In Scotland, the 7 day average of new cases is 159 .
https://www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker/
The UK 7 day average of new cases is 3 777.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
The UK population is 12.2 times greater than Scotland’s so, all things being equal, the daily number of cases should be around 1 900 but is, in fact 3 777, twice as high.
Intuitively, I’d have thought that the above would mean Scotland had a lower R number than the UK. Why doesn’t it?
Over to you readers.
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
R is the infection reproduction number. Even if there were only 1 person infected at any one time R could be equal to 1 and the level of infection would remain at 1. Eventually the entire population would have been infected at some point.
The R could be less than 1 in England but the new infections can be twice as many per head because more english were infected to start with.
With 1000 infected english and R = 0.5 we would expect 500 new infections.
if population of england were 10000 then their new infection rate would be 5% .
With 10 infected scots and R = 1 we expect 10 new infections
If Scotlands population were 1000 then scotland’s new infection rate would be 1%.
So R can be 1 in Scotland and 0.5 in England but the rate of new infections in England can be 5X that in Scotland.
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Thanks a lot. Now I have a headache.
Does this mean that the infection rate is more useful than the R number?
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I think if R is less than one the number of new cases should fall until there are no new infections. The charts seem to show there was no pronounced peak in Scotland unlike for example London. There seems to be still some underlying transmission in spite of the lockdown. I think this may cause R to rise again in London.
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If we had 1 new case per day would the R number be 1?
If so, it’s FA use?
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Yes R would be 1 if there were only 1 case at any time. 1 guy gets sick transmits to another guy. The first guy gets better. The new guy transmits to one other and so on
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Yes R only measures the rate of increase/decrease not the proportion of infected people at any one time.
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Prompted by you, John, I did just a little research. it got me nowhere. Most usually it was stated that the median R rate was 3. I have seen another study that suggested the median R value was 5.7. if it is the latter rate,London is already in trouble for the R rate means,it seems, that infections will double every 2 to 3 days.
Dr Morag Kerr has tweeted, if I remember rightly, that she will feel safe to return to normal when infection rates are in single figures. Me, too.
R is political?
“Lockdown may be needlessly prolonged by the Government’s reliance on an “irrelevant” infection rate measure, senior MPs and scientists have warned.
Ministers have been told the national reproductive ‘R’ value of coronavirus should not be regarded as the key to unlocking the UK because the figure has been skewed upwards by cases in hospitals and care homes.
Meanwhile, officials refused to say when data revealing the true transmission rates in the community and different parts of the country would be made public.
The average national ‘R’ value – the rate at which coronavirus is spreading – has become a daily feature of Downing Street press conferences, and is currently said to stand between 0.5 and 0.9….”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/08/government-should-not-rely-irrelevant-r-rate-end-coronavirus/
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R is political. I knew it. Well I didn’t until you told me but I do now.
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The R value as it is being used now isn’t the unchecked value of 3.8 originally given by the Chinese in late January it is a measure of the success we are having in controlling it.
If we release the lockdown with no controls before putting in measures to stop it then the R number jumps back to it’s normal rate, assuming it isn’t changing. In summer with more people outdoors it is assumed it will slow it down and so will social distancing and hygiene but no one as far as i am aware thinks that anything other than test, trace and isolate can stop this before a vaccine or cure become available.
Correct me if i am wrong.
https://threader.app/thread/1220919589623803905
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The Telegraph has this piece about care homes
“A Government diktat that NHS hospitals should move hundreds of elderly patients to care homes has been branded “reckless” and blamed for the homes’ soaring coronavirus death rates.
In two damning policy documents published on 19 March and 2 April, officials told NHS hospitals to transfer any patients who no longer required hospital level treatment, and set out a blueprint for care homes to accept patients with Covid-19 or who had not even been tested.
Analysis by the Telegraph suggests that the rate of coronavirus deaths accelerated more than twice as fast in care homes than in hospitals in the week beginning 7 April – two and a half weeks after the first policy document was published. ”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/24/care-homes-ordered-take-patients-suspected-coronavirus-nhs-hospitals/
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R is only the number of new people infected divided by those already infected. It doesn’t indicate how many infections there are per head.
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So why does it matter?
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I have read that if the Ro value is above 1 it is a runaway epidemic. It increases logarithmically like a snowball.
If it is below 1 it is the opposite, it eventually becomes less and less and i assume over time, should die out(?).
But i assume that this will never happen everywhere all at once globally and there will always be local epidemics where the Ro value rises above 1. That is what appears to be happening in the USA. They are up shit-creek with a Trump.
Until we get a vaccine.
