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Coronavirus in the UK

Discussion in 'Health and Fitness' started by aposhark, Mar 4, 2020.

  1. bigmac
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    bigmac Well-Known Member Trusted Member


    i know exactly what you mean. last trip to my doc was about--amongst other things--i was passing fresh blood from the back door. he said it was most likely a pile--said to take some ointment i had--and see him in a weeks time.

    which i did.

    at the 2nd visit--he also suggested he examine my prostate--digitally. i was impressed that he could do that, but he meant with his digit--a finger--. i said help yourself.

    he had a finger the size of a cucumber.
    but at least he said my prostate was in perfect working order.
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  2. Druk1
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    Druk1 Well-Known Member

    Bought it at the ukay-ukay in Earls Court?
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  3. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    64460534-EFBF-4D83-8871-8844B415D86B.jpeg Just came across someone who has just had the Covid 19 antibody test and came up positive. She thinks she had it last November. She paid just over £60 to have it done privately.
  4. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    Most of the Serological tests for antibodies have proved sufficiently flawed that you can't rely on a one off test, plus this is anecdotal evidence John, the genomic epidemiology of the virus converges on China late November the evidence from thousands of Genome sequence samples would be invalidated by this virus appearing outside China before late December.
    Last edited: May 24, 2020
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  5. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    It was done through Medichecks.

    The individual had a heavy viral condition back in November where she was in a bad way for a couple of weeks. Since then nothing.

    From the Daily Impress:

    “Said to have originated from Wuhan, China, in December, a recent study by researchers at University College London and the University of Reunion Island, found COVID-19 may have made the jump from its initial host to humans at some point between October 6 and December 11.

    Looking at the Office of National Statistics (ONS) official death figures, Express.co.uk identified what experts have now determined to be a "spike" in fatalities in England and Wales between adults 45-85+ starting on week 45 of 2019 – November 8 – with the same figures being almost 1,000 deaths higher than the previous year and around 200-300 higher than the five-year average.

    The ONS confirmed to Express.co.uk that there were 129,821 deaths registered in England between October and December 2019, 6,752 more deaths than the five-year average (2014 to 2018) for this quarter and that age-specific mortality rates significantly increased between this same timeframe for all age groups aged 75 years and over, in comparison to the year before.

    Dr Jason Oke of the University of Oxford says these deaths need to be studied further to understand their implications.“

    From Medichecks:

    “The test is performed on a blood sample by our UKAS-accredited laboratory partners using a CE-marked antibody test.“

    And:

    “The manufacturer states that in its validation study the test detected antibodies in 100% of confirmed coronavirus cases when the sample was taken at least 14 days after symptoms first developed“

    The test kit has been manufactured by Abbott who also make the world renowned Freestyle Libre.

    As reported in the Financial Times for example - these are the tests the government is planning to be made available on the NHS shortly.

    https://www.ft.com/content/2d1bf42e-fedd-4f1b-837a-4460d0ad7494
    Last edited: May 24, 2020
  6. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    I agree that the margin of error is as broad as October to first week of December which certainly would allow for the possibility that the infection you had and that I had in January could have been SARS-Cov-2.

    It is possible that no samples remain of any taken at that time and certainly won't have been sequenced but I would have expected some current sequences to regress further back than the current estimates of first week of December.

    will edit this later, consultant just arrived.

    I saw on nextstrain one sample set which indicated emergence as far back as June last year but that data set vanished some time ago.

    A junior doctor here did say to me that she thought it possible that I could have had covid in January and this sort of study certainly might support that.

    But to do that they really need to sequence some samples from back at that time and trace the lineage.
    Last edited: May 24, 2020
  7. aposhark
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    aposhark Well-Known Member Lifetime Member

    Jim, do you think the fistula could have been the cause of your high temperatures earlier on these past two or three months?
  8. aposhark
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    aposhark Well-Known Member Lifetime Member

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  9. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    Sometimes all we have to go on is anecdotal evidence. Often it turns out to be correct.
  10. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    I tend to think that once in a while it turns out correct ;) and it can be a useful starting point for further investigation, I would not dismiss anecdotal evidence out of hand but there needs to be caution.
  11. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    That is now the conclusion, 9 weeks ago I didn't have the additional usual symptoms that I get, which is splitting headache and a solid infection in my buttock, but on Thursday night I did, I've also calibrated my in ear thermometer against the hospital ones and mine reads up to a degree low, so I should have been even more alarmed back then.

    Working from home has caused this as I am far more mobile when I am in the office, I've had this fistula for 20 years, it erupted to the surface of my left buttock in 2000, but I've lived with it and seen a consultant in the last five years, the result was he agreed that I should live with it as he was worried about damage to my bowel if he operated.

    So next week I get the second MRI scan first was in 2017 this will be the second and they will decide what to do on the basis of that result.
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  12. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    Yes. For this individual, she has what she believed may have been coronavirus back in 2019, recorded her symptoms and then once the Antibody test has become available, effectively scientifically tested her blood for the antibodies with a positive indicator. For her it was essentially scientifically derived data.
  13. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    If I could I would consider getting a private test done, but the Northern Ireland one has a one in 10 chance of being wrong , if the Swiss Roche test were available I would probably pay for that one myself, but even then you could not make a causal link because you could have picked it up later and been totally asymptomatic.

    I would be happy to find I had antibodies but I would not link it to what I had in January as the only way I could absolutely with certainty say that I had it at that time would be if I had taken the antigen test at that time.

    One test tells you that you are experiencing it right now, the other test tells you that you experienced it at some point but not when.
  14. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    Meant to add I had the covid 19 test on Friday, not nice but not so bad, she said "we have to swab your nostrils then we have to push the same swab right deep up your nose" I said "right up to ma brain" she said "erm yes" :D

    No results yet.
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  15. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    They will be available on the NHS. But are already available privately at £65 a shot.

    “The Government has ordered 10 million antibody tests to be rolled out over the next few months.

    Health Secretary Matt Hancock said a deal has been struck with Swiss firm Roche and pharmaceutical company Abbott to supply the vital tests.“
  16. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    • Informative Informative x 1
  17. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

  18. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

  19. oss
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    oss Somewhere Staff Member

    John about a month or so ago there was one occasion when I went on to nextstrain.org https://nextstrain.org/ncov/global and found that the dataset had changed and it had confidence ranges for some genome sequences going back as far as June 2019 I was going to screen grab and post as that was the first computational biology result that I had seen that pushed the possible date of the zoonotic jump back before October, but before I could I had a browser crash and other laptop problems and had to reboot, by the time I got back to it the dataset had changed again and the confidence range was back to being very narrow late November to first week of December right now it is back to a confidence range of a few days.

    So I don't know what was going on there or why they would have excluded samples going further back, but way back in one of these threads I said that although I thought it unlikely that the date of the jump would change much it was possible if samples were found that could be computationally determined to link to earlier generations.

    The PCR mechanism used in the antigen test is very very sensitive it is designed to take really tiny samples and amplify them by orders of magnitude until sufficient quantity is available to test for markers specific to a particular virus, there was a time many years ago when the quality of PCR copying was questionable but I think it is much better now.

    So I am completely open to what you are saying and I think I will try to track down this test and get one, and if I tested positive I might encourage my colleagues to do the same as for me that is the only real infection route, I really do lead the life of a recluse between Jan 1st and Jan 24th I was only in contact with people at work and although I came home through Singapore on New Years day a 24 day incubation period is just not realistic.
  20. Anon220806
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    Anon220806 Well-Known Member

    It might be something your employer is willing to pay for if you are required to jump on a plane for business purposes?
    Last edited: May 24, 2020

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