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Coronavirus - the political argument

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observer
Sluffy
gloswhite
Ten Bobsworth
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okocha
wessy
Cajunboy
xmiles
karlypants
Norpig
Natasha Whittam
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401Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Mon May 11 2020, 23:05

Natasha Whittam

Natasha Whittam
Nat Lofthouse
Nat Lofthouse

wessy wrote:Not a boat but flood defences yes, that's allready happening a pisspoor choice Nat your standards are slipping

I'm talking about the sort of flooding that wipes out cities, if it lashed it down non-stop for a month or two no flood defence is going to hold, no matter how strong.

So should we be preparing for that? With climate change it could happen.

And what if someone creates a Skynet clone? Again, entirely possible, so should we be preparing for computers trying to take over government? Or robots from the future taking over Preston?

And what if aliens invade? Rather than fix the potholes on roads should we be spending that money on space weapons?

402Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Mon May 11 2020, 23:35

xmiles

xmiles
Jay Jay Okocha
Jay Jay Okocha

Natasha Whittam wrote:
wessy wrote:Not a boat but flood defences yes, that's allready happening a pisspoor choice Nat your standards are slipping

I'm talking about the sort of flooding that wipes out cities, if it lashed it down non-stop for a month or two no flood defence is going to hold, no matter how strong.

So should we be preparing for that? With climate change it could happen.

And what if someone creates a Skynet clone? Again, entirely possible, so should we be preparing for computers trying to take over government? Or robots from the future taking over Preston?

And what if aliens invade? Rather than fix the potholes on roads should we be spending that money on space weapons?

Yadda yadda yadda but you are ignoring the fundamental point that the Tories have systematically underfunded the NHS for 10 years and this does have a significant effect on the capacity of the NHS to cope with any sudden increase in demand.

403Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Mon May 11 2020, 23:45

Sluffy

Sluffy
Admin

wessy wrote:Council's have had over 60% reduction in terms of funding over the last 10 years that is a political decision, that has a knock on effect in terms staffing and conditions that care workers are expected to work on minimum wage, it really is poltical.  It also effects mental health support and all the community based projects that have been cut by this government.


There are very few things that aren't political, you say i do not acknowledge that other country's weren't prepared then quote two that were prepared? Why could we not have been more prepared. Even now two months into lockdown we have failed to meet the testing targets and failed to meet the PPE targets, our death rate is through the roof and probably much higher than reported, It's the Politicians that make all these calls and that means it always comes back to politics.


Quote
In the Autumn Statement, the Government missed its chance to tackle the residential care crisis and restore the £2bn funding it took away to help plug its deficit. Right now, the UK is sleep walking into a full blown residential care crisis.”

28% of care homes at risk of failure because of government underfunding








I wish you would quote your references when you copy and paste as it would make things a great deal easier to understand the context of what is being said - and its relevance.

Your quote above (In the Autumn statement...) was made by Nick Hood (two years ago!) who is a senior insolvency advisor.

Basically what he was saying is the private care home sector is finding it difficult to make a profit because local council's have 'capped' what they are prepared to pay of PUBLIC funds (that's you and my money) to PRIVATE firms for the benefit of their shareholders.

The following is what he said directly before the 'selected' quote you posted of him -

"‘Care home operators are refusing to accept local authority funded residents because the fees are well below the cost of providing care. Sooner or later, privately-funded residents and their relatives will revolt against having to pay sky high fees to cross-subsidise publicly-funded residents.

The residential care sector, which looks after the most vulnerable in society, was barely profitable, even before the impact of the National Living Wage. Our research shows that far too many operators face a serious risk of failure and a deeply worrying number are in negative financial equity. Debt levels for those who borrow are far too high".

The point he was making was that care workers were being paid too much now that the government had introduced the National Living wage and that care homes had already started NOT to accept people who couldn't fund their own care costs!

In other words it was unfair on his clients that they were unable to make the profits they used to because the government had made the 'private' care homes pay minimum wage to the care staff they employed rather than the pittance that they had been paying them up to that time and also that they were only in the care sector business to turn a 'profit' and not as a social welfare service per se by already refusing to accept the poor in the community.

