United Kingdom VI: Summer Lovin'

[Neon Ignition]

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

Another day, another record figure - 58,784

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2021/jan/04/uk-coronavirus-live-matt-hancock-south-african-covid-variant-lockdown-schools-latest-updates

A snap poll has found 79% of the public support a full lockdown whilst the UK looks set to enter the highest alert level, higher than it was in during Lockdown 01.

Should Lockdown 03 come into effect it's increasingly looking likely that it will be similar to the first lasting at least 3 months, schools closed and a stay at home order given to all but front line key workers.

[MartyG]

Bog roll, flour, pasta and yeast supplies about to go empty - Tesco's grocery shopping has just started timing out as every one tries to book a slot.

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2021/jan/04/uk-coronavirus-live-matt-hancock-south-african-covid-variant-lockdown-schools-latest-updates

Seems like Lockdown 03 will be similar to Lockdown 01 thank god, presumably minus the financial support though unless an annoucement on that is incoming.

So, given yet another obvious event has occured that was clear month/s in advance and yet we marched straight into it... I will Mystic Meg style continue to stick to my prediction that Lockdown 03 will still be the final national lockdown. However, I think the giving of hope of lifting it for Feb hols is insanely ambitious, unrealistic and damaging for them unless by lifting they mean with nearly all the nation being in a same thibg Tier 5/4 combo. 4 weeks will barely dent this as vaccination will be too slow to initiate and Lockdown 02 showed the futility of half arsed measures. Easter.

[MartyG]

Johnson says government aims to give all care home residents and their carers, everyone over 70, all frontline health and social care workers, and everyone who is clinically extremely vulnerable in England first dose of vaccine by mid-February

Extrapolating that out with some rough napkin maths, it seems that means it will take about 25-30 weeks to vaccinate everyone in the UK with the first dose, taking us to August-ish - dream on if you think we'll be done with Covid-19 by easter.

Seems like Lockdown 03 will be similar to Lockdown 01 thank god, presumably minus the financial support though unless an annoucement on that is incoming.

The furlough scheme had already been extended to April 2021 back in December.

[Blobcat]

“Vaccinated more people in the uk than the whole of Europe combined”

Er, those who have had the first dose Pfizer vaccine are not fully vaccinated till the 2nd dose. So none of them are vaccinated, especially if they go ahead with delaying that second dose which means the first is a waste of time and money, which our government excels in doing on a daily basis so it seems.

[Anpanman]

Wife traveling home on the bus from work tonight witnessed two fat female chavs being told off by the driver for not wearing a mask, they replied they were - well if wearing one under you chin counts then yes they were.

...meanwhile Japan with double our population has 200k infections and 3k total deaths, probably cos they do what they are bloody well told.

[Hohum]

“Vaccinated more people in the uk than the whole of Europe combined”

Er, those who have had the first dose Pfizer vaccine are not fully vaccinated till the 2nd dose. So none of them are vaccinated, especially if they go ahead with delaying that second dose which means the first is a waste of time and money, which our government excels in doing on a daily basis so it seems.

Yeah, trust him to try and get some spin in there. The proposed delay of 12 weeks for the second shot is outrageous given that it goes against the vaccine testing regime and throws in more unknowns. So much for 'led by the science'.

[Neon Ignition]

Johnson says government aims to give all care home residents and their carers, everyone over 70, all frontline health and social care workers, and everyone who is clinically extremely vulnerable in England first dose of vaccine by mid-February

Extrapolating that out with some rough napkin maths, it seems that means it will take about 25-30 weeks to vaccinate everyone in the UK with the first dose, taking us to August-ish - dream on if you think we'll be done with Covid-19 by easter.



The furlough scheme had already been extended to April 2021 back in December.

Definitely, by Easter I mean the lockdown not COVID. That's going to be all year of a job if not possibly longer. For the furlough scheme is it not still closed to new additions?

Either way as soon as we hit March/April companies will have to deal with the reality of how the year has been for them and I assume the answer will be an unhappy one for many

[MartyG]

Definitely, by Easter I mean the lockdown not COVID. That's going to be all year of a job if not possibly longer. For the furlough scheme is it not still closed to new additions?

From the website: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/claim-fo...tention-scheme

All employers with a UK, Isle of Man or Channel Island bank account and UK PAYE schemes can claim the grant. You do not need to have previously claimed for an employee before the 30 October 2020 to claim.

That's for existing staff even if they've not claimed before, what you cannot claim for is staff that have recently been employed (the presumption being why would you be taking staff on if you can't pay them). Quite possible they might change the rules around this again before the end of April.

[Neon Ignition]

That's good then, won't affect my place I imagine as they already made their cuts and are pretty steady in approach. Biggest frustration my work is having is that they can't get a clear picture of how long it will take vaccinations to roll out across their frontline staff because its local authority led so varies across the board with little information that's clear coming through.

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/lockdown-end-date-england-michael-gove-b1782398.html?utm_source=upday.samsung.browser&utm_medium=referral

Gove already begins the process of tempering expectations by shifting talk of the lockdown lift back till March or beyond

[MartyG]

I came across this looking at vaccine rollout earlier - it's a "when will I be vaccinated" calculator: https://www.omnicalculator.com/health/vaccine-queue-uk

It's nothing official, just like my napkin maths earlier, it's based on the parameters released by UK gov. For me it gives:

Based on your profile, there are between 28,049,905 and 38,844,493 people in front of you in the queue for a COVID vaccine across the UK.

Given a vaccination rate of 1,000,000 a week and an uptake of 70.6%, you should expect to receive your two doses of vaccine and be fully protected by between 02/02/2022 and 03/07/2022.

So it's far more pessimistic than my maths, you can adjust it to the figures I used in the advanced mode and I get

Given a vaccination rate of 1,500,000 a week and an uptake of 70.6%, you should expect to receive your two doses of vaccine and be fully protected by between 24/09/2021 and 03/01/2022.

Which is a lot closer to what I worked out last night.

[Neon Ignition]

I got the same, presumably so far in the queue that they'll have dropped it as a hard push by then as well trying to push on to it being more seasonal. That also seems optimistic given how many first doses we're about to waste

[Dogg Thang]

Our rollout here has been slow enough to be news worthy, although it looks like part of that is that we're currently not doing what the UK is doing - we're making sure we have the 2nd dose allocated in time rather than pushing to get the 1st dose out to people and then having to wait for the 2nd dose. Which is at least reassuring in some way, although I'm still waiting for the total mess up to happen somewhere.