With the skiing season over and clubs closed this thing seems to have evolved into a disease of the poor. White collar workers still work at a large scale from home (and enjoy an unexpected increase in family time) and don’t come in contact with any larger crowds. But let’s see how that is going to change when clubs, university canteens and other places where several thousand people come together are going to open.
In the German case these are mostly East European migrant workers who are housed in dilapidated barracks, sometimes 10 per room, with substandard sanitation.
only now we are learning that many of those migrant workers have scramed when they understood what is going on and ran for home. Which is Bulgaria and Romania.
I am currently in Bulgaria an we are bracing for impact. Most probably we will be hit with a massive 2nd wave when these guys all make it home without quarantine.
This interactive UK (well, England and Wales) map is really interesting. You can pan and zoom it, and select different months.
Have other countries done something similar?
But even with all the work that’s gone into this, there is no limit to political correctness / GDPR-utter-bollocks data-protection stupidity:
To protect confidentiality, a small number of deaths have been reallocated between neighbouring areas.
Confidentiality for whose benefit, exactly? If you are dead, you are dead, and anybody who cared about you either already knows, or isn’t going to identify you from the green blob.
Anyway, this is a big step forward because one can now see which bits you probably want to avoid.
No prize for guessing where property prices are going to shoot upwards… fortunately we don’t have to move
The latest UK research suggests the UK has 3-5% overall of people who either have antibodies or can’t catch it for some other reason e.g. previous coronavirus infections gave them enough immunity.
I am in Bulgaria now since Saturday. The situation here is that we had a massive spike over the last week, when new infections peaked at around 100 per day country wide with several hotspots, the largest of which Sofia with about half of the whole figure.
The worst was the trip. Zurich airport was a total disgrace. Despite the fact that at our departure there were only 2 flights, Swissport managed to create a 45 minute queue at the check in desks (there was no web checkin possible) without ANY distancing whatsoever, just the opposite, we were forced into the same kind of waiting queue as usual. This was the unsafest thing I have had to do since the whole crisis started. About half of the people wore masks, including us. Bording and the flight was ok, the airplane was full to the brink and it was compulsory to wear masks the whole flight. No drinks or food were served.
On arrival, Kafka would have loved it. They only transported 20 people per bus to keep the distance. The result was another 45 minutes were people stood in the aisle breathing down each others neck (with masks however). A few (us included) kept our seats and waited for the lunatics to leave. We had to leave our contact in case someone from the flight would show symptoms.
Here in BG generally, people appear to be indifferent but cautious. Masks are in evidence in most places. Since today, the government has again ordered masks obligatory in public places indoors, so we have to wear them when shopping, which is ok.
There is some anxiety about that meat factory scandal in Germany as MANY Bulgarians work there and apparently when quarantine was announced a large number of them (and Romanians) scramed with their cars before being locked up in that community. So potentially there is a wave of foreign workers going home carrying this thing. According to the government they know about it and will take action, what kind is not being communicated.
The district where we are now had no registered cases throughout the crisis. The hotspots are Sofia and surroundings with around half of the registered cases country wide, there have been smaller outbreaks elsewhere like Sliven, Padzarjik and Kurdjali. I feel relatively safe where we are. The question wil be how to get home when the time comes in 5 weeks. But we’ll see about that. Another “fun” thing is that so far Bulgaria Air have modified my schedule 6 times since I bought the ticket. Departure times all within a couple of minutes or hours max from before. As long as they are not cancelling on a larger scale, we will wait and see.
One thing I can’t help reflecting on is how the govt support is misdirected, at least in some directions.
Most of the GB Ltd catering scene took the 80% and whatever grants, and not bothered to do takeaways which were always legal. This seemed strange.
The takeaway places which are open are mostly run by sole Ltd Company owners (Co. Directors) who worked in the business personally but who don’t qualify for any support! Or by “sole traders” (self employed individuals) who started too recently and don’t qualify for support (a measure to combat obvious fraud opportunities).
The support scheme was much too generous IMHO, in some areas where the businesses could have easily stayed open at some level. And now a lot of them, having pocketed the grant and spent it on a Merc, etc, will not re-open because this is the best time to go bust. Never waste a good crisis, as the saying goes. Your employees are gonna hate you for being an opportunist but nobody will listen to them because half the country is going bust right now.
I guess we’ll get to see the “uncontrolled, let it rip through the population” scenario. Cases are on a sharp rise in Texas, in Houston in particular (where I used to live), and they seem to have decided to just let it rip. The hospitals in Houston expect to run out of ICU space by July 4th.
Here we also did supports for businesses affected. Up to 85% of salary paid for low paid workers, and 350pw for middle earners. But the business did not have to close nor the employees be laid off.
In fact for the employer to get the support the employees had to be retained on their books, even if not working. They could continue to work as most did.
The principal conditions was that the employer had to suffer a 25% fall in turnover due to COVID19 and that the employee’s wage could not be increased beyond their Jan/Feb level.
As a result we don’t have businesses staying shut because they would lose the support if they re-opened.
That’s much smarter.
the employees had to be retained on their books, even if not working.
Same here
They could continue to work as most did.
Here, most didn’t 
The 80% was just too good. In fact with the lack of commuting to work, some are better off than before.
I am sure lots of lessons will be learnt all around. But highsight is always 20/20 and the UK govt was absolutely desperate to avoid any level of public disorder, and with the videos of Italian hospitals on the TV all day…
The hospitals in Houston expect to run out of ICU space by July 4th.
A very bad timing…
