Thread by @whippletom

The UK government has just published its scientific evidence and it's....amazing gov.uk/government/gro…

Risk of public disorder. "agreed that large scale rioting is unlikely. It is rarely seen in these circumstances. Acts
of altruism will predominate, and HMG could readily promote and guide these." assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl…

A modern keep calm and carry on:

"Promote a sense of collectivism: All messaging should reinforce a sense of community, that
“we are all in this together.” This will avoid increasing tensions between different groups "

The problem of going our own way

“Expectations of how the Government will react will be set by media reports of public
health strategies in other countries. This increases the risk of public concern if
interventions that are perceived to be effective are not applied."

How long will be in isolation?
"A policy of alternating between periods of more and less strict social distancing measures could plausibly be effective at keeping the number of critical care cases within capacity. These would need to be in place for at least most of a year. "

Full credit to HMG for transparency. This is exactly what we have been asking for.

For those who feared an over-reliance on behavioural science, it seems they were aware of limitations.

"The coronavirus outbreak is a unique challenge. Identifying an evidence base from which to make behavioural science recommendations is difficult."

Some of the debate about school closures has, I understood before, been agonised. Here is an idea of issues.

"SPI-B have a consensus view that school closures will be highly disruptive and likely to
present an unequal burden to different sections of society....

"...Our understanding of reports from Japan is that there is growing discontent around the policy. Isolation of entire
households also poses a substantial, and unequal, burden on those affected."

Instituting isolation is not a simple thing. "Given the link between poverty and mental health and between quarantine and mental health, thought also needs to be given to the additional mental health burden likely to accrue during two weeks of home isolation."

This is oddly heartening. They believed it was easier to get people to isolate to help others than to do so when they were the ones at risk.

"[when] protecting the self, rather than others (particularly outside care homes) may be more difficult to “persuade” people to adhere."

More on school closures

The view on university closures is remarkably pragmatic about what most people actually get up to in university.

Concerns about stigmatising the ill - also showing why they want to avoid compulsion. Quarantining to be portrayed as noble and selfless act:

"voluntary quarantine’ should be portrayed as an act of altruistic civic duty."

This table (zoom in) is key. It shows the predicted effect of each intervention. Note that closing pop concerts and sports fixtures has an estimated benefit of essentially zero.

One last point. I spoke to Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome, and member of Sage. He said this:

“We will not get everything right. There are no rules, there’s no textbooks to follow here. These are judgement calls, made in very best faith but in tremendous difficulty.”

This is the effect of each policy on its own, not together...

Full interview with sage scientist @JeremyFarrar who, like all of us, is working from home. With a dog

thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/w…