Coronavirus: General discussion (see opening post for rules)

[DJ-1701]

If instructed to close by central government, staying open will undoubtedly invalidate the school’s insurance.

 

This needs some thought!

 

Hmmm... makes things interesting for some of year rounders if they have to be 'closed' during Easter. Guess we would have to work from home, which would be a little ironic due to the lack of staff and one of the times of year we can get places to do stuff.

[paulkerton]

It appears that our school will do everything in their power to keep the school open, even if he government announces closures. So if the call is made, our students without symptoms are still expected to come in. Failing that, just year 11 students are expected to come in with a 'skeleton staff'.

 

That is one for the unions, I think!

I'm pretty sure that there is going to be closures very soon, followed by a decision over the Easter break as to what to do for the exams.

To be honest, Northern Ireland are indicating a 16 week closure is coming, so I wouldn't be surprised if that is what happens in the rest of the country, with some caveats on skeleton staffing for supporting parents in the emergency services, and then figuring out what to do about the GCSEs. I doubt they'll go ahead as planned, they've just got to decide if it's going to be delays or using the mocks as the final results.

Edited March 16, 2020 by paulkerton

[witch]

Sad news already for a local small business - one of our TAs does dog walking and boarding as her other job. I noticed her house is up for sale and she told me that the business has fallen off a cliff in the last month and she has very few bookings ahead. She has made a decision to shut the business as the insurance costs are huge.

[LeMarchand]

Hmmm... makes things interesting for some of year rounders if they have to be 'closed' during Easter. Guess we would have to work from home, which would be a little ironic due to the lack of staff and one of the times of year we can get places to do stuff.

 

Guess it depends on what the decision will be. If the main aim is just to keep the kids out, then I don't see why staff who don't need to be on childcare duties couldn't come in. I'd certainly like to get able to do some "holiday" jobs before the holidays.

 

OTH, it might be a complete and/or deep clean closure. I wonder if there will be temp cleaning jobs coming up - you could get paid twice by the same school!

[FishCustard]

I'm still skeptical that the UK Gov will close schools given their scientists' approach to things (note - I am in no way criticising this approach, nobody knows for sure what the best way to deal with COVID-19 is).

 

My main concern if they do, as you say, is supporting parents who work in the NHS and related services.

[localzuk]

given their scientists' approach to things

 

Not going to be political, but remember - scientists and advisers give options. They don't make the decision about which option the government choose. So, whilst scientists will then provide support for that option, it isn't "their approach" as such - it is the government's approach.

 

You can be 100% sure that the scientists advising the government gave them multiple ways of dealing with this, the government then chose the route they are taking based on their own perceived priorities - rightly or wrongly.

[paulkerton]

My main concern if they do, as you say, is supporting parents who work in the NHS and related services.

 

Absolutely. But there are certainly ways to keep schools open with skeleton staffing for this purpose and reducing exposure by allowing staff to cycle in and out, and reducing the spread between pupils due to fewer numbers.

Eventually, many parents are just going to do it anyway, and it's going to be very difficult to say to people shouldn't gather in social gatherings of 500 or more, but then suggest they send their child to a school which is open to 500 for a larger primary, or 1000 - 3000 for a secondary. I think closures are inevitable, and sooner than we all think, as statistics are showing that we're no more than 2 weeks behind Italy, not 4 as suggested last week.

Edited March 16, 2020 by paulkerton

[FishCustard]

Eventually, many parents are just going to do it anyway, and it's going to be very difficult to say to people shouldn't gather in social gatherings of 500 or more, but then suggest they send their child to a school which is open to 500 for a larger primary, or 1000 - 3000 for a secondary.

 

Fair point.

 

And agreed about case growth - never bet against the exponential function. Without locking everybody in their homes for twelve weeks, cases will continue to grow in the order of e^x.

[Dos_Box]

Thunderf00t has posted this up today. It has quite a lot of information in it and if anyone knows anyone who is in any doubt about the seriousness of this, you should send them the link:

 

 

TBH, I wouldn't be surprised if we don't hear about more serious measures being introduced this week.

[vikpaw]

So, we have 10 schools in Spain all affected, and 6 in the middle east. I'm not travelling and we're having meetings using Teams, but then that failed!!!

https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/16/21181300/microsoft-teams-down-outage-europe-remote-working-coronavirus

 

Thankfully, we have other VC options like BlueJeans, and a lot of schools use Google.

[jthompson]

Given that the current approach in this country is predicated on the assumption that the public won't have the appetite to stick to an extended lockdown, I wonder how much that might change as the public mood develops.

[Jamman960]

I'm starting to wonder how all of our virtual learning providers are going to cope, more or less all are now on cloud infrastructure which scales but surely there's only so much free capacity in the various cloud providers, they're going to be fighting for resources against Netflix etc, there are already reports of higher bandwidth usage in Italy due to people playing more Fortnite.

 

Showbie announced last week they'd give new customers unlimited licences until July and would give existing customers extra licences, the next day their platform couldn't cope with the load of their existing customers so have had to fall back to offering existing customers 5 extra licences, nothing free for new ones. Following this they've disabled various functions to cope with the higher loads.

 

James

[elsiegee40]

So much for the special offer! Not that I wanted more than 2 cans anyway.

