These are the stories of the British coronavirus that you need to know today.
NHS pressure
NHS provider Briefing paper For parliamentarians before the House of Commons tonight votes for the English class.
According to it, many issues are not included in the national data on bed occupancy. The main issues are:
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Infection control measures reduce capacity by up to 20%
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Delayed or interrupted planned surgery caused by limited theater space and infection control
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Although overall demand for emergency and emergency medical care is low, Trust reports an increasing number of highly ill patients requiring hospitalization and an increasing number of A & E people with complex mental health needs. ..
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Increased staff absenteeism in addition to a serious labor shortage
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Lack of access to quick turnaround testing
Chris Hopson, Chief Executive Officer, commented: “”
Opposition parties are refraining from voting, but Boris Johnson is expected to win the vote despite the expected backbench rebellion.
Break the rules
Twenty-six percent found it difficult to comply with the second blockade rule. According to a survey of King’s College London and Ipsosmori of 2,244 people across the UK.
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16% felt it was meaningless to follow the rules
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14% were forced to violate the rules by family and friends
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34% thought the restrictions were not applied fairly
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34% had low confidence in government and official advice
There was a gender difference with women who were more likely to feel exhausted by the pandemic (47% women vs. 33% men).
Professor Bobby Duffy, director of the Institute for Policy Studies at King’s College London, said, “As the rules change again, the British government rebuilds confidence in its approach, clarifying what it is doing and why. I have to tell. “
Latest data
The latest office of the National Bureau of Statistics Weekly data It shows that the number of registered deaths was 20.8% above the five-year average.
COVID-19 is listed on the death certificate of 21.5% of all deaths in England and Wales, an increase of 231 deaths compared to the previous week.
vaccine
Pfizer / BioNTech has applied for European conditional marketing approval for the COVID-19 vaccine. modern I applied for EU yesterday.
The European Medicines Agency was already reviewing the data under a rolling review.
MHRA in the UK Start evaluating Pfizer November 20th.
Lamp test accuracy
The rapid OptiGene RT-LAMP (loop-mediated isothermal amplification) test is accurate and sensitive with or without COVID-19 symptoms. Published data According to the Ministry of Health.
The sensitivity was 79% and the specificity was 100%. For high viral load samples, test sensitivity increased to 94% for saliva and 100% for cotton swabs.
Professor Keith Godfrey, who led the first phase of the Southampton Saliva Testing Pilot, said: “The Southampton Saliva LAMP project is very easy to use for students and very popular with parents and staff. 80% of students are in residential halls and more than two-thirds of students in private accommodation It was very encouraging to be enrolled in a regular saliva lamp test. “
Scottish bonus
The Scottish NHS and social care workers have received a £ 500 lump sum to thank Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon for what he called their “extraordinary service” during the pandemic.
Prorated payments are to be paid as soon as possible to staff hired after March 17, 2020, including staff who had to shield or who subsequently retired.
Children’s symptoms
Most children with COVID-19 infection experience mild symptoms or remain asymptomatic, a new report from Imperial College London (ICL) suggests.
Univadis From Medscape Report on the survey results from Systematic review Of the 128 studies, 29 were considered for meta-analysis. Most of the studies included included children tested as contacts in COVID-19 patients.
The majority of children experienced mild COVID-19 symptoms, only 3.8% experienced severe or severe symptoms, and 21% of infected children remained asymptomatic.
Studies assessing infectivity in children have not been identified, and it has been found that susceptibility of children to COVID-19 infection varies widely between studies.
Steven Riley, a professor of infectious disease dynamics at the ICL, said: “We could not find reliable evidence that children could be a source of infection compared to adults.”
Vitamin protection?
A Preprint Observational studies of the King’s College ZOE COVID Symptom Study app have associated vitamin and supplement intake with a slightly lower chance that women will report positive on the COVID-19 test.
The author writes: “Probiotics, omega-3 fatty acids, multivitamins, or Vitamin D Low risk of supplements and SARS-CoV-2 positive testing in women. No clear effect on men was observed, nor was any effect of vitamin C observed. garlic Or zinc For men or women. Randomized controlled trials of selected supplements will be needed to confirm these observations before making therapeutic recommendations. “
Naveed Sattar, a professor of metabolic medicine at the University of Glasgow, commented through the Science Media Center, saying: For infection with COVID-19. It is behavior, not supplements, that explains these results, as health consciousness can make some women less susceptible to infection. The lack of relevance in men also suggests results. Some supplements can be confusing in unmeasured ways, as there is no biological reason to believe that they should work in women rather than men. Therefore, wait for the results of randomized trials. “
Visit to virtual ward
Credit: QMUL
A third-year medical student at Queen Mary University followed her instructor in a surgical ward round, thanks to a virtual reality kit.
Professor Shafi Ahmed wore HoloLens smart glasses at the Royal London Hospital.
“The pandemic has given us a different way of thinking about medical education,” he said.
“For the past six years at Queen Mary, my work with Google Glass, virtual reality, holograms, avatars, and mixed reality is how immersive and exponential technology provides effective medical education. It shows that it represents a paradigm shift. “
Santa’s secret
Experts at the University of Exeter are urging parents to maintain the “vital tonic” of Santa mythology, saying that this year is not a year of complete honesty.
Dr. Chris Boyle gave some results from the university’s international Santa’s Survey: “My findings reveal that there are many ways parents can accidentally expose Santa’s myths. The main slip-ups plagued by parents are involved in the act. I will. “
“COVID Christmas in 2020 brings so much uncertainty and misery. It is argued that it was not such a great time to indulge in Santa’s escapism. Christmas is a magical time and children We’re Santa-Adults and older children wish they could believe too, especially in 2020, who can blame them? “
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