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One of the other explanations for the lower death rate in Russia is that they have been doing extensive testing according to Alexander Mercouris.
In Russia, where testing has been very extensive (4.1 million tests up to May 3 in a country with a total population of 144.5 million, with numbers of tests currently in a range of 120,000 and 180,000 a day) the percentage of persons detected in a typical day who are infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus, but who are not ill with Covid-19, is in the range of 40-50 percent. Many of these persons do eventually fall ill with Covid-19, so the actual percentage infected who do not become ill with Covid-19 is lower.
Widespread testing can decrease the death rate only when those who test positive are quarantined. So widespread testing plus quarantine decreases the death rate by lowering R.
However, widespread testing with or without quarantine does lower the Case Fatality Rate or CFR by finding a higher proportion of the infectees, thus increasing the number of confirmed cases.
SA and Clark,
You are both correct on russia’s current situation. We do mass testing and we do quarantine.
Current figures are here, 6.9 million testing done up to today
https://xn--80aesfpebagmfblc0a.xn--p1ai/On quarantine, we discussed recently with my sister who lives in Moscow. She is a teacher, thus she is keeping connected to social life even when quarantined. We still educate our children with school programmes by Internet here in Russia.
Well, we talked about lockdown and discussed if it is necessary at all. Ann says directly: “(low mortality tall in China and Russia) ’cause people trust their government. They were told to stay home, they were told BY STATE, to stay home, that’s why they DO stay at home.” And when I tried to debate this was rather totalitarian decision, she and my husband unanimously said ” history proves that people, if they have too much freedoms, then they start – khm, i try to voice it in a polite manner – if people are given too much freedom, then they start *sorry* f@ck each other in the *sorry* butt”.
Actually, I agree to some extent, that some parts of society put their desire above the wishes, needs and necessities of the rest. But, on the other hand, I can’t see the balance option, I can’t see which way would please everyone.
So far, I prefer this approach – let’s stay quarantined until the things clear up. I mean, the virus is new, it is simply reasonable to take precautions until we know for sure what we are getting in touch with.In France today more than twice as many people died as were newly found to be infected with covid-19
this seems like good news.
They are coming out the end of their tunnel.Tatyana, no apology necessary as far as I’m concerned; I’m a Derek and Clive fan!
Derek & Clive – ‘Non Stop Dancer’ / ‘My Mum Song’ from the album Come Again
Tatyana, do you know if the test kits are manufactured in Russia? The problem here seems to be that the UK can no longer manufacture anything – except high-tech weaponry to sell to Saudi Arabia of course. It seems we can’t even make masks any more; just a bit of fabric and some elastic.
Clark, yes we do it ourselves. I know that the team visited China to learn about the new virus and to get samples. Then, government facilitated licencig procedure to get tests as soon as possible. It is PCR test, so we only needed samples and reagents, so we obtained samples and we produce reagents. And they also authorised several private commercial clinics to do testing and published the list of them, thus anyone may go and get tested for rather modest sum of about 2000 roubles, in case they want to know.
Is all the testing commercial, or is there a government programme too? And if there’s a government programme, do the public have to pay for those tests?
I feel ashamed to be English. So many people commenting here seem to think that there is no such thing as science. I am 57; it didn’t seem like this when I was younger, it seems to have happened in the 2000s onward. I don’t understand where such ignorance came from. I suppose it must be born of suspicion, because of distortion in the media to justify the wars for oil in the Middle East, and the grotesque imbalance of wealth. Though I should add, a few of those grotesquely rich people are Russians!
I’m rambling. The denial of science makes no sense to me; I can’t imagine how the deniers explain technology to themselves. Technology has advanced almost beyond recognition in my lifetime, so someone must be researching to achieve the advances upon which this is based. It is surreal; I can sit here at home exchanging text with you, a Russian in Russia, and we can exchange our experiences of the pandemic. From the perspective of my youth, that would have been unthinkable, both technically and politically, yet here we are, our computers communicating by a shared protocol that is fully published, nothing secret about it at all. Yet to my compatriots that is not even a mystery, it is apparently just another product, something they don’t need to think about because it is just something they buy, and therefore they expect it to work, without any thought or involvement from them… Have they no curiosity? I couldn’t be satisfied to think I was surrounded by a sort of commercial magic.
My government can’t make tests, it can’t even make masks. If it wasn’t so arrogant and aggressive, it could simply ask to buy some from Russia; instead it sends the samples to the USA to get them tested there! Yet my nearest town is Chelmsford where Marconi made radios, I live just three miles from were the first scheduled public radio transmissions were broadcast, from a wooden shed in Writtle. It has been moved to a museum a few miles away, but I know where it was and when people visit me I take them to the site. Radio! which has done so much to connect all humanity! Yet I am disconnected from people right next to me by their ignorance of science; many seem to think I must be either an agent of an international conspiracy, or so feeble minded that I’ll believe everything the politicians tell me on television. At least I know how the damn television works.
