Corona Virus

[Oldschool]

How many Tests have we done?
Who did we test? Was it largely drawn from contacts of confirmed cases?
Who are we testing at the moment? Is it largely referrals from GPs?
What % of referrals are testing positive?
Are our positive tests lower than anticipated?
Are they planning to test a good-sized random sample to get an overview?

To me these are all reasonable questions that the Goverment should give us answers to. The Irish population is fairly savvy. We're generally not thick and prejudiced. Give us reasonable information and we'll accept it and plan accordingly. At the present I get the overall impression that neither Holohan nor Reid are giving us completely factual information. We are been fed carefully crafted spin because the HSE either haven't planned properly:
A) to get enough testing kits; or
B) to get enough protective kits; or
C) who to test and in what priority; or
D) who to inform that they are at greatest risk (other than front-line staff)

Nothing pisses me off more than an elite, whether politicans or technocrats, who believe that their rentention of factual information is better held in their hands than communicated publicly to the population.

Give us the relevant facts.

My mrs waiting for over 10 days now, she’s called and been told multiple conflicting stories about whether or not she’s on a list and which list she should be on.

It stinks of something that’s being managed in Excel with no version control on the document and on top of that it feel like there’s a bean counter somewhere re-prioritising and or removing people from the list because there’s a lack of testing kits, lack of PPE and maybe a lack of training in how to actually administer the test.

No medical experience.
Shitty situation for you.
Main thing is that it sounds like you are all ok.
If you are just wait it out and watch for symptoms, take temperatures.
Obviously any sign of problem s talk to your GP
As for the Mrs OSS' test get on the blower again and don't be nice (Don't be rude)
As soon as the rigmarole starts ask to speak to the supervisor.
Think of it like this, if you complain they might actually up their game, sort their systems out and in the meantime sort Mrs OSS' test out.
It's worth remembering this is f^cking serious and we need things to be working efficiently.
Imagine what they'll be like when the heat comes on if this is how things are being run now.

[Oldschoolsocks]

Cheers OS, and yup - strategic complaining and asking who I’m talking to.

[Oldschool]

How many Tests have we done?
Who did we test? Was it largely drawn from contacts of confirmed cases?
Who are we testing at the moment? Is it largely referrals from GPs?
What % of referrals are testing positive?
Are our positive tests lower than anticipated?
Are they planning to test a good-sized random sample to get an overview?

To me these are all reasonable questions that the Goverment should give us answers to. The Irish population is fairly savvy. We're generally not thick and prejudiced. Give us reasonable information and we'll accept it and plan accordingly. At the present I get the overall impression that neither Holohan nor Reid are giving us completely factual information. We are been fed carefully crafted spin because the HSE either haven't planned properly:
A) to get enough testing kits; or
B) to get enough protective kits; or
C) who to test and in what priority; or
D) who to inform that they are at greatest risk (other than front-line staff)

Nothing pisses me off more than an elite, whether politicans or technocrats, who believe that their rentention of factual information is better held in their hands than communicated publicly to the population.

Give us the relevant facts.

No 1. Totally agree about a random sample being required to get an overall picture.
No 2. The information dissemination has been minimalist.
Other countries are using colour coding to identify the levels of cases in zones and by inference higher risk zones. Most of the population aren't colour blind.
People are being asked to blindly trust and follow the plan. That's fine but a bit of feedback would help and it helps people to remain connected and supportive.
We've been told x% of health personnel have been infected, how many of them have recovered.
People recovering is good news, gives us the info.
The testing side of things doesn't appear to running smoothly yet.
Hopefully that will change.

[paddyor]

How many Tests have we done?
Who did we test? Was it largely drawn from contacts of confirmed cases?
Who are we testing at the moment? Is it largely referrals from GPs?
What % of referrals are testing positive?
Are our positive tests lower than anticipated?
Are they planning to test a good-sized random sample to get an overview?

To me these are all reasonable questions that the Goverment should give us answers to. The Irish population is fairly savvy. We're generally not thick and prejudiced. Give us reasonable information and we'll accept it and plan accordingly. At the present I get the overall impression that neither Holohan nor Reid are giving us completely factual information. We are been fed carefully crafted spin because the HSE either haven't planned properly:
A) to get enough testing kits; or
B) to get enough protective kits; or
C) who to test and in what priority; or
D) who to inform that they are at greatest risk (other than front-line staff)

Nothing pisses me off more than an elite, whether politicans or technocrats, who believe that their rentention of factual information is better held in their hands than communicated publicly to the population.

