Thursday 28 January 2021

COVID - Oxford University/AstraZeneca partnership & The EU



Unlike me to not be knocking the UK Gov but .... credit where credit due.

The Oxford University and AstraZeneca partnership came out of the UK Govs dedicated Vaccines Taskforce,  basically the Gov fitted them together.

Oxford University’s vaccine research was given £20 million Government funding.
AstraZeneca will work with global partners on the international distribution of the vaccine, particularly working to make it available and accessible for low and medium-income countries.

Both partners have agreed to operate on a not-for-profit basis for the duration of the coronavirus pandemic.
Only the costs of production and distribution are being covered.

Uk got early access because Gov basically took a punt on it being successful as they ordered millions of doses before the trial results were out.
EU ordered 3 months later so unfortunately behind us in the queue.

The agreements between Astra and UK & EU have not been released but apparently, Astra saying that it was a best endeavours agreement. So not sure how far EU will get with that one. If it goes to court the agreements would have to be released.
EU supply will happen when previous commitments have been fulfilled.

Think there's a lot of smoke being blown around.
EU because they were late ordering, but then would you order a car if there was no guarantee the engine would work.
UK Gov took a speculative punt and this time it paid off. If the trials had failed then would have been a different story, I guess they were sweating for a while there. But it didn't and so we were front of the queue.

In the big scheme of things, there seems to be some disparity with costs of the vaccine being sold to smaller countries for double the price, but I guess whether that is true or not will come out in the wash.




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Wednesday 27 January 2021

COVID - Why does the UK have highest death rate in Europe.

The question seems to be being asked as to why we have the highest death rate in Europe.

To me its a no brainer, not sure why its even a question, seems fairly obvious.
  1. UK Gov, didn't take on board the reccomendations of the 2016 pandemic report, operation cygnus, this wasnt an if it was a when. It was known this would happen, they just couldnt predict exactly when.
  2. Because of point 1 frontline staff ran out of PPE and the Gov had to spend millions to get stocks, some of which were not fit for purpose.
  3. UK's High population density in relation to land mass.
  4. One of the lowest levels of ICU beds and staff in Europe.
  5. Didnt close borders. Easy for the UK to close borders as we are an island.
  6. Slow to react in bring in a lock down, which wasnt really a lock down. Initially went down herd immunity route until doing a sharp U Turn.
  7. Inconsistent and changing messages all the way through, meaning the public didnt buy into it fully.
  8. Allowed major sporting events to go ahead. Cheltenham a point in case 500,000 people from all over the country.
  9. Failed to instigate a working track & trace at the start and wasted millions. Other countries seemed to be able to instigate working systems. 
  10. Kept schools/universities open, saying "theres no indication of it spreading in schools" and Boris "I'll keep schools open regardless of the cost", he didnt say wether that was monetry cost or deaths.  Meanwhile specialists (so the scientists knew) on the radio were saying of course it spreads in schools and silently, as kids rarely show symptoms. Later schools were struggling to stay open due to lackof staff.

There are many others, but 10 will do.

From previous post
The closest country that is similar to the UK in population and population density is Vietnam total cases 1,549 total deaths 35. (If you believe the figures)

Whilst Vietnam didn't lock down totally. Months before the rest of the world acted, it brought in travel restrictions, closed the border with China, schools were closed for 6 months, anyone entering the country quarantine for 14 days, 40% of quarantined cases had the virus but were asymptomatic carriers. Any towns with Positive cases were locked down with no one allowed in or out until two weeks had passed with no confirmed cases.

It wasnt like this snuck up on us, it could be seen coming across the world like a tidal wave. Italy was the best warning but the UK Gov seemed to chose to ignore, stand on the beach and watch the wave coming, rather than running for high ground.

A short sharp lock down at the start, including locking borders and we would have been out of it in 3-6 months, it would have never got to the levels it has. People will say ah well easy to say that in hindsight, well it wasnt hinsight. Ive been saying it from the start, its just common sense, and Vietnam our closest comparison (land area and population density), did just that, locked down well in advance of other countries and achieved possibly the lowest death rate.

Others that have closed borders etc Australia, NZ have achieved the same, although not really compareable, due to population density being much lower.

 

 ooOOoo

 

 Dr Jennifer Dixon, Chief Executive of the Health Foundation, responding to data showing the death toll from COVID-19 has exceeded 100,000 people in the UK, said:

‘This is a tragic milestone, and our deepest sympathy goes out to all those who have lost friends and family to COVID-19.

‘The scene for the current crisis was set long before the virus arrived. There has clearly been a lack of long-term planning and horizon scanning — and the investment across government and public agencies needed to do this. Underinvestment in public services has been ignored, leading to staffing shortages in the NHS, an obviously inadequate system for social care and cuts to public health grants over the last decade. This, plus a bias in decision-making towards the short term, has meant the country was not prepared and has struggled to find the capacity needed to deal with a crisis of this magnitude.

‘Decisions and action to protect people in care homes was late and inadequate. Over a quarter of deaths took place in care homes.

‘There was poor appreciation of the skills available in local authorities to help develop a strong test and trace system. Instead the government relied heavily on private contractors, many selected quickly without normal due diligence to cost or value, and the system has struggled to meet its own targets.

‘The pandemic has severely tested governments around the world. The toll of 100,000 deaths in the UK rightly raises huge questions as to how the pandemic was managed. There will need to be full inquiry to make sure lessons are learned for the future. Crucially, this will need to consider the extent to which existing health and economic inequalities in the UK, compared with other developed nations, made our experience far worse.’

https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/news/health-foundation-response-to-the-uk-covid-19-death-toll-exceeding-100000

 

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Tuesday 26 January 2021

COVID ~ Sweden per capita is still better than in the UK


They should be with 1/12th of our population density. If a country could have pulled off no lockdowns Sweden should have been able to. However, they are currently doing U-Turns and now have the laws to allow a lockdown, if needed. They brought in face masks on public transport about 2 weeks ago, not that I totally agree with face masks, as they are not used correctly.

Sweden's population is 14% of ours

Population density is 8% of ours

UK 724/mi2

Swe 58/mi2

Their death rate is 11% of ours which is kind of on a par with us in comparison to the population.

However with their population density being so much lower and if not locking down was actually working that figure should be much lower.

Difficult to compare countries that are so far apart on population density.

One of the big differences is the swedes are more compliant to following rules, so whilst no lockdown was imposed, social distancing was advised and in the main followed ...try that here in the UK 😀 😀

The closest country that is similar to the UK in population and population density is Vietnam total cases 1,549 total deaths 35 (if you believe the figures)

Whilst Vietnam didn't lock down totally. Months before the rest of the world acted, it brought in travel restrictions, closed the border with China, schools were closed for 6 months, anyone entering the country quarantine for 14 days, 40% of quarantined cases had the virus but were asymptomatic carriers. Any towns with Positive cases were locked down with no one allowed in or out until two weeks had passed with no confirmed cases. 

We shall see how Sweden fairs in the next month but with their population density and the broadly compliant population they should be able to pull it off. But not comparable to the UK. 🙂
























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