How well does that sit with your socialist values?

https://www.caremanagementmatters.co.uk/care-homes-at-risk/

As for the country's - did you know that there are 206 sovereign states (as they say on Pointless) and only two (three if you include Singapore) that coped in anyway adequately to meet the pandemic - meaning 203 (including ourselves) didn't!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Country

The latest country to be being swamped by the pandemic at the moment is Russia.

"Russia now has the third-highest number of confirmed infections worldwide.
In the last 24 hours it reported a record daily rise of 11,656 cases, bringing the official total to 221,344.

That means Russia now has more confirmed cases than both Italy and the UK. Only Spain and the US have reported more infections".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52620015

So Russia joins China, USA and the EU in being swamped by the pandemic but we would have been ok if we hadn't had a Conservative government for the last ten years?

You really believe that to be the case?

I believe any government, Labour, Conservative, Lib Dems or even the Monster Raving Looney Party wouldn't have been able to cope with it based on how nearly every other country in the world as fared.

But you are of course entitled to your own opinion.

I could go on but you clearly have it firmly fixed in your mind that it is the Conservatives that are the problem when in reality even the world's superpowers weren't able to deal with this irrespective of their industrial might and power they had to hand.

This pandemic is on a scale not seen since 1919 (Spanish flu) and the one before that probably being the Bubonic Plague of 1665 - nobody was prepared for this.

It's as simple as that.

404Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 07:35

Guest


Guest

It’s not as black and white as doing a good job and not doing a good job. Nobody has claimed we’d be fine if we hadn’t had a Tory gov for ten years - you’re putting words in people’s mouths again.

I see the below as failures of government:

- too late locking down
- abandoning track trace
- lack of PPE supply and failure to purchase
- horrendous communication throughout

It’s pretty clear to me the response hasn’t been close to adequate and has worsened the crisis. Hypotheticals such as ‘nobody could do better’ are not valid arguments to the above.

405Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:06

wessy

wessy
El Hadji Diouf
El Hadji Diouf

Natasha Whittam wrote:
wessy wrote:Not a boat but flood defences yes, that's allready happening a pisspoor choice Nat your standards are slipping

I'm talking about the sort of flooding that wipes out cities, if it lashed it down non-stop for a month or two no flood defence is going to hold, no matter how strong.

So should we be preparing for that? With climate change it could happen.

And what if someone creates a Skynet clone? Again, entirely possible, so should we be preparing for computers trying to take over government? Or robots from the future taking over Preston?

And what if aliens invade? Rather than fix the potholes on roads should we be spending that money on space weapons?
Bloody hell that's desperate and requires no response

406Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:16

wessy

wessy
El Hadji Diouf
El Hadji Diouf

Look sluffy i admire your attention to detail , but you would do well to remember that not all of us are as technically gifted as you. i did read the other part of the quote you used ,but two years old or not this government as run down the funding on health care.  I really don't want to be part of a running battle over this, as you say we are all entitled to our views and i think i did say that this pandemic would test any government. But does that mean that we can'y hold the government of the day to account.

They have made many well documented mistakes and continue to do so like the mixed messaging this week, It appears now that French and Irish can come and go without quarantine whilst others will be locked down, it'a just piss poor on many levels.

I support the minimum wage and it's socialist values, because it's the correct thing to do, this government opposed it for many years and was forced into it when in bed with the Libdems. 

Anyway when the shit hit the fan this capatilist government turned to socialism to fix the problem how ironic.

407Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:17

Natasha Whittam

Natasha Whittam
Nat Lofthouse
Nat Lofthouse

wessy wrote:
Bloody hell that's desperate and requires no response

Ha, what you mean is you know I'm right.

If you'd asked people in Summer last year which was more likely, their town being wiped out by flooding or a deadly virus killing hundreds of thousands, which would people have said more likely? I'm guessing flooding.

The point I'm making is a government can't realistically plan for a once in a century occurrence....do you honestly think they should?

By all means have a pop at the government for their handling of the pandemic once it hit the UK, but to expect a government to spend billions on something that last happened in 1919 is unrealistic.







408Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:19

Natasha Whittam

Natasha Whittam
Nat Lofthouse
Nat Lofthouse

xmiles wrote:Yadda yadda yadda but you are ignoring the fundamental point that the Tories have systematically underfunded the NHS for 10 years  and this does have a significant effect on the capacity of the NHS to cope with any sudden increase in demand.