Bless you Tatyana, for being a friend across these thousands of miles.
And thank you to the moderators for correcting my errors of memory.
The PCR test is something that is easy to develop in any university and many NHS and biological labs. Because it relys on cycles of amplification and high sensitivity contamination and cross reaction with similar molecules have to be guarded for and the test thoroughly validated. But PCR tests are easier to develop than antibody tests and can be scaled up quickly. I am not quite sure what the government has by way of facilities to produce and scale up PCR testing, but it would have been up something like Public Health England to seek to get these facilities up and running and that would have meant that there would have been an executive, or even a political direction to do so.
I remember that in the early days of the pandemic some universities and research institutions in the US wanted to roll out testing but prevented from doing so by government. It really seems a political more than a logistic problem.
The same sort of obstruction seems to have happened with contact tracing. This is a well established way that is used for example to trace outbreaks of drug resistant TB or other infectious disease. This needs a local network of people trained to do so. I think we are currently not well placed to do contact tracing despite three months or more of notice. Again this is a political decision. When the government hides behind: ‘we are guided by the science’ they are really talking a lot of crap and is a code for avoiding blame for the very political decisions they have taken.Clark,
Is all the testing commercial, or is there a government programme too? And if there’s a government programme, do the public have to pay for those tests?
Sure, there’s state programme, free testing, as all vital medicine in my country. They do tests and computer tomography and whatever doctor considers necessary – for those people who have signs of the disease.
It works like that: you call the “hot line” and report you have signs of the virus. A medical crew in protective suits arrives at your home and examines you, takes material for analysis, if necessary they may bring you to a CT scan of the lungs, or they can hospitalize you.
If the symptoms are non-dangerous they prescribe you to stay home, isolated. When the results of the test are ready they call you back and inform of the result. If positive and the manifestations of the disease are slight, then you get official paper notice and you should stay at home. Doctors call these patients daily and patients report their temperature and overall state of health.
The official paper also obligates you to install the monitoring app in your phone and confirm that you are staying at home and observing quarantine, by the app reminder (usually send your photo). Also, the official notice reminds you that you are responsible for the spread of the epidemic, and if you are careless and infect people with a fatal outcome, you can be prosecuted. When you have 2 negative test results, you are considered ‘cured’ and you report it back to the… actually I don’t know whom they report back… and uninstall the app.
It’s great to have a commercial alternative, in case you have no symptoms, and you’d like to do a test just to be sure. There must be a lot of people who want to do it. That’s why my government published a list of authorized labs, to prevent scam testing.
Moscow started mass testing on May 15, this programme is Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)
https://www.rbc.ru/society/14/05/2020/5ebd51f99a7947173a1c5b3e“Every few days approximately 70 thousand Muscovites will receive an invitation to donate blood.
“The selection of residents will be carried out randomly in accordance with the age structure of the population of Moscow and taking into account the district of residence, and invitations will be sent by e-mail or via SMS,” – the mayor said.Those who receive such an invitation will need to register for blood donation online. Testing results will be summed up every week and will be published on the city site. Everyone who passes the tests will be separately informed about their result.”
Well, for the sake of justice and balanced view, it’s necessary to mention that in which my government is crap.
Putin promised additional payments to medics, but they did not receive them. There were a number of protests about this. As it turned out from the texts of government orders, it was formulated incorrectly and a dumb bureaucratic calculation was applied, while Putin ordered just to give money to people. I followed the development of this situation and frankly, I am glad I confirmed again my opinion, expressed once upon a time on this site:
Putin is doing well, he understands the life and the needs of the Russians, and therefore deservedly has the support of the majority. The problem is in the bureaucratic system, with stupid incompetent and cowardly people, who also often turn out to be greedy.Tatyana and SA, thank you both for information.
Hello, Clark, my fractal friend 🙂 found this piece of hahaha and thought you’d like it! That’s very russian humor, you giggle and nearly cry at the same time.
—
Doctor:
– This mouse is definitely very happy to participate in the vaccine research”
😀
Thanks for complimenting me on my Gravatar. It’s quite grainy; I must plot a better one sometime, and integrate an XR symbol into it.
Here’s a good site I found:
Done properly, restrictions need last only five weeks.
The number of people world wide who now find themselves without work is huge.
Some also find getting hold of food a problem.
The Prince of Wales is begging out of work people to become pickers on the land, like the Women in the Second World War.Unemployment in U.K. is sky-rocketing because of Lock-Down.
Employment and money can be reorganised; they’re human creations. They were completely reorganised for WWII. Employment needs to be reorganised anyway to hinder the spread of covid-19.
Eran Yashiv: how to reopen society more quickly
The more cases there are of covid-19, the more chances we give it to evolve. We don’t even know if you can catch the current strains again, after say a year, because it hasn’t existed that long. If you can catch it again, the second bout might be worse, like dengue fever. Or maybe you can’t make a vaccine against it, like HIV. We don’t know our enemy yet.
