Annotations on BBC2 TV programme “Lockdown 1.0 – Follow the Science”
1. Nothing (data, precedent) to go on in January except work by the modellers. Too much reliance on the models. Modelling was the driver of the “Science”.
2. Not a single institute (bar a single scientist from Bristol) with knowledge of human corona virus.
3. No access to “fresh” data from China; scientists used Wikipedia.
4. NHS data was always a week too late to be useful for the mathematical models.
5. The quality of the UK data << quality of Ebola data from Democratic Republic of Congo.
6. “Follow the Science is a meaningless term.”
7. And the care homes? (20,000 deaths from a population of 400,000). Answer? “We didn’t look”.
It was only in April that care homes were seen as a serious problem. Previously, it didn’t appear on the radar.
8. Learn from the Lodi (Lombardy, Italy) pandemic? No! “We are different and we have the NHS”. And this mindset persisted up to 11 March 2020. UK made exactly the same mistakes as the Italians.
9. Scientists wanted Lockdown 10 March 2020. Actual lockdown 23 March.
10. Care homes not supported in the mathematical models. Look like no support for age as an independent variable? If yes, then the SIR model is not suitable.
11. SIR model does not support time delays.
12. 16 March 2020 modellers predicted 250, 000 deaths. Panic stations at Number 10?
13. Modelling estimates had very wide upper and lower bounds of uncertainty.
14. Gabriel Scally “this was eminently curable”.
15. No screening of flights from Wuhan.
nolite interficere nuntius