Government xxxx ups

[TRINITY]

2 minutes ago, Retsdon said:

. But the thing is, it's doubtful that the UK - particularly England and Wales - still has sufficient local public health staff and infrastructure still standing to  undertake any such testing regime. Decades of budget cuts have seen to that. So I think this aversion to testing isn't so much a policy so much as it is a matter of trying to make a virtue of a necessity. Even if they wanted to it can't be done.

Not often I agree with much you say but you are right in this post. I would also go a bit further ,in that budget cuts in part must be considered. However the main reason is that we have become nothing more than a service economy and have lost most of our ability to supply our needs. When extreme circumstances such as this virus come along it shows how totally I'll prepared we are to deal with anything out of the ordinary.

[Raja Clavata]

Just now, Retsdon said:

Well, this is the thing. Once you abandon the idea of mass testing you no longer have any idea how many people are infected -or in what locality - other than a guesstimate by the numbers pitching up at hospitals. So how can you plan anything such as when or where to lift a lockdown? It's impossible to formulate coherent policy in an informational void. It simply can't be done. But the thing is, it's doubtful that the UK - particularly England and Wales - still has sufficient local public health staff and infrastructure still standing to  undertake any such testing regime. Decades of budget cuts have seen to that. So I think this aversion to testing isn't so much a policy so much as it is a matter of trying to make a virtue of a necessity. Even if they wanted to it can't be done.

Preaching to the choir 👍

The thing is I'm hearing Boris doesn't want to relax the lockdown because he fears a second wave - without mass testing I don't see any credible way to avoid that, getting data at the point where people roll up at hospital is too late and no basis for control. So we either stay in lockdown until a vaccine arrives or something changes or we just cycle between bringing the thing under control and risking running the NHS into the ground through over-demand. None of this is a credible strategy. Mass testing provides a closed loop control mechanism, our current testing is like a bang-bang controller taking an unpredictable path between the upper and lower limits == chaos (and lots more deaths).

If this is really the strategy then they might have been better off going with the herd immunity, 250k+ dead including a load of collateral damage but at least over with quickly and then allowed us to get on with life.

The problem is the self-appointed government spin doctors here refuse to listen, we're not towing the party line therefore we are troublemakers. I'm many things, a lemming isn't one of them...

I can only assume it's fear that is blocking rational thought here.

[Walker570]

I know, why don't you all get up to Downing Street and offer to take over, because I am sure you could make a better job.  Boris has just cheated death and the left wing press and their acolights are moaning because he misses a meeting. I see that useless paper hat Blair has stuck his head above the parapet again spouting is smart alec mouth off.  The big problem is the left wing unions destroyed any chance of the UK producing anyhting itself so it all went abroad. Now we find we are incapable of actually making stuff again.

[Retsdon]

14 minutes ago, Raja Clavata said:

is like a bang-bang controller

I had to look that one up! 😁

[Raja Clavata]

Just now, Walker570 said:

I know, why don't you all get up to Downing Street and offer to take over, because I am sure you could make a better job.  Boris has just cheated death and the left wing press and their acolights are moaning because he misses a meeting. I see that useless paper hat Blair has stuck his head above the parapet again spouting is smart alec mouth off.  The big problem is the left wing unions destroyed any chance of the UK producing anyhting itself so it all went abroad. Now we find we are incapable of actually making stuff again.

I seem to remember quite a few on here suggesting they could do a better job than Mrs May a while back.

Your argument would resonate better with me if you didn't politicise it - nobody gives a damn about Blair, Corbyn or Abbott any more - old news.

Regarding your final sentence, sorry but wrong, we are capable of making pretty much anything but not normally at a competitive price compared to overseas alternatives.

[grrclark]

Such a shame that so many commentators from PW dont put themselves up for election, by all the evidence exhibited in these forum posts we would have been in a much better place had they been in public office.

Only problem is that half the commentators who are boldy proclaiming their "foresight" about what they "would" have done can barely structure a sentence, yet still apparently consider themselves a master planner.

I really despair at reading so many of these comments, even the ones that are written well.

