Christmas 2021

[moorfield]

Thought this would be an interesting one to look back on next year, let's get some (hopefully realistic) expectations set... Poll will close in 30 days time.

[UncleEbenezer]

No.

I will not be celebrating christmas 2021 or any other year, regardless of whether or not we're free of covid restrictions.

[GrahamPlatt]

No.

I will not be celebrating christmas 2021 or any other year, regardless of whether or not we're free of covid restrictions.

You really ought to read A Christmas Carol uncle.

[absolutezero]

No.

I will not be celebrating christmas 2021 or any other year, regardless of whether or not we're free of covid restrictions.

Living up to your name!

[moorfield]

How are folks feeling about their vote now?

Schools are a write off now until Sept imho, and will still have their bubbles and so on when the next year starts.

[moorfield]

A week left to register your vote!

With 4 out of a target 15 mio vaccinated - three weeks to go remember - and talk of lockdown being extended beyond Easter, are folk expecting a restriction free Christmas 2021?

A 60/40 spilt feels about right to me.

[88V8]

There might be a window. A sort of covid advent calendar.

I expect we'll have to show a vax certificate to go to church.

V8

[jfgw]

Pessimists!

Most people who catch it don't catch it again. Some catch it twice, but not many.

Those who have already had it will, I suggest, tend to be the ones who were most likely to catch it, whether due to a weaker immune system or a riskier lifestyle (such as having a public-facing job).

Infection rates already started to fall in November and reached a minimum near the end of November. This was too late to have been a result of the second lockdown. Except for the "Kent" variant, infections have continued to fall.

Areas with a higher December 2020 / January 2021 wave have peaked slightly earlier. This suggests that something in addition to the current lockdown is having an effect, that something being herd immunity. (The peaks are too soon to be due to the current lockdown but schools closing for Christmas could be a factor.)

New cases are going down,
Admissions are going down,
Patients in hospital seem to be reaching a peak.

We may have to actively keep the reproduction rate below 1 for some time yet but vaccines will progressively make this easier.

Unless a much more infectious strain comes at the wrong time, my guess is that, if anything, we may have another autumn peak but this should die down in time for Christmas. 2021 will be a lot easier than 2020.

Only 338 days to go!


Julian F. G. W.

[Arborbridge]

I slightly misinterepreted the question - chump.

Looking again, was it intended a question about family gatherings at Christmas? I which case they may well be back to normal.

But as far as public events - theatres, restaurants etc, I believe there may well be "covid restrictions" still necessary.

Arb.

[tjh290633]

There might be a window. A sort of covid advent calendar.

I expect we'll have to show a vax certificate to go to church.

V8

You can go to church now, if you can find one open.

TJH

[moorfield]

I slightly misinterepreted the question - chump.

Looking again, was it intended a question about family gatherings at Christmas? I which case they may well be back to normal.

But as far as public events - theatres, restaurants etc, I believe there may well be "covid restrictions" still necessary.

Arb.

I deliberately left the question more open to interpretation than just the family gatherings here ...

[moorfield]

Pessimists!
Only 338 days to go!

Realists, not pessimists. I think there is a growing realisation - among many of my friends & family at least - that public health restrictions will be around in some form or t'other for much longer than first thought. I have drawn a comparison here already with post war rationing which continued until 1954 ie. I don't think there will come a single day when we go from "off" to "on" and all start partying... Already starting to see summer events cancelled (Glastonbury, maybe the Olympics, I hope not Queen@O2 for which I have tickets ...).

Who knows where we will be come Christmas ...

[anon155742]

We had all the family around for 2020 so why not 2021!

[jfgw]

I have drawn a comparison here already with post war rationing

Post war rationing? Are you confusing Covid with Brexit?

So will restrictions exist for years to come? I would be surprised if lockdowns such as the present one will be needed much longer, although I reckon we will be wearing face masks for a while yet.

Here is what I think:

If the pesky thing hadn't mutated, we would have had an almost normal Christmas last year.

I posted this a while back on the Statistics thread,

My graph.
Blue, magenta and yellow lines: data derived from here,https://twitter.com/The_Soup_Dragon/status/1346903393508466688/photo/1
Cyan line: Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. : https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/

The cyan line (England admissions) is there to show that there is a correlation between admissions and the percentage of tests which were positive (Yellow line). Things went awry due to Christmas but, other than that, the shapes are a good match. Admissions were going down from a week into November until near the end of November, and infections from variants other than the Kent variant continued to go down. Bear in mind that infections went down despite the season being conducive to infections going up.

The government timed the second lockdown too early to take credit for the November dip - as far as I can see, the second lockdown had toilet-all effect on infections (although it probably had some small effect).

It's a positive feedback loop; if the gain is greater than 1, infections will increase and, if the gain is less than 1, infections will decrease. Infections have gone down twice already and are now going down for a third time so this is the third time that the gain (R number) has been below 1. Immunity lowers the gain, and immunity is increasing both through infection and vaccination. The virus is not "novel" any more.

