The Guardian has splashed with a humdinger of a story today, revealing that Dominic Cummings drove 264 miles from his home in London to stay with his parents in Durham. The police were tipped-off on March 31st after Cummings was spotted in his parents’ front garden with his three year-old child by a member of the public and officers “explained to the family the guidelines around self-isolation and reiterated the appropriate advice around essential travel”.
The police took no further action, but the Guardian leaves its readers in no doubt what it thinks should happen:
The witness, who did not wish to be named, told the Guardian: “I was really annoyed. I thought it’s OK for you to drive all the way up to Durham and escape from London. I sympathise with him wanting to do that, but other people are not allowed to do that. It’s one rule for Dominic Cummings and one rule for the rest of us.”
Tulip Siddiq MP, the Vice Chair of the Labour party, said of the reports: “If accurate, the Prime Minister’s chief adviser appears to have breached the lockdown rules. The Government’s guidance was very clear: stay at home and no non-essential travel. The British people do not expect there to be one rule for them and another rule for Dominic Cummings. Number 10 needs to provide a very swift explanation for his actions.”
The acting leader of the Liberal Democrats, Ed Davey, tweeted: “If Dominic Cummings has broken the lockdown guidelines he will have to resign. It’s as simple as that.”
Ian Blackford, the Scottish National party’s Westminster leader, said: “Dominic Cummings’ position is completely untenable – he must resign or be sacked.”
Breaking lockdown rules has been a resigning issue for senior officials.
Prof Neil Ferguson, the epidemiologist whose modelling prompted the lockdown, quit as a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies for flouting physical distancing rules when he was visited by his girlfriend.
After he stood aside, senior Tories insisted he had done the right thing.
Hancock said he was “speechless” and added: “I think he took the right decision to resign.”
So should Dominic Cummings go? I punched the air when Neil Ferguson was caught with his pants down and promptly slunk off with his tail between his legs. So shouldn’t I be screaming for Cummings’s head? Or is it one rule for my Tory mates and another for bearded leftists?
My view is that unlike Professor Pantsdown, Cummings had a “reasonable excuse” to be outside his home. Under the guidelines issued by the College of Policing (and reproduced in Appendix 1 of Lockdown Sceptics), one of the reasonable excuses listed is “providing support to vulnerable people”, accompanied by the following guidance:
Social visits are not generally a good reason to leave home. However, there may be exceptional circumstances for a person to visit another…
So what were the “exceptional circumstances” in this case? Well, both Cummings and his wife were suffering from COVID-19 at the time and as a result felt unable to care for their three year-old child. That was the “vulnerable person” that required “support”, so Cummings drove to his parents’ house in Durham and entrusted his toddler to their care while – as far as we know – observing the correct social distancing rules while in their household.
In other words, this isn’t a case of one rule for them and another for the rest of us, although Cummings was certainly interpreting those rules quite liberally.
And I don’t think I can be accused of sucking up to my Tory mates. If I was willing to turn a blind eye to their faults I wouldn’t have started this website…
Coronaphobia Still Grips Nation
Britons do not want to go back into work because they fear the lockdown is being eased too quickly – and they enjoy being at home, according to a depressing poll in today’s Mail. Here are some of the key findings:
- 33% said they were “better off” as a result of the lockdown, compared to 29% who said they were “worse off”. In the public sector, this rises to 46% saying “better off” and 23% saying “worse off”.
- 43% said they have enjoyed being stuck at home, with 25% saying they haven’t.
- 53% think the lockdown is being eased “too fast” against 11% who think it’s “too slow”.
- 75% think all travellers arriving in the UK should be quarantined for two weeks while 11% think they shouldn’t.
- 60% of parents said they won’t be sending their children to school on June 1st and 55% think the teaching unions are right to veto schools reopening compared to 27% who don’t.
- 58% think pubs with outdoor seating should not reopen, while 35% think they should.
Will London be First Out of Lockdown?
This is rumoured to be the big announcement Boris is planning on May 31st, following the news that there’ve only been 634 cases in the capital over the past fortnight. To lend credence to these reports, Barcelona and Madrid will be easing their lockdowns from Monday, allowing people to meet in groups of up to 10 and travel within their provinces. In addition, bars and restaurants will reopen, provided customers eat and drink outside.
Amusing comment spotted beneath the Times‘s piece on the forthcoming liberation of the capital:
People of Cornwall, Cumbria and Wales: please do not visit London. We are worried that you will reintroduce infection and overwhelm our health services. You will be welcome to taste the pleasures of urban sophistication when the crisis is past, and we will be pleased to relieve you of your money.
Former Director of Israel’s Health Ministry Condemns Covid Hysteria
There’s a good interview with Yoram Lass, former Director-General of Israel’s Health Ministry, by Fraser Miles in Spiked. He thinks the global reaction to the pandemic, including that of governments, has been fuelled by social media-induced hysteria:
It is the first epidemic in history which is accompanied by another epidemic – the virus of the social networks. These new media have brainwashed entire populations. What you get is fear and anxiety, and an inability to look at real data. And therefore you have all the ingredients for monstrous hysteria.
It is what is known in science as positive feedback or a snowball effect. The government is afraid of its constituents. Therefore, it implements draconian measures. The constituents look at the draconian measures and become even more hysterical. They feed each other and the snowball becomes larger and larger until you reach irrational territory. This is nothing more than a flu epidemic if you care to look at the numbers and the data, but people who are in a state of anxiety are blind. If I were making the decisions, I would try to give people the real numbers. And I would never destroy my country.
Lass is sceptical about the number of deaths being attributed to COVID-19 across the world, pointing out that the most reliable data are the excess death figures published at the end of the year.
The only real number is the total number of deaths – all causes of death, not just coronavirus. If you look at those numbers, you will see that every winter we get what is called an excess death rate. That is, during the winter more people die compared to the average, due to regular, seasonal flu epidemics, which nobody cares about. If you look at the coronavirus wave on a graph, you will see that it looks like a spike. Coronavirus comes very fast, but it also goes away very fast. The influenza wave is shallow as it takes three months to pass, but coronavirus takes one month. If you count the number of people who die in terms of excess mortality – which is the area under the curve – you will see that during the coronavirus season, we have had an excess mortality which is about 15 per cent larger than the epidemic of regular flu in 2017.
Compared to that rise, the draconian measures are of biblical proportions. Hundreds of millions of people are suffering. In developing countries many will die from starvation. In developed countries many will die from unemployment. Unemployment is mortality. More people will die from the measures than from the virus. And the people who die from the measures are the breadwinners. They are younger. Among the people who die from coronavirus, the median age is often higher than the life expectancy of the population. What has been done is not proportionate. But people are afraid. People are brainwashed. They do not listen to the data. And that includes governments.
Needless to say, Lass thinks the lockdowns are a pointless act of self-harm:
Any reasonable expert – that is, anyone but Professor Ferguson from Imperial College who would have locked down everybody when we had swine flu – will tell you that lockdown cannot change the final number of infected people. It can only change the rate of infection. And people argue that by changing the rate of infection and ‘flattening the curve’, we prevented the collapse of hospitals. I have shown you the costs of lockdown, but this was the argument in favour of it. But look at Sweden. No lockdown and no collapse of hospitals. The argument for the lockdown collapses.
Worth reading in full.
The Covid Bible
A reader has sent me some verses from the “Covid Bible”. This one could run and run…
- And their number was said to be Five Thousand… until the Authorities dispersed them as it was an illegal gathering under the Corona Virus Legisation.
- And the Disciples said, there is a boy here with Five loaves and Two fishes… which caused accusations of Panic Buying as the maximum at the time was two per customer.
- And I tell you, Lo, where two or three are gathered together in My name there will… the Police be also, to fine thee for breaking the Lockdown Rules.
Professor Ferguson’s Latest Astrological Charts
Neil Ferguson and his team at Imperial College have published a new paper – Report 23 – analysing the likely impact of easing lockdowns in different US states. According to them, the prognosis isn’t good:
We predict that increased mobility following relaxation of social distancing will lead to resurgence of transmission, keeping all else constant. We predict that deaths over the next two-month period could exceed current cumulative deaths by greater than two-fold, if the relationship between mobility and transmission remains unchanged.
You’d have thought Team Ferguson would have learnt its lesson by now. Why make apocalyptic predictions, given the high likelihood that they’ll turn out to be over-estimates? In the case of this one, we only need wait two months before it’s proved wrong. You’d think the bespectacled soothsayers would be a bit more risk averse, given that the general tenor of their advice is to hide under your bed until we have a vaccine.
I asked Alistair Haimes, a data specialist who’s written some great number-crunching articles about the crisis, to take a look at the report for Lockdown Sceptics. This was after I’d seen a tweet of his saying: “Just imagine that the Imperial College report is all in Comic Sans and you’ll have an idea of the esteem they’re held in right now in the UK.”
Imperial’s latest analysis is mesmerisingly bad, finding interesting new ways to be wrong and misleading. Key questions to ask yourself reading it or its conclusions would be:
1. Why is Imperial still only using deaths to work backwards to past infections and then forward again to future infections (an inherently error-prone method) when we have on-the-ground data like hospital admissions and COVID-19 calls to doctors and hospitals to track the disease’s spread? (In the UK, this information is actually the most useful data for ‘community’ R, as it excludes nosocomial infection: UK’s R is currently around 0.6 from this data by the way). Why on earth wouldn’t they use whatever current data they can get their hands on rather than using a single, variable lag-indicator?
2. Why is Imperial not differentiating states based on how they have controlled the outbreaks in care homes, given the high percentage of total deaths this represents? New York has 10x the proportion of care home residents dying of COVID-19 as Florida, since NY made the same mistake as the UK, where 1/3rd of deaths are care home residents (and Sweden, where >50% deaths are in care homes or care-at-home), which was to send infected patients back to care homes without first testing them to ensure they’re negative. (Both Germany and South Korea got this right, btw.) The ‘care home’ R would clearly be hugely different as a result, and everyone is now ‘on”‘this issue, but Imperial’s analysis does not account for it.
