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Because Jeremy Vine hasnt posted anything bike related for a while ?

I wouldn't say that the ratio of general good health advice to wooooo bullsh*t here is half and half......

Garage at Large wrote:

One other thing he did claim was that of the people who died with no co-morbidity, their average age was 82.5 (Ie higher than the average life expectancy in the UK).

That, however, shows a real misunderstanding of how life expectancy works.  Yes, if you live to 82, you have exceeded the average life expectancy in the UK.  But that doesn't mean you are likely to die any moment; the average life expectancy of someone who has reached 82 is another 8 years.  That will include people who have a co-morbidity - so it you reach 82 with no co-morbidity you can expect to live a good while longer. 

Garage at Large wrote:

I'd say he is partially correct too. My YouTube doctor did a video yesterday (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9UHvwWWcjYw) which showed very few people with no co-morbidity have died of COVID, but I thought that is very well established.

So what? The definition of a Co-morbidity is not 'something that was about to kill them anyway'. People with comorbidities who die of covid were still killed by covid.

Wingguy wrote:

Garage at Large wrote:

I'd say he is partially correct too. My YouTube doctor did a video yesterday (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9UHvwWWcjYw) which showed very few people with no co-morbidity have died of COVID, but I thought that is very well established.

So what? The definition of a Co-morbidity is not 'something that was about to kill them anyway'. People with comorbidities who die of covid were still killed by covid.

perhaps we can remove all the people with  co-morbidities from the heart attack figures or cancer figures. They could be on to something here.

This person hasn't died FROM heart disease, they have died WITH heart disease, because they are overweight.

Garage at Large wrote:

You're missing the point - from the very start of this pandemic they should have locked down vulnerable people (i.e. those with comorbidities) and left everyone else to live their lives until those vulnerable groups were vaccinated.

Sure, because at the start of this pandemic we knew that a vaccine would be developed in record time and we knew it would be effective. Yes, I remember that well!

Regardless of which, vulnerable people simply cannot be separated from society. They cannot live on their own without contact from anyone. A young colleague of mine died of covid contracted while isolating in his house because someone else in the house brought it home. The far greater infection rates among normal people WOULD lead to greater infection and death rates among vulnerable people if your selfish suggestions were followed.

Garage at Large wrote:

You're missing the point - from the very start of this pandemic they should have locked down vulnerable people

Ah yes, like they managed succesfully in [checks notes] ah, no country anywhere in the world.

Remembering that they spectacularly failed to keep it out of nursing homes, despite the residents not leaving, and visitors being banned.

But you think we could have locked down somewhere approaching half the population, what about people with diabetes or high BMI who live with others?

It's total insanity to suggest we could let the virus circulate within half the population while preventing it reaching anyone in the other half. It's so patently absurd I can only assume anyone suggesting it is being disengenuous, has no interest in protecting the vulnerable and is quite prepared to have a high deathrate among those they consider less at risk than themself.

It would have been easier to keep the virus out of the country entirely.

Garage at Large wrote:

Well I guess you've just provided an argument that lockdowns don't work. I have some sympathy for that point of view, but of course if lockdowns don't work for 50% of the population, they don't work for 100% of the population either where the virus is circulating openly.

If your definition of lockdowns 'working' is eliminating any spread of the virus whatsoever then sure, UK style lockdowns don't work. Well done, I'm sure you're extremely proud of having made such a useful point.

Maybe he needs to change his name to Garbage at Large?

As a type 1 diabetic could I ask that you consider using the term "protected"  or "shielded" rather than "locked down".  May not seem a big thing but it would emphasise that many of the measures suggested by well informed and unbiased experts and implemented around the world were sacrifices made by the physically strong to protect the physically weak.  I appreciate all have made those sacrifices.

check12 wrote:

He's half right and half wrong, if you eat well, (vit D, zinc, less chance of diabetes) exercise (so your bmi is good, and heart is strong), and get outdoors, fresh air (less chance of lung problems) you will probably be fine and if everyone did this we'd be in a much better position. But half wrong as it does exist and there are a lot of older people out there with comorbidities that may die from covid, and vaccines have helped a lot (1/20,000-30,000 chance of heart issues after vaccination is it though? From Scandinavian county data) so on balance he's more dangerous to be saying it in the way he's saying it.

