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[ChairmanPoo]

I'd say give a pass to everyone. The important thing is a mandatory facemask. Goverments (or window police for that matter) being anal about people having HEPA masks when the number that do will be ludicrulously low and won't have enough to change things for hospitals...  well, I think it's both bullshit and a way to deviate attention from the *real* reasons for the shortages, which are a misguided economic policy that delocated everything and made countries one trick ponies, and ANOTHER misguided economic policy in which goverments encouraged health institutions to work with no redundance whatsoever in general, and in this particular case, not keeping stocks of PPE*

Blaming those few citizens who do have HEPA masks is a huge red herring.  And the most important thing is encouraging people to use any mask

[Starver]

(Maybe, @McT, but I've been thinking about all the other stored-up issues that'll spike after this.)

Just seen, for the UK: "Everyone over age of five in the UK with symptoms can now be tested for coronavirus, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced."

A) That's...good?
B) That'll be impossible to do. Another of Hancock's Half-Brained targets?

Breaking news, and I forgot to tune into the Daily Briefing this is probably being announced in, so I'll have to  keep an eye on the follow-up reports.

[Iduno]

(Maybe, @McT, but I've been thinking about all the other stored-up issues that'll spike after this.)

Just seen, for the UK: "Everyone over age of five in the UK with symptoms can now be tested for coronavirus, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced."

A) That's...good?
B) That'll be impossible to do. Another of Hancock's Half-Brained targets?

Breaking news, and I forgot to tune into the Daily Briefing this is probably being announced in, so I'll have to  keep an eye on the follow-up reports.

But I thought the government in the UK always listened to the experts before making decisions? /s

[hector13]

(Maybe, @McT, but I've been thinking about all the other stored-up issues that'll spike after this.)

Just seen, for the UK: "Everyone over age of five in the UK with symptoms can now be tested for coronavirus, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced."

A) That's...good?
B) That'll be impossible to do. Another of Hancock's Half-Brained targets?

Breaking news, and I forgot to tune into the Daily Briefing this is probably being announced in, so I'll have to  keep an eye on the follow-up reports.

But I thought the government in the UK always listened to the experts before making decisions? /s

They’re at least back to not telling the experts to fuck off. I guess that’s the same thing.

[Starver]

Almost posted something based on this in the Terrible Jokes thread, when it occured to me just now.

The dimensionless factor R is of course the basic reproduction number by which any given number of infectors create another given number of infectees in a situation.  (R₀ is specifically the likely number given one typical infector amongst a naïve population, both in immunity and behaviour.  R_t is how this has changed by time t when the pool of susceptibility has been reduced by precautions, vaccinations, those already succumbed already, in a model, but when estimating - for example trying to colourise a height-map of hotspots or giving observed risks for a table of groups - you can refer to R_e, the effective number for the situation. And I think someone has told the politicians this, as they've stopped talking about "Reducing R-nought", which can't be done after the fact.)

So, anyway, this is something they might start teaching more in schools, if they do reopen them before summer, as a topical application of mathematics to keep them busy in the short time before they break up for the holidays. At the same time, all those pupils meeting up in whatever scholarly situation is provided will inevitably be subject to some viral transmission, varying by school, etc.

And I suppose you could then call the accumulation of values that would attempt to describe what is seen happening a Students'-R Distribution.

[thompson]

(Maybe, @McT, but I've been thinking about all the other stored-up issues that'll spike after this.)

Just seen, for the UK: "Everyone over age of five in the UK with symptoms can now be tested for coronavirus, Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced."

A) That's...good?
B) That'll be impossible to do. Another of Hancock's Half-Brained targets?

Breaking news, and I forgot to tune into the Daily Briefing this is probably being announced in, so I'll have to  keep an eye on the follow-up reports. I initially interpreted the “values” of the distribution to be the values the students calculated, which wasn’t particularly amusing. Upon rereading I realised you were in fact referring to infection rates post lockdown, which actually works rather well (but spoiled by my earlier misreading). Maybe it’s just me though.

C) He meant “Anyone”.

Do I get a prize?

Edit: I think there’s something in that joke, but the delivery needs a bit of work. I initially interpreted the values of the distribution to be the values the students calculated in their excercises, which didn’t really mesh with the part on new infections. I later realised you may have been referring to the Rt values of these new infections, but by that point the tension had been spoiled. It may just be me though.

[Frumple]

Seriously though, you do get a prize. The prize is more crow plague.

It's a shitty prize, yes.

[Starver]

[C) He meant “Anyone”.

Do I get a prize?

Well, that's my assumption. As in "we need to artificially raise 'accomplished'[1] tests, to get our arbitrary yet still insufficient target actually accomplished, but we can't seem to get enough of the current list of targetted people in the position of taking a test... let's just make it a free-for-all and service as many of the lower-hanging fruits as we can, even if people with greater need now get passed over due to awkwardness".


([1] I imagine postal kits will feature heavily, fresh off the production-line but long before they actually become used. If indeed they do. With an assumed ramping up of availability, it's effectively a Ponzi scheme if you know you need to not double-report on return but add new 'new' tests every day to cover the pre-counted with brand new pre-counted false-accounting and then need some more to demonstrate you're not standing still.)


edit: They also just added "loss of taste or smell" to the list if symptoms, after inexplicably being absent compared to other jurisdictions. At the same time as saying "hey, like, if you have any of the symptoms, you're qualified to ask to be tested..." Sounds almost like they are shifting all the goalposts in a coordinated manner for some reason.

[ChairmanPoo]

Loss of taste of smell... which has been known to be a symptom for over a month now

[scriver]

Maybe if you didn't shove food up your nose

But jokes aside I hope it's just the normal flu Chairman. Or a weak case of the Ravenflu. Where are you know? If I understood your plans correctly you hadn't gotten back to Ireland yet, or did you? Can you self-quarantine where you are?

[ChairmanPoo]

Eh not me. I was just commenting on the previous post. My taste and smell are alright 🤣
I'm good for the time being. Plus I've barely left the house in the last 2 months. Shopping is mostly done by my mother who goes out with protection. We're fairly good so far

Plan is to fly eventually depending on availability of flights and accomodation of some sort, interview results and management decisions yes.

[wierd]

I believe it was in response to the "Just recently added symptom!" (which has been known for well over a month now, in professional circles...)

So far so good in my resident population here. No active cases; quarantine still effective. (knocks on wood.)

[scriver]

Oh, good

I didn't notice the edit

On the plus side this means I don't have to have any guilt over joking about your typo, which is also good

[Frumple]

I believe it was in response to the "Just recently added symptom!" (which has been known for well over a month now, in professional circles...)

Just outta' curiosity, but isn't a loss of taste and/or smell, like... common... for respiratory issues? Could swear it's something that occasionally happens with just normal colds or allergies or whatev'. _{which would just make the "just recently added" thing even more of a farce, covid's symptoms are mostly just flu/cold/anything-respiratory ones, of course taste/smell loss would be a potential symptom!}

[wierd]

A major one not seen in ordinary colds, is the "walking hypoxia" one.

Basically, under *NORMAL* conditions, when your body has low SpO2, you have shortness of breath, rapid breathing, and a feeling of suffocation.

NOT SO with Covid19.