3. Why does Imperial assume that infection spread is only affected by state-sponsored interventions rather than declining naturally, given that the downward trajectory of R is indistinguishable for a lockdown versus non-lockdown country (see UK v Sweden)? Michael Levitt – Stanford Professor of Structural Biology – pointed out two months ago that transmission is constantly declining whether the disease is managed or not, but Imperial’s model implicitly assumes that infections will spring up again when interventions are lifted like an un-squashed sombrero. The ‘natural experiment’ or ‘control’ of Free Sweden versus HMP England does not bear this out.
4. Why is Imperial using only antibody levels to sanity-check its results, when it is clearer by the day that large proportions of people are relying on other facets of the immune system (T cell and likely cross-immunity from other coronaviruses) to fight off infection? This would make a massive difference to its calculations of the remaining susceptible population.
5. Why is Imperial still running the model based on Chinese (no comment) parameter inputs for length of illness from over two months ago, when we know so much more about the virus, the disease and its treatment now than we did then?
6. Why is Imperial still using IFR assumptions via shaky historical data from selected countries in Europe, when the CDC has calculated the current actual IFR rate (0.26%) in the US?
I could go on. There is a two-page digression proving (with lovely charts) that mobility is strongly correlated with stay-at-home orders: no shit, Sherlock. The code itself is very short and simple – formatting and presenting the results is more lines of code than the calculation – but it’s the old chestnut: garbage in, garbage out.
P.S. A lockdown sceptic on Twitter decided to plug Sweden’s numbers into Neil Ferguson’s model to see what deaths it would have predicted compared to the reality. We all know how this turns out because I’ve written about two other versions of this exact same exercise. But here’s the graph just for laughs:
Instant Karma for BP’s Looney
A few days ago a reader emailed me with the following gripe:
I am really getting hacked off at the amount of money that is being splashed around as a consequence of this stupid lockdown. Now we learn that the wonderful boys in blue have been getting free petrol, c/o BP’s generosity. Do BP’s shareholders know this is how BP is misuing their funds I wonder?
He included a link to an article in Police Oracle confirming that from the beginning of April British police have been allowed to fill up their tanks at BP petrol stations completely free of charge.
Yesterday, the same reader emailed me again, only this time he was in a better mood:
Today the CEO of BP (aptly name Bernard Looney) announced this: “BP is halving the number of top managers as the coronavirus pandemic accelerates a strategy shift under the new chief executive to transform the UK energy major into a ‘smaller and nimbler’ company. The pool of managers will be cut from 250 people to around 120, with many who held leadership positions under former chief Bob Dudley leaving the company in the next few months, a person familiar with the change said. In an email to staff sent on May 14, Bernard Looney said the company was working towards a new operational and leadership structure as it seeks to achieve its ambition to be a net-zero emissions company by 2050.”
You can read the story in full on EnergyWorld.com, where it’s headlined: ‘BP’s Looney halves top management roles in energy transition plan.’ Someone has a sense of humour…
Did Matt Hancock Inadvertently Reveal London’s IFR is 0.32%
At the Downing Street press briefing on Thursday, Matt Hancock announced that “around 17% of people in London… have tested positive for coronavirus antibodies” based on “the results of our antibody surveillance study”. Is this the much-touted Porton Down seroprevalence study? He didn’t say. He also didn’t say how he was defining “London”, but if we assume it’s the London metropolitan area that’s a population of 14,372,596.
Can we calculate the infection fatality rate (IFR) in the capital based on this? I think we can. According to the ONS, 5,654 people died in London hospitals after testing positive for COVID-19 up to the week ending May 8th. The ONS estimates that 75% of Covid deaths in the capital have occurred in hospitals, giving us a total – in and out of hospital – of 7,805.
So let’s calculate the IFR:
- 14,372,596 x 0.17 = 2,443,341
- 2,443,341 ÷ 7,805 = 313
- 100 ÷ 313 = 0.32
- IFR = 0.32%
Probably an over-estimate, given that we know some people who’ve been exposed to the virus have it so mildly their bodies don’t produce enough antibodies for them to show up on a PCR test. But still three times smaller than the IFR Neil Ferguson plugged into his shonky model.
Stop Press: I put in a call to the Department of Health and Social Care to try and find out a bit more about this data and have been told it comes from Public Health England’s seroprevalence study, the results of which are due to be published next week. The 17% estimate comes from studying 974 NHS blood transfusion donors in London between May 1st and 3rd. So a small sample and hardly a representative one. After all, anyone who thinks they have the virus, as well as some who think they’ve had it, would be unlikely to give blood. Some of you may recall the bonkers prognosis that Professor Anthony Costello gave to the House of Commons Health Select Committee on April 24th, claiming we wouldn’t achieve herd immunity until after eight to ten waves of infection, with a death toll exceeding 40,000 in the first wave alone. This prediction was based on a Dutch survey of blood donors which showed that only 3% of them had developed antibodies to the virus. As a reader pointed out at the time:
By definition, a blood donor has no known infections, has not had a recent illness, even a cold or flu, and I presume the blood banks are being particularly careful at present. Even if the tests are done from the initial samples rather than the blood collected (i.e. includes rejected donors), someone who is aware that they had a cough recently would either not have volunteered or been rejected at questionnaire stage before giving a sample.
Children More Likely to be Struck by Lightning Than Die of COVID-19
At yesterday’s Downing Street press briefing, Sir Patrick Vallance, the Government’s Chief Scientific Advisor, was asked what risk COVID-19 poses to children. He said: “They are very low risk, but not zero risk. And there have been some serious cases in children, of course, but very few compared to adults and older age groups.”
Let’s unpack what he means by “very few”. Up to the the week ending May 8th, according to the ONS, there were 37,375 deaths registered in England and Wales involving the coronavirus and of these two were of children aged 14 or under. There were no such deaths in Scotland, and none in Northern Ireland. So that’s two in total aged 14 or under for the whole of the UK. According to Statista, there are 11.91 million children aged 14 and under in the UK. So that means the chances of a child under the age of 15 dying from COVID-19 are one in 5,955,000.
An average of 49 people are injured by lightning in the UK each year and if we assume those strikes are distributed equally across different age cohorts that means about eight children aged 14 or under are struck by lightning each year.
So the chances of a child under the age of 15 being struck by lightning are four times higher than them dying of COVID-19.
Can you say that next time please, Sir Patrick?
Harvesting Deaths
In yesterday’s FT, David Spiegelhalter, the Cambridge statistician, told Alphaville’s Jemima Kelly he has revised downwards his estimates of the proportion of people dying from COVID-19 who would have died in the coming year anyway, suggesting that figure is between 5 and 15%. The colloquial term for this is “harvesting” – a short-term increase in the mortality rate that then causes a subsequent drop in deaths because some of the most vulnerable people will have died during the earlier spike. Five to 15% is a far smaller estimate than Neil Ferguson’s, who previously said that as many as two-thirds of the people who’ve died from COVID-19 might have died later this year anyway.
Sir David, who is the Winton Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk in the Statistical Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, and was formerly president of the Royal Statistical Society, said his reduced estimate was partly based on research carried out by University College London and published in the Lancet, showing that even among the over-85s with at least three comorbidities, we would still only expect 1 in 4 to die in the next year without coronavirus.
But evidence that at least some “harvesting” is taking place was provided by last Tuesday’s ONS data which shows that in Week 19 of this year the total number of deaths in hospitals in England and Wales was below the five-year average for all-mortality deaths in Week 19 – 114 lower, to be precise. It will be interesting to see whether that was a one-off or the beginning of a trend.
The Reality of Lock Down for One 99 Year-Old
Lockdown sceptics like me are often told we are “heartless” for wanting to “sacrifice” the elderly for the economy. Worth pointing out, then, that for many elderly people the miseries of being kept in quarantine, unable to see their families, are so acute they would prefer to take their chances. Here’s the story of one reader’s 99 year-old mother-in-law:
On 21 March my 99-year-old mother-in-law fell at her care home in Lincolnshire and cut herself so badly she had to be rushed into Peterborough Hospital. Since I and my wife had only returned home that morning from Australia after an abruptly curtailed trip, this was fairly distressing for all since we could not visit her. She was to remain there for 15 days largely because thanks to the habit of NHS regions of offering different treatments, Lincolnshire could not deal with the type of dressing used in Peterborough. On 31 March this was finally sorted out, my wife having had to ring almost daily to barrack staff in Peterborough and Lincolnshire.
So, she was discharged. Incredibly, even at this date the proposition was that this elderly lady be sent back to her care home in an ordinary taxi, with all the attendant risks. Staggered at this, we stepped in and collected her ourselves. I need scarcely mention that she was not tested for COVID-19 at the hospital. She lives in a detached garden apartment so does not need to come in contact with any other residents.
As it happens, she’s fine and there were and still are zero cases of the virus at her care home, a place which is incidentally so well organised they have plenty of stocks of PPE. But let’s just look at what the lockdown means for my mother-in-law. Her husband died three years ago. Two of her three children are dead, many years ago. Almost all her friends and relatives are long dead. The only person she has left is my wife, our children and her great-grandchildren, none of whom she is allowed to have visit her. Since some of them live abroad the new quarantine rules will ensure any chance of seeing them again is being pushed back further and further.
Handicapped by macular degeneration she can hardly see anything and her hearing is only just acceptable thanks to a number of electronic devices that enable her to listen to the radio and TV.