Then answer the question I posed yesterday, would having double the doctors and nurses and beds made any difference to the total deaths?



409Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:21

Sluffy

Sluffy
Admin

T.R.O.Y. wrote:It’s not as black and white as doing a good job and not doing a good job. Nobody has claimed we’d be fine if we hadn’t had a Tory gov for ten years - you’re putting words in people’s mouths again.

I see the below as failures of government:

- too late locking down
- abandoning track trace
- lack of PPE supply and failure to purchase
- horrendous communication throughout

It’s pretty clear to me the response hasn’t been close to adequate and has worsened the crisis. Hypotheticals such as ‘nobody could do better’ are not valid arguments to the above.

I haven't qualified at anytime if the government is doing a 'good' job or a 'bad' job, all I've been saying is that they've had to do the job with the 'tools' they had at the time of the pandemic, the systems and resources in place in place when it appeared to fight it with and what 'knowledge' they had about the coronavirus at the time to plan and come up with a strategy to do their best to cope with it until they could put the infra structure and resources in place to deal with it properly.

That would have been the exact same position of any government anywhere in the world.

If you apply that to your four criticisms you state then -

- Too late to lockdown - the strategy they initially followed was that of herd immunity, which was derived from modelling based on the data from China in respect of their stated infection rates and mortality levels arising from the virus. We now widely acknowledge that data was deliberately under reported and once that was realised (just four days later) we moved into lockdown.

- Abandoned Trace tracking - Trace tracking is only effective if the number of cases of known positive tests for the virus is relatively low - as each case must have had numerous contacts with others whilst being infected.

The herd immunity strategy was for the virus to take hold in the community (the percentage quoted iirc, for herd immunity to become effective is for 60% of the population to catch the virus).

Once it was realised what the true mortality rate was from Italy's data and the R rate was estimated to be now somewhere around 3 in our country at that point and that virus was already now established in the community then there simply wasn't any point for Trace Tracking as the volume of people having been in contact with someone with the virus would have been in the millions.

To put that into some context iirc that when we moved into lockdown having abandoned the Chinese data as being false, then our 'best' scenario envisaged by the medical advisors based on the new model based on Italy's data was for 20,000 deaths. As the death rate was considered to be about 1% of those infected then that implied 2,000,000 catching the virus.

If we say each of the 2m had close contact with say just 5 people, then Trace tracking would have involved dealing with 10 million people - and that assuming that non of these 10m people hadn't caught the virus and thus creating more trace tracking need.

Once lockdown was commenced the need for trace tracking became irrelevant until the numbers of people infected fell to a level that Trace Tracking could once more become a relevant tool in fighting the pandemic.

- Lack of PPE and failure to purchase - I've answered this many times now - the world was not ready for the pandemic and had insufficient PPE and have since been battling each other to get supplies from anywhere in the world.

Hardly the fault of just the Conservative government to underestimate/poo poo the doom mongers to build up sufficient stocks to be ready just in case.

They were right though, and all the governments in the world (save perhaps S.Korea) had got it wrong.

(Germany had the pharmaceutical infra structure to fight the pandemic in terms of testing but didn't have sufficient PPE's as they have been buying stocks of it throughout the world like everybody else).

- Horrendous communication through out - Difficult/impossible to say what the outcome of the pandemic will be - last night the government were publicly acknowledging that there probably would never be a vaccine for Coronavirus...

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/covid-coronavirus-vaccine-trials-latest-uk/

...as after nearly 20 years there is still not one for Sars which is also from the Covid 'family'.

It's impossible to give simple 'one size fits all' advise that everyone will be happy with - let alone accept and adhere to.

Wrong advise has already been given (herd immunity) based on false information, that has initially 'dented' the credibility of the government from the outset and the current 'Be Aware' message is certainly not the clearest, I don't doubt many could say otherwise.

There is also what I suspect many still don't get (as I've tried to explain how inside government works) that sometimes you simply can not communicate the truth for it doing more damage than simply keeping it under wraps.

If the government had said (which I believe was the case) that we are sacrificing patients in care homes (being generally composed of old and frail, with a limited lifespan already) because otherwise we can't protect the NHS and consequently the community as a whole, then their would have been riots on the street.