Fresh air? I'd settle for air that meets legal levels for pollution, but we don't even get that in the UK (not in cities, anyway).

check12 wrote:

(1/20,000-30,000 chance of heart issues after vaccination is it though? From Scandinavian county data) 

Thats a bit high - the highest risk group (18-29) they have about 29 cases per million (1/33,000)  - other groups down to about half that. (1/60k)

• Plus much less chance of catching covid
• Plus much less chance of spreading covid
• Plus about 50% less chance of getting Long Covid (which will destroy your cycling for months and months)
• Plus 8 times less likely to need a hospital admission if you catch Covid.

Sources

https://www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/heart-matters-magazine/news/co...

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03495-2

https://www.bmj.com/content/376/bmj.o5

Garage at Large wrote:

You've taken that across the population, but all evidence of heart issues from vaccines suggests skew towards affecting young people more than old. Also being fully vaccinated doesn't stop you catching COVID or passing it on, as bourne out by the fact Australia has had the highest per capita figures for COVID despite being >90% fully vaccinated.

Being fully vaccinated (ie including the booster) does reduce the chance of you catching COVID.

Garage at Large wrote:

We've been here before - by fully vaccinated I mean having had 2 doses of the vaccine (which is the official UK government position at this time). I also think there is a much larger scope for monoclonal antibodies rather than boosters.

Yes, we have been here before.  And again, you just pretend like the whole booster programme hasn't happened.

Unfortunately Omicron protection only lasts for a rather short period of time.

Which renders the whole vaccine passport thing a bit moot.

Reading the Lancet link from your link.  There were 7 people's case history in the study.

You really are not a very good source on any subject that you post on.

Your comments here expose that you do not have a fundamental understanding of statistics. You are misrepresenting data. You should stop.

Garage at Large wrote:

Actually I have an excellent understanding of statistics, having studied econometrics and general statistics throughout my Cambridge university economics degree. What are your qualifications?

Cool! What college did you read at and when did you matriculate? I did a few stats as part of my NatSci @Fitz, but mainly the maths we did was the tough stuff linked to quantum mechanics.

Tit Hall?

Not trying to be funny, in my time there that was the only central college that would ever describe themselves as small. All the others seemed to boast about who was biggest, oldest, richest etc.

Except Sidney Sussex.

Peterhouse is tiny in terms of student numbers, and Mr Garbage certainly displays some of the nastier traits associated with Peterhouse men.

Anglia Ruskin is also in Cambridge...

Rendel Harris wrote:

Peterhouse is tiny in terms of student numbers, and Mr Garbage certainly displays some of the nastier traits associated with Peterhouse men.

There is the possibility that their mendacity stretches to humble brag college dropping in a vain attempt to impress

More likely work out who you are not.

I would stop bother replying before he boasts about his degrees and his Reflected-Sounds-of-Underground-Spirts by referring you to the totally wrong page number in a report like usual.

Unfortunately Omicron has changed everything and rendered all that information obsolete.

We know that vaccines don't provide lasting protection against symptomatic Omicron infection. We don't know the implications of this for long COVID, hospitalisation or contagion.

Some of that data will be available soon but given that Omicron is apparently milder than Delta the absolute risk reduction is likely to be far smaller than it was with Delta even if the vaccines were equally efficacious.

Rich_cb wrote:

We know that vaccines don't provide lasting protection against symptomatic Omicron infection

No, we know that vaccines developed for the original variant don't provide lasting protection against Omicron. We don't know whether vaccines developed for Omicron (which last I heard we expect to be available in March) will provide lasting protection, but I can see no reason why they wouldn't.

(I don't disagree with anything you've said, I just felt that needed to be clarified).

To clarify further:

We know that no existing available vaccines provide lasting protection against symptomatic Omicron.

That statement may or may not need updating in the coming months but at present it is correct.