She has no dementia and is utterly appalled at watching her country being reduced to economic ruin for the sake of people like herself. She is crippled with acute back ache that confines her to bed most days. The doctor is not allowed to visit her. Nor of course can she go to the dentist or get her hair cut.This is the reality for one very elderly person who never stops telling us she has had enough and wants to go. The lockdown has denied her not only any remaining joy in her life but even some amelioration of her physical discomfort. She is in despair for the future of her descendants of whom she is immensely proud. The care home staff do their very best but nothing can compensate for what has happened.
I’m not going to pass judgement here myself on the lockdown. But when I hear people like Matt Hancock or Priti Patel say they understand how tough it must be, I know they really don’t have the slightest idea.
Queen Sacks Boris, Takes Back Control
Has one particular 94 year-old finally had enough? Excellent post in the comment thread beneath yesterdays update from “Annie”. It begins:
Last night I dreamed a dream.
The Queen was scheduled to make a live broadcast to the nation. She appeared as usual, poised and serene. But suddenly she sat bolt upright, hurled a brick through the autocue, fixed the cameras with a steely glare, and began:
People of Britain, I know you are watching me without respect or full attention, sloppily dressed and probably eating junk food. I will give you just five minutes to take off your nappies, assume decent clothes, smarten yourselves up and return to hear my announcement.
[Five minutes later.]In view of the lamentable condition of this country, I have decided to resume my proper place as an active head of state. I have dismissed the present Cabinet and am in process of selecting a new set of ministers equipped with brains and backbones. Dr David Starkey is to be the new Prime Minister, and Lord Jonathan Sumption will be Lord Chancellor. We are currently looking for a Chancellor who can add up and knows that there is no such thing as a magic money tree. We will let you know when and if we find one. Leading my new team, I shall restore this country from the shambles it has become.
For a thousand years, the best of the people of these islands have striven – not always successfully, and never unanimously, but unceasingly – to construct a system which is built on justice and individual freedom. But to maintain justice requires courage, and individual freedom requires individual responsibility. People of Britain! In a few short weeks, cowed and subjugated by panicking bullies who use fear and lies as their weapons, you have cast away the labours of a thousand years. You have ceased to care for justice, you have surrendered your freedom, and you have shrugged off your responsibilities. Everything that is worth having in Britain has been destroyed by the so-called lockdown. Without protest, without resistance, you have allowed your country to be turned into a vast concentration camp, where you are at the mercy of self-styled leaders who know neither leadership nor mercy.
There’s a good deal more in the same vein. Read the rest of it here.
Famous Companies That Have Gone Bust (So Far)
After hearing the news that Hertz has filed for bankruptcy I thought I’d start a new section in which I list those famous companies in Britain and the US that have gone bust as a result of lockdown lunacy. Here is a provisional list, but it will grow given that half of Britain’s high street chains are expected to be in administration by August:
In the UK:
- Debenhams
- Carphone Warehouse
- Oasis
- Warehouse
- Carluccios
- Cath Kidson
- Lombok
- Brighthouse
In the US:
- Hertz
- Dean & Deluca
- Gold’s Gym
- JC Penney
- J Crew
- Neiman Marcus
- Pier 1
Round-Up
And on to the round-up of all the stories I’ve noticed, or which have been been brought to my attention, in the last 24 hours:
- ‘Tens of thousands of coronavirus tests have been double-counted, officials admit‘ – Diagnostic kits which involve nasal and saliva samples of a single individual are being counted as two tests, says the Telegraph
- ‘Every part of England would pass Germany’s Covid test‘ – Ross Clark in the Spectator suggests forgetting the R number and using the same metric used in Germany and Ontario – if the no. of infections falls below 50/100,00 then continue easing restrictions
- ‘Stanford Professor and Nobel Prize Winner Explains this Viral Lockdown – Fully!‘ – Ivor Cummins, aka the Fat Emperor, talks to Professor Michael Levitt about the lockdown policy
- ‘Feel a Little Shame for the Lost Soul of the Nation‘ – Avay Shukla makes a powerful moral case for ending the lockdown in India. A must-read for people who think lockdown scepticism is a conservative cause
- ‘The worst week for Britain’s economy laid bare – in five charts‘ – The Telegraph publishes five charts to show the economic devastation unleashed by the lockdown. Sobering
- ‘Lockdowns Haven’t Proved They’re Worth the Havoc‘ – Joe Nocera in Bloomberg contrasts the reaction to COVID-19 with the reaction to the Hong Kong Flu pandemic in 1968-69
- ‘We Can’t Go On Living in a Two-Meter World‘ – More scepticism from Bloomberg
- ‘Two in three of us have put on weight in lockdown‘ – I am among the 66.6%
- ‘Next week’s clap for carers should be the last‘ – The inventor of ‘clap for carers’ calls time on the virtue-signalling seals
- ‘Cracks widen as fatigue takes its toll at Downing Street‘ – Trouble down pit, according to the Times
- ‘California doctors say they’ve seen more deaths from suicide than coronavirus since lockdowns‘ – Disturbing report in the Washington Examiner
- ‘Life long damage inflicted on children by lockdown, reveals study seen by SAGE advisers‘ – The Telegraph reports on data shown to members of SAGE showing lasting harm done to children by keeping them out of school
- ‘Justice Dept. supports downstate lawmaker’s lawsuit against Illinois stay-at-home order‘ – The US Justice Department is helping a state congressman in Chicago sue Governor JB Pritzker over stay-at-home order
- ‘Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike reveals restart plan as end of emergency looms‘ – Governor of Tokyo gives short shrift to the idea of a “new normal”. He told a meeting of the city’s coronavirus task force yesterday: “We need to proceed cautiously, but each day the city meets these criteria is another step toward reclaiming the lives we had before.”
- ‘Exclusive: Sir Keir Starmer reveals his children have been at school and calls for consensus to get pupils back in classroom‘ – Good scoop from the Telegraph. Starmer’s wife is a “key worker” so this is within the rules
- ‘Boris Johnson’s ‘Conservatives’ Are Spineless Bed-wetters‘ – James Delingpole’s latest in Breitbart. Yes, James, but what do you really think?
Theme Tune Suggestions
Some more suggestions for theme songs from readers: “I Am the Law” by Spandau Ballet the Human League, “Cancer” by Joe Jackson, “You’re Not Very Well” by the Charlatans, “Patience” by Guns n’ Roses and “My Sweet Lord” by George Harrison (for Lord Sumption).
Small Businesses That Have Reopened
Last week, Lockdown Sceptics launched a searchable directory of open businesses across the UK. The idea is to celebrate those retail and hospitality businesses that have reopened, as well as help people find out what has opened in their area. But we need your help to build it, so we’ve created a form you can fill out to tell us about those businesses that have opened near you. Please visit the page and let us know about those brave folk who are doing their bit to get our country back on its feet.
Shameless Begging Bit
Thanks as always to those of you who made a donation in the last 24 hours to pay for the upkeep of this site. It still takes me about nine hours a day, what with doing these updates, moderating your comments and commissioning original material. And my journalist helpers have gone! If you feel like donating, please click here. And if you want to flag up any stories or links I should include in tomorrow’s update, email me here.
And Finally…
If you want to visit your elderly parents this weekend and are worried about being stopped by the police, just wear this Halloween mask. You should get away with a slap on the wrist.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
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Today’s home learning spot is a history lesson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqsAMJEIQ8I
We need to talk about Matt.
https://twitter.com/russellhoward/status/1264179614051700736
ARRRRGHHHH
With you there!
Any advice for someone (a close friend of mine) who is a next-door neighbour to two teachers, who are spending each weekday enjoying their gardening, sunbathing, DIY projects and grocery shopping during school hours? My kids’ teachers have been nothing short of excellent but the above really is happening and it has to be more than this one couple. When parents are in despair at having to work from home etc and they are receiving nothing more than links to BBC bitesize for their children, we really have to take those polls from teachers as somewhat inaccurate.
Some (not all) of them are just keen to prolong their paid holiday and spruce up their houses. While others end up losing their houses and their jobs everything will be coming up roses for them.
Well. I am a School Business Manager and we are all on a rota to work one day a week, across the school workforce. This, sensibly, was put in place from the offset to ensure social distancing and to make sure that teachers who were at home, had time to set up online learning. Also because there is no way that any school staff, other than the head, will have needed to work full time during this lockdown period. We have all, in our school, been working hard, trying to keep up with the new rules and keeping the more mundane aspects of running a school up to date. But without face to face interaction with all of our parents and pupils it isn’t a full time job. So, what are the teachers next door to your friend supposed to do? It’s not their fault the school is shut. We didn’t ask for it to happen. If they are your friends neighbours why doesn’t your friend have a chat with them and stop being so judgemental?
Sure, it’s frustrating though when I hear from other friends that they aren’t being given structured work at all for their children. The two might not be directly linked but for those who don’t know the intricacies of the school system it feels unfair and annoying. My friend is having to work from home doing more hours than she usually does, as is her husband.
To be fair our school is an outstanding school with a hugely dedicated staff. Pupils teachers ring them every week to see how they’re getting on with life, not just home learning.
Probably because she’d get back the same defensive tripe you’ve just written.
Why is it tripe? It’s true! If your a neighbour chat to your neighbours! One of them may have underlying health conditions and shielding! Unless you ask you’ll never know. All of the school staff I know can’t wait to get back to school.
Just out of interest, and I’m assuming you will have a lot of contact with the unions through teachers etc. – what can be done by teachers when they disagree with their unions? Like….. can’t they just do it anyway? Could a band of rebel teachers just open their school regardless? Would they get fired?
Believe it or not I used to work in a school and there was a strike on whilst I was there. The ones who disagreed with the strike just went in anyway (and were treated like absolute trash as a result), brave souls. But in this case, can they not do anything because the schools are just…. shut? What if a headteacher decided she wanted to open her school? Could she do it?