I say this knowng a few folk that are atually invloved in the planning and response to this crisis at a national level, not politicians, but those embedded in the supply chains in both the demand and supply sides and the amount of work that has been done at pace and scale over the last 3 months has been extraordinary, as is the work that is currently ongoing, yet of course every man and their dog looking on from the outside can always do better with what seems to be absolutely no understanding or comprehension of the scale of activity involved.

I have used the example before in another post, but the demand for 1 item of PPE, disposable face masks, in Scotland in response to Covid19 is 4100 time higher than normal.

Please somebody name me any supply chain process for any product anywhere that factors in a contingency immediate demand factor for an unknown event that is 4100 times higher than normal.  That is just Scotland and just for the NHS.  Take that demand factor for every country, add on the multiples for private sector as well as personal demand and tell me what supply chain can cope?

Of course there have been mistakes, of course we will find that with the benefit of time, data and hindsight that things could and should have been differently.  If we look in the right area we will also find that many of the arguments advanced and referenced in the press are heavily politicised and agenda led, they also conveniently overlook failures in business as usual processes that have been massively stressed by the demand of this pandemic and that will extend from invidiual behaviours thorugh private and public sector organisations to governmental levels.  The press will conveniently distance themsleves from where they reported in error, how their sensationalism and hyperbole have precipitated behviour patterns, etc.

The majority of the time the press cannot even ask an insightful and question, it is the same hacknetyed question time and again that makes for an easy headline the news editor has already decided that they want to print.

It's just so easy to comment from the sidelines and throw rocks and promote oneself as sage and insightful.  A few hours reading of internet articles that are interpreted such as to reinforce the biases of the reader and the world has a new expert.

Go and chat to a planner who is actually doing the job and not just talking about it, talk to the people in procurement who are bursting themselves every day to try and find an untapped channel for supply that every other buyer in the world in the same field has not yet found, chat to planners who are trying to co-ordinate a cohesive testing plan across public and private sector labs that were up until a couple of months ago working completely autonomously, effectively nationalising a massive disparate sector within the space of a few weeks.

Edited April 20, 2020 by grrclark

[grrclark]

1 hour ago, Retsdon said:

. But the thing is, it's doubtful that the UK - particularly England and Wales - still has sufficient local public health staff and infrastructure still standing to  undertake any such testing regime. Decades of budget cuts have seen to that. So I think this aversion to testing isn't so much a policy so much as it is a matter of trying to make a virtue of a necessity. Even if they wanted to it can't be done.

Decades of budget cuts in health care, really?

Care to back that up with something evidential rather than just rhetoric?

[JDog]

grrclark

Your post is precise and eloquent and eminently sensible but I am afraid it will have landed on the parched and stoney ground that surrounds the 'know it alls' on this forum.

[AVB]

The thing I find strange is that the majority of medical staff complaining of lack of PPE appear to be Labour activists. Perhaps it’s a deliberate ploy to purposely put them at risk. Or perhaps they are just stirring things. 

[Old Boggy]

16 minutes ago, grrclark said:

Such a shame that so many commentators from PW dont put themselves up for election, by all the evidence exhibited in these forum posts we would have been in a much better place had they been in public office.

Only problem is that half the commentators who are boldy proclaiming their "foresight" about what they "would" have done can barely structure a sentence, yet still apparently consider themselves a master planner.

I really despair at reading so many of these comments, even the ones that are written well.

I say this knowng a few folk that are atually invloved in the planning and response to this crisis at a national level, not politicians, but those embedded in the supply chains in both the demand and supply sides and the amount of work that has been done at pace and scale over the last 3 months has been extraordinary, as is the work that is currently ongoing, yet of course every man and their dog looking on from the outside can always do better with what seems to be absolutely no understanding or comprehension of the sale of activity involved.

I have used the example before in another post, but the demand for 1 item of PPE, disposable face masks, in Scotland in response to Covid19 is 4100 time higher than normal.

Please somebody name me any supply chain process for any product anywhere that factors in a contingency immediate demand factor for an unknown event that is 4100 times higher than normal.  That is just Scotland and just for the NHS.  Take that demand factor for every country, add on the multiples for private sector as well as personal demand and tell me what supply chain can cope?