Hence we got into all the palaver of insufficient PPE's for care home staff, why little testing was being done for them and their residents and all the media/political 'scrutiny/points scoring' that came with it and again damaged the image of how the government was communicating. Still the lesser of the two evils though.

Finally did I actually say 'nobody could do better', I don't believe I did, as what I've been trying to say all along is that nobody is perfect, mistakes will and have been made and that given what resources. infrastructure and knowledge each individual country had at the start of the pandemic that I don't doubt the vast majority of them acted in the best way they believed was right for them.

The simple truth is that we along with the rest of the world was unprepared with what has happened and what had only happened once before (in 1919) since 1665 - over 350 years previously.

410Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 12:31

wessy

wessy
El Hadji Diouf
El Hadji Diouf

Nat the scientist did a study back in the day. and concluded at some point this is what would happen, they advised countries to take steps to prepare or at least have a plan, China , South Korea took the advice on board and were better prepared.

 Much to the scientist dismay the UK CHOSE to ignore it.

Your examples may or may not happen and of course we cannot cover every base, however the world KNEW that at some point this would happen, and seeing it was 100 years since the last one it was due very soon.

411Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 13:10

Sluffy

Sluffy
Admin

wessy wrote:Look sluffy i admire your attention to detail , but you would do well to remember that not all of us are as technically gifted as you. i did read the other part of the quote you used ,but two years old or not this government as run down the funding on health care.  I really don't want to be part of a running battle over this, as you say we are all entitled to our views and i think i did say that this pandemic would test any government. But does that mean that we can'y hold the government of the day to account.

They have made many well documented mistakes and continue to do so like the mixed messaging this week, It appears now that French and Irish can come and go without quarantine whilst others will be locked down, it'a just piss poor on many levels.

I support the minimum wage and it's socialist values, because it's the correct thing to do, this government opposed it for many years and was forced into it when in bed with the Libdems. 

Anyway when the shit hit the fan this capatilist government turned to socialism to fix the problem how ironic.

The Devil IS in the detail though.

It always is.

I won't debate back and forth with you because you do not wish it and I respect your wish but at the end of the day you have to strip bare any emotions, political allegiances and personal bias you may have and any other baggage you carry around with you if you really want to get close to the truth of why anything happened and the context of why it did.

Anybody can put their own 'spin' on things and that's why socialism and capitalism sees the same thing in completely opposite ways.

Nobody has a monopoly of being correct, it stands to reason therefore that socialism isn't right every time and capitalism wrong - nor visa versa - so clearly if you firmly hold one view all the time then you to must be wrong from time to time also.

Ironically enough I've worked for many years of my life in a political environment but have never been remotely politically motivated myself.  I've come from a working class council house, 'socialist' background to a relative comfortable, 'capitalist', lifestyle, yet would not describe myself as being either. 

I've always found it more natural to 'establish' what is going on rather than 'believe' what I think/am told is going on.

Clearly you are too entrenched in your socialist beliefs to give much credit to capitalism/conservatism, I on the other hand am free of such bias and open to seeing the pro's and con's of both sides.

At the end of the day all we can wish for is for all of us to stay well and to come out of this with all our love ones safely.

And that is what I wish for you and everyone else on here.

Stay safe.

PS Fwiw, France and Ireland are only 'easing' out of lockdown (somewhat similar to what we are doing with a 'roadmap' approach) and many restrictions are still in force there -

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52615733
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52509390

412Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 15:10

okocha

okocha
El Hadji Diouf
El Hadji Diouf

T.R.O.Y. wrote:

I see the below as failures of government:

- too late locking down
- abandoning track trace
- lack of PPE supply and failure to purchase
- horrendous communication throughout

It’s pretty clear to me the response hasn’t been close to adequate and has worsened the crisis. Hypotheticals such as ‘nobody could do better’ are not valid arguments to the above.
A good summary, Troy.