It would depend on what type of school it is. An independent school I once worked at did not recognise unions, they could open if the trustees permitted it. An academy could do the same. My current school is an LA school and realistically we would have to take a steer from them as they are the employer. We have not consulted unions, but have been bombarded with blanket emails from them threatening strike action, wanting copies of our risk assessments for opening etc. We have told our staff we are opening if the LA permits it and that everyone, unless you have a shielding letter, is back full time from 1st June. My apologies for being defensive but there’s a lot of school staff bashing about generally, when actually the unions are the vocal ones.
Don’t feel that you need to apologise Adele. It’s nice to have people come on here and share their own experiences. And I’m disappointed that people aren’t being more receptive.
Unfortunately there is a lot of Public Sector worker bashing going on on here recently. Everyone decries the media for feeding them brainwashing material but then they lap it up from elsewhere as long as it fits their agenda.
I’m not entirely sure what people expect Public Sector workers to do…Send their salaries back? Turn up to work when it’s locked up? Hide indoors and self-flagellate in case they accidentally enjoy themselves?
I wish people would stop consuming the fake news that they’re all fearmongers who are enjoying a nice holiday and appreciate that they share exactly the same range of views as everyone else and that a huge amount of them are lockdown skeptics who want to get back to work.
I would expect teachers to be working still, for a decent portion of the week to be honest. I know not all kids have access to computers but many do and for those who don’t maybe more time and effort should be being put into creating work for them or trying to be accessible when possible.
I’m sure these people are the exception to the rule. I’m frustrated at this time about how much our kids are being let down and perhaps this story from a friend just hit a nerve.
I work in social work and we have absolutely abandoned our most vulnerable clients.
I was treated like a pariah for turning up to work on days I was not on the rota as everyone is totally paranoid.
I am being paid for doing next to nothing and that does not sit well with me.
As I said before there will be redundancies after this and I will be first in line.
So sorry to hear this. It’s utter madness and no one seems to be in charge! It seems with each day they’re making decisions that get us deeper and deeper into the mire.
Thank you! I am as frustrated as everyone else on here, can’t wait to get back to normal! And no, not the “new normal!” And I don’t care if my comments are getting down ticks either!
I can’t go into work if there isn’t anything for me to do because the government shut schools, I tried to volunteer but the NHS rejected me! 
Teachers are human just like the rest of us. While I don’t doubt there are some taking advantage of the situation, there are likely many who are trying their best to deal with this foolish situation and, even worse, dreading what it will be like returning to teaching during the “new %$rmal” (I can’t bring myself to even type the ridiculous phrase) of 2 meters apart and mask-wearing. Not to mention fielding inquiries from paranoid parents unaware that their children’s risk of dying from coronavirus is less than getting struck by lightning. However, I won’t be too hard on anyone posting here. It’s an especially frustrating situation for skeptics.
Then maybe they should be much more vocal about it!
My apologies for getting triggered lol. I have a temper
So it’s the LA that is the Power That Be….s. Never thought I’d see an advantage to private schools but here we are. The Unions are literally acting like the mafia.
It’s fine!
There was never anything sensible about closing schools. Do you think there was?
I think the lock down, including closing schools, to begin with was sensible as it was a new situation on which we had little info and we needed to ensure the NHS wasn’t overwhelmed. After a month it would have been obvious that those already in hospital, care homes, the elderly and those with underlying health conditions should be the only ones to be shielded and everyone else needed to get back to their normal life.
We knew from the beginning that this virus was not dangerous for children. It was deemed a category 1 ie of no particular threat.
The only people needing protected were the elderly and those with underlying health conditions and those are the people we have failed to protect.
The following is gudance from the WHO:
Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is an infectious disease caused by a newly discovered coronavirus.
Most people infected with the COVID-19 virus will experience mild to moderate respiratory illness and recover without requiring special treatment. Older people, and those with underlying medical problems like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, and cancer are more likely to develop serious illness.
The best way to prevent and slow down transmission is be well informed about the COVID-19 virus, the disease it causes and how it spreads. Protect yourself and others from infection by washing your hands or using an alcohol based rub frequently and not touching your face.
The COVID-19 virus spreads primarily through droplets of saliva or discharge from the nose when an infected person coughs or sneezes, so it’s important that you also practice respiratory etiquette (for example, by coughing into a flexed elbow).
Nothing has changed since this advice was given.
You have fallen for the mantra protect the NHS. It is their job to protect us, which they are at this time failing miserably to do.
This was only ever about protecting the government from potential embassament and you have been fooled.
I was fooled. But not now.
But look at the damage it has done to our children.
And if this nonsense idea of social distancing goes on there will be more damage.
It is nothing short of child abuse.
I know the majority of people got caught up in the panic at the start but the government deliberately raised the threat of the virus and repeated in its ads that the virus is dangerous for people of all ages, which they knew was a lie. Obviously this has terrifed parents.
Watch UK Column. They have been doing many excellent reports during this fiasco.
https://www.ukcolumn.org/article/covid-coercion-boris-johnsons-psychological-attack-uk-public
The main stream media and BBC have been complicit in ramping up the fear.
I don’t envy you Adele as it is not easy to make your voice heard about the crowd and I am glad you have come to this site. I think it is very brave of you and I hope you take some comfort from it.
Good luck in trying to lead your school back to normal normal.
Thanks. I came here as I wanted some sanity and a different perspective. As someone who has suffered health anxiety in the past this period has been an absolute nightmare! I am convinced Boris panicked and kicked us down, following bad advice. But now? Where even is he?!
I think he is having his own mental breakdown.
I think you’re right. I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes, but the man needs to get a grip! End the sodding lockdown now and protect the vulnerable (as outlined by the WHO.)
The virus has all but run its course now anyway.
I think it’s more that he’s a skiver.
I was too. Don’t be too hard on yourself. The panic porn was unrelenting.
Yes. For the first couple of weeks I was quick to embrace the lockup because my only sources of info were the Beeb and the Grad. Thank goodness I found sites like this – ironically thanks to Guardian comments. Please keep posting in there, those of you who can stomach it!
Which is why recently reinforcing the 2m rule is either bloody-minded or downright sinister.
No. In fact there are experts who believe it may have made the situation worse, at least initially.
who cares if the government says stay in? Individual Sovereignty takes precedence over anything else. The government can and do make all sorts of bullshit laws and i ignore all of them. They may wish to spend their one and only life in this universe making laws to make things better by always making things worse but i don’t have to listen to them. It’s like there’s you and then there’s the you that must do what they say. There ain’t enough people who genuinely don’t give a fuck about society or what happens to you. No one reading this gives two shits for me, quite rightly, but the ones who claim they do are the evil ones. How about we all get on doing what we like doing and stop caring what the so called law or the government or some chinless inbred royal or Scientist or Clergy or worst of all a celebrity say about anything. Time to step out the house and go do something the authorities are saying you shouldn’t, fuck ’em.
Quite right, have been defying the rules since day 1, and will continue to do so. New neighbours moved in today (quite strange in these times I thought).
Went to say hello, and first thing I did was shook his hand. Ha… Things already looking up.
Thankfully the wet lettuces who were previously there, NEVER left the house, and had their kids bouncing up and down on those friggin trampolines all day have ran off – hopefully to some nuclear bunker where they can be ‘safe’.
Small victories count.
Covid bunkers are actually a good idea. We build one in every community, and the zombies flee into it every time something ( calked real life) scares the s..t out of them.
And the rest of us shut the three-foot-thick steel doors on them, and get on with living.
Annie, Who’s going to see their virtue signalling.
Start how you mean to go on, Ian. Hopefully you’ll get on better with these neighbours.
Already have many times Biker.
Damn right, brother. There are some aspects of life that I don’t recognize the governments authority over me. One of those is whether or not I can leave my home. You want to put me under house arrest, put me in front of a judge, but until then I will do as I please.
You’re right Biker but the big problem is for those who want to go back to work but are forced to childmind, or who can’t because the 2m rule means it’s impossible – and insurance is a big deal for employers, nomatter how they feel about the silly rules. Same for teachers who want to pursue their vocation but are pawns in a political game. And of course for the children who NEED to play with their peers but are prevented from doing so by a mixture of hysterical parents and official redtape.
I know it’s Mental Health Awareness Week and I’ve seen the Conservative social media pages posting various virtue-signalling videos and photos to ‘mark the occasion’.
As someone who has been in and out of therapists’ offices for the best part of 10 years of my life, this is a complete kick in the teeth. These cretins really have nerve posting their saccharine propaganda paying lip service to mental health awareness while implementing a ruinous policy that forbids anyone from having any sort of normal fulfilling life, preventing people from having physical contact with loved ones, pumping out endless fear-mongering and anxiety-inducing drivel, denying people the right to work and take pride in producing something and providing for themselves and their families, and letting businesses into which people have put their heart and soul go up in smoke – all the while allowing this lunacy to go on indefinitely and providing no end date.
That’s just me – I already have problems so I was always going find lockdown very difficult but what really makes me angry is that my boyfriend, who was previously one of the most sane, cheerful, optimistic, and mentally stable people I knew, is starting to struggle terribly. Every day I see him slip further into a heartbreakingly uncharacteristic depression as he watches his future go down the pan while completing exams that he feels are totally pointless due to his now-dented employment prospects, all the summer internships he managed to get through hard graft having been cancelled, and his final year of university (and all the fun, freedom, and liberty that entails) hanging in the balance. It is technically illegal for me to provide him with any meaningful consolation or comfort (a pixelated moving face on a screen is not an adequate substitute for proper human contact). I know there will be so many more like him out there who had previously good mental health which is being completely ruined for absolutely no good reason. I will give it a couple of weeks until he’s finished his exams and then this lockdown can go f*** itself, I absolutely refuse to see my loved ones destroyed by this.
As has been said in these comments already – the government shall never be forgiven.