We should stamp it out, like we did smallpox. We could do it in five weeks if only we’d cooperate. Instead I keep hearing people say we should give up and let it multiply, cripple, kill and evolve.
Social distancing in the US in the 1918 – 1920 flu pandemic:
– Philadelphia waited eight days after their death rate began to take off before banning gatherings and closing schools. They endured the highest peak death rate of all cities studied. 748 deaths per 100,000.
– After relaxing social distancing measures, San Francisco faced a long second wave of deaths. 673 deaths per 100,000.
– New York City began quarantine measures very early — 11 days before the death rate spiked. The city had the lowest death rate on the Eastern Seaboard. 452 deaths per 100,000.
As Skawkbox article linked by Clark is spot on. I have always believed that the government has never abandoned the policy of herd immunity just stopped talking about it, It explains the way that they have behaved throughout, abandoning early testing in the community, not providing PPE, ignoring the care homes, and the half hearted ‘lock down’ which has effectively been diluted further..
But I also do not understand why the basics of public health measures used for combatting epidemics have been abandoned for the sake of listening to non-medical experts with their modelling fetishes. This has detracted from real science I am afraid, and that is why the medical advice has been so sidelined and so shambolic.
For what is essentially a respiratory virus, the emphasis from the outset has been on hand washing. OK that is important but only as secondary to limiting the virus leaving the respiratory passages and landing on an object. The fact that masks can also do this also by preventing wider spread of aerosols has been ignored and when debated, has been even suggested to be possibly dangerous because you can touch your g=face more. What a moronic excuse, if you have already washed your hands you can touch your face if you want!!!!
Then there is this idiotic phrase: test track and isolate, which should revert to its original proper form of the purpose of widespread testing and contact tracing, which is to QUARANTINE, I am sorry I have to shout, but self isolation and quarantining are two different animals altogether. A quarantined person is totally isolated and cared for by people who must themselves be protected with PPE and totally looked after for FOURTEEN DAYS, yes that is right 14 DAYS.
I think that the scientific community especially the scientific advisors to the government are complicit in this, maybe indirectly, because they have been told that there is no money for PPE and there is no money for providing proper quarantine facilities.SA, yes, quarantine is the proper medical term.
And yes, the proper medical procedure of enforcing quarantine should have been the default position from the start.
I disagree that modelling is not proper science. Computer software is an instrument for applied mathematicians. Just as telescopes extended astronomy and microscopes extended biology into hitherto unreachable domains, computers with software extended mathematics into the hitherto unreachable domain of non-linear equations – which are the vast majority of equations, just as microorganisms comprise the vast majority of life and invisible stars and galaxies comprise by far most of the universe.
However I agree that modelling has been overly promoted, and I think this is all part of the government’s covert “herd immunity” plan. Models become essential only beyond the point where the epidemic has got out of control. You don’t need models when you have some hundreds of infectees, all in quarantine, and few new infections each day among non-quarantined society that can be traced. Modelling becomes essential only if you’re trying to hold the infection rate at a manageable level compatible with not overwhelming the healthcare system.
I have been glad of the ICL model because it reveals the daily infection rates and the total infected so far. It has done a very well at that, as is now being confirmed by large-scale antibody studies. But such a tool should never have become essential; had the epidemic been handled properly those figures would have been a simple matter of counting.
Note also that the ICL model requires daily death figures as an input. It’s a macabre retroscope; by examining recent deaths it tells us where we were two weeks ago. But such models are the only way to see that.
Clark
You sort of confirm what I meant to say but perhaps didn’t verbalise it clearly.
The modelling has taken forefront to the tried and tested ways of dealing with epidemics and pandemics. I remember clearly the government clearly staring at the outset that they discarded some options such as closing down major events such as football matches because the models said they would only produce a minimal effect on reducing infection. Now anyone can see that this is crap but because the modellers imputed crap, crap came out.
Up to 60m people will be pushed into “extreme poverty” by the coronavirus warns the president of the World Bank.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52733706
Millions of people in the U.K. are also moving into a state of joblesness and poverty, directly because of Lock-Down.
Some people will top themselves, many will lose everything, including their homes.The collateral deaths from Covid-19 are an inevitable part of any pandemic and must be thought of for planning and that is a political decision.
If the lockdown was a proper lockdown with widespread testing and proper quarantine as happened in China and South Korea and also in some European countries like Austria and Czechia, this could have been ameliorated. But it is cloud and cuckoo land to say that in the long term you would get overall less death by not having a lockdown at all as some seem to have advocated.I would say it is obvious there would, in the long term, in the U.K. be more deaths over that normally expected, with or without Lock-Down.
What Lock-Down will do is bring death and destruction of the economy
and with that the blight of unemployment and destitution on a scale not seen since The Great Depression.
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