My gut thinks that vaccination is essential if we are to, within a reasonable time, reduce infections to such a level that we will be able to go back to the old normal. Normality shall return, however.


Julian F. G. W.

[Mike4]

No.

I will not be celebrating christmas 2021 or any other year, regardless of whether or not we're free of covid restrictions.

^^^THIS^^^

Christmas 2020 was a particularly good Christmas for me personally. I lazed about, drank some good wine, posted a bit of rubbish on TLF, nobody visited. PERFECT.

[Arborbridge]

We had all the family around for 2020 so why not 2021!

There were Covid restrictions: even if you have the family around again in 2021, there could still be covid restrictions. That was the poll: not whether you would or would not have the family around.

Arb.

[Arborbridge]

No.

I will not be celebrating christmas 2021 or any other year, regardless of whether or not we're free of covid restrictions.

^^^THIS^^^

Christmas 2020 was a particularly good Christmas for me personally. I lazed about, drank some good wine, posted a bit of rubbish on TLF, nobody visited. PERFECT.

Yes, there were big advantages, and many people commented on the fact. Much less pressure particularly for those who are expected to be at the centre of the organisation - usually, but not exclusively, a woman.

[Arborbridge]

It's a positive feedback loop; if the gain is greater than 1, infections will increase and, if the gain is less than 1, infections will decrease. Infections have gone down twice already and are now going down for a third time so this is the third time that the gain (R number) has been below 1. Immunity lowers the gain, and immunity is increasing both through infection and vaccination. The virus is not "novel" any more.

My gut thinks that vaccination is essential if we are to, within a reasonable time, reduce infections to such a level that we will be able to go back to the old normal. Normality shall return, however.


Julian F. G. W.

I have a question about R you might be able to answer. THe official gov site still refers to R s being between 1.2 and 1.3 - how can this be when infections seem to be going down according to the interactive map. Or is it that the latest survey which claims infection are not going down is correct and the map is wrong?

BTW, you say the November lockdown didn't do much - well it certainly brought the infection rate down; it's just that Borisky let go of the restrictions too soon instead of keeping his foot on the snake, which was an error in view of the new variant making the position riskier.

Arb.

[UncleEbenezer]

Christmas 2020 was a particularly good Christmas for me personally. I lazed about, drank some good wine, posted a bit of rubbish on TLF, nobody visited. PERFECT.

My very best was 1992. Christmas day was just under two months after I moved to Italy, after a spell jobless and homeless (my previous fixed-term postdoc research contract having ended in April; my tenancy rather earlier). I was back in a job and had just moved into a flat. And christmas was my first holiday in Italy, to go out into the mountains. Most of my belongings including camping cooking gear were still in transit, so it was christmas under the stars with dinner of bread and water.

[jfgw]

I have a question about R you might be able to answer. THe official gov site still refers to R s being between 1.2 and 1.3 - how can this be when infections seem to be going down according to the interactive map. Or is it that the latest survey which claims infection are not going down is correct and the map is wrong?

This site gives an R value below 1 for most areas.
https://archive.uea.ac.uk/~e130/R.html

This government site gives R as ranging between 1.2 and 1.3 and a daily growth rate between 2% and 5%. It was last updated 15th January but the growth rate was negative by then,
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk

However,

From the above site,

These estimates represent the transmission of COVID-19 over the past few weeks due to the time delay between someone being infected, having symptoms, and needing healthcare.

and

How R and growth rates are estimated

Individual modelling groups use a range of data to estimate growth rates and R values, including:

epidemiological data such as testing data, hospital admissions, ICU admissions and deaths – it generally takes up to 3 weeks for changes in the spread of the disease to be reflected in the estimates due to the time delay between initial infection and the need for hospital care
contact pattern surveys that gather information on behaviour – these can be quicker (with a lag of around a week) but can be open to bias as they often rely on self-reported behaviour and make assumptions about how the information collected relates to the spread of disease
household infection surveys where swabs are performed on individuals – these can provide estimates of how many people are infected. Longitudinal surveys (where samples are repeatedly taken from the same people) allow a more direct estimate of the growth in infection rates

From the above, it appears that the government estimate is based to a large degree on historical data. If this is the case, it is out of date by the time it is published.

I would be interested in any other suggestions as to why there is a discrepancy.

BTW, you say the November lockdown didn't do much - well it certainly brought the infection rate down

The government timed the second lockdown too early to take credit for the November dip - as far as I can see, the second lockdown had toilet-all effect on infections (although it probably had some small effect).

Checking the dates, I see I made a mistake here. However, it is difficult to see how much effect it had. The non-S- gene variant admissions started to fall around the time of the start of the lockdown or slightly after, possibly too soon to be attributed wholly to the lockdown (but data are noisy). There is a noticeable fall which could be attributed to the lockdown, although the fall continues after the lockdown ended (which I would not otherwise expect). It could be that the lockdown (with schools open) selectively suppressed the non-S- gene variants. The government themselves said that the lockdown had little effect on the new variant, however, and that is what we are dealing with now.


Julian F. G. W.