Give us the relevant facts.

The test isn't accurate enough to just test a random sample to get an overview. It's only 70% accurate some of which will be false positives(you may have heard stories about people who develop no symptoms testing positive) and others will be false negatives. So you can immediately see the danger of a random sample. As I understand it testing is mostly focused around contact tracing aand the percentage of referrals that are testing positive is 7%(900/13000). Theoretically this should be lower with a broader random sample. I reckon when we've ramped up towards 15k tests the backlog will yield maybe another 500 cases with a further 500 self presenting. FWIW some of the backlog are people who are part of the backlog are people who had minimal contact with confirmed cases. I know one person who has no symptoms but is in that boat.

Stats in this are from 17th Match for us(about 6.6k) and we're now at 13k total tests. We compare pretty favourably with the ROTW IMO.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covi ... BR+USA+VNM

I don't agree with a to d at all I'm sorry. At this point it's logistics. They need to train people to do testing, move at risk staff to othe rparts of the service to keep them safe from the virus. SO a healthey GP might be replaced on the phone by a retired one who came back to the service. They have loads of testing kits but need to bring labs online toe ramp up to 15k tests a day. That could take 2-4 days per lab with QA etc.

[suisse]

Delighted that Canada has announced they are not sending athletes to Tokyo 2020. New Zealand has said they'll probably boycott the games. We should have made a stand against this a long time ago. The cynicism of Abe and the Japanese government is incredibly. They've hardly tested anyone in the country and it isn't because they're somewhat immune from this. The IOC really need to grow a pair and end this nonsense too. What sort or a team is sent from any European country plus NA? Can anyone even fly there? Would athletes and fans have to leave much earlier because of the forced quaratine or would the Japanese authorises kindly relax all their rules and allow everyone to enter?

[Oldschool]

How many Tests have we done?
Who did we test? Was it largely drawn from contacts of confirmed cases?
Who are we testing at the moment? Is it largely referrals from GPs?
What % of referrals are testing positive?
Are our positive tests lower than anticipated?
Are they planning to test a good-sized random sample to get an overview?

To me these are all reasonable questions that the Goverment should give us answers to. The Irish population is fairly savvy. We're generally not thick and prejudiced. Give us reasonable information and we'll accept it and plan accordingly. At the present I get the overall impression that neither Holohan nor Reid are giving us completely factual information. We are been fed carefully crafted spin because the HSE either haven't planned properly:
A) to get enough testing kits; or
B) to get enough protective kits; or
C) who to test and in what priority; or
D) who to inform that they are at greatest risk (other than front-line staff)

Nothing pisses me off more than an elite, whether politicans or technocrats, who believe that their rentention of factual information is better held in their hands than communicated publicly to the population.

Give us the relevant facts.

The test isn't accurate enough to just test a random sample to get an overview. It's only 70% accurate some of which will be false positives(you may have heard stories about people who develop no symptoms testing positive) and others will be false negatives. So you can immediately see the danger of a random sample. As I understand it testing is mostly focused around contact tracing aand the percentage of referrals that are testing positive is 7%(900/13000). Theoretically this should be lower with a broader random sample. I reckon when we've ramped up towards 15k tests the backlog will yield maybe another 500 cases with a further 500 self presenting. FWIW some of the backlog are people who are part of the backlog are people who had minimal contact with confirmed cases. I know one person who has no symptoms but is in that boat.

Stats in this are from 17th Match for us(about 6.6k) and we're now at 13k total tests. We compare pretty favourably with the ROTW IMO.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/covi ... BR+USA+VNM

I don't agree with a to d at all I'm sorry. At this point it's logistics. They need to train people to do testing, move at risk staff to othe rparts of the service to keep them safe from the virus. SO a healthey GP might be replaced on the phone by a retired one who came back to the service. They have loads of testing kits but need to bring labs online toe ramp up to 15k tests a day. That could take 2-4 days per lab with QA etc.