[Theblacksheep]

Attendance at one of our schools today 72%

[Andrew_C]

I may be somewhat behind, but looking at the John Hopkins map, can anyone offer explanation as to why New York State is doing so much better at keeping victims alive when compared to Washington State?

 

12:43 on 16/3:-

NY - 746 cases, 6 deaths

Wash - 769 cases, 42 deaths

Edited March 16, 2020 by Andrew_C

[elsiegee40]

Thunderf00t has posted this up today. It has quite a lot of information in it and if anyone knows anyone who is in any doubt about the seriousness of this, you should send them the link:

 

 

TBH, I wouldn't be surprised if we don't hear about more serious measures being introduced this week.

 

This is really good!

[mikeprice]

I may be somewhat behind, but looking at the John Hopkins map, can anyone offer explanation as to why New York State is doing so much better at keeping victims alive when compared to Washington State?

 

12:43 on 16/3:-

NY - 746 cases, 6 deaths

Wash - 769 cases, 42 deaths

 

I would suggest that it is down to detection

 

probably Washington are not detecting as many cases

 

or possibly NY are not detecting all the deaths that have the virus but that is less likely

 

having said which the virus is not well understood so the experts are still trying to work out why the differences exist

 

e.g. it does not seem to be spreading in Africa in the way it is elsewhere - but no-one seems to know why

[FishCustard]

e.g. it does not seem to be spreading in Africa in the way it is elsewhere - but no-one seems to know why

 

Epidemiologists have some ideas: (a) Africa has lower population density on average, (b) Coronaviruses are fragile (as viruses go anyway), destroyed by heat and UV radiation, of which there will be more in equatorial regions.

[paulkerton]

I may be somewhat behind, but looking at the John Hopkins map, can anyone offer explanation as to why New York State is doing so much better at keeping victims alive when compared to Washington State?

 

12:43 on 16/3:-

NY - 746 cases, 6 deaths

Wash - 769 cases, 42 deaths

 

Washington State is the epicentre of where it all began in the US. In layman's terms (very layman) it's the equivalent of Italy for Europe. Didn't realise it was there until it was already upon it.

[pooley]

Attendance at one of our schools today 72%

 

 

64% in one of my primaries

[localzuk]

Epidemiologists have some ideas: (a) Africa has lower population density on average, (b) Coronaviruses are fragile (as viruses go anyway), destroyed by heat and UV radiation, of which there will be more in equatorial regions.

The density one doesn't particularly hold up too well, as populations in Africa are gathering in very tight areas - eg. Lagos, at nearly 7000 residents per sq km. London is about 4500 for comparison.

 

I think the heat may be more likely - temp in Africa is considerably higher than here 34 degrees C in Lagos right now. The big question will be when it switches - we'll have the warmer weather, they'll be in winter.

[paulkerton]

Epidemiologists have some ideas: (a) Africa has lower population density on average, (b) Coronaviruses are fragile (as viruses go anyway), destroyed by heat and UV radiation, of which there will be more in equatorial regions.

 

This is one of the reasons why they think the peak will hit in late April and then we will see a drop off into June and July, due to longer hours of sun, and more powerful UV radiation in June and July.

Of course, when the UV and sunlight recedes, we need to be even more vigilant that we don't see another outbreak.

[FishCustard]

The density one doesn't particularly hold up too well, as populations in Africa are gathering in very tight areas - eg. Lagos, at nearly 7000 residents per sq km. London is about 4500 for comparison.

 

I think the heat may be more likely - temp in Africa is considerably higher than here 34 degrees C in Lagos right now. The big question will be when it switches - we'll have the warmer weather, they'll be in winter.

 

Is it that high already? I knew urbanisation was accelerating, but that quickly? Makes sense though...

 

Yeah, the heat is the key factor I think. Consensus is that's what did for SARS in 2003. As you say though, places like South Africa and Australasia will just be getting to the worst of it...

[paulkerton]

I think the heat may be more likely - temp in Africa is considerably higher than here 34 degrees C in Lagos right now. The big question will be when it switches - we'll have the warmer weather, they'll be in winter.

 

Well your example for Lagos isn't great for the weather and UV comparison, and they have roughly similar daylight hours all year around, and roughly the same temperature all year around!

But yeah, South Africa would be an interesting one to watch.

[localzuk]

Is it that high already? I knew urbanisation was accelerating, but that quickly? Makes sense though...

 

Yeah, the heat is the key factor I think. Consensus is that's what did for SARS in 2003. As you say though, places like South Africa and Australasia will just be getting to the worst of it...

 

The Chinese belt and road initiative has sped a lot of development up in some areas of Africa, absolutely. 472m people of Sub Saharan Africa's 1bn live in urban areas now and predicted to grow by 65m per year (which is insane). So, yeah density there is quite extreme in places.

 

The problem will be during their winter, they're gonna get hit hard and even with the urbanisation, they don't have the health systems to cope yet (I mean, we don't either).

 

Well your example for Lagos isn't great for the weather and UV comparison, and they have roughly similar daylight hours all year around, and roughly the same temperature all year around!

But yeah, South Africa would be an interesting one to watch.

True... It'll be the more southern countries that will hurt.