New 4-tier system for England

[brad465]

I'm sure COVID19 has been having a wail of a time this past week! So I would expect a national level 4 lockdown (whatever that may mean) in January as cases start to sky rocket.

If it wasn't for having to get the Brexit deal through Parliament, among other ratification means, it probably would already have been announced now. Either that or they are waiting for the Oxford Vaccine approval to announce both at once. Any new lockdown announcement should also come with a plan for getting restrictions lifted based on vaccination levels and/or infection rates to inspire confidence in the population and allow for better scrutiny (although not getting my hopes up such a plan will be released).

 

[Cdd89]

having no takeaways would really really suck. I don't like ready meals and don't always have time to cook.

I agree, though remember that takeaways/deliveries were permitted under the March lockdown (widely regarded as the most severe) - even though fairly few restaurants took up the option that early - so it would take a deliberate action to ban it.

 

[hwl]

If it wasn't for having to get the Brexit deal through Parliament, among other ratification means, it probably would already have been announced now. Either that or they are waiting for the Oxford Vaccine approval to announce both at once. Any new lockdown announcement should also come with a plan for getting restrictions lifted based on vaccination levels and/or infection rates to inspire confidence in the population and allow for better scrutiny (although not getting my hopes up such a plan will be released).

Restrictions lifting - They would base it on case rates and NHS capacity / functionality (i.e. ability to deal with non-Covid patients) rather than vaccination rates.

As Gove said earlier they are going for progressive lifting.

 

[yorksrob]

Restrictions lifting - They would base it on case rates and NHS capacity / functionality (i.e. ability to deal with non-Covid patients) rather than vaccination rates.

As Gove said earlier they are going for progressive lifting.

Thats fine, as long as they start progressing soon. And hospitality isn't given the crappy end of the stick again and made to wait after everything else
.

 

[Envy123]

I agree, though remember that takeaways/deliveries were permitted under the March lockdown (widely regarded as the most severe) - even though fairly few restaurants took up the option that early - so it would take a deliberate action to ban it.

Also, considering that relying upon deliveries actually had me stay at home when I work from home. Without them, I'd have to go to the supermarket, which is not ideal for me or for the government!

 

[7 Ingleborough]

Thats fine, as long as they start progressing soon. And hospitality isn't given the crappy end of the stick again and made to wait after everything else
.

Nearly 20,500 admissions with covid in just England and Wales, ICUs at capacity in many areas, and at the highest highest it's been since the start of all this, as of this morning. In addition staff sickness in the NHS is soaring again. I don't think you will get your wish.

 

[yorksrob]

Nearly 20,500 admissions with covid in just England and Wales, ICUs at capacity in many areas, and at the highest highest it's been since the start of all this, as of this morning. In addition staff sickness in the NHS is soaring again. I don't think you will get your wish.

Yet wherever I look on the BBC website, I can't find the page that allows one to look up ones local infection rate.

Still stuck on Thursday.

 

[7 Ingleborough]

If it wasn't for having to get the Brexit deal through Parliament, among other ratification means, it probably would already have been announced now. Either that or they are waiting for the Oxford Vaccine approval to announce both at once. Any new lockdown announcement should also come with a plan for getting restrictions lifted based on vaccination levels and/or infection rates to inspire confidence in the population and allow for better scrutiny (although not getting my hopes up such a plan will be released).

It's going to be a race. We are ready to deploy to mass vaccination centres as soon as the UK vaccine is authorised. The Phizer vaccine is not suitable outside facilities with the refrigeration facilities. The transport kits supplied to keep these doses cool enough are too small to carry the numbers of doses required. The plans are for 110,000 a week through the Bristol facility, plus all GP surgeries are co-operating to get as many patients through as possible at their own sites.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 28 Dec 2020 ==

Yet wherever I look on the BBC website, I can't find the page that allows one to look up ones local infection rate.

Still stuck on Thursday.