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Vaccine shall prove to be a fools paradise
.much more sensible to channel research
Into mitigating and better treatments
This little demon is with us for ever now
Just as the common cold and flu is
It took us long enough with HIV research to divert from vaccine and come up with Prep which now has this virus well and truly controlled
See Trump kidding all on now with his massive push for a vaccine
He will have to do the impossible and find loads of different ones as this little bug mutates so easy and ever so so as the no.of infections increase
It is truly global
We are NOT GODS
A tiny little piece of RNA genetic material
Is out witting us and all our so called marvellous technology and computing power
We think we are smart e.g Space rockets
That is quite simply roll a alloy into a giant tube fill it with a highly explosive fuel stick a few humans in a capsule at the top of the tube,retire and lignite the rocket motors OH WOW
All akin to the Kon Tiki raft
Nature is our GOD
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Surely “R” is a product of statistical analysis. What action you take based on its value is political.
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Right I’m settling with that. The R number is now banned from TuSC
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Johne thinks this is arising due to
1.Westminster by nature is a Old Gents Club so engrained in their modus operandi
That leads to in this situation
A) they surround themselves with so called experts who quickly adapt to telling their bosses what they want to hear
In assured knowledge no matter what
Their reward in the form of a telegram from the Queen is on the way
B) They have the God of all wisdom in the form of Dominic hovering in the background who by merely casting you a ominous glance tells the expert recipient
That his days are numbered unless you change your tack
This is true because the awful evidence
Is now on Death certificates
They are like mad dogs and English Men
Who only go out into the virus laden mid day sun
Whereas in Scotland and in main due to NS education,working class values inherent in her upbringing and all capped off with her legal background has led to
1.The experts know to give it to her Straight and if not so stern consequences
For their reputation and career
Such sharpens everyone’s focus and endeavours by ensuring what their teal task is and not one of massaging egos
2.Therfore when it comes to gathering data,collating and reporting
It is without doubt that the laws and rules of statistics. ARE strictly adhered to
And actually quite simple to impose by only allowing them a mean standard defficencey of a very low factor say+ or – 5 % acceptable.This really brings you to heel fast and goes a very very long way to ensuring your consequential actions are correct and egg shall not appear upon your face
NS.needs all this because their is no MSM
to wipe the egg off but only throw more at her
In future NS willing be taught in political
Master course as a shining beacon as exactly how to conduct the affairs of good and proper governance
As always it is only the RESULT that really matters
Tell me who cane 2nd in any large sporting event you cant because they got it wrong
Such will be the case as this unfolds
Jackson Carlaw who never heard of him
He is 4th class horse running in a 1st class race against a pure thorough bred
Donkeys do not win Derby’s
MSM you have put your money on the wrong one here and you shall without doubt become all the poorer for it
Edith Piaf springs to mind Nicola
No Regrets
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Ermm
“It turns out that r-nought isn’t nearly as simple as it might seem. It also ties in with the SIR model, which models the progress of an epidemic by relating the relative proportions of sick (infectious), recovered, and susceptible people in a given population to each other. This relationship is defined in a few clean differential equations that tell us the rate of change in the infected/infectious/sick fraction of the total population.
In the SIR model, we’re given a variable B. B is generalized as the number of contacts a person is likely to have in a given day. That’s obviously a kind of goofy way to look at things, because what difference would the number of contacts even make if we don’t know how easily the disease is transmitted? So we have to come up with a B that takes into account the ease and method of transmission.”
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/pgazpv/meet-r-nought-the-magic-number-that-spreads-infectious-diseases
So, we have a median rate of R as 3 in studies accepted by UK gov and scientists but another study gives a median rate of 5 point something which, if there were no interventions would mean infections doubling every 2 to 3 days.
Ease and method of transmission? I’ve read somewhere that you need to be within a metre of an infected person for 15 minutes to catch covid19. I wonder how they decided that. The Chinese experience was that most infections were in families. To me much of this is an unknown unknown. I hope to keep it that way.
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I hate bring it back to the R number but
https://www.thecanary.co/discovery/news-discovery/2020/05/13/results-of-tens-of-thousands-of-covid-19-tests-disappear-into-black-hole/
just might be related.
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I had seen something of this reported before and commented on it here. At that time the local health board (whatever it is called in England) was thinking of asking for Deloitte to be removed fro testing control. Is this reporting the same issue or have problems continued,do you know?
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This is an easy to understand explanation of the R nought in Corona virus. https://www.healthline.com/health/r-nought-reproduction-number#conditions-it-measures I would think that the R nought is probably lower in Scotland than South of the Border. BUT we will never know because of lack of testing. The Scottish Gov is under pressure to ease on lockdown. Not on account of the measures introduced by UK Gov, but on account of the effects on mental and physical health. There will probably be some easing on outdoor persuits, and perhaps the DIY retail/garden centres with strict social distancing guidance (projects help with mental health as being productive helps). Nobody wants a rebound. We would all rather stay safe until a workable strategy is in place. Devi Sridhar (on Scottish Advisory Health Board) has suggested opening up safe zones , where the R nought is very low.
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