Quoting benefit spending in £bn/ year can never provide a true picture. For accuracy it needs to be considered alongside increases in GDP and pensioner numbers.

The estimates shared by SC are based on 80% of the population contracting the disease and then 0.6% dying. So by now we would expect a large proportion of China's population to have had the disease based on their population of 1.4 bn people. So 1.2bn cases. In the real world we see that china has ~80,000 cases and that's with a 3 months head start on the rest of the world. https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020 ... rus-charts

The estimates shared by SC are based on 80% of the population contracting the disease and then 0.6% dying. So by now we would expect a large proportion of China's population to have had the disease based on their population of 1.4 bn people. So 1.2bn cases. In the real world we see that china has ~80,000 cases and that's with a 3 months head start on the rest of the world. https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020 ... rus-charts

I have removed the offending word and apologise for any upset caused.

Some so called expert reckons this could last till next spring...best get to tesco for some bog roll and pasta...

The graph shows working age benefits only and excludes pensions.

Experts arent always right However, as they know more about the subject than non- experts, there is an increased possibility of them being correct.

The graph does, but the spending figure (£217bn) you quote doesnt.

Very good graphic. The media are reporting it as if it's the Bubonic plague. Yes it's nasty, yes people will die but there have always been deadly diseases.

I thought it would be interesting to look into the claim that "60% of the population will get Coronavirus". Is it it scaremongering so we change our behaviour, or perhaps just a guess ?

If we assume that we have a vaccine for the virus then how many people would we need to vaccinate in order to bring it down to a safe level ? This is a well trodden path as it's been done for years with all sorts of infectious diseases both in animals and man. The most important number is R0, the number of people that one infected individual will him/herself go on to infect. For measles its a big number at around 17 and the maths requires that you vaccinate approximately 95% of the population. The WHO figure for Coronavirus is approximately 2.5, so it's more contagious than seasonal flu but a lot less than measles.

When the fraction of people that don't have the virus is less than 1/R0 then the infection can't continue and starts to die out. So for Coronavirus 1/2.5 = 0.4, ie we need less than 40% of the population that are still not immune. Or to turn that around, we need 60% of the population to be immune (vaccinated).

But of course we don't have a vaccine. So people will continue to get infected and then return to work (immune to the virus) until more than 60% of the population has been infected.

So this big number does tie in with Merkels' claim that 60-70 % of Germans will be infected and it would also support Patrick Vallances statement " It's not possible to stop everyone getting it and it's not advisable because you wan't immunity". You could also go a little further down this line of reasoning and work out why the UK government policy is different to that for most if not all other countries.

I will just edit this post to say that these are my figures and it's purely IMO.

The Public Health England figures are looking over the full duration of the pandemic. It is not over in China, they have just got on top of it with extreme lockdown measures. Given that there is no vaccine yet, and it is rampant in the rest of the world, it is still a threat to China too once they start to relax controls.

In the UK we haven't got the same lockdown approach as China and haven't got the capacity to do what they did - eg build extra hospital in 10 days in Wuhan. They also have a centralised, surveillance state and a more compliant society.

The example of what is happening in Italy and Spain is a warning of what is about to hit the UK in the next 2 to 4 weeks.

The next few months will be something totally unprecedented for any of us not old enough to remember the war and tragic on a personal level for many people. A lot of people are in denial at the moment and carrying on as normal and will be negligently spreading the virus to people who will become critically ill or die.

There's no point having arguments about it. I'm sure there will be some replies like "Christ, get a grip" at this point and for the next week or two maybe some will try to cling on to the idea that its just seasonal flu but once people start seeing the impact on people they know and relatives the tone will change and people will regret making light of the situation and ask why the government didn't act more quickly to slow the spread and keep some capacity in the health service like China, South Korea and some others have done.

It's going to shatter the US too, because they have poor leadership from the top and a private health system that is completely unsuitable for dealing with a large scale public health crisis.

It's bollix. The dwp spend 1-2% of their budget on out of work benefits S around 50% on pensions!!!

Our government as usual are making the figures suit.

They are only testing for corona if someone goes to hospital, and gets worse during observations. So they are jot testing 99% of suspected corona virus patients. I know this as brother went in with it n not tested just sent home n told to self isolate.

Our governments whole strategy is based in keeping the economy going as long as possible rather than looking after the interest of the population. They have played a blinder on capitalising on majority stupidity, herd immunity requires a vaccine. Not once in history has the human race developed herd immunity by becoming infected!!!

Does anyone know of any person who's got this virus by that I mean family member friends..not just some footballer cricketer etc