Cell EV90 , actually it's for England only, does not include Wales.

https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/12/COVID-19-daily-admissions-and-beds-20201228.xlsx

 

[yorksrob]

It's going to be a race. We are ready to deploy to mass vaccination centres as soon as the UK vaccine is authorised. The Phizer vaccine is not suitable outside facilities with the refrigeration facilities. The transport kits supplied to keep these doses cool enough are too small to carry the numbers of doses required. The plans are for 110,000 a week through the Bristol facility, plus all GP surgeries are co-operating to get as many patients through as possible at their own sites.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 28 Dec 2020 ==


Cell EV90 , actually it's for England only, does not include Wales.

https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/12/COVID-19-daily-admissions-and-beds-20201228.xlsx

That's no use to me, I don't have microsoft office.

 

[Domh245]

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ is the more useful (and whole) data including that NHS spreadsheet in a more accessible form

edit: healthcare is updated less frequently, however given the original question was about the local infection (positive case) rate, this is definitely the more useful

 

[yorksrob]

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ is the more useful (and whole) data including that NHS spreadsheet in a more accessible form

edit: healthcare is updated less frequently, however given the original question was about the local infection (positive case) rate, this is definitely the more useful

Ah thanks. That seems to follow on from what the BBC usually publish.

 

[7 Ingleborough]

That's no use to me, I don't have microsoft office.

Neither do I. Bog standard chromebook with no additional software installed. But most people should be able to view it and scroll it.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Nearly 20,500 admissions with covid in just England and Wales, ICUs at capacity in many areas, and at the highest highest it's been since the start of all this, as of this morning. In addition staff sickness in the NHS is soaring again. I don't think you will get your wish.

Mechanical ventilation is substantially lower than March/April actually but the easier to administer Oxygen support is majority of ICU cases. The real issue though is average stay per case is 10-14 days now with better treatments so bed turnover is very slow and at 2k + cases/day all hospitals will be overwhelmed unless admission rates are slowed. What is clear is London should have been in tier 3 after lockdown 2 but they shyed away from that but I do feel they now realise half hearted measures are futile now so full lockdown 3 here we come when new tiers are announced on 30th. They also need to be much more forthright about how critical things are getting. Only tonight my wifes nurse friend who is in a London hospital has been told all leave cancelled and a call for staff to work longer shifts and rest days now as resources are critical.

 

[bspahh]

My favourite source for a breakdown of Covid cases by local authority is

Public COVID-19 Data Table: Lower Tier Regional Breakdown

docs.google.com

Its a Google Sheet with three tabs. The first has a summary of the new cases by region. The second has a table with each local authority and columns with the number of new cases that day, in the last week etc. The third tab also shows a bar chart for each local authority.

It usually gets updated with that days' figures about 6-7pm by https://twitter.com/LawrenceGilder

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Ah thanks. That seems to follow on from what the BBC usually publish.

Other way round; that's the page the BBC seems to get their data from - even showing screenshots of it on the main news when it's been published late and only minutes before the news goes on air ( usually broadcast at 18.00, whereas the data is normally published at 16.00 )

 

[yorksrob]

Other way round; that's the page the BBC seems to get their data from - even showing screenshots of it on the main news when it's been published late and only minutes before the news goes on air ( usually broadcast at 18.00, whereas the data is normally published at 16.00 )

Ah thanks. I wonder why the BEEB's stuck on Thursday.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Ah thanks. I wonder why the BEEB's stuck on Thursday.

Nobody around to update the website, maybe?

 

[yorksrob]

Nobody around to update the website, maybe?

Perhaps.

 

[Class 33]

Someone here commented that the origin of Tier 5 being possibly introduced, was just someone on Twitter mentioning it and word spreading. But now the press and media are all over it that Tier 5 could be introduced this week with even tougher measures. Has anyone from the cabinet actually said that Tier 5 with tougher measures are being considered?? Because it seems the press and media come up with speculation like this, and then it goes and fuels and influences the governments decisions and then these things actually happen! And if Tier 5 does get introduced this week, will it then be Tier 6 introduced next week and Tier 7 the week after? This is beyond a joke now.

