Coronavirus
Out of context: Reply #1492
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- yuekit0
What do you guys think about this?
Coronavirus may have infected half of UK population — Oxford study
The new coronavirus may already have infected far more people in the UK than scientists had previously estimated — perhaps as much as half the population — according to modelling by researchers at the University of Oxford.
If the results are confirmed, they imply that fewer than one in a thousand of those infected with Covid-19 become ill enough to need hospital treatment, said Sunetra Gupta, professor of theoretical epidemiology, who led the study. The vast majority develop very mild symptoms or none at all.
“We need immediately to begin large-scale serological surveys — antibody testing — to assess what stage of the epidemic we are in now,” she said.
The modelling by Oxford’s Evolutionary Ecology of Infectious Disease group indicates that Covid-19 reached the UK by mid-January at the latest. Like many emerging infections, it spread invisibly for more than a month before the first transmissions within the UK were officially recorded at the end of February.
The research presents a very different view of the epidemic to the modelling at Imperial College London, which has strongly influenced government policy. “I am surprised that there has been such unqualified acceptance of the Imperial model,” said Prof Gupta.
- So it's either the end of the world, or we all have it already and it's extremely mild. Thanks scientists for clearing that up.yuekit
- I thoroughly believe this. Everyone in my family have had a hellish ongoing cold/cough since then that started with fevers.microkorg
- Yes, that's very possible. The problem is, we don't have that antibody testing yet. My actual knowledge is, clinical tests start friday in Switzerland.uan
- also this is a ft article...it's a legit argument for the 'economy'. but circumstances are different. italy got burned, spain and maybe also france.uan
- ^ well, i'm still kinda convinced i had it in december. everyone in my work had something over december/ jan my g/f is still coughing.kingsteven
- Actually my lady and I had intense two-day fevers over Christmas, too. I think. Didn't record our temperatures.nb
- mild cases get through in a couple of weeks. the problem is the severe cases, and it's weak immune system, old ppl who get it mostly.uan
- you can't know till they have that antibody test. that's the problem. meanwhile you can spread the virus without knowing you are sick.uan
- @ks - i had what I now know was 'Aussie Flu' back in late Nov - worst I've ever felt. i had fantisised that i might've been some early outlier for SARS2, but noNairn
- fantisised?Nairn
- watch this:
https://youtu.be/zIp…shapesalad - ^ yeah i guess you would have expected it to tear through nursing homes as in Seattle or to have shown as an increase in flu cases.kingsteven
- Fairly certain my family has all had it. Started feeling rough end of February. Cough and tight chest didn't hit until two weeks ago.monoboy
- No fever, bad dizzy spells. Short of breath doing menial tasks. Loss of smell and taste.monoboy
- Mild headaches on and off. The wife was first to get the cough, then my eldest. Now me. Barely touched my youngest.monoboy
- 90k people tested, but only 8k cases. How is that 1/2??? Especially as those tested were ones with symptoms. Not logical. Junk Theory.shapesalad
- Also, nasty mouth ulcer.monoboy
- If they theory where remotely true, of 90k tested you'd expect 20k+ cases, and that's being generous to the theory. Ideally 45k cases. But 8k... junkshapesalad
- We self-isolated two weeks ago once the coughs started. I went to a gig in Glasgow with at least a thousand people at the end of Feb.monoboy
- I think the UK gov knew this already and felt it wasn't worth attempting to contain it.monoboy
- Got a feeling we'll be seeing hospital cases rocket in the coming weeks.monoboy
- We all thought it was just a cold.monoboy
- Still might be. But the symptoms are very unusual.monoboy
- Me and my wife been sick in Dec with a loooong "flu", the symptoms are the same as covid, my wife did'nt recovered the taste, our daugthers been ill too...OBBTKN
- I've been 3 or 4 days in bed, one day in ER with oxigen and corticoids (I'm asthmatic) but this shortness of breath was not asthma I'm starting to suspect...OBBTKN
- They've got my x-ray pic saved, now is not time to bother the docs, but just curiousOBBTKN
- the low 90K/8K ratio: they test for the virus that is only present before-while you are sick. if you had disease already you need to test for antibody to know.uan
- The science from day 1 said most cases would be unnoticed or written off as cold or allergies. This is absolutely no surprise as it backs up the science.monospaced
- Yes but this is saying we have massively overestimated the death rate. It's completely different from what every government is planning for right now.yuekit
- Whether true or not its mind-boggling that governments are taking all these drastic actions, spending trillions etc without bothering to figure this stuff out.yuekit
- this what's panic does to a population - especially to stupid modafuckers.grafician
- They DID figure it out, and they're making sure it doesn't slam us all at once. Let's be clear: WE CANNOT STOP THIS. We can only slow it down severely.monospaced
- incredibly reading the twitter thread on this there are many folks much smarter than i explaining that although the reporting by the ft is dangerous the theorykingsteven
- has legs https://twitter.com/…kingsteven
- and it doesn't even suggest to change the response btw mono, it's just a different model of how it has spread but with far higher immunity levelskingsteven
- it's more or less just a call to develop antibody testing alongside mass testing if we're to understand the spread and contain the virus.kingsteven
- mono spaced, clearly they did not figure it out yet. I’m talking about the debate over how many people are already infected, which has implications for howyuekit
- severe the virus is and what the public policy response would be. Surely if half the country or anything close to that is already infected this is not exactlyyuekit
- a minor detail.yuekit