Imperial College vs. University College

[MikeAustin]

LS report that University College London predict herd immunity by Monday here, when people with protection reach 73.4%. Imperial College London said protection would be 34% at the end of March.

Imperial College (aka Professor Ferguson) is modelling a big wave in July. See "SPI-M-O: Summary of further modelling of easing restrictions – Roadmap Step 2, 31 March 2021" here. Warwick University also contributed.

On 1st February, I checked the funding of ICL by the Billy Goats Foundation here. In 2020, it was $83.5m. That is 89% of their total funding since before 2009.

I checked on the funding for Warwick (Billy Goats has moved the url) here. It was only $2.2m, making the total of ICL and Warwick up to $85.7m

So how much did UCL get in 2020? I found that here - a measly $0.48m, with not much of a history of funding by Billy Goats.

So $85.7m versus $0.48m. Ferguson can get sums right if he wants to.

[miahoneybee]

An excellent piece of detective work mike..it shows Billy goats ( love that ) has dipped himself everywhere..follow the money usually leads back to bully somewhere along the line ...there will be plenty of people behind him too ( lierally).

[Splatt]

Missing out important bits.

Firstly and most importantly, Friston is from Pretend-SAGE.
"Independent SAGE" that was set up by Labour just to oppose everything the government and real SAGE do. They come out with frequent oddball predictions all the time.

Friston also modelled Herd Immunity by May 2020 last year. Then when that was wrong forecast much smaller second waves.

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/headlines/20 ... ed-mid-may
https://www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/spm/covid-19/
https://gh.bmj.com/content/5/12/e003978

This is just the latest indie SAGE nonsense.

[MikeAustin]

Missing out important bits.

Of course, modelling from all quarters should be taken with a pinch of salt. I prefer an evidence-based approach using years of experience, exemplified by those such as Professor Carl Heneghan.

The salient point that I was making, independent of whether there is any validity to these models, is the relative severity of predictions and the prime movers behind them. In that regard, your 'important bits' are peripheral.

[Splatt]

A very useful thread on the latest models is here:-

https://twitter.com/JamesWard73/status/ ... 8813337602

Cuts through a lot of media induced hysteria.

In short, many variations were published, the media ONLY picked on the doom and gloom ones and ran with those.

Some are modelling seasonality now. If you look at THOSE you can see that predicted wave is squashed almost entirely. Media didnt mention that and run with the 0%

Some model vaccine effectiveness, some dont. Media picked the models that didnt.

Most seem to work on a 50% transmission reduction after vaccination. This sadly maybe about right given our reliance on AstraZenica. If we switched to Pfizer/Moderna that'd be 90%+ and far far more positive in the outcome.



These are the vaccine model assumptions but are based on the latest data. We're going to struggle to ever reach herd immunity with the lack of efficacy for AZ so long as we rely on it for our major vaccine.
Mathematically it's just about impossible.
...and thats BEFORE the inevitable escape mutants take hold and grow.

All of the models are here:- https://www.gov.uk/government/publicati ... march-2021

Its worth having a read before jumping on the "This is all stupid" which upon reading seems to be entirely made-up media nonsense not modellers themselves.