Truly appalling that this country’s young are being so under-mined. And, as for ‘our’ government’s words of ‘sympathy’ and ‘understanding’, yes saccharine is indeed le mot juste.
You are absolutely right poppy. They have lost all credibility, particularly on mental health.
They have no credibility on the economy or education either.
I never imagined that any UK government was capable of these policies.
It’s terrible. I would take comfort in the fact that they must be suffering and struggling to sleep at night knowing the true consequences of the devastation they have wrought across the country, but then again most of them are sociopaths anyway. I don’t know how else they’d be able to live with themselves.
I’m sure they’re fine. After all, they have saved 450,000 lives, word of an expert.
Have you forgotten the 1980s?
You are so right. My teenage daughter (GCSE year) is suffering greatly. She worked so, so hard recently and spent a year in therapy building up her self esteem and dealing with her anxiety. She grafted at school to get the best grades she could in her mocks and was on an upward trajectory to do even better. Now she is withdrawn, her confidence gone almost completely, she is reluctant to take part in any of the work set for her etc and she is anxious about the future.
I can’t imagine how she must be feeling, truly terrible. It’s like the government has just totally overlooked the consequences of this for young people. My younger sister was due to do her GCSEs this year as well but of course they went out of the window. I’m not sure if it’s blissful ignorance, being too young or just incredible resilience (or a combination of all three) but she doesn’t seem too put out by what’s going on – yet I fear that by the time she is, it’ll be too late.
F++k the government and all the sniveling lickspittles and curtain twitchers of this country,don’t wait two weeks,go to your boyfriend and loved ones now Poppy,we all need to be back with the ones we care about now,enough is enough !.Over the weeks I have had friends harassed by the police for the crime of going to buy food and then been left feeling frightened to venture out afterwards,friends abused by members of the public for the audacity or going out for a walk on a beautiful spring day,I have been shouted at for breaking some kind of ‘covid law’ when going out for exercise and I am utterly,utterly sick and tired of being treated as if I am radioactive every time I approach someone on the footpath !.When I got out of bed this morning I was determined to try and be positive but after all I have seen and read today I am absolutely seething with anger.
This must be a very vivid nightmare,it can’t be real,can it ?.
Go for it Poppy!
Mental Health Awareness week has been a sham. If they truly cared about people’s mental health, the likes of Mind, the Samaritans and Heads Together should have been calling for the government to end the lockdown and social distancing NOW.
Instead they post the usual blathering about how “you are not alone”, “together we can do this” but its reached a point now where their advice is no longer helpful or effective. What will they do then when we see the inevitable spike in suicide rates?
My God, it’s disingenuous. I got one of those trite little ‘help your mental health’ pamphlets through the door the other day, complete with the stereotypical simplistic typeface and babyish illustrations. It went straight in the bin.
I got something similar as well. To be fair it was helpful in the beginning but now as the lockdown has become more Nightmare on Elm Street, they have ceased to be effective.
There has already been a spike in suicide rates the figures are just not being released.
I would have thought that these so called mental health charities should be collating the firgures and lobbying government but no they all stay silent.
Shame on them.
What a wonderfully heartfelt post Poppy, my best wishes to you and your boyfriend. I am utterly incensed by the biblical ineptitude and cowardice currently permeating through every corridor of Westminster.
I am 33 and soon to be a father of three children, and whilst I have been able to work during this lockdown crisis I fully appreciate that the worst is yet to come; crippling tax rises, cuts far more ranging than those felt during the last period of austerity and an explosion the cost of living.
Our generations have had their futures, ambitions and dreams completely dashed by the liberal elites who infect every facet of Government, major institutions, media and academia. These people have worked in lockstep to afflict some of the most authoritarian, punishing terms on our society in living memory; separating loved ones, destroying livelihoods, and surely precipitating a most dreadful increase in mental health issues.
Once the full scale of their hideous vandalism is revealed, I hope Boris and Co will be forever reeling from the venom of the nationwide protests that will hopefully ensue.
My best wishes to you and your family as well. I would hope Boris and Co will be ‘forever reeling’, but I get the impression that their political reputation is much more important than the wellbeing of their citizens, otherwise we’d be lifting lockdown a lot faster than we are. They’re just populists hiding behind a blue rosette.
Too late for the protests I fear. The damage is done.
You’d have to find Boris first!
And Cummings would say he was at one end of the country while secretly partying at the other.
My daughter lives in Wales – she went there to do a degree in dietetics and is in her final year. She was attending hospital placements until they stopped a couple of weeks short of her finishing – she is also (now) 32 weeks pregnant and suffered with severe anxiety before the lockdown, which has now intensified – all hospital appointments without her husband – why can’t pregnant women have their partners with them? Aren’t the hospitals pretty empty now? And we can’t even visit as Wales won’t let us in from England! I truly despair at what is happening but was heartened to see lots of people kite surfing at the beach today and others just enjoying the sunshine and the beach cafe (takeaway only of course!)
Wow. Well said. I hope your bf gets better. I think part of the problem with my generation ( I am 58) is that they do not seem to care for your generation (as I assume you guys are much younger if your bf is still studying).
The 70’s Me generation WAS just that. The focus was improving your own life – who cares about other people? The UK £1 trillion debt for Covid19 will be repaid by your generation not mine.
I have had terrible stresses in my life (as almost everyone does) from, in my case, friends committing suicide. God bless and good luck.
Yes we are both 20 and 21. I feel like my life has been much longer than it is because the internet/social media exposes young people to so much more anxiety and rubbish than they would have been exposed to 50 years ago and effectively robs them of their innocence – no wonder mental health issues in young people have skyrocketed what with the MSM’s apocalyptic predictions on the effects of Brexit, climate change, and now this.
I know that I’m only just starting out and I have time to turn things around. Sadly the government is robbing us of that optimistic opportunity by taking as long as possible to open up the economy. It’s a total joke that hairdressers will be open in JULY when they’ve already been open for weeks in other European countries. I doubt our lockdown easing will be brought forward either.
By July, it won’t be a case of whether or not to wear a mask, I’ll need a bag over my head!
My hairdresser is late 50s, absolutely brilliant but only worked 4 days a week before lockup. I’m not sure she won’t already have decided to fold. The remaining ones will have very long waiting lists. There are much more serious issues than a haircut, but it’s symptomatic. Like thousands of other small businesses, she won’t be the only one to disappear due to this fiasco.
Poppy, I really feel for you and for your boyfriend. This lockdown has to end, now. Right now. As a therapist, I’ve been terrified of what this house arrest will do to people’s mental state, and the sycophantic, happy clappy nonsense drives me to distraction. A lot of it perpetuated by my colleagues – sheesh! But I wanted to say this to you, and I hope you can pass this on to your boyfriend.
This will end, and you have got time.
We all have. Yes, the future might be a tough one, for some more than others, but reading through all of these comments, there are so many of us out here who understand, who want to be supportive and are fighting in the only ways we know how to change this situation. There is time ahead of us to make much of our lives after house arrest. Inferring your age, you both have a lot more time ahead of you than I do at 57, but we’ve all got time. My neighbour made me laugh the other day when he said, ‘one day we’ll look back and say, ‘you remember that crazy spring when we all locked ourselves in our houses? What the hell were we thinking?’
I suspect your neighbour is right – one way I cope with this destructive madness is to imagine myself in 6-12 months’ time (hopefully), looking back on this period and thinking how completely insane it was. I feel that if I can mentally picture myself reflecting on it after it’s happened, then I can hold on to the idea that it WILL be over eventually.
“one way I cope with this destructive madness is to imagine myself in 6-12 months’ time (hopefully), looking back on this period and thinking how completely insane it was. ”
That’s a really helpful thought Poppy. Thank you so much for sharing. I will bear that in mind for my situation too.
Absolutely right. This will not be forgotten.
I was rather shocked to find that ” Boris should swing ” being rewarded with top comment yesterday but then on reflection maybe he should be held to account along with Gove, Hancock, Vallance and Whittey and there is a precedenct for this.
In 1947 the ” Doctors Trial ” took place in Nuremburg . Leading physicians who had performed medical trials on people who were definately not volunteers were tried before the tribunal and in the most serious of cases were sentenced to ” swing ” . As a result we now have the Nuremburg Code on Human Ethics . One of the stipulations for human experiments is that all participants should be volunteers.
We all know “Lockdown ” is a massive novel human experiment and we all know now that it has been ineffective. Its harm to the people of this country has been enormous. The people who forced it on the British people without the consent of the people should be held to account before a court and the events at Nuremburg in 1947 provide a basis for this .
*rubs hands together*
I’ll buy the popcorn
By the way I must emphasise that I am not in favour of capital punishment , before some stasi officer reports me ; however I do think there should be some settling of accounts and a legal process will be necessary.
The problem is that ANY approach to Covid would be an experiment. No-one knows for sure what is going to work. We are all guessing. The only way to not carry out an experiment is to do literally nothing and hope it doesn’t kill everyone.
Almost certainly a less costly response than the one we chose, as Belarus seems to be proving.
In reality the rational response was obviously just to do the least costly measures that have proven effect, such as encouraging people to was hands, and stay at home when they’re ill, and quarantining the vulnerable where possible. Pretty much what Sweden did and it worked for them.
Unfortunately the press think Sweden (and Belarus) are the ones “experimenting”. You won’t get any argument from me that we should have taken that approach, but equally if Covid was as bad as had been claimed then this would have been terrible.
It’s a little too easy today to say “the least costly measures that have proven effective” when at the time no-one actually knew what was effective.
We should have been more skeptical, and we should have been less cavalier with the economy, but we can’t fall into the trap of hindsight.
That might have been a sensible response 6 weeks ago. There’s absolutely no excuse now.
Hmm, I can’t say that I agree with you (perhaps a first!), Toby, over Cummings.
