Just wondering all your thoughts. Hubby was saying last night he thinks France will end up following the UK into lock down at some point (end of month when we see the results of Christmas / NYE?) and was debating going to get plasterboard in today . Iâm more optimistic and think it unlikely, and if it did happen probably not full lockdown like before. I doubt theyâll close schools, they would perhaps do week on week off for college like they already do for lycee (or is that just here?).
no no quite innocent (at least at this time of day!). Last time we saw it coming but didnât realise that it would happen so quickly. Was very frustrating, weâd slowly stocked up with food over a couple of months but didnât think about our reno jobs that were on the go / needed doing and were very frustrated until they gradually started opening the bricos again! Home and willing with no materials - very cranky making!
Iâve just started taking the IT equipment back to the office from home, so am hoping that it wonât come to that, as Iâll have to lug it all back up again. Working from home in legal services has been relatively easy, but I still prefer my office in town for lots of things (access to paper files, internet speeds, office supplies, picking up the mail, etc)
There was an interesting comparison in The Guardian this morning. According to the WHO, in the final week of 2020 the UK had a 14-day new-case notification rate of 720 for every 100,000 people, more than double that in France, Germany, Italy and Spain. (Rate in France actually only 277.5/100,000 - also France has a lower death rate per case, more hospital beds, more doctors, more intensive care beds, etc - although a few hospitals are stretched, across France about half of all ICU beds are still unoccupied (in my region - Brittany - about 75% are unoccupied) - so in many ways weâre not really currently comparable to the UK at all.)
Now we are back to school my Guardian reading in the morning with my coffee has gone to pot! This is reassuring that the figures are so different. Would be nice to think that we wonât be having to lock down!
It has always puzzled me why there are more hospital death outcomes from Covid19 in the UK compared to France. Dare I say that the standard of care is better here ?
I think youâd be safer suggesting that the two numbers are not directly comparable.
We donât know how the official number of cases maps to the actual number, or their severity, we donât know how well the official number of deaths correctly identifies those who have died of Covid. We donât even know how the hospital admissions compare in terms of severity (presumably France, with its greater number of beds will take slightly less ill patients and therefore appear to have a better hospital survival rate).
A lot depends on whether France can control the new variant and keep numbers heading in a downward direction. And that depends a lot on peopleâs behaviour and how strict they are on tracking and testing.
There is always a big difference between the UK headline covid deaths figures (people dying with a positive covid test result) and the ONS figures (people with covid on their death certificate) - presumably the latter (generally higher figure) is more realistic?
Some of the figures might even take years to be recorded - a cancer patient, denied curative treatment because of the impact of Covid on elective procedures, might still have several years of palliative treatment options.
Also, as we are around the peak of the 'flu season it is reasonable to suggest that a few, maybe even more than a few, of the Covid deaths would have happened anyway.
If the âworldometerâ figures are to be believed, the number of cases in UK and France (historically - not now) are actually very similar (per capita), but the death rate consistently 15% or so higher in the UK.
Another oddity is that even when it has much lower case numbers, France consistently reports far more cases in intensive care. Maybe because they are not stretched in terms of ICU beds, French hospitals are putting less severe cases in intensive care than the UK?
I think thatâs the problem. Superficially, yes, they are the official mortality figures from each country - but can the two be compared directly without knowing how the two countries define a âCovid deathâ? We might (but there again might not) get a better idea once the excess deaths figures come out for each country.
I think it is inevitable that the new variants (and those yet to be announced) will soon be spreading in France. Combined with general stupidity a third lockdown will follow - I am certainly planning for it.
Keep hold of the fact that there is no evidence that the B117 strain is any worse than the previously circulating variants. It does appear to be better at spreading though so it will come to dominate the strains of virus in circulation in an area eventually.
The way to stop it is the same as the other variants.