jfgw wrote:FWIW, I do think that herd immunity (even if it is short of the HIT) is a major contributory factor in the falls in infections. I am not convinced that the second lockdown (flouted by many, and with schools open) had much effect at all.
To avoid any question of doubt, I wholeheartedly support this third lockdown and consider it essential to help to reduce hospital admissions.
When we talk about comparisons between earlier last year (March/April etc) and the seasonal period I find it useful to look at other North European Countries where you see countries with no real first wave and a really big second wave (sufficient to put them in the upper part of the chart for deaths per million people).
It is also useful to look at individual trusts.
I have been giving the question of what impact lockdown per se has. It does appear to me (not just based upon Cornwall, but other areas) that lockdown per se increases the transmission of the virus in more rural areas.
I think this may relate to public transport. The tube is probably the best system for spreading infection. In rural areas when people are asked to stay mainly at home this will not really have that much of an effect on public transport as there isn't really that much that is available. In urban areas, however, it keeps people off public transport to a greater extent.
Shutting schools (which I really don't like as a policy) is probably something that does reduce the spread of the virus between households quite significantly.
It does, however, appear that the process of concentrating people on going to the supermarket and otherwise sitting together at home increases the ability of the virus to spread.
I think we all agree with the objective of avoiding an overwhelming impact on the NHS and also keep the number of deaths down as well. It is probably too late now anyway to do much about this as the mistakes have been made. That is not to say the intentions were bad.
There have been a number of key questions which were initially uncertain, but became more certain.
The first one was susceptibility
The second was the level of infection.
If the government had correctly analysed the hospital admissions in March/April then they would have known that their assumptions were wrong.