Seriously, he had to travel 264 miles to arrange care for his child, with a sick wife in tow and, according to some sources, whilst beginning to show signs himself?
Yes, of course, the ‘guidance’ is utter rubbish, but he was part of that. Quite intolerable.
Completely agree….
I understand the nuance Toby is putting forth, and technically he’s correct, but as I said yesterday, given the heavy-handed over-reaching way the police and gauleiters have dealt with this, and how it has left people being far more restricted in their movements and lives than the letter of the law dictated, he has to appreciate the bad taste it leaves in people’s mouths when he sees the people at the top ‘getting off on a technicality’.
I think this will not go away, and it will dog the government until they have no choice but to get rid of him. The comms guy absolutely cannot become the story. Rightly or wrongly, the press now have him where they want him and his position will be completely untenable by this time next week.
Maybe he himself planted this story so as to be ‘sacked’ by this joke of a government. It would make some sense.
In addition, his wife wrote an article for the Spectator which was deliberately deceptive and then repeated the deception two days later on Radio 4.
They deliberately made people think the restrictions were tighter than they are. He should go.
Marr read out the guidelines several times this morning. They were perfectly clear – stay in your primary residence.
Totally agree with you. Its another case of do as i say and not as i do. The fact all 3 drove all that way just for some childcare in case either of them got too ill to look after him is quite frankly ridiculous. You can’t tell me they didn’t have friends that they could of relied on for emergency childcare. Me and my partner is in a similar situation. Our nearest family member is over 100 miles away. I would never dream of travelling to see them if we were ill with anything just incase I needed them to look after our son for a few days. Also has anyone asked if they stopped for a comfort break. There’s no way they drove over 200 miles with a small child without stopping at least once on the way.
The total disregard they showed not only towards their family but everyone else they would of encountered on their trip up shows they knew the figures coming out from government was a complete lie.
Agree too… it is irrelevant the rules are unacceptable for so many reasons, them making an excuse to bend the rules to fit around him just highlights utter contempt for us plebs.
First we had 1984 now we have Animal Farm too.
… from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again…
Don’t understand how this took this long to be public knowledge-wish I could find that reference that Cummings himself made about seeding ideas so that it becomes accepted over time
If two parents with a 3 year old fear that they are coming down with Covid and the child can be looked after by relatives, what is the alternative for them ? They can’t pack him off on a train .
Yes that maybe the case but you wouldn’t be treated to the same rational if you were in that situation which is the point.
The family should all have self isolated surely.
Well all the other families did!
They have relatives in London and you can’t tell me they don’t have some form of nanny!
I agree, however how absolutely ridiculous and typical that this will now be the MSMs obsession for days (until he goes) rather than the COMPLETE LACK OF ANY POSSIBLE REASON TO KEEP US IN LOCKDOWN.
Anyone else think he KNEW the lockdown is bollocks? Same for Ferguson and Boris.
They all know it. Every single one of them.
None of this is about a virus
It seems that you might be implying that Mr. Cummings ‘crime’ is all more heinous because of who he is; that “Yes, of course, the ‘guidance’ is utter rubbish, but he was part of that”.
How do we know he was part of that? I’ve seen that he’s an advisor to the Prime Minister, but I’ve never seen him speak publicly on any aspect of the lockdown (admittedly I never watch television, so he may well have done so, just that I didn’t see it) so to say he’s part of the guidance is just to believe what has been reported in the MSM. And as a matter of course, I don’t believe anything they report until I’ve investigated further (if I’m interested enough in the topic).
I seem to be very much in the minority, but I applaud what Mr. Cummings did and I would have done the same. It seems to me that those on Twitter and Facebook and other MSM who are condemning him are just rather envious of the fact that he did something that they have wanted to do but were too scared to do so. What appals me more is that a neghbour felt it was right to report to the police that he visited his parents. That chills me to the bone.
At least he hasn’t caved to the pressure and apologised like a little wuss the way all the others do the very second they are caught being naughty. Gets my respect for that if nothing else at least.
Typical! I’ve been waiting for years for someone to show a spine and refuse to apologise, and when this one comes along it’s one of the evil idiots behind this coronapanic lockdown disaster, whom we desperately need to get out of government regardless of whether or not he’s “guilty” of what he’s charged with!
Most of the companies listed didn’t go bust just because of lockdown. They’ve been struggling for a long time and lockdown only accelerate the inevitable. I follow what happens in retail on a regular basis.
We criticise the government for blaming a lot of deaths for covid to inflate the numbers. We need to keep some level of objectivity and not blame everything on COVID ourselves.
The real problem though is that it is all being forced to happen within a very short time-frame. Who would wish to be looking for a job right now?
I agree with you – lockdown put these companies in a very disadvantaged position and left a lot of people jobless, without any chances of finding employment right now.
But we have to remember that some of these businesses were struggling for years. They were already closing down stores and looking for potential buyers long before we knew anything about coronavirus.
There is a difference between a healthy business (for example, restaurant) that was doing great until forced to shut down and a company with an outdated and overgrown retail estate that was making losses (JC Penney, Debenhams).
I think you may be surprised by the survival rates of non-chain restaurants on a 5 year timescale… it’s vanishingly small.
I think you raise a valid point here. In a sense, Covid was the catalyst – it sped up the inevitable chemical reaction, without affecting the final outcome.
Much of the death of the high street chains has come from the rise of online consumerism, particularly from Amazon.
It’s an ongoing trend called ‘Retail Apocalypse’ that started around 2010, and it’s a direct result of online sales increasing with every year. Only in the first half of 2019, there were 2,868 store closures in the UK. There was also a lot of openings, but nowhere near that figure.
Online is a big factor but it’s not the only one… car-unfriendly town centres and gross iniquities in business rates are a couple more.
Rent is another one. The overheads of having a bricks and mortar business make it very difficult to compete with online businesses.
I’ve been to Thailand a few times and apparently the stores in the malls don’t pay rent (the high end big name stores at least). The mall owners just take a cut of the sales. Possibly something that should be considered over here.
Also land supply restrictions by leftie Councils…causing high rents…IMHO
Town centre parking fees and supermarkets offering free carparking had a large part to play in the death of my high street.
Besides, Amazon offers a lot of small businesses a shopfront. That’s how I can buy my coffee from a small family business in North Yorkshire and my soap from two mums working from their kitchen in London. No way they’d survive lockdown without Amazon.
The wonderful tiny cafe I love to visit won’t be able to come close to adhering to social distancing, even if it’s reduced to 1m. Social distancing, if pursued, will kill many thriving businesses and whole communities with them.
And if anything the proposed social distancing measures will hasten the demise of more shops.
That said I do agree that the shops have not really helped themselves and are now even making it harder. Just now, I was forced to buy a kitchen knife and ice cream scoop after both gave up the ghost. Went to John Lewis website and to my horror, they proclaimed on their website that they were not selling knives online!
So I went to Amazon and found that they did and placed an order in no time.
Amazon – 1, John Lewis – 0
I had similar from John Lewis Online about a year ago, suggested I went to my nearest JL store, which is about an hour of more drive or train ride away, to see if they had the set of knives I was interested in.
As you say others will always pick up this type of business, in my case it was Lakeland, but it could so easily have been Amazon.
Normally I would not have minded as I could have dropped by a branch after work or during one of my days off but not now especially with this lockdown.
So for those complaining about Amazon’s dominance they only have themselves to blame.
They would probably argue their demise wasn’t inevitable. In any case, every business that goes under is a blow to employees, landlords, suppliers, HMRC. Even if they’d only survived 3 more months absent this disaster, that’s valuable.
Yep it happens every time there is a crisis. They used to blame Brexit now it’s ‘The Virus’.
From the start I jokingly called this virus “The Finisher”, I know I’m a heartless b’stard, because that’s essentially what it is. Most of the companies that have gone bust were on their last legs already and this was merely the final straw. More victims of “The Finisher”.
A few sectors as well are oversaturated – fashion is one that pops into my mind. Many fashion houses and retailers have been struggling for years now and it doesn’t help that they have been cynical and hypocritical in their pursuit of sales.
The current business model for fashion is not sustainable and I won’t be surprised if this current situation will see more brands either downsize or disappear altogether.
Yes of course Cummings used common sense but the populace as a whole were not encouraged to use common sense.
I just posted this comment on this story about how the clapping for the NHS & carers should stop now,
https://uk.yahoo.com/news/clap-carers-stop-becomes-negative-143918669.html
“Before all of this nonsense & scaremongering & fear about a common flu virus that the vast many of the gullible sheeple just fell for, nobody ever clapped for the NHS, it is & was their job to try & save people’s lives. Nobody bothered prior to all this nonsense.
What next? Clap for the government who have single handily destroyed the economy on a biblical scale, who have peddled outright lies & fear of a stupid non threatening virus, caused unnecessary suffering to people by introducing a stupid lockdown that was not required, ruining normal life as we knew it, taking away people’s liberties & freedoms, stopping people from seeing their families (unless you are a government minister) causing unnecessary suicides, causing domestic violence to shoot up,
Causing schools to close unnecessarily & causing suffering to children by stopping their education, introducing stupid 2m distancing from people, introducing stupid “social distancing “ in shops, taking away football & other sports.
I could go on & on & on, but it’s time that everything was lifted & this country gets back to normality. Sweden has done it without all of this rubbish & the evidence is out there that this was a total over reaction by the government & it’s bunch of ill informed “advisors “
Thumbs down brigade at the ready here, but I really don’t care, it’s you gullible people as well as the government that have caused all of this nonsense. Buying into it all without even questioning it all.
This country is royally messed up now & it will be your children & their children that will ultimately end up paying for all of this, all because of a biblical over reaction to a virus that is no more harmful than the common flu.
I for one also never clapped for the NHS, nor did I stick the stupid rainbow drawings in my windows.