In addition, the UK had advanced warnings, but ignored them:

 eg the findings of Exercise Cygnus in 2016; and those of Sir Ian Boyd in 2019

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/we-knew-uk-wasnt-prepared-for-coronavirus-says-former-adviser-9qhgcdmm9

413Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 15:50

xmiles

xmiles
Jay Jay Okocha
Jay Jay Okocha

Natasha Whittam wrote:
xmiles wrote:Yadda yadda yadda but you are ignoring the fundamental point that the Tories have systematically underfunded the NHS for 10 years  and this does have a significant effect on the capacity of the NHS to cope with any sudden increase in demand.

Then answer the question I posed yesterday, would having double the doctors and nurses and beds made any difference to the total deaths?

Almost certainly it would have reduced the number of deaths but by how much I don't know.

We have far fewer hospital beds, doctors and nurses per head of population than just about every other western European country.

414Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 15:56

karlypants

karlypants
Nat Lofthouse
Nat Lofthouse

The one thing I am amazed at is the fact that the NHS hasn’t been overloaded to the extent these field hospitals such as the Nightingale one have been needed. I still find this odd with us having the worst death rate in Europe. 

The rest has been a diabolical shit show by Boris and Hancock.

415Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 16:12

Natasha Whittam

Natasha Whittam
Nat Lofthouse
Nat Lofthouse

xmiles wrote:
Almost certainly it would have reduced the number of deaths but by how much I don't know.


I've not read any report of people dying because they couldn't see a doctor in hospital, or couldn't get a bed.

So how would extra doctors/nurses/beds have changed the statistics?

While I'm sure your second point is correct, the facts as I see them is the NHS hasn't been overwhelmed at any point (so far), in fact many of the beds that the government provided (thankfully) haven't been needed.

416Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 16:51

Guest


Guest

The NHS has stood up well - the government and NHS deserve massive credit for increasing capacity so quickly. Does it need to get to additional deaths to prove that the NHS wasn't as prepared as it should/could have been with proper funding? Don't think so personally, but it's more hypothetical at that point and will need a proper investigation.

I do think cuts to social care and PPE stockpiling have had a demonstrable effect though, as has the governments failure to resolve the PPE shortages. This is a clear failing.

417Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 17:06

Sluffy

Sluffy
Admin

xmiles wrote:
Natasha Whittam wrote:
xmiles wrote:Yadda yadda yadda but you are ignoring the fundamental point that the Tories have systematically underfunded the NHS for 10 years  and this does have a significant effect on the capacity of the NHS to cope with any sudden increase in demand.

Then answer the question I posed yesterday, would having double the doctors and nurses and beds made any difference to the total deaths?

Almost certainly it would have reduced the number of deaths but by how much I don't know.

We have far fewer hospital beds, doctors and nurses per head of population than just about every other western European country.

Sadly it most certainly would not have.

There is no known cure to Corvid-19 and if you've got it bad then it's only your body that can fight it off and if it can't you die, irrespective of how many doctors and nurses we have.

The only help they can practically offer is putting those who can't breath for themselves on to ventilators to mechanically to do that for them whilst their body try's to fight off the virus.

As for your second point ironically the coronavirus has actually made more beds available and even some nursing staff surplus to need as attendance at hospitals have been dramatically curtailed initially from cancelling schedule admissions (in order to create more space for the expected surge in coronavirus admissions and latterly a reluctance of the general public to attend A and E because of the fear of catching the virus at the hospital.

An anecdotal account told to me by my neighbour whose wife is a nurse on the oncology ward at the local hospital is that at times the staff are sat down playing cards as they have had nothing else to do!

Obviously though these are strange times and the norm is that the NHS and its staff are routinely stretched to breaking point.

418Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 17:38

Sluffy

Sluffy
Admin

T.R.O.Y. wrote:The NHS has stood up well - the government and NHS deserve massive credit for increasing capacity so quickly. Does it need to get to additional deaths to prove that the NHS wasn't as prepared as it should/could have been with proper funding? Don't think so personally, but it's more hypothetical at that point and will need a proper investigation.

I do think cuts to social care and PPE stockpiling have had a demonstrable effect though, as has the governments failure to resolve the PPE shortages. This is a clear failing.

To be deliberately confrontational just for the moment the facts simply don't support that opinion IF you look at the statistics (and limit those treating Corona-19 patients in hospital to an age range of 20 to 39 - which I would imagine the majority of these staff are(?))

