love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

A housing crisis underway today. Despite @mhclg advice below, Travel Lodge is closing hotels today, (when had said Thursday), throwing out the hundreds of homeless families put there for emergency accommodation by councils. Notes under doors earlier today. pic.twitter.com/EzkpMyR7Mv

— Nearly Legal (@nearlylegal) March 24, 2020

it's all good, all be forgotten, businesses gonna business

I'd like "widespread and reliable antibody testing" but Tories have been going on about everyone getting their antibody test and going back to work and I think we need to be really sure of the "reliable" part tbh

I mean, if I was told tomorrow I'd already had it (v v unlikely, but perhaps not 100% impossible) then I'd find that interesting and reassuring for my own personal prospects, of course - but I'd want to be very, very sure I couldn't possibly be contagious (still, or likely ever again) before I went to visit my vulnerable self-isolating mother, and should we really treat going to work etc with that much less caution?

x(x)p oh dear

how does this square with like whole families getting ill one after another? just a statistical outlier in the hundreds of millions who’ve been infected?

― a struggle to make meat-snacking fit (bizarro gazzara), Tuesday, 24 March 2020 18:36 (forty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Viral load? whole families living in close proximity means increased exposure and more serious infection. Getting exposed in passing from idk a door handle could lead to minor or asymptomatic infection.

One of the 18 patients didn’t develop symptoms, yet the viral load was similar to that of the symptomatic patients, the researchers said, “which suggests the transmission potential of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic patients.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-22/one-third-of-coronavirus-cases-may-show-no-symptom-scmp-reports

Guardian reporting that 21 people died in a single London Hospital Trust in the last 24 hours - Northwick Park, which announced it had run out of critical care beds last week

Sir Quiff's almost unreadably calm and meaningless tweets explained, then? https://t.co/6txwWP13dJ

— Owen Hatherley (@owenhatherley) March 24, 2020

Soldout Boy Tell 'Em

Christ that reminds me I still need to send off my ballot vote for not this guy

if he passes the fit-for GoNU test that is definitive proof he's a tory in disguise cunt.

oh jesus it's just hit what the Excel Centre is. I went to a NAS event there 10 years ago. Fucking grim.

I’d be all in on a gnu if I didn’t think he’d be a clegg “moderating influence” as opposed to someone actually challenging their bullshit

I don't know why a government with a large majority would consent to a GNU except as a tacit admission that some of their ministers just aren't up to it.

so they can spread the blame after the complete disaster this is going to be.

cute way of sharing future blame maybe

lol calz beat me to the cynicism

The Tories: Hey Kier could you please come and stand in front of this hand grenade whilst I run away after pulling the pin
Starmer: yes this is leadership https://t.co/hZTuRB27E1

— Loki (@Lokinash06) March 24, 2020

Although tbf I don't think it would be harsh to say there is quite a dearth of brains and talent in this cabinet, some of the tory moderates like Gauke for example who weren't brexity enough probably have more in common with Starmer but there isn't really a path to bring them back maybe?

if the last 12 months have taught us anything (narrators voice: they didn't teach them anything) it's that Tory moderates and their kin who wound up in the wrong party by mistake aren't really the best at working together to moderate the worst excesses of full-blown Tories

oh christ imagine Starmer trying to moderate the Tories lol!

hard to imagine him moderating a bingo night tbh

This is a fucking low:

Hi everyone, just wanted to share my thoughts given I'm currently living in Italy, the epicentre of the virus.

— Ashley Young (@youngy18) March 24, 2020

People are waiting for hours on the #UniversalCredit helpline or placed up to 78,000th in an online queue.

Cuts of nearly 50,000 staff from the DWP since 2010 have created a failing system even before this crisis.

People need financial security if they're expected to stay home.

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) March 24, 2020

just thinking about how Corbyn and McD would slate Universal Credit on a daily basis in quite plain language and remembering how Starmer once called it "deeply flawed" and then called for it to be scrapped once, in the heat of a Labour leadership election. Such a huge volume of extra people getting exposed to its deliberate dysfunctional design flaws at the same time was probably never part of the plan.

He actually had a pretty good tip about putting your trolley behind you when unloading at the checkout so that the person behind can't get too near xp

at least when this has passed millions of people will be radicalized and will recognize the injustice and cruelty of the benefits system and demand change

probably more likely they'll be radicalised towards the right and calling for homeless corpses to be converted into bio-fuel for Drax. But I do believe many people will actually have their eyes opened by this.

i was being sarcy and i think most people will snuggle back into "normality" with a sigh of relief and heavy amnesia

Ideally you'd have two trolleys, one in front and one behind
xpost

The UK electorate do seem to have a preternatural gift for not seeing dead people

"What we did in Italy was to let the virus spread – we intervened too late and that’s why we ended up where we are."

Our latest episode features TP contributor @luxrub, currently in isolation in Italy: find the full episode here → https://t.co/tThVBQWQs1 #CoronavirusLockdown pic.twitter.com/5qmtBN66is

— Talking Politics (@TPpodcast_) March 24, 2020

what this podcast lacks in the startling insights of Ashley Young it gains by almost covering every blade of grass re: the story of the Italian response to COVID 19

uk symptoms tracker: https://covid.joinzoe.com/

(full in daily even if well)

I'm helping *Ralph Wiggum voice*

Anecdotally there seem to be lots of people in Brixton getting this right now - two couples I know and Miranda Sawyer.

lol the fucking app doesn't work *not Ralph Wiggum voice*

crossing out "guy's" and writing in "lads"

Anecdotally there seem to be lots of people in Brixton getting this right now - two couples I know and Miranda Sawyer.

― santa clause four (suzy), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 bookmarkflaglink

No surprises there, the virus probably originated in the Hootenanny pub

Prince Charles has tested positive.

The virus keeps on giving

Andrew next please.

Being incapable of sweating is going to really benefit him when the fever hits.

please do the queen, based COVID-19

I don't think anybody wants a dead queen while we're stuck inside in front of the telly

I've put my symptoms in the app too. Everything bar the fever, it seems. Is there any way to see the results?

I mean what's the point if we can't have a day off and a street party?

critical support for comrade covid-19

luv to see virus on virus violence

Parliament rising today until 21 April so last Jez PMQs at noon.

Astonishing it's still open.

The government has also updated the list of premises which are allowed to stay open to include off licenses, which is kind of the perfect encapsulation of "We will be very strict unless you don't want us to be".

On which note I can absolutely see all of this called off for a full Dead Monarch street parade.

> I don't think anybody wants a dead queen while we're stuck inside in front of the telly

it's bad enough with charles. the same 5 minute clip of him shaking hands with most of a small welsh town is currently being shown on a loop.