Coronavirus - is enough being done to contain it?

According to The Telegraph, the government carried out 122,347 on the final day of April. The Telegraph reports this includes 27,000 tests that were mailed to homes & may not have been carried out.

Not exactly 100,000 tests but you would never know given the Telegraph's headline of "Government beats 'audacious' 100,000 testing target on final day of April".

The Telegraph making it abundantly clear that it is nothing more than a propaganda arm of the government, or to be precise Boris Johnson.

Are you suggesting thst our Pm might have faked enough tests to help his Govt hit that target...?

It may or may not be 100,000, but it's a big enough number I'm prepared to let it go provided they can keep on that trajectory.

Because a hell of a lot of people, who are not the government, will have busted a gut to get the testing ramped up and I don't think it's fair on them to brand it a failure just to have a pop at Hancock.

(30-04-2020 15:24 )Charlemagne Wrote:  Also Dr Fauci (Trumps advisor) has said that Remdesivir, an experimental antiviral drug has shown positive results in helping patients recover more quickly from the illness caused by the coronavirus. Patients recovered 31% quicker than the patients given the placebo.

Remdesivir has now been approved by the USA for use today.

^ It's been given emergency approval even though the trials have not been completed.

Liver damage is already listed as a possible side effect.

Reading a report this morning suggesting that many of the home tests may give false negative because of being incorrectly taken.

Apparently the home kit is a swab test just like the testing centres, but that requires two swabs, one from a long stroke along the tonsils, and one from high up the nose, both of which are faintly unpleasant to achieve, and therefore not easy for someone to do correctly by themselves.
People could be swabbing incorrectly, and therefore getting a negative result when they are in fact positive, and then spreading the virus unknowingly.

That why I would say if you are going to have a test done, let a medical professional do it

Newsnight: Did the government meet its target of 100K tests? Sort of



As policy editor Lewis Goodall & SilentMajority both mentioned it will be interesting to see whether the Government can maintain that level of testing or whether it was ramped up to meet a political target. Time will tell, lets hope they can maintain this level at least

How many of us trust the Govt figures on testing? And how many of us feel that the lockdown, should not be eased this month but in June?

(03-05-2020 07:31 )lovebabes56 Wrote:  ... And how many of us feel that the lockdown, should not be eased this month but in June?

I'd say the numbers of deaths need to be about half what they currently are before we can safely relax.
But of course, we all know that Boris' mantra of being 'led by the science' is poppycock, so the decision will be a political one, not a sensible, rational, medical, saving lives one. There is increasing pressure from business, sport (looking at you premier league), and restless natives, to ease lockdown.
Another 3 weeks as is would be sensible to allow the numbers to fall further, then review end of May, with, hopefully, a chance to relax starting June, but I'm really not convinced that will be what happens.