Speculation also growing that the whole country could be put into Tier 4. Why?? Especially for some areas which still have infections rate of less than 200 per 100,000. Or yet another full national lockdown again, barely a month after the last one finished!! Absolutely ridiculous. We can't keep going in and out of full national lockdowns! IF there is to be another one, then this really will have to be the very last one now. With vaccinations being ramped up, hospitalisations and deaths should really start plummeting by the end of next month, and it can't come soon enough.

We'll have to see what is announced in tomorrow afternoon's Downing Street press conference. If it's announced that Whitty and Vallance will be there, you can get that it's going to be bad news.

Hopefully the title of this thread won't have to be changed to "New 5 Tier system for England"!!!

 

[Skimpot flyer]

We went for a drive up to Norfolk on Christmas Day and saw the same - every road sign was either displaying something akin to “essential journeys only”, or “tier 4 rules apply from 26th Dec”.

Whilst absolutely not busy compared to a normal non-Covid Friday, the roads certainly were busier than one might have found on Christmas Day a decade or more ago. No visible police presence that we could see.

I saw a “stay at home protect the NHS” sign in London today too. I suppose that is in line with tier 4. At least there aren’t the rather threatening “obey the rules or move to a higher tier” ones seen over the last couple of months. These always reminded me of scattergun management.

As I keep pointing out, some bus shelters in Brighton have been running the government’s ‘Stay home. Save Lives. Protect the NHS’ message CONTINUOUSLY on digital advertising since April. It has never changed. Why ???

 

[duncanp]

Someone here commented that the origin of Tier 5 being possibly introduced, was just someone on Twitter mentioning it and word spreading. But now the press and media are all over it that Tier 5 could be introduced this week with even tougher measures. Has anyone from the cabinet actually said that Tier 5 with tougher measures are being considered?? Because it seems the press and media come up with speculation like this, and then it goes and fuels and influences the governments decisions and then these things actually happen! And if Tier 5 does get introduced this week, will it then be Tier 6 introduced next week and Tier 7 the week after? This is beyond a joke now.

Speculation also growing that the whole country could be put into Tier 4. Why?? Especially for some areas which still have infections rate of less than 200 per 100,000. Or yet another full national lockdown again, barely a month after the last one finished!! Absolutely ridiculous. We can't keep going in and out of full national lockdowns! IF there is to be another one, then this really will have to be the very last one now. With vaccinations being ramped up, hospitalisations and deaths should really start plummeting by the end of next month, and it can't come soon enough.

We'll have to see what is announced in tomorrow afternoon's Downing Street press conference. If it's announced that Whitty and Vallance will be there, you can get that it's going to be bad news.

I was thinking the same - it is almost as if someone has an agenda to ramp up the level of fear in the general population, and to try and scare the government into taking more and more restrictive measures.

Already, we are hearing that "SAGE scientists" are saying that tier FIVE will "not be enough to contain a devastating third wave of the virus" and that we need to "ramp up vaccinations to 2 million per week" in order to keep the "R" rate below 1.

What gives me hope is that the whole tier system comes up for renewal in parliament on January 27th. If, as seems almost inevitable, the whole of England is in Tier 4 by then, I would like to think that MPs will stand up and demand, as a condition of renewing the tier system:-

• Clear and unambiguous criteria for moving up and down the tiers
• A roadmap for the progressive and permanent removal of restrictions, including criteria and timescales
• Any scientific advice given to the government by SAGE is independently peer reviewed before it is used to inform decisions

I am not confident that any of this will happen, but another factor is what happens in other countries, especially our closest neighbours in Europe. If, for example, France re-opens non essential shops, restaurants and bars, and nothing bad happens, there is less of a justification for keeping these settings closed in the UK.

 

[nlogax]

'Tier 5' is a social media construct, inspired by needless panic, latched onto by traditional media and then amplified once more by social media.

I can well imagine even tougher restrictions could crash down upon us in the new year but unless / until someone in government specifically proposes a tier 5 then it's a work of fiction.

 

[DustyBin]

'Tier 5' is a social media construct, inspired by needless panic, latched onto by traditional media and then amplified once more by social media.

