Tweet

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

More from @ewanbirney

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

2 Jan

Gather around again for a tweet-thread about "models", their types, what they are (and aren't) and how to use and comment and/or critique them.

First off, models are always ways of understanding the real world. The well worn adage, "all models are wrong, some models are useful" serves you well, and focuses on *utility* of models rather than correctness.

Already you can see you might change what is useful in different settings - indeed, there are some very practical constraints about what things one can or cannot do because we have both time and decisions - this is a system with *lots* of endogenity as the economists would say.

Read 25 tweets

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

31 Dec 21

@KateRoseMorley

I think for the second day running of high wind across the UK the North Sea link has run at full capacity in both directions - over night back to Norway, during the day to the UK (great website grid.iamkate.com from @KateRoseMorley)

This is to my very amateur energy eyes the system working as expected - using Norway as a massive grid scale battery (as one can often control trad hydro flow doesn’t need to be pumped hydro - just offsetting Norwegian electricity supply)

More wind farms in the U.K. will increase the frequency of this and the Viking link will increase the ability to offset into the high hydro Scandinavian market I think

Read 7 tweets

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

28 Dec 21

Post-christmas COVID thoughts from dark Northumberland. TL;DR Omicron is rising across the world, and hospitalisations are following, but it seems clear Omicron-COVID is different from previous variants; the actions needed to steer a safe path in Omicron Europe are still murky

Context: I am an expert in human genetics and computational biology. I know expets in infectious epidemiology, viral genomics, immunology and clinical trials. I have some conflicts of interest; I am consultant and shareholder of Oxford Nanopore and was on the Ox/Az trial.

Brief recap; SARS-CoV-2 is a new human coronavirus which jumped from an animal host in late 2019. It causes a horrible disease, COVID, which often leads to death in a subset of people (older, more likely to be male and obesse) and can triggers a CFS-like disease, LongCOVID.

Read 25 tweets

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

23 Dec 21

COVID thoughts from beautiful, misty Northumberland. TL;DR As expected, Omicron is exploding in numbers in cities and beyond worldwide. Reassuringly Omicron infections are less likely to end up in hospital, but whether this reduction in severity is enough to be safe is unclear

Context: I am an expert in human genetics and computational biology. I know experts in infectious epidemiology, viral genomics, immunology and clinical trials. I have some conflicts of interest: I am a consultant and sharehold of Oxford Nanopore and I was on the Ox/Az trial.

Reminder: Omicron is the first "antigen drift" variant with fast transmission from SARS-CoV-2. This drifting antigen presentation on spike is one of the ways Coronaviruses shift their appearance to our immune system, so it was expected, though always not fully appreciated.

Read 32 tweets

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

22 Dec 21

With Scottish, English and South African data all in hospitalisation risk given infection all coming in below 50% (range I think 80% lower SA to 60% lower, English some endpoints) this key parameter is firming up. Frustratingly in the balance from my reading of the SPI-M models

(plus "what does xx% lower mean - xx% per infection or per equivalent infection knowing that Omicron reinfects etc," and how does one factor this vs vaccination and age - so much detail here to nail down)

Basically, good news, and provides narrower spaces for models (both forward models and backward models on infection levels as hospitalisations are more completely ascertained than cases etc).

Read 4 tweets

Ewan Birney

@ewanbirney

22 Dec 21

In general I am impressed and v. positive about how the UK Science community does analysis and feeds into UK Government - SAGE and tip-of-the-spear Patrick Vallance. eg, It's notable how Germany's new expert modelling/academic group under the new Government has a nod to this.

(UK is a very mixed bag in pandemic response. Some is knock it out of the park good - RECOVERY trial, some has improved hugely over a year - data flows, testing, sequencing, and some is ... really not so good. That's a British understatement for non-Brits).

...but...

Read 5 tweets

Share this page!

Ewan Birney

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

More from @ewanbirney

Ewan Birney

Ewan Birney

Ewan Birney

Ewan Birney

Ewan Birney

Ewan Birney

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Like this author's thread?