Of course there have been mistakes, of course we will find that with the benefit of time, data and hindsight that things could and should have been differently.  If we look in the right area we will also find that many of the arguments advanced and referenced in the press are heavily politicised and agenda led, they also conveniently overlook failures in business as usual processes that have been massively stressed by the demand of this pandemic and that will extend from invidiual behaviours thorugh private and public sector organisations to governmental levels.  The press will conveniently distance themsleves from where they reported in error, how their sensationalism and hyperbole have precipitated behviour patterns, etc.

The majority of the time the press cannot even ask an insightful and question, it is the same hacknetyed question time and again that makes for an easy headline the news editor has already decided that they want to print.

It's just so easy to comment from the sidelines and throw rocks and promote oneself as sage and insightful.  A few hours reading of internet articles that are interpreted such as to reinforce the biases of the reader and the world has a new expert.

Go and chat to a planner who is actually doing the job and not just talking about it, talk to the people in procurement who are bursting themselves every day to try and find an untapped channel for supply that every other buyer in the world in the same field has not yet found, chat to planners who are trying to co-ordinate a cohesive testing plan across public and private sector labs that were up until a couple of months ago working completely autonomously, effectively nationalising a massive disparate sector within the space of a few weeks.

Very well said that man 

[grrclark]

1 hour ago, TRINITY said:

Not often I agree with much you say but you are right in this post. I would also go a bit further ,in that budget cuts in part must be considered. However the main reason is that we have become nothing more than a service economy and have lost most of our ability to supply our needs. When extreme circumstances such as this virus come along it shows how totally I'll prepared we are to deal with anything out of the ordinary.

According to some figures the UK is the 9th largest manufacturing economy in the world with manufacturing accounting for 23% of our national Gross Value Add when considering the full supply chain.

Doesn't sound like "nothing more than a service economy" to me.

Edited April 20, 2020 by grrclark

[The Heron]

Other than try to gain political capital why do the opposition keep on about what the government should have done its history now and what they should be doing is concentrating on the here and now and the future. 

[Lloyd90]

In 12 months time when the health crisis is over, but the country is in a massive economic depression, all the people that are currently criticising the government for not doing enough, will be criticising the government saying they did too much. 
 

They’ll say they spend too much getting us into debt. 
 

They’ll say they closed everything down causing businesses to go bust and people to lose their jobs. 
 

They’ll complain about things the government did, that before they were shouting out asking why they didn’t do it sooner. 
 

 

In-case you didn’t notice ... they don’t care what they’re critical about. They just want to criticise the government about absolutely anything they can. 
 

This is a global pandemic, almost every country is having issues with PPE, ventilators and all the same issues we are having. The demand is crazy for all those supplies. 
 

People keep saying “why don’t the government give them PPE they need?” As if Boris is sat in his evil lair with hundreds of thousands of sets of PPE just laughing about how he isn’t giving it out 🙄. 

[JohnfromUK]

Just now, Lloyd90 said:

People keep saying “why don’t the government give them PPE they need?” As if Boris is sat in his evil lair with hundreds of thousands of sets of PPE just laughing about how he isn’t giving it out

/\  This;  PPE is harder to get than loo paper at the moment.

[bluesj]

16 minutes ago, JohnfromUK said:

/\  This;  PPE is harder to get than loo paper at the moment.

I couldn't get ffp3 masks and disposable gloves just after Christmas and that was before most people had heard of PPE or the coronavirus.

Another factor with health service not having large stock of PPE is what it costs them, my mrs work at a doctors their disposable glove were costing 3 times what I pay because theirs come from a health care supplies place and mine came from a motor factor

[Raja Clavata]

Sorry, but some very specific points have been raised with very few reasoned responses coming back the other way. The standard retorts generally seem to be along the lines of:

• it would be worse under a Labour Government
• all you are doing is being critical of everything
• broad brush statements like if you're such a self proclaimed expert then go to Downing St and take over

Often with absolute gems of inaccuracies and spin thrown in for good measure.

