Coronavirus

[Bob's Orange]

Except eggs. Cant get eggs anywhere

Randomly there is a coffee shop at the end of our road which has remained open - (not sure coffee is essential but there we are) and i noticed has quite a few eggs which it is selling for £5 a dozen!

[RobertT]

Looks likely we'll pass 1m people confirmed with the virus within a day or two.  Places like India worry me, having seen the chaos of their lock down and mass migration of construction workers all being jammed together to wait for buses.

[theakston2k]

Looks likely we'll pass 1m people confirmed with the virus within a day or two.  Places like India worry me, having seen the chaos of their lock down and mass migration of construction workers all being jammed together to wait for buses.

Would imagine we’ve passed that already as sounds like China have completely lied about the true scale of it within Wuhan, some are saying as many as 40k+ actually died there. Who’d have thought a communist country with state controlled media and propaganda would do such a thing....

[Richie Wellen-Dowd]

Places like India worry me, having seen the chaos of their lock down and mass migration of construction workers all being jammed together to wait for buses.

As terrible as this has been and will surely get in western countries, it's the thought of it sweeping through places like India that really terrify me. Places where people live on top of each other can't social distance, and so many can hardly afford a day off work let alone more.

Health care systems that barely function at the best of times won't stand a chance to cope. I used to say in Cambodia that I'd rather die than end up in the provincial hospital there, yet so many would even avoid going there because they'd be scared of the bill at the end(if they weren't left to die on the floor because they had no bribe anyway).

[suttonred]

Randomly there is a coffee shop at the end of our road which has remained open - (not sure coffee is essential but there we are) and i noticed has quite a few eggs which it is selling for £5 a dozen!

You saying the £5 is dear?

[Bob's Orange]

You saying the £5 is dear?

Are you asking me if I think £5 for a dozen eggs is expensive? If so, then yes!

[suttonred]

Tell who does the shopping in your house.. I usually pay between £2 and £2.50 for 6 free range.

God we're boring

[Ardiles]

Interesting piece about a drug being developed to combat Coronavirus.

Coronavirus: Potential drug treatment starts UK trials

The drug company developing it has a slightly disturbing name (for anyone familiar with The Handmaid's Tale), but happy to look past that right now.

[Bob's Orange]

Tell who does the shopping in your house.. I usually pay between £2 and £2.50 for 6 free range.

God we're boring

Yes, yes we are I usually buy whatever is the cheapest but do try and get the free range ones if possible.

[Pax Romana]

Some pretty bad articles coming out of Italy now, especially the south.

Our government appears to have fucked up on testing and then lied about it but at least they're throwing money at the problem.  In Italy there seems to be little being done by the government to assist people whose livelihoods have disappeared and banks are rejecting requests to delay loan repayments.

On the subject of banks, it's good that UK banks are suspending dividend payments which should encourage other sectors to follow suit.  Will screw everyone's pension pots even further but still seems right thing to do.

They seem to be rather more coy about whether they are going to cancel bonus payments however...

[pauld]

On the subject of banks, it's good that UK banks are suspending dividend payments which should encourage other sectors to follow suit.  Will screw everyone's pension pots even further but still seems right thing to do.

They seem to be rather more coy about whether they are going to cancel bonus payments however...

They also seem to be being a bit slow/unwilling to dish out the govt-backed loans to small businesses. Hearing a lot of stories about businesses being refused emergency loans or told they're not eligible for the govt schemes. Seems the banks have forgotten how everyone else had to bail them out when they fucked up the global economy in 2008.

[Pax Romana]

Went to supermarket yesterday.  First time in 2 weeks.  15 minute queue outside, not bad.  Shelves pretty ok apart from pasta and flour.  Loads of toilet rolls so hopefully that madness has dissipated.

Had to recycle 2 weeks of wine & beer bottles in front of the queue which was a bit embarrassing.  One guy asked me if I liked a drink.  Blamed it on the wife.

[Arriba]

The only thing that's been a positive for me during this is the quietness on the roads. On the m4 at night you can go for over a minute without seeing anything on either side. Bizarre, but rather nice.

Oh and for eggs, try Waitrose. Bloody expensive mind.

[Pax Romana]

They also seem to be being a bit slow/unwilling to dish out the govt-backed loans to small businesses. Hearing a lot of stories about businesses being refused emergency loans or told they're not eligible for the govt schemes. Seems the banks have forgotten how everyone else had to bail them out when they fucked up the global economy in 2008.

Ok.  Not good.  I thought the government was underwriting all bank loans?

[pauld]

Ok.  Not good.  I thought the government was underwriting all bank loans?

No, apparently you can only access the govt backed loans if you wouldn't qualify for a commercial loan. So some banks are refusing to give companies access to the govt scheme because they would qualify for a commercial loan or being denied both commercial or govt backed because they were already in trouble. Companies arguing they'd have been able to trade their way out of it, banks saying they wouldn't. BBC had a piece on it this morning, but I've seen similar tales elsewhere and anecodotally on SM

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52114414

TBF they do need to have some checks to stop complete chancers, but it's loans not handouts and seems like the banks are forgetting how we all bailed them out when they were up shit creek