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The govt strategy on COVID-19 appears to be to “allow the disease to circulate in younger people where it’s not causing much harm” while protecting “the people who are really vulnerable” This should concern us all - outlined in this @BylineTimes piece by @NafeezAhmed 
Thread https://twitter.com/BylineTimes/status/1349412341486653440
Thread https://twitter.com/BylineTimes/status/1349412341486653440
The primary strategy of govt is vaccination of the vulnerable to reduce serious illness & death. While this is vital, there appears to be no plan to tackle transmission & no recognition of the harms to health & economy that would come with 'allowing the disease to circulate'
Once again, the govt have conflated SARS-CoV-2 with influenza - a mistake which has led us to almost 100,000 excess deaths in the UK. High levels of continuing transmission in the UK have created the conditions for viral mutation & adaptation.
SARS-CoV-2 isn't influenza.
SARS-CoV-2 isn't influenza.
10% of people with SARS-CoV-2 have persistent symptoms lasting >3 months - including people who have mild acute infection. The long term impact is not known but many studies suggest multi-organ dysfunction that can last at least for months- we don't yet know if this is reversible
Studies suggest long-term dysregulation of the immune system & development of auto-antibodies in some people with COVID-19. We know the virus can invade many organs & virus antigen can persist in the brain, and in the gut for many months. https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/933621#vp_3
Why is our government happy to expose millions of people to a virus where the long term impact on health is simply not known. Esp when early studies suggest that the impact may be long-lasting & serious for at least a subset.
And why are we still drawing comparisons with flu?
And why are we still drawing comparisons with flu?
Worse still, the govt seems fully aware that vaccinating a subset, or even most of the population may not prevent transmission. They cannot & do not rule out the need for further lockdowns.
Why, then, are there no plans to suppress & keep transmission down, to prevent this?
Why, then, are there no plans to suppress & keep transmission down, to prevent this?
Why after repeated late action, & lack of adequate case finding, contact tracing & isolation which has led to three lockdowns,~90,000 deaths from COVID-19, and economic devastation are we still moving forward with a strategy which could result in more cases & a fourth lockdown?
The negligent strategy outlined by govt sounds suspiciously similar to the 'focused protection' ideology described by the Great Barrington Declaration that suggested shielding the vulnerable, while letting the virus spread through the population to develop herd immunity.
The voices behind the GBD were invited to brief the PM in autumn, despite the GBD being grounded in pseudoscience & their repeated predictions being proven incorrect. They advised the govt not to lockdown in Sept despite SAGE advice - leading to thousands of preventable deaths.
The govt now once again appears to have chosen a policy of pseudoscience & mass infection. After three late lockdowns that cost thousands of lives in the name of 'saving the economy', we are here yet again. Are we going to change course or keep repeating the same mistakes?
After 10 months, we still have no strategy to exit lockdown in a way that prevents yet another wave of infections, cases of long COVID & deaths, and a repeat of very recent history. The NHS is in crisis. We have a new variant of virus that transmits much more easily.
Continuing transmission also favours further virus adaptation (we've now seen at least three new concerning virus strains across the globe), leading to further risk of favourable adaptations, and escape mutations to vaccines.
Rather than focusing on elimination, which is the only way out of this, that doesn't end either in mass devastation or another lockdown - the govt has once again chosen a strategy of 'living with the virus' and 'tolerable deaths'. Govt & its advisors have ruled out elimination.
What would high levels of transmission mean?
We had >1 million cases of COVID-19 reported in last weeks ONS report. That means at least 100,000 people with debilitating symptoms lasting >3 months, >35,000 hospitalisations and ~10,000 deaths. That's just cases from *one week*.
We had >1 million cases of COVID-19 reported in last weeks ONS report. That means at least 100,000 people with debilitating symptoms lasting >3 months, >35,000 hospitalisations and ~10,000 deaths. That's just cases from *one week*.
Deaths may be lower depending on the speed of vaccine roll-out. But our health & economy would be devastated, if the virus was allowed to spread across the population.
And cases will rise again unless we put measures in place *now* to *keep* transmission down once cases are low
And cases will rise again unless we put measures in place *now* to *keep* transmission down once cases are low
This means bringing cases down as fast, and as low as possible and not easing restrictions before cases fall to very low levels. This means doing everything possible to bring R down now. This means fixing our broken test,trace, isolate & support systems so we can keep cases low.
It means revising measures on social distancing & mask use in the light of the new variant & supporting the public with new measures as much as possible. It means reducing transmission in schools by supporting them with mitigatory measures.
It means better quarantine measures. Support with isolation. Financial support to those who are suffering the impact of lockdowns. Greater support for parents & carers & schools. Greater investment in mental health. Addressing structural inequities.
Pandemic control is multi-pronged. There is unfortunately no single silver bullet. It's half-way measures and late action that's brought us here. Unless we learn from these mistakes, we are doomed to repeat them again and again. At an unacceptable cost.
This graphic from the BBC shows how long it can take vaccine programmes to really have an impact on containing disease outbreaks (and these are for highly effective vaccines that do protect against transmission). It's completely dishonest to present these as a magic silver bullet