With few notable exceptions it's starting to sound like an audition for a "Baghdad Bob" role in the govt covid response team.

[Smokersmith]

I believe everyone tries to do a good job … ergo, one of my favourite quotes below.....

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat

 

[Mice!]

3 hours ago, Raja Clavata said:

The thing is I'm hearing Boris doesn't want to relax the lockdown because he fears a second wave - without mass testing I don't see any credible way to avoid that,

It seems this is what's happening in Japan,  they relaxed the lockdown and have a second wave.

2 hours ago, grrclark said:

have used the example before in another post, but the demand for 1 item of PPE, disposable face masks, in Scotland in response to Covid19 is 4100 time higher than normal.

The amount of PPE being used is way beyond anything that could have been planned for or stored,  but they are just about managing. 

I heard something today saying gowns I think could be washed three times and still be usable but are normally only used once, it probably means the structure isn't in place to wash them but it probably will be by the end of the week.

[Lloyd90]

58 minutes ago, Smokersmith said:

I believe everyone tries to do a good job … ergo, one of my favourite quotes below.....

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat

 

Excellent. 

[Raja Clavata]

2 minutes ago, Mice! said:

It seems this is what's happening in Japan,  they relaxed the lockdown and have a second wave.

I'm not sure what the approach has been in Japan but it will be interesting to see how they fare in Germany and other parts of the EU as they relax restrictions - not that we should directly draw too much by what happens in Germany as they have obviously taken a very different approach to us.

My point on the original comment was, that without a mass testing campaign, if we relax the lockdown then I don't see how we can possibly hope to avoid a second, third and so on wave until such time that herd immunity is reached through a large percentage being infected or a vaccine coming early. Mass testing has proven to be effective, we are somewhat banking the farm on immunity and vaccines...

[peck]

 

1 hour ago, Smokersmith said:

I believe everyone tries to do a good job … ergo, one of my favourite quotes below.....

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat

 

%100 AGREE.   

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. dont know why these moaners didn't tell us what was going to happen before it did. 

Edited April 20, 2020 by peck

[grrclark]

1 hour ago, Raja Clavata said:

Sorry, but some very specific points have been raised with very few reasoned responses coming back the other way. The standard retorts generally seem to be along the lines of:

• it would be worse under a Labour Government
• all you are doing is being critical of everything
• broad brush statements like if you're such a self proclaimed expert then go to Downing St and take over

Often with absolute gems of inaccuracies and spin thrown in for good measure.

With few notable exceptions it's starting to sound like an audition for a "Baghdad Bob" role in the govt covid response team.

Some very specific points have been raised I agree, however they are being raised against a backdrop of incomplete information with the benefit of hindsight and with a large degree of assumptive deduction while being presented in a way as though it is a slam dunk in demonstrating government and institutional failure.

We just do not have enough qualified data to carry out any reasonable comparative analysis as yet.

In time we can and will be able to do that and that will be appropriate, but from my perspective it really bends me out of shape reading some of the very critical comments when I see from personal experience the level of effort and commitment that is happening, but of course some numpty who can barely form a sentence could always do batter.

Can you imagine what would happen if some of the experts who put themselves in front of the camera everyday actually met some of the stupid questions from the press head on?

There would be howls of outrage and protest at the high handed arrogance and elitism, instead they have to suffer that criticism with good grace and a limited right of reply, which is a crying shame.

 

[Lord v]

3 hours ago, grrclark said:

Such a shame that so many commentators from PW dont put themselves up for election, by all the evidence exhibited in these forum posts we would have been in a much better place had they been in public office.

Only problem is that half the commentators who are boldy proclaiming their "foresight" about what they "would" have done can barely structure a sentence, yet still apparently consider themselves a master planner.

I really despair at reading so many of these comments, even the ones that are written well.

I say this knowng a few folk that are atually invloved in the planning and response to this crisis at a national level, not politicians, but those embedded in the supply chains in both the demand and supply sides and the amount of work that has been done at pace and scale over the last 3 months has been extraordinary, as is the work that is currently ongoing, yet of course every man and their dog looking on from the outside can always do better with what seems to be absolutely no understanding or comprehension of the scale of activity involved.

