Coronavirus: Lots of news and articles 13 April 2020

Found by reading through my coronavirus dashboard here.

UK

1. The Times: Sunak says Britain's GDP may fall by up to 30%; ten ministers call for lockdown to be eased next month: https://reut.rs/2XwlfPe

2. Meanwhile, Capital Economics is now predicting a 24% GDP fall for the UK in Q2: https://www.capitaleconomics.com/the-economic-effects-of-the-coronavirus/

3. UK cancels order for simple ventilators, needs more complex ones — shows how complicated the situation is: https://reut.rs/2JYfFNL

4. Banks feel under pressure to lend to companies that will not repay: https://reut.rs/344Q3YT

5. Auditors have been told to take a tough line re. declaration of going concern: Auditors clash with directors over the question of ‘going concern’: https://www.ft.com/content/bd1bdf51-2211-44b2-a0fb-f90c4ff57d14?shareType=nongift

Update on some statistics

6. This is a great way of tracking whether control measures are working. The lines drop if the rate of increase of cases (in relation to existing cases) falls. Controls are working in several countries. https://aatishb.com/covidtrends/?location=China&location=Czechia&location=Denmark&location=Germany&location=Italy&location=South+Korea&location=Sweden&location=Taiwan&location=US&location=United+Kingdom

7. It is not true that Sweden is fully open for business, but controls are less strict than elsewhere. Citymapper travel in Stockholm is at 23% of normal (vs 7% in London)... https://citymapper.com/cmi/stockholm

8. ... and national retail and recreation mobility is down 25% (vs down 82% for the UK): https://www.gstatic.com/covid19/mobility/2020-04-05_SE_Mobility_Report_en.pdf

Test-and-trace and opening up

9. It is not clear how well the US is doing in preparing for test-and-trace: https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2020/04/april-12-update-us-covid-19-test.html?m=1

10. The FT reports that the UK government is modelling the health cost of lockdown to set against lives saved, but gives little firm detail: https://www.ft.com/content/8027d913-2e2f-4d4c-93db-89bd726105f0?shareType=nongift

11. How China is keeping control: “ To guard against flare-ups, investigators trace and quarantine close contacts of every newly confirmed COVID-19 case, including those who may be asymptomatic.” https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/can-china-return-normalcy-while-keeping-coronavirus-check#

12. Model suggests testing and contact tracing could suppress the epidemic if 75% of infected people are isolated with 12 hours of symptom onset: https://www.statnews.com/2020/04/09/social-distancing-controlling-covid-19-which-measures-are-most-effective/

13. Detailed article on how Apple and Google are working together to achieve contact tracing while maintaining privacy (APIs due to be released in May): https://tidbits.com/2020/04/10/apple-and-google-partner-for-privacy-preserving-covid-19-contact-tracing-and-notification/

14. ... and an infographic on how it would work: https://ncase.me/contact-tracing/

15. Test-and-trace requires people to be hired to do the work — some US states are already moving fast: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-11/states-prepare-test-and-trace-programs-to-reopen-their-economies

16. Amazon and Walmart are developing testing/safety protocols: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/04/discovering-safety-protocols.html

Other science stories

17. Some scientists fear the rapid approval of hydroxychloroquine in the US may hamper research on whether it and other drugs work: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/04/former-fda-leaders-decry-emergency-authorization-malaria-drugs-coronavirus

18. Some trial results for remdesivir — but NOT from a randomised controlled trial: https://us11.campaign-archive.com/?u=f8609630ae206654824f897b6&id=81acccf4f6

19. Media outlets are reporting an Icelandic study that found 50% of those with coronavirus were asymptomatic — BUT that was at the time of testing and many developed symptoms later: https://www.icelandreview.com/sci-tech/is-icelands-coronavirus-testing-showing-that-50-of-cases-have-no-symptoms/?fbclid=IwAR2aBMKHGpqdE0bdMb007Rt7_9JrKOtZP-clCMJSeuObZZtAkQJD3GNR4TA

20. Immunity is a spectrum; immunity to SARS-COV (1), which causes SARS, lasts 2-3 years; we do not know whether antibodies necessarily mean immunity: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-immunity-to-covid-19-really-means/

21. The reproduction number of the virus has fallen towards 1 in many countries: https://epiforecasts.io/covid/posts/global/

22. Problems and challenges of epidemiological modelling: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/04/what-does-this-economist-think-of-epidemiology.html

Other stories

23. Satellite data suggest China’s economy is still slowing: https://www.barrons.com/articles/the-view-from-space-china-hasnt-started-to-rebound-51586551202

24. Some interesting colour on the draconian controls that China imposed: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/04/life-after-covid-the-view-from-beijing.html

25. It may not have been loo roll hoarding, but rather the fact that people are using a lot more at home than usual, and the B2B and B2C supply chains are different? (I tend to think that (i) an implicit understanding of this issue among consumers and (ii) game theory together explain the shortage.) https://marker.medium.com/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about-the-toilet-paper-shortage-c812e1358fe0