Let's talk about COVID-19 cases, hospitalisations and deaths in England - and the effects of the vaccine.
Here's a look at how many cases it takes per additional hospitalisation (assuming a 7 day delay) and how many hospitalisations it takes per death in hospital (ditto).
1/N
At the beginning of the pandemic, we were in the dark as far as case numbers. It was only at the end of June 2020 that we passed 100,000 tests a day (indicated by the vertical green line on the graph).
That makes drawing conclusions about cases early in the pandemic v hard.
2/N
The blue line represents the number of new cases it takes to produce one new hospitalisation (after a 7-day lag).
As you can see, that's been anywhere between 2 and 25+ new cases.
We're at or close to the best ever ratio. That is likely to be the effect of the vaccine.
3/N
The orange line represents the number of hospitalisations per hospital death (after a 7-day lag).
That has fluctuated from a low of 5 hospitalisations/death at the grim height of the second wave to over 20 hospitalisations/death now.
Again, we're close to the best ratio.
4/N
So if we think of the pandemic as a conveyor belt...
1. A certain number of cases go in.
2. 7 days later (simplistic time lag, for modelling purposes) those cases lead to hospitalisations.
3. 7 further days later, those hospitalisations lead to deaths.
5/N
Right now, thanks to better treatment expertise and the effects of the vaccine, we seem to be hovering around...
22-28 new cases per hospitalisation.
and
20-25 hospitalisations per death.
That implies that we will see one death for around every 500 new cases we detect.
6/N
The above doesn't account for the effects of the more potent Delta (Indian) variant, because most Delta infections happened too recently to impact hospitalisations and deaths yet.
It's possible that the vaccine will insulate us effectively. Or we may see the ratios worsen.
7/N
But what we can at least say is that, right now, around 1 in 500 confirmed cases of COVID-19 will die.
So if we end up with double the cases because the virus spreads, we might expect double the deaths.
The next few weeks will confirm if that's still the case or not.
8/N
The Express has published 94,096 articles about Brexit. That's an average of 52 articles per day since the referendum!
They're still putting them out at a furious rate. Key tropes: attacks on the EU, and on Remainers.
A veritable avalanche of brainwashing.
To give you a taste of the scale of their assault on truth and reality, here's the headlines from the 30 - yes, 30 - Brexit-related articles they've put out so far today...
So whenever you're having difficulty understanding why Express readers can be so wrong on all matters Brexit, just think of that relentless, endless cascade of corrosive filth they're being exposed to.
With brainwashing of that intensity, no other outcome is possible.
Brexit is like quitting Netflix to build your own streaming service (because theirs is rubbish and doesn't match your sensibilities) while simultaneously demanding Netflix allow you to keep accessing their content because you're BRITISH.
And when Netflix refuse, on the sensible grounds that you're not a member of their service any more (and plan to be a major competitor to boot) you accuse them of bullying, bloody-minded punishment behaviour.
After you've quit their service, you use the fact that Netflix don't let you access their content any more to retroactively justify your decision to leave.
"If they're that selfish now that we're no longer a member, we should never have been a member at all!"
Here's a look at new cases vs hospitalisations vs deaths since 1 September 2020. The graphs are normalised so that "100%" represents the "worst data point" of each.
(It won't pinpoint the exact peaks because it uses 7-day batches of data, but it's close enough to see trends.)
NOTES:
1) Hospitalisations lag cases
2) Deaths lag hospitalisations
3) Vaccine has a real effect on reducing deaths (falling more steeply than hospitalisations)
4) Too little time has elapsed to see the expected increase in hospitalisations/deaths from recent spike in cases
In other words...
1) There are ALWAYS lags between new cases and hospitalisations, and between hospitalisations and deaths.
2) It's TOO EARLY to say whether the vaccine has broken the link. Another week and we'll know for hospitalisations. Another 2-3 weeks for deaths.
Brexit's broken but is about to break a lot more! It's the gift that keeps on taking.
Here's a look at some upcoming changes.
30 June 2021: Deadline to apply for the EU citizen settlement scheme in the UK, and for equivalent schemes aimed at UK citizens in several EU countries.
1 July 2021: New EU VAT regime, affecting sales into the EU market by non-EU firms. Elimination of VAT exemption on low value consignments (previously up to EUR 22) so all goods imported into the EU will be liable to VAT. ec.europa.eu/taxation_custo…
1 October 2021: National IDs are no longer valid for most travel to the UK. Instead, passports will be required. Impacts school trips, language and cultural exchanges etc. (National IDs are mandatory in most EU countries, so many children won't have passports.)
We're talking the loss of several million hotel nights. Plus much fewer children coming on language courses. A massive body blow to the economy.
BTW this isn't news, in the sense it's not a new revelation. Many people (including me) have been warning about that for years, because the decision to turn away from national IDs has been trailed for a long time.