I have used the example before in another post, but the demand for 1 item of PPE, disposable face masks, in Scotland in response to Covid19 is 4100 time higher than normal.

Please somebody name me any supply chain process for any product anywhere that factors in a contingency immediate demand factor for an unknown event that is 4100 times higher than normal.  That is just Scotland and just for the NHS.  Take that demand factor for every country, add on the multiples for private sector as well as personal demand and tell me what supply chain can cope?

Of course there have been mistakes, of course we will find that with the benefit of time, data and hindsight that things could and should have been differently.  If we look in the right area we will also find that many of the arguments advanced and referenced in the press are heavily politicised and agenda led, they also conveniently overlook failures in business as usual processes that have been massively stressed by the demand of this pandemic and that will extend from invidiual behaviours thorugh private and public sector organisations to governmental levels.  The press will conveniently distance themsleves from where they reported in error, how their sensationalism and hyperbole have precipitated behviour patterns, etc.

The majority of the time the press cannot even ask an insightful and question, it is the same hacknetyed question time and again that makes for an easy headline the news editor has already decided that they want to print.

It's just so easy to comment from the sidelines and throw rocks and promote oneself as sage and insightful.  A few hours reading of internet articles that are interpreted such as to reinforce the biases of the reader and the world has a new expert.

Go and chat to a planner who is actually doing the job and not just talking about it, talk to the people in procurement who are bursting themselves every day to try and find an untapped channel for supply that every other buyer in the world in the same field has not yet found, chat to planners who are trying to co-ordinate a cohesive testing plan across public and private sector labs that were up until a couple of months ago working completely autonomously, effectively nationalising a massive disparate sector within the space of a few weeks.

Absolutely agreed. That's why I am hesitant to put any 'blame' at the governments door. 

(see my response on the other thread) 

[Old farrier]

Just a thought here 

there’s a shortage of ppe  

is it manufacturer in the uk  if not why not? 
 

solution we have a massive workforce in prisons get some patterns and some materials and get them making it 

obvious rewarding them for the work if they volunteer with a reduced jail time 

is this to simple 

[Raja Clavata]

6 minutes ago, grrclark said:

Some very specific points have been raised I agree, however they are being raised against a backdrop of incomplete information with the benefit of hindsight and with a large degree of assumptive deduction while being presented in a way as though it is a slam dunk in demonstrating government and institutional failure.

We just do not have enough qualified data to carry out any reasonable comparative analysis as yet.

In time we can and will be able to do that and that will be appropriate, but from my perspective it really bends me out of shape reading some of the very critical comments when I see from personal experience the level of effort and commitment that is happening, but of course some numpty who can barely form a sentence could always do batter.

Can you imagine what would happen if some of the experts who put themselves in front of the camera everyday actually met some of the stupid questions from the press head on?

There would be howls of outrage and protest at the high handed arrogance and elitism, instead they have to suffer that criticism with good grace and a limited right of reply, which is a crying shame.

 

I don't disagree with anything you have said there. I think part of the issue with this particular thread is that it's more or less a copy of another one running concurrently, the other perhaps conveying a more balanced view and certainly more aligned with your point regarding the facts emerging in the fullness of time.

I was involved, through industry consortia links, in some of the activities around the call to arms on the breathing apparatus and ventilators which was astonishing so I can identify with struggling to accept overly critical comments from "obnoxious bystanders".

Regarding the journos - I normally leave the room after the briefing as the Q&A is just repeats of the same old thing, over and over again. I'm sure they would love to come back with both barrels at them.

With respect to mistakes, I think any right minded individual will accept that they have and will continue to happen but in the fullness of time we do need to know if they were all "innocent" failings or in some cases negligence. I think it would be in our interest if these questions were answered sooner rather than later save them being lost in the noise of what I suspect will be a significant ding dong between govt advisers and the civil service. That issue in itself may be the cause of some of the things that haven't gone as well as they might...