
As with the first wave, the sharp rise in people testing positive for SARS-CoV-2, will be followed by a sharp rise in hospital admissions for COVID-19, and then a similar rise in excess deaths in January but like all disasters, for every death we can expect many more people to be injured and survive. And so it is with COVID-19. Most hospitalised patients will survive but they will take a long time to recover. Many will experience so-called ‘Long COVID’.
It's a false dichotomy to suggest we are choosing between the health impacts of COVID and the economic impacts of lockdowns. Poor health causes poor wealth. When an economically active person is too ill to work, their dependents are affected, all become poorer.
Like all diseases, COVID-19 affects the poor more than the wealthy. The blue columns in this graph show the number of patients admitted to intensive care by levels of deprivation (or IMD). The yellow line shows where the columns would be if we were all affected equally.
COVID is not a disease of older people. Half the patients admitted to intensive care are less than 60 years of age while four out of five are independent (needing no assistance in daily activities: washing, dressing, cooking, etc).
For society, death is quick, simple and relatively inexpensive. But survival with serious complications is the much more likely outcome from COVID, and for many people a worse one. Also worse for the economy. Ill people need care from their family and the state
So, if (as some suggest) we lock up the old and sick, then let the virus rip, we would see many young people die of COVID, but many more survive with long-term disability, with the greatest impact on the poorest in society. The economy would get much worse, not better.
We must accept that the virus SARS-CoV-2 will be with us for years. When we finally manage to control the pandemic, we will still see a long period where the virus is endemic (widespread) in both UK and global society. Ignoring the pandemic won’t make it go away.
Please engage those who need convincing and exclude those who spread denial. Many lives depend on our collective responsibility. Freedom to ignore the pandemic is the freedom to put the lives of others at risk.
https://twitter.com/rupert_pearse/status...30113?s=20
This year has been miserable and the way that we have reacted to it has been heroic in some parts and moronic in many others, I am amazed at the number of people who ignore basic points because it doesn't really suit them and they want to do what they want. I can fully sympathise with those that need to do something to earn a living and I would hope that you got all of the support you needed (although it doesn't sound like some of you did) to get through this, my gripe is with the those that make out it isn't real and will just go away - those are the ones that have fucked it for everyone.
On that note I want to wish you all a merry Christmas and a vaccinated new year.
As of the 23rd we had just over 18k in hospital in England, the peak in April was just under 19k - we'll pass that today or tomorrow. We locked down the whole country on the 23rd March when we had 3,183 in hospital, we have 6 times that amount now and still haven't locked down, fuck knows what's going on any more.
There is a thread on Twitter from an Intensive Care Doctor in London that says a lot more than we can on here so I thought it was worth sharing:
Situation in London continuing to deteriorate as expected. Many doctors are worried that other parts of the UK will follow. A lot of misinformation around, so some fairly blunt observations here, for which I apologise. But we all need to understand the equation.
As with the first wave, the sharp rise in people testing positive for SARS-CoV-2, will be followed by a sharp rise in hospital admissions for COVID-19, and then a similar rise in excess deaths in January but like all disasters, for every death we can expect many more people to be injured and survive. And so it is with COVID-19. Most hospitalised patients will survive but they will take a long time to recover. Many will experience so-called ‘Long COVID’.
It's a false dichotomy to suggest we are choosing between the health impacts of COVID and the economic impacts of lockdowns. Poor health causes poor wealth. When an economically active person is too ill to work, their dependents are affected, all become poorer.
Like all diseases, COVID-19 affects the poor more than the wealthy. The blue columns in this graph show the number of patients admitted to intensive care by levels of deprivation (or IMD). The yellow line shows where the columns would be if we were all affected equally.
COVID is not a disease of older people. Half the patients admitted to intensive care are less than 60 years of age while four out of five are independent (needing no assistance in daily activities: washing, dressing, cooking, etc).
For society, death is quick, simple and relatively inexpensive. But survival with serious complications is the much more likely outcome from COVID, and for many people a worse one. Also worse for the economy. Ill people need care from their family and the state
So, if (as some suggest) we lock up the old and sick, then let the virus rip, we would see many young people die of COVID, but many more survive with long-term disability, with the greatest impact on the poorest in society. The economy would get much worse, not better.
We must accept that the virus SARS-CoV-2 will be with us for years. When we finally manage to control the pandemic, we will still see a long period where the virus is endemic (widespread) in both UK and global society. Ignoring the pandemic won’t make it go away.
Please engage those who need convincing and exclude those who spread denial. Many lives depend on our collective responsibility. Freedom to ignore the pandemic is the freedom to put the lives of others at risk.
https://twitter.com/rupert_pearse/status...30113?s=20
This year has been miserable and the way that we have reacted to it has been heroic in some parts and moronic in many others, I am amazed at the number of people who ignore basic points because it doesn't really suit them and they want to do what they want. I can fully sympathise with those that need to do something to earn a living and I would hope that you got all of the support you needed (although it doesn't sound like some of you did) to get through this, my gripe is with the those that make out it isn't real and will just go away - those are the ones that have fucked it for everyone.
On that note I want to wish you all a merry Christmas and a vaccinated new year.