LGWClosedAgain

That's actually the government motto last time I checked.

adrianlondon

I might have missed this above, or on another thread, but I've just read there's a pilot of taking a (assume lateral flow) test every day instead of self isolating.

"Mr Gove will be tested every day for a week rather than having to self-isolate for ten days as he is taking part in a pilot scheme, reports suggest."

https://news.sky.com/story/covid-19-...final-12324383

DaveS

Yesterdays daily data, which is late because I am travelling:

Cases 5,274 (3,542 last Thursday)
Deaths 18 (10)
Patients admitted 110 (113 on the 23th)
Patients in hospital 919 (918 on the 25th)
Patients in ventilation beds 129 (125 on the 26th)
People vaccinated up to and including 02 June 2021:
First dose: 39,758,428
Second dose: 26,422,303

The rolling seven day daily average for cases is now up 38.9% on the previous week and the same measure for deaths is down 5.3%. The rolling 7 day daily average for deaths is 7.7 today.

13901

I had very little to do earlier so here's a little chart for you. It's from gov.uk, it shows the actuals for cases, hospitalisations & deaths in Blackburn, Bolton & Arwen.



Between December 1st and January 31st these areas had 205 daily cases, 43 hospitalisations and 5 deaths. For the month of May it's 185 daily cases, 7 hospitalisations and 0.39 deaths.

It's getting better. We've got to deal with morons in Whitehall, but it's getting better.

Misco60

The success of the vaccination programme has brought deaths down to tolerable levels, the same order of magnitude as the number of deaths you would normally expect each day from any respiratory disease.

Hospitalisations remain stubbornly around the 100-130 per day, and there is now some evidence that the Delta variant, which is massively dominant in the UK, carries a much greater risk of hospitalisation. I think the jury is out on this one.

New cases are rising quite rapidly, and I think the seriousness of this is being masked somewhat by the low absolute numbers. The number of infections reported yesterday is the highest since March, and three times what it was in mid-May. The warning lights are flashing here, and I think the government would be foolish to rush to lift all remaining restrictions and repeat the mistakes they made at the end of last year. Another lockdown would be an absolute disaster for all of us.

PeaSouper

How much impact can return travellers from only Portugal make, between 8 June (when this takes effect) and 14 June? Is that really the difference between determining whether or not lockdown can finally end on 14 June or not?

13901

What I wanted to show in that chart is that there's reason for hope and we shouldn't yield to unnecessary alarmism or scare. This Delta variant spread is serious, but the numbers from the epicentre of the variant, as I was showing, are nowhere near as bad as this winter's. I agree with the need for caution, but this should've been the case all along - HMG was sleeping at the wheel on India, again, and again it's now shuffling the steering wheel left and right as they try to find some control. I'd very much preferred a slower but steadier course.

And the problems are continuing, an example from yesterday. Due to my wife's job we have quite a group of friends that are local to us and work for BA. One of them just returned from a DEL there-and-back. Her return flight was fairly full, 60%-ish. They landed in T5, from where transfers were taken to Ready to Fly and arriving passenger to T3 for Red list country processing. Well, according to the passenger manifest there were a good (20% of passengers) transferring to GIB, which she found very odd as transfers to GIB from India tend to be zero.

We discussed it with another friend, who is a Duty Ops manager in BA, and it seems that there's a new trend on these passengers, with quite a large number (10%) transferring from Indian flights to GIB. They then fly back to London or the UK on another ticket and, apparently, that's enough to dodge the hotel quarantine (but maybe not the other tests). BA have apparently been communicating this to HMG, let's see what comes out of it.

bluemoon68

My first thought was that they were spending 10 days in GIB, which would be within the rules, if not ideal (particularly for the local population in GIB).
If this is enough to dodge quarantine, then I would have thought it enough to dodge isolation entirely ie if you are prepared to lie about where you�ve been, logic would say you claim to have been in GIB the whole time, thus saving money on tests and isolation.

it�s people behaving like this that (a) extends lockdown and (b) adds weight to the call for no amber countries, that all isolation should be in hotels, because we just can�t trust people.

KARFA

tbh there is no need to even be on separate tickets - fares being equal. that's perfectly fine to do and your restrictions on arrival are purely based on where you have been in the preceding 10 days. so if you have only been in green countries you are a green arrival even if you have been in red countries 11 or more days before arrival. i don't see why there should be a need to report this or for UKBF to act on it.

EDIT: sorry i may have misread, so they are not sitting in GIB for 10 days? in that case you are correct that they are a red arrival and should be treated as such on arrival in the uk. they would also have to lie on their plf. however, short of closing the borders completely i don't see how you completely stop that behaviour.

wilsnunn

Yes, I read it as they were going to GIB and flying back the same day or the next day (or something similar) thus allowing them the opportunity to lie on their PLF and say they are a green arrivals.

PeaSouper

Are there no records kept about who is transiting the UK and from where they have come? It seems fairly straightforward to check if the traveler who is arriving in the UK from GIB today also arrived in the UK (even if only on transit) from a red list country in the preceding ten days.

Obviously if the traveler managed to get to GIB without somehow transiting the UK first that�s a different story.

13901

Nailed it. Should've explained myself better. Basically people in BA did some digging and found that passengers are flying DEL-LHR-GIB, another ticket and then GIB-LHR on the same day. Some do same back-to-back LHR-GIB-LHR, or at least they attempt to.

I'd have thought that GIB being part of the UK/Dominion/Crown/Whatever (sorry, like cricket the setup of the British Empire is mystery to me) data would be visible on these sort of trips... Plus BA/airlines share passenger data with UK gov, or could enhance it. Another thing I'm thinking about is to slash the hotel quarantine cost. �1750 can be a good "incentive" to try and dodge the hotels.

bluemoon68

More than �1750 saving. Coming from a green country and claiming to have been there for 10 days, means you only need a day 2 test not day 2&8 tests. (obv no test to release too).
You would have thought the country that the PCR test to enter the UK (twice) would give also a clue.

PeaSouper

Doesn�t have to be a PCR test. Could have been one of those lateral flow tests done with an online video call.

cauchy

There are only 17 known cases of people dying due to Delta-Covid in the UK.

Page 9 of https://assets.publishing.service.go...riefing_14.pdf .