I can well imagine even tougher restrictions could crash down upon us in the new year but unless / until someone in government specifically proposes a tier 5 then it's a work of fiction.

Hopefully you’re right, however this is generally how we first hear about new restrictions so I wouldn’t rule it out....

 

[Richard Scott]

Hopefully you’re right, however this is generally how we first hear about new restrictions so I wouldn’t rule it out....

Seems to me that tier 1 and 2 will almost disappear so still have three tiers just more severe, lockdown by stealth? Thought the initial idea of three tiers was to make it simpler? I have no idea of what is/isn't allowed in any of them and, to be honest, have no intention of finding out.

 

[nlogax]

Seems to me that tier 1 and 2 will almost disappear so still have three tiers just more severe, lockdown by stealth? Thought the initial idea of three tiers was to make it simpler? I have no idea of what is/isn't allowed in any of them and, to be honest, have no intention of finding out.

I forgot what each tier allows and doesn’t allow way before Christmas. It’s made for a couple of awkward moments when planning social stuff with friends as so little of it makes sense to me, and my friends seem way more on top of the rules than I am.

 

[Kite159]

A couples prediction if "Tier 5" actually comes to fruition:
A lot tougher on shops/cafes with the definition of "essential" better defined. Similar to the level of shop opening last March/April time. No Click/Collect offered.
More pointless restrictions on what you can leave the house for, outdoor exercise limited to X miles from your address
No meeting others outside.

As for the rest of the country joining the South East in tier 4, personally I'm expecting it to get announced tomorrow or on Thursday. I would imagine some landlords of pubs in tier 2 areas are dreading the announcement.

 

[duncanp]

A couples prediction if "Tier 5" actually comes to fruition:
A lot tougher on shops/cafes with the definition of "essential" better defined. Similar to the level of shop opening last March/April time. No Click/Collect offered.
More pointless restrictions on what you can leave the house for, outdoor exercise limited to X miles from your address
No meeting others outside.

As for the rest of the country joining the South East in tier 4, personally I'm expecting it to get announced tomorrow or on Thursday. I would imagine some landlords of pubs in tier 2 areas are dreading the announcement.

I am not sure that there will be a ban on click and collect in Tier 5.

There is very little risk involved in someone turning up at a prearranged time to collect something that they have ordered on line.

But, there again, since when was logic and common sense involved in decisions related to tiering and COVID.

Tier 5 is more likely to involve closure of places of worship, restrictions on the rules for outdoor exercise, some partial closures of schools and universities, putting the guidance on travelling outside your local area into law, a complete ban on household mixing whether indoors or outdoors, closure of certain businesses which can currently open in tier 4 (golf courses, outdoor gyms and swimming pools, outdoor playgrounds).

I rather doubt whether any of these rules will have a significant effect.

But they are something, and we must be seen to be doing something in response to the more than 50,000 cases that were announced today.

 

[Kite159]

Isn't it Northern Ireland which has banned click & collect with their latest lockdown rules?

 

[geoffk]

Restrictions lifting - They would base it on case rates and NHS capacity / functionality (i.e. ability to deal with non-Covid patients) rather than vaccination rates.

As Gove said earlier they are going for progressive lifting.

I'm hoping to get the vaccine in February. Is there any evidence that being vaccinated means you cannot still carry the virus to someone else? If so, and I have a piece of paper confirming I've been vaccinated, I can then disregard all lockdown restrictions!

 

[Domh245]

I'm hoping to get the vaccine in February. Is there any evidence that being vaccinated means you cannot still carry the virus to someone else? If so, and I have a piece of paper confirming I've been vaccinated, I can then disregard all lockdown restrictions!

Nope, no evidence that it does reduce transmission, so you'll need to continue to follow all lockdown restrictions, including isolating if told to by track & trace (or similar)

Even if it is proven to limit transmission, I'd hope that they won't allow for a two tier system for the vaccinated and unvaccinated in terms of following restrictions. Then again maybe they will, as one of the underlying themes of this whole pandemic has been "screw the young for the old's benefit"..