As you note, they are partly due to the reasons you highlighted, but also partly due to many people refraining from going to the health service to getting care during the last 2.5 years because they were consistently told to stay away and protect the NHS, and many obstacles were put in place to make it difficult to access primary care. They are getting diagnosed and treated a lot later which of course leads to poorer outcomes. Some obstacles still remain and many are still finding it difficult to access GPs - which of course means they turn up as hospital instead which is not what should happen and is helping add to the long A&E waits you highlight.

I responded to clarify the excess deaths were not still some kind of covid caused deaths, not because I am trying to stoke culture wars.

It really is surreal going back to the very first page of this thread and starting to read through all the machinations thereafter. I suspect I will not re-read all 658 pages though (!) but it's hard to believe that we went through all of this (even if though I know we did!).

But your theory that lockdowns contributed to our current healthcare crisis only work if doctors and nurses were sitting around doing nothing during the lockdowns and healthcare capacity was empty, and I can't find any evidence of this. Instead my theory is that they were instead focused on the pandemic and probably worked more hours than normal. If we want to maintain healthcare capacity during a pandemic, the only options I can see are (1) increase capacity - here we found the beds in reserve but not the staff, (2) decline treatment to covid patients, or (3) earlier and longer restrictions (e.g. lockdowns) to reduce the number of hospital admissions due to covid.

A friend from school is now a NHS psychologist- but she spent some months in 2020 and 2021 working long hours on a covid ward in a hospital - so of course a backlog of psychology patients built up (I'm sure with negative consequences). I guess something similar happened to corporate-wage-slave - it feels like he (or she) has focused on covid the last 2 years and I assume not whatever job he was doing before.

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/deta...ts_in_hospital
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c9f8f6b4f7.png

Again, no. I am suggesting there were other ways which didn’t involve lockdowns and legal restrictions, and which didn’t involve the kind of messaging that told people to stay away from health care.

Additionally maybe a different approach may have worked to spread out the load more on the health service. However as your graphs show there were a few times of very high demand, but for the majority of the pandemic the demand of covid on the NHS was relatively low.

England cases 4,107 (3,928 last Monday) - up 0.5% week on week
England deaths down 24.9% week on week
Patients admitted in England 526 (602 on the 29th)
Patients in hospital in England 4,864 (5,658 on the 31st)
Patients in ventilation beds 117 (144 on the 31st)
Vaccinated up to and including 7th September 2022:
First dose: 45,243,079
Second dose: 42,653,942
Booster: 33,534,629

This data is now being reported on Thursdays.

It is my turn to be late to the party again. I tested strongly positive this morning.


https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...07b3238ef4.jpg
This was likely picked up in Paris where I returned from yesterday. Thankfully only the mildest of symptoms - slight cough and runny nose and no fever.

I wish you a speedy recovery! How soon since your previous infection?

That was my first back in December last year.

Indeed a speedy recovery from me too, It seems a bit tough that some people have had the infection 2 or 3 times (and one person has had 5 confirmed infections) when i'm still waiting my first infection.

Same here! Unless I've been completely asymptomatic (tested regularly anyway to visit a care home).

Here is the delayed weekly data from the ONS survey. In the week ending 26-28 August 2022:

One in 70 people in England had Covid (last week one in 60)
One in 95 in Wales had Covid (last week one in 65)
One in 50 in Northern Ireland had Covid (last week one in 50)
One in 50 in Scotland had Covid (last week one in 55)

England cases 4,463 (4,375 last Monday) - down 1.4% week on week
England deaths down 30.7% week on week
Patients admitted in England 519 (526 on the 5th)
Patients in hospital in England 4,540 (4,864 on the 7th)
Patients in ventilation beds 140 (117 on the 7th)
Vaccinated up to and including 14th September 2022:
First dose: 45,250,569
Second dose: 42,669,359
Booster: 33,552,749

All reported cases are now omicron with BA.5 accounting for 87% of those.

Today's weekly data from the ONS survey. In the week ending 5 September 2022:

One in 75 people in England had Covid (last week one in 70)
One in 110 in Wales had Covid (last week one in 95)
One in 55 in Northern Ireland had Covid (last week one in 50)
One in 45 in Scotland had Covid (last week one in 50)

What are the numbers like for take up of the winter vaccination - 4th/5th dose depending on the person I guess?

It is still early days. Something like 7-8% of those over 75 have had their autumn booster.