So, people, wait until the true scale of this becomes apparent, which it will, then you will not be so happy to accept what is happening, there will be no jobs to go back to, but you will need to pay all the money back somehow or other, the government doesn’t have a magic money tree.
Gullible fools.”
I now await the comments & thumbs down votes that I am a murderer who doesn’t care about lives etc.
Lol.
Don’t think you’ll get downvotes here mate.
Sorry Beefy, I should have said the “I await the comments & thumbs down” part was meant for my post on yahoo, not on here.
I post often on here, it has opened my eyes a lot since I first found this superb website, which was not long after it first started out.
I was going to downvote him for the tabloidesque style …
Just a small comment : you seem to have posted this in the wrong place – this is NOT the Guardian!
Few here clapped for the NHS and even fewer are under any illusion about the utterly devastating consequences to come!
No IanE, I posted it on here to show how stupid people are buying into all of this nonsense, because Yahoo is also full of people who fully believe in all this lockdown rubbish.
I enjoy noising them up, because it is rare that anyone on there (like the Guardian) actually can see this for what it actually is.
Will probably end up banned on Yahoo though.
Hmm, preaching to the converted as if they are the reverse seems odd to me, but, hey, it takes all sorts.
Send this to the MSM, they need to hear it
No excuse at all for Cummings.
The mantra was stay at home. Protect the NHS.
What if he, his wife, and god knows how many members of his family that he infected had ended up in an ICU in little Durham?
Goes against the spirit of why the lockdown was in place in the first place, certainly in the context of when he made his “mercy dash”.
Man is a complete hypocrite as well as a charlatan.
Agree, and at this point I don’t think it matters what happens to him. Looks like he’ll stay, so he’s a constant reminder of the govt’s hypocrisy, and constant ammo for critics as Johnson, Hancock et al try to explain it away. If he were to go or be sacked, it’s an admission of guilt.
We’ve seen this so many times before… a SPAD/minister comes a cropper… thinks he can hang on… PM expresses full confidence… media like a pitbull and there’s a new story every day…. by day 7, he’s gone.
I’ll give Cummings a week.
Steve Baker has the measure of it on Sky News…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMMkE6KP4zM
Well said Steve Baker. I enjoyed this in the comments: where can I get a dominic cummings mask so that I can go on holiday to Devon ?????
I like this website a lot but I don’t agree with Toby young defending Cummings… lots of people rightly or wrongly have followed lockdown rules – implemented by government of which cummings is part of..
Join the discussion…Simple question: when will anti-social distancing end in the UK? The message I’m increasingly getting is – Never. Any thoughts?
Same in the US. I feel that far more livelihoods and childhoods will be destroyed by “social distancing” / “new normal” noise than by the lockdown. This will be our new struggle in the post-lockdown world. We are post lockdown in Minnesota, but everywhere we go we feel a malaise and a dour sense that life is only barely worth living.
In business terms, it’s just a huge and entirely gratuitous decrease in productivity, which will have the results that inevitably follow decreased productivity. It has damaging social, cultural and political aspects as well, of course.
Now that Vrouw Aaslik, or whatever her name is, has called time on the spontaneous bestowal of Clap on the NHS, it is obviously time for the new religion to organise its services more formally. Here is a preview of the trial run:
(The people of Zombieville, capital of Zombieland, congregate in the streets, masked, gloved and observing social distancing.)
(The Celebrant begins the service. The Celebrant looks and sounds very like Nicola Sturgeon, only nastier.)
C. Safety, security and stay at home be the rule with you all.
All. And also with you.
C. I’ll just remind you that I can see every single one of you on my telescreen, so you had better show fervour.
(All show fervour.)
C. We shall begin with Number 100 in your NHS virtual book of worship songs. The tune is ‘Old Groveller’.
All sing:
We praise you, holy NHS,
For keeping us alive
And to maintain your holy laws
We will forever strive.
We know we must protect you
From every lurking ill
And not let cancer patients
Your holy precincts fill.
We promise all to stay at home
And wear hygienic masks
And not to spread the virus
As we go about our tasks.
We praise your holy rainbow
And say thank you every day
And always we’ll obey you
In every sort of way. Amen.
C. We will now make our general confession.
All. We confess to the Almighty and Everlasting NHS, doctors, nurses and holy paramedics:
We have offended against your holy laws.
We have sinned in thought, word and deed.
We have dreamed of going to cafés.
We have hugged our grandchildren in our hearts, which is almost as bad as actually doing it.
We have not stood exactly on the blue foot markers.
We have shaved centimetres off the two-metre rule.
We have smiled at people.
We have not reported our neighbours to the police as they will undoubtedly have reported ourselves.
We have not made ourselves face masks out of old T shirts.
And there is no health in us.
Wherefore we pray you, o Mighty NHS, to have mercy on us.
C. May the Almighty NHS have mercy on you, pardon and deliver you from all your sins, and keep you in lockdown eternal.
All. Amen.
Now follows The Harangue.
(C. looks fixedly at her telescreen. All shudder .)
C. People of Zombieville, last week I told you of a grievous affliction that has long haunted this land. It is called TRUTH.
Last week I told you a terrible story. I told you about a doctor who, called to certify the death of a man who was brought in from a road accident with multiple injuries, refused to put ‘Covid 19’ as the cause of death merely because it was not true.
(Cries of horror erupt on all sides.)
We learned two lessons from that dreadful story. The first is that traitors and heretics can lurk even within the holy NHS itself. They will be hunted down and eliminated.
You all know the second lesson. Repeat it, please.
(There is a dreadful silence.)
C. (snarling) So you have forgotten? This time, and this time only, I will give you a last chance. Repeat after me:
UNTRUTH CREATES TERROR.
TERROR CREATES OBEDIENCE.
OBEDIENCE PROTECTS THE NHS
THE NHS SAVES LIVES.
(All repeat these words with great fervour.)
This week, I am going to warn you of a yet greater sin. It is called Compassion. Before the Holy NHS took over the world, quite a lot of people, including the deluded adherents of that dead faith called Christianity, used to openly advocate Compassion.
We know better now.
Compassion makes people into Covid spreaders. I will give you some dreadful examples. And every single one is true. It has actually happened, somewhere in Zombieland.
A toddler fell over, and an adult came over from the other side of the street, picked up the toddler and consoled him.
(Cries of horror.)
A woman who had not seen her elderly neighbour out in her garden for three days, became concerned for her so-called welfare, went round to her house, knocked, and, getting no answer, actually opened the door and put her head inside the elderly woman’s house.
(Screams of execration.)
A man collapsed in the street with a heart attack, and a first-aider who was passing by attempted to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
(Roars of fury, ‘death to first-aiders’, ‘string them up’, etc.)
All these are examples of Compassion. Now listen and listen well:
COMPASSION MAKES PEOPLE INTO SPREADERS.
SPREADERS ARE KILLERS.
SPREADERS OFFEND AGAINST THE HOLY NHS.
SPREADERS ARE OTHER PEOPLE.
OTHER PEOPLE ARE THE ENEMY.
HATE YOUR NEIGHBOUR.
STAY SAFE.
(All repeat the above many times, until they have it by heart.)
C. And now comes the Great Clap. Once again, don’t forget: I can see every one of you on my telescreen.
(The clapping lasts for a good fifteen minutes. By that time, some people are wincing every time their reddened hands make contact. Others are failing to connect their hands, and are desperately hoping that the Celebrant won’t notice. Nobody dares to be the first to stop clapping.)
At long last the Celebrant says, with a thin smile:
C. Very well. That will do. I shall expect a longer Clap next week.
Now may the blessing of the Holy NHS be upon all those who Snitch on their Neighbours, Observe Social Distancing, and Stay Safe.
All: Amen.
C. Now return quickly to your homes and don’t come out again until the same time next week.
(The people creep back into their homes, trying not to breathe. )
Terrific!
Brilliant. Sums up the Church of the NHS well!!!
Superb!
If you are not already making a living from your writing you should start. Savage and accurate. Thank you again.
James
Absolutely brilliant and thanks for all your effort in writing this. I certainly won’t be clapping for the NHS who’ve no doubt been complicit in making this whole charade a hundred times worse. I used to be a nurse and have never come across such a bitchy, back stabbing and mostly inherently stupid group of people who obsessively focus on the trivial and ignore the important issues. I left after spending years of dreading going to work as an insider in this insular culture and fighting the kind of covert and actual bullying that’s endemic in the profession. The final catalysts for me were being totally unsupported following an unexpected patient suicide and being disciplined after a bitchy colleague pretended to be distressed after I’d said I was a nurse who wanted to to leave nursing in a team meeting. I now work in a non nursing role in adult social care in a wonderfully supportive team.
Thank you, fiery! I hope that if I fetch up in hospital ( horrid thought) you will be my nurse – or at least pop in to see me!
Excellent once again! Keep it up.
This is just brilliant. Thank you!
Disappointing on Cummings. Regardless of the arguments on the issue itself, anybody who really recognises the severity of the damage this lockdown has done and continues to do should be requiring Cummings to be booted out of government for any excuse (or none) that becomes available.
This isn’t a matter of a criminal or even civil charge requiring to meet some sort of standard of proof. He’s just an adviser whose advice on the most crucial of issues has proven to have been some of the most disastrous given to any British government since WW2. It’s incredible, frankly, that he hasn’t been dismissed in ignominy already, except that to do so would be to admit the failure of the whole government.
Far too much mates’ and old campaigners’ sympathy going around here. Clearly you don’t have any respect for the idea of taking personal responsibility for the consequences of one’s decisions. If Cummings had the slightest self respect or decency he’d have resigned by now anyway. Just remember, you who support him for old times’ sake – he’s already been responsible for more disastrous decisions than some entire governments. What’s he going to inflict on us next?