Even at the level of accuracy that you are indicating a random sample is still valid.
It won't be quite as accurate but it will still give a good picture especially if it's done at least once a week.
The keep your distance and self isolation policy looks like it's being almost too successful.
However given the general level of preparedness (need for training, gearing up etc) that's maybe just as well.
The government has already committed to 4bn in supports with more to come and our tax take is plummeting.
There's trouble ahead and it's not sustainable.

[Twist]

Delighted that Canada has announced they are not sending athletes to Tokyo 2020. New Zealand has said they'll probably boycott the games. We should have made a stand against this a long time ago. The cynicism of Abe and the Japanese government is incredibly. They've hardly tested anyone in the country and it isn't because they're somewhat immune from this. The IOC really need to grow a pair and end this nonsense too. What sort or a team is sent from any European country plus NA? Can anyone even fly there? Would athletes and fans have to leave much earlier because of the forced quaratine or would the Japanese authorises kindly relax all their rules and allow everyone to enter?

Ive no expertise on this at all, bit have heard on a couple of podcasts - most prominently on Second Captains - that the American broadcasters are dead set against postppning the games until the Autumn, as that would put them in conflict with the NFL.

The reluctance of the IOC and Japanese has been quite striking. I thought theyd use the excuse of typhoon season but they havent even mentioned that, so far as I can see. Even if CV-19 is completely under control by July (which seems doubtful) how are the competitors meant to train now, under the current restrictions?

[IanD]

A practical idea that works for us.

When loading the fridge etc when back from shops we write the use by date on a piece of paper and put it on the fridge door.

So far we have had no food waste at all.

[jimbobjoe]

A practical idea that works for us.

When loading the fridge etc when back from shops we write the use by date on a piece of paper and put it on the fridge door.

So far we have had no food waste at all.

Nice one. We've been meal planning based on UBD and leaving it on the door.. Might add the use by for snacks etc. Most spare veg gets chucked into a standard veg soup which keeps us going for lunch most days.

[johng]

Unemployment Benefit Distribution?

[johng]

I don't agree with a to d at all I'm sorry.

I'm having trouble with initials today. But I do know what a tracker mortgage is.

[jimbobjoe]

Unemployment Benefit Distribution?

Use by date

[Oldschool]

A practical idea that works for us.

When loading the fridge etc when back from shops we write the use by date on a piece of paper and put it on the fridge door.

So far we have had no food waste at all.

Nice one. We've been meal planning based on UBD and leaving it on the door.. Might add the use by for snacks etc. Most spare veg gets chucked into a standard veg soup which keeps us going for lunch most days.

Mrs School is extremely conservative regarding UBDs and BBDs.
However the CV19 has moved the goalposts for her.
On a couple of occasions my cans of beer have been OOD and I've been admonished with suitable phrases of doom and gloom.
However I resisted and at least broke the psychological barrier.
You may well wonder "beer ood?" - unplanned outages or rapidly planned outages.
Did mean tho that MOI was under pressure to consume ood product as soon as reasonably possible.
Not bad going even if I do say so myself.

[Peg Leg]

A practical idea that works for us.

When loading the fridge etc when back from shops we write the use by date on a piece of paper and put it on the fridge door.

So far we have had no food waste at all.

Nice one. We've been meal planning based on UBD and leaving it on the door.. Might add the use by for snacks etc. Most spare veg gets chucked into a standard veg soup which keeps us going for lunch most days.

Mrs School is extremely conservative regarding UBDs and BBDs.
However the CV19 has moved the goalposts for her.
On a couple of occasions my cans of beer have been OOD and I've been admonished with suitable phrases of doom and gloom.
However I resisted and at least broke the psychological barrier.
You may well wonder "beer ood?" - unplanned outages or rapidly planned outages.
Did mean tho that MOI was under pressure to consume ood product as soon as reasonably possible.
Not bad going even if I do say so myself.

Here you go, this is a podcast by 2 liberals and 1 anarchist. The pod "Worst Year Ever" started in 2019 as a commentary on the American presidential primaries and election, but has morphed into a commentary onto worst year ever adjacent subjects. The pod listed below is their most recent and covers a lot of very useful information required to be a good member of your community in times of emergency. You might find the free links to documentation, medical information and food collection/storage info relevant, the bit about guns- less so.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-wor ... =web_share

[paddyor]

Even at the level of accuracy that you are indicating a random sample is still valid.
It won't be quite as accurate but it will still give a good picture especially if it's done at least once a week.
The keep your distance and self isolation policy looks like it's being almost too successful.
However given the general level of preparedness (need for training, gearing up etc) that's maybe just as well.
The government has already committed to 4bn in supports with more to come and our tax take is plummeting.
There's trouble ahead and it's not sustainable.

