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Old May 20th 20, 05:16 PM posted to uk.transport.london
Recliner[_4_] Recliner[_4_] is offline
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Default Coronavirus: TfL reveals 20 busiest Tube and train

Recliner wrote:
tim... wrote:


"Recliner" wrote in message
...
tim... wrote:


"Recliner" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 19 May 2020 09:45:14 +0000 (UTC), wrote:

On Tue, 19 May 2020 08:25:34 -0000 (UTC)
Recliner wrote:
The 2m thing is like a religious prohibition: vaguely based on a
sensible

I hadn't thought of it like that, but it certainly matches peoples
behaviour.
Wierdly - assuming my local supermarket is typical - that behaviour is
forgotten in the aisles. Presumably because its almost impossible to
observe.

Tempting though it may be, most experts say we should not look for
individuals. Superspreading events are determined by a complex mix of
behavioural and environmental factors.

I wonder if its complex in reality. I imagine its the sort of people
who
wipe
their nose with their fingers then go and then go and touch a dozen
items
in
every shop they visit and hardly buy any of them just leaving them on
the
shelves nicely infected. Ditto when they touch the handles in buses and
trains.

In London, cases of coronavirus have dropped dramatically since the
lockdown. The superspreading events that were once spreading the virus
so
widely have now stopped.

I doubt they've stopped , far more likely IMO is that a significant
proportion
of the population have caught the virus without knowing it and are now
immune.

I think it's true that in London, most of the mobile population is now
either immune of not susceptible to the disease. I was in Waitrose
today, and everyone seemed more relaxed. Few of the staff were
bothering to wear the face shields they're supplied with, there was no
special sanitising of the trolley handles, and people got quite close
to each other in the aisles. There was also almost no queue to get in.

The few people with or susceptible to the disease in London are in
care homes or hospitals, and the task now is to stop it getting back
into the wider population.

though we are still getting 3,500 new cases every day

You're out by three orders of magnitude. The number of new cases a day in
London is probably now in single figures:


I mean in the whole country, and it's not the quantum that's the problem,
it's the fact that it has barely moved downwards from the peak, after 6
weeks of Lockdown (AIH it did yesterday)

I've argued before that a regional change in the rules is unfair and
unworkable, so the London number alone is IMHO not relevant


We already have regional variations in the rules, and will see more as
schools start going back. It's not only fair and workable, but is
inevitable.

The virus arrived first in London, which you might regard as unsporting
behaviour on its part, but nobody told it your rules. It had longer to
spread in London before the lockdown started, so London got hit harder and
earlier than anywhere else. It had a higher peak of excess deaths, and then
an earlier decline in new cases. The virus has now almost burned out in
London, but not in the north of England or Scotland, which are a few weeks
behind on the curve.

In fact, their curve was more squashed than London's, so they may need a
significantly longer total period of lockdown before the virus runs its
course. Remember, the lockdown isn't a cure; it's just a way of prolonging
the agony, and only justified to avoid overloading the NHS, which it did
very successfully, even in London.


Follow-up:

The number of new cases in London has now fallen to zero in a 24-hour
period:

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/coronavirus-cases-london-figures-decline-phe-a4446336.html