Is This A Waste Of Money?

[ichkeria]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56632084

Sorry if it's covered elsewhere. I can't see it.

[jim360]

https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n706

Based on the numbers reported in there, this could even end up picking more false positives than true positives. That sounds like a recipe for chaos.

[ToraToraTora]

"It seems like crumb throwing to the scaredy cats." - indeed, vaccination is the answer coupled with a "passport" system for access to everything. That's what we should be doing.

[Sqad]

Interesting jim,but I reiterate, my concern lies mainly with the false negatives.

[emmie]

passports surely can be faked....

[jim360]

Those too. Still, if these tests are effective on detecting high viral loads, then it's not implausible that the cases it misses are also those least likely to pass on the disease unwittingly.

[ToraToraTora]

emmie: "passports surely can be faked.... " - and around we go. Not if they are connected to NHS record, NI number qith QR code, well not easily, and test results can also be faked. You can fake everything but we just do what we do now, make it as hard as possible and prosecute when discovered.

[ToraToraTora]

the virus will be with us forever we need a robust system going forward. Ordinarily I applaud the libertarian stance of a government but this is a war and we need to treat it as one. We need to ignore the tin hatters and set up an infrastructure that does the job wee need.

[dave50]

The vaccine prevents serious illness and death so it doesn't matter if you get infected, you will just get mild symptoms so what's the problem?

[mushroom25]

// what's the problem? //

the problem is you become an asymptomatic super spreader......

[emmie]

how do we know for sure who gets mild symptoms as yet. 5 million people have had their second vaccine but no notification as to whether anyone has got ill even mildly ?

[dave50]

But the elderly and vulnerable have been vaccinated, the young do not suffer from it, so even if the virus is spread, people will not be suffering from it, so I ask again what's the problem?

[emmie]

children can be spreaders, thats why they are being tested so regularly at school

[jim360]

Because(a) that's a hasty generalisation: although many young people suffer little from Covid, not all do, and in any case death is only one long-term effect from the disease; and (b) vaccines never offer fully protection to everybody, so if the disease is allowed to run rampant again then it would break through the protection offered by vaccines, presumably with a lower but still significant death toll.

[bhg481]

dave - mutation. The more people that have it, even without problems, gives the virus a chance to mutate and, possibly, create a version which is immune to the vaccine.

[emmie]

if we are all vaccinated and that seems unlikely - it doesn't mean there aren't going to be more illness, death from this deadly virus,

[mushroom25]

// if we are all vaccinated //

but we're not, and never will be. aside from the foil headed deniers, for whatever reason (distrust of government, distrust of vaccine, religious or cultural reasons, etc etc etc) many ethnic groups are shunning the vaccine.

[emmie]

thats what i said, its unlikely.....

[teacake44]

It keeps the cons mates in a lucrative business.

[dave50]

But we dont go to these lengths to protect people from flu so why is everyone still paranoid about this virus even after all the progress we have made?

[jim360]

It (probably) isn't a requirement to vaccinate everybody, by the way -- you just need to vaccinate enough, and hope that the disease doesn't mutate beyond the scope of it; perhaps also with reasonable border control policies to ensure that travellers need to demonstrate a negative test on arrival/departure, to reduce the possibility of variants arriving.

Regardless of the details, there's no reason to despair about never achieving a fully-vaccinated population, be it because of lack of resources or lack of compliance. Herd immunity is also a thing, and if you assume that the required threshold is in the region of 80%-90% then we are well on track to meet that in the coming months.