If as many seem to assume/believe PPE was so critically unavailable and that many doctors and nurses went into bat significantly under protected then it is absolutely staggering that only 172 people in their age range have died and that is in the WHOLE age group range - meaning many/most of those who died were probably not hospital workers at all - just general people in the community - and some of which would have had underlying health issues anyway!

15:34
England death figures: Which age groups are worst affected?

Of the 23,709 confirmed reported deaths so far in hospitals in England of people who tested positive for Covid-19, 12,451 (53%) have been people aged 80 and over while 9,184 (39%) were 60-79, NHS England said. 

So 91% of all hospital Covid-19 deaths have been people aged 60 or over.
A further 1,890 (8%) were aged 40-59, with 172 (1%) aged 20-39 and 12 (0.05%) aged 0-19.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-52627824

Obviously I don't want to make light to ALL who have been fighting the virus in hospital and some in the 40 to 59 age group may have succumbed to the virus through lack of PPE but even then the total would seem to be miniscule as only 1,890 people have died in total and again the vast bulk of them would not be hospital staff and some would have had underlying health issues.

Of course it would have been best to have ample PPE for all who needs it but looking on the stats alone it doesn't seem to have been a major factor in the hospital death rate as you claim (and many automatically assume) above.

One death because of it though is one death too many.

The NHS have been doing a wonderful job and I for one are thankful to them.

419Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 17:58

xmiles

xmiles
Jay Jay Okocha
Jay Jay Okocha

Sluffy wrote:
xmiles wrote:
Natasha Whittam wrote:
xmiles wrote:Yadda yadda yadda but you are ignoring the fundamental point that the Tories have systematically underfunded the NHS for 10 years  and this does have a significant effect on the capacity of the NHS to cope with any sudden increase in demand.

Then answer the question I posed yesterday, would having double the doctors and nurses and beds made any difference to the total deaths?

Almost certainly it would have reduced the number of deaths but by how much I don't know.

We have far fewer hospital beds, doctors and nurses per head of population than just about every other western European country.

Sadly it most certainly would not have.

There is no known cure to Corvid-19 and if you've got it bad then it's only your body that can fight it off and if it can't you die, irrespective of how many doctors and nurses we have.

The only help they can practically offer is putting those who can't breath for themselves on to ventilators to mechanically to do that for them whilst their body try's to fight off the virus.

As for your second point ironically the coronavirus has actually made more beds available and even some nursing staff surplus to need as attendance at hospitals have been dramatically curtailed initially from cancelling schedule admissions (in order to create more space for the expected surge in coronavirus admissions and latterly a reluctance of the general public to attend A and E because of the fear of catching the virus at the hospital.

An anecdotal account told to me by my neighbour whose wife is a nurse on the oncology ward at the local hospital is that at times the staff are sat down playing cards as they have had nothing else to do!

Obviously though these are strange times and the norm is that the NHS and its staff are routinely stretched to breaking point.

On the question of whether the number of deaths could have been reduced if the NHS had been better resourced there are two facts which support my belief that they could. Firstly getting more people more quickly on to ventilators is definitely going to increase their chances of surviving. Secondly as part of their preparation for coping with the crisis hospitals sent elderly patients back to care homes even when they may have had corona virus thus increasing the spread of the disease and the number of deaths.

On the second point to say that "ironically the coronavirus has actually made more beds available and even some nursing staff surplus to need" hardly disproves the fact that the NHS has been systematically underfunded by the Tories over the last 10 years. It also ignores the reality that a lot of people are now going to die because they are not receiving the treatment that they normally would.

420Coronavirus - the political argument - Page 21 Empty Re: Coronavirus - the political argument Tue May 12 2020, 17:59

xmiles

xmiles
Jay Jay Okocha
Jay Jay Okocha

Natasha Whittam wrote:
xmiles wrote:
Almost certainly it would have reduced the number of deaths but by how much I don't know.


I've not read any report of people dying because they couldn't see a doctor in hospital, or couldn't get a bed.

So how would extra doctors/nurses/beds have changed the statistics?

While I'm sure your second point is correct, the facts as I see them is the NHS hasn't been overwhelmed at any point (so far), in fact many of the beds that the government provided (thankfully) haven't been needed.


Please see my reply to sluffy at 419 on both points.

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