A 30% margin of error isn't accurate enough. And 2 data sets a week isn't enough to form an opinion. You can form an opinion of a trend after a few days like 5-7(a statisician will tell you need about 30 for comfort). SO what you're talking about is that at best we form an opinion in about 4 weeks(from a dataset with a lot of noise) and we can be comfortable in about 4 months.

We're testing now at about 2k a day which per capita puts us pretty close to Germany and SK. Typically in a flu season we'd test 15k cases. We're better off diverting resources to the existing clusters and testing around there. By this day next week(after 2 weeks social lockdown) we'll know more than random samples could ever tell us.

[Ruckedtobits]

Thanks to all contributors on this thread. The cumulative opinions / information has been much more value that the total absence of coherent information or discussion from DofH or HSE.

[Oldschool]

Even at the level of accuracy that you are indicating a random sample is still valid.
It won't be quite as accurate but it will still give a good picture especially if it's done at least once a week.
The keep your distance and self isolation policy looks like it's being almost too successful.
However given the general level of preparedness (need for training, gearing up etc) that's maybe just as well.
The government has already committed to 4bn in supports with more to come and our tax take is plummeting.
There's trouble ahead and it's not sustainable.

A 30% margin of error isn't accurate enough. And 2 data sets a week isn't enough to form an opinion. You can form an opinion of a trend after a few days like 5-7(a statisician will tell you need about 30 for comfort). SO what you're talking about is that at best we form an opinion in about 4 weeks(from a dataset with a lot of noise) and we can be comfortable in about 4 months.

We're testing now at about 2k a day which per capita puts us pretty close to Germany and SK. Typically in a flu season we'd test 15k cases. We're better off diverting resources to the existing clusters and testing around there. By this day next week(after 2 weeks social lockdown) we'll know more than random samples could ever tell us.

Yeah but it's not a 30% margin of error.
Statisticians can to some extent reduce that margin for error once they are aware of the problem and the extent.
Reading between the lines, we just don't have the resources to do random sampling yet but as soon as it's possible we should be doing it.
So it's fair enough to prioritize but I would be concerned if we keep putting it off.

[Oldschool]

Thanks to all contributors on this thread. The cumulative opinions / information has been much more value that the total absence of coherent information or discussion from DofH or HSE.

TBF to the HSE I think they have admitted (by inference) that they are still building up their preparation and aren't ready yet, we can wish them well and support their efforts by being as compliant as possible.
What I think they need to do is bring people a little more into the information circle.
They can surely get some advice on how to do this.
People are looking for a leadership figure and I'm not sure we have one yet.
Would also agree with you regarding the contributions on this thread.
It's been very informative and helpful.
It's also nice to be challenged in a by and large fair way.
Particularly like the fact that there are differing opinions and ideas.
Questioning is always important.

[FLIP]

Thanks to all contributors on this thread. The cumulative opinions / information has been much more value that the total absence of coherent information or discussion from DofH or HSE.

TBF to the HSE I think they have admitted (by inference) that they are still building up their preparation and aren't ready yet, we can wish them well and support their efforts by being as compliant as possible.
What I think they need to do is bring people a little more into the information circle.
They can surely get some advice on how to do this.
People are looking for a leadership figure and I'm not sure we have one yet.
Would also agree with you regarding the contributions on this thread.
It's been very informative and helpful.
It's also nice to be challenged in a by and large fair way.
Particularly like the fact that there are differing opinions and ideas.
Questioning is always important.

This is informative. I used it this weekend and I wish more people did.

Safe places to visit during this Corona pandemic, https://placestovisitthisweekend.com/

[Oldschool]

BOJO going Full Metal Jacket.
The film itself started about a half an hour ago on TCM movies, he probably has it on record.
Have it on record myself, is it worth watching, like I don't want to waste a couple of hours of my life when I have so much to do.