I will set out my “take” on the specifics of the Cummings business below, but I wonder if we should be looking at it more from the point of view of “how does it help or hinder our efforts to end lockdown?”. Sadly I think it’s negative for us – lose lose.
If we defend him, we’re elitist, rule-breaking evil Tories. If we attack him, we risk finding ourselves on the same side as the lockdown supporters.
I think we are best off ignoring it and moving on, and focusing on persuading people that the lockdown hasn’t done much good and it can’t continue. I have never got an answer from a lockdown supporter to the question “how long should this continue?”.
Cummings I have mixed feelings about. His “excuse” is plausible, though the singing in the garden bit doesn’t quite gel with two desperately sick parents unable to look after their child. I don’t know much about him. He seems quite able, not especially likeable (though between having to deal with press, politicians and civil servants, one can understand a certain irritability), possibly a bit arrogant, bright, some interesting and innovative ideas, maybe can’t be trusted with big decisions (but then neither it seems can the people he advises).
A general point for Mr Young and everyone else – I think “lockdown” as such will end in the next two or three months. Or least the government might be able to pretend it has ended, by pointing to businesses and schools having reopened in some form.
However it won’t be a return to normal – it will be the “new normal” in which businesses and educational establishments will be much more online than on-premises, social distancing will be expected and/or mandated in many many settings, and the Coronavirus Act 2020 will still apply in some modified form, and we will still be in the “Emergency period”.
Travel to and from other countries will continue to be very difficult.
Mass sporting and leisure events will be restricted.
I shudder to think what restrictions might remain regarding who we are allowed to see in our own homes, or gathering in groups.
So the struggle, such as it is, must go beyond “end lockdown” and move to a return to normal, not the “new normal”. It must press for the ending of the Emergency Period and all legislation associated with coronavirus.
All of which is why we must just ignore the ‘new normal’. If enough of us carry on as we did before, ‘they’ cannot put us all in jail can ‘they’?
Come on – out you go- back to normal and bugger the ‘new normal’.
Free petrol for police is disgusting, if they were offering free petrol to ambulances and health workers that would make sense, but giving it out to an organisation who have recently proven themselves to be scarcely better than concentration camp guards, that is unacceptable.
On the Cummings matter, what he did would have been entirely acceptable had he also at the time publically gone and stated that the lockdown was a bad idea, that it helped no-one and we should all get our country running again. What made his actions immoral is that rather than coming out and saying that the lockdown should appply to no-one he just decided secretly that it shouldn’t apply to him alone, at exactly the time that he was assisting the government in comdemning and fining people who did similar things that were within the actual rules but against the dictatorial guideline decrees.
The Cummings matter goes to the heart of the lockdown problem; the abnegation of leadership that got us here in the first place. That it has taken so long for this story to break speaks volumes.
So many of us would have done what he did. That is not the point. We are not senior figures in government.
It is very much one rule for senior figures at the heart of government and another for the rest of the population, but the rule for the senior figures is that they are held to much higher standards of behaviour than the general public. That is a requirement of leadership.
By that measure, Mr Cummings has fallen short (who knows what those who work for him must think of this since, by all accounts, including his own, he holds them to very high standards), even if for the finest of motives, and must go.
As I said yesterday – ‘All pigs are equal, but some pigs are more equal than others’. He should go.
To paraphrase on old saying “Caesar should be above suspicion”. The fact that those who have inflicted this on us could not even hold on to the rules they made is untenable. Cummings should go.
And if anything this shows that this lockdown is unsustainable. Until today I did think if we played our cards right we could go the Switzerland route and reopen earlier, now I think we’ll end up like Italy – people taking matters into their own hands and TPTB can’t do anything about it.
It was Caesar’s’s wife who had to be above suspicion. According to Caesar.
How many other bigwigs do you think have flouted the lockdown?
How many haven’t?
So far as I can tell, wasn’t it Cummings that pushed for the lockdown and Cummings that’s been brokering deals with big data, AI and whatever else, that I am convinced we remain in lockdown only to ensure these companies have a market for their product? In other words didn’t Cummings flog our freedom? I want him gone.
Toby. I don’t think you have called this right about Cummings, and nor do I think it holds up in the court of public opinion. As one of the architects of the lockdown – he sits on the SAGE committee and is the supposed ‘intellect’ tasked with contextualising ‘the science’ for the prime minister – the little people, rightly, anticipate ‘do as I do’. When his wife waxed lyrical about their experiences with CV, why the glaring omission if it was a perfectly legitimate reason; they drove to Durham to self-isolate because they have no family network around them in London to look after their little boy in an emergency? Frankly, his excuses now look rather thin and seek to play on technicalities.
100% agree.
Telegraph headline – he broke lockdown again in middle of April. Thought that was likely given Rachel Reeves’ letter (read in full on Guido). I will give him till 9pm to resign!
Suggested theme song for admirers of Sweden: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-mBMHR-ol9s#menu
“Nu mår jag mycket bättre”, which means “now I’m feeling much better”.
This is seriously turning Into george Orwell’s perpetual war against the invisible enemy. The Idiots in government spending £280 million to make public transport safe FFS! Is this the new normal.
Toby could you arrange / repost an idea that all us lockdown sceptics POST a physical letter to for example direct to No10 or maybe better to one of the main newspapers. A physical letter must carry more weight.
Maybe get all the other sceptics you know (Delingpole, Frisby et al) to publicise the same.
I’m sure everyone here would do this?
I think they are just describing increasing services in coronavirus terms – ie the plans are basically what theh would have been before?
No, they are recruiting a little army of hygiene nazis to yell at you if you get too close to a fellow commuter.
What’s the definition of IFR? I assumed it didn’t include people who were exposed to a virus but in which it never developed because they were resistant to it either through acquired or innate immunity. I don’t really care which it is but I just want to make sure we use the same standard for this virus as for others especially flu which is what we mainly want to compare it with.
Yes, IFR is all infections, asymptomatic etc.
The trouble is a serology survey only picks up antibody cases.
So we retrun to our quest since the start of all this to find medical evidence of durable (can’t be infect a second time) non-antibody resistance. IF we can find this then we can increase all these spread estimates, petition Bojo and get out of the Groundhog day!
Any joy finding anything? I still can’t find solid medical evidence. Plus, the genetic immunity research stories all seem to have gone quiet too…
…. this is the silver bullet, the thing we really need to find.
Obviously it includes asymptomatic infections. But what counts as an infection? Presumably not being exposed but immune due to acquired immunity from this or other coronaviruses. What about being exposed but resistant via innate immunity? Is this not a standard definition?
This study shows acquired resistance via other coronaviruses present in up to a third of the population https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.17.20061440v1.
But people don’t have to be resistance so that they can’t be infected a second time, it’s not a binary thing. They just have to have sufficient resistance to mean they aren’t all infected when they are exposed, so that not everyone gets it when it’s going round.
Yes exactly but can you imagine the headlines if they did find that asymptomatic cases could be reinfected?
In reality it just alters the herd immunity threshold in subtle ways. The infectiousness of these “asymptomatic superspreaders” is probably actually quite low on average so I would expect that even if they can be reinfected their existence would still reduce R0 overall.
Yes, it’s the reduction of R overall through a substantial proportion having a level of resistance that makes the difference and contributes to herd immunity without them necessarily being fully ‘immune’ from (re)infection.
Do you know the definition of infection in Infection Fatality Rate? Is it someone who would test positive for antigens in a (perfect) PCR? Is that true of all people whose innate immune system fights off the virus, or do some fight it off at an early stage before they would test positive?
Another way of putting this is, is there a difference between asymptomatic infection and being exposed but unaffected because your innate immune system fought it off, or are these identical categories?
What about if you’re exposed and your antibodies fight it off – is this an infection?
If you were reinfected, and actually had regular antibodies, there would still be a bit of virus in your body until the antibodies had got rid of it. A regular PCR test would probably not pick this up but you probably could detect it if you looked hard enough.
If you had cross-immunity from something else maybe you’d have a bit more viral RNA present for a bit compared to someone with “proper” SARS2 immunity, but not as much as a completely fresh host would.
Innate immunity and vaccination (especially with something like ChAdOx1 which doesn’t seem to work that well) would also result in some viral replication, though less.
If you read that study about the monkeys they tried to reinfect (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.13.990226v1.article-info) even after they had antibodies they still had a small reaction and a temperature when they were re-exposed (they always use huge viral loads on these poor monkeys) but quickly dealt with it and were then considered PCR negative, but relative to a particular threshold that they used for the test.
So I think the only consistent definition is to say that “infected” means “virus has entered your body and replicated at least a bit”. And that can still happen whatever kind of pre-existing immunity you might have (innate, cross or vaccination). In this sense you could be infected but PCR-negative (because you’d be below the usual thresholds used).
Under that definition, the effect of a vaccine or cross-immunity is to reduce the IFR, and that is how the term seems to be used. In this paper (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.11.20062232v1) they speak of looking for lower IFRs in places that had BCG vaccination programs.
A consequence of this definition however is that anyone can be reinfected with SARS2 at any time whatever kind of immunity they have. So obviously people aren’t always using the term this way because when they talk about the risk of “reinfection” they really means the risk of becoming significantly re-infectious.
So in conclusion I think people use the term a bit loosely and differently depending on whether the context is biology or epidemiology.
Excellent discussion of the issue, thank you, and I certainly agree with your conclusion, a looseness that doesn’t help the public conversation one bit. However, the answer to my question seems to be that infection basically means exposure, and the IFR properly speaking should take into account everyone who is exposed regardless of their level of immunity and how quickly they deal with it. (I wonder how they know what this is for the portion that doesn’t show up in any tests, or will all exposures/infections show up in PCR tests?)
On this definition then IFR will vary hugely between populations, even more than I thought.
No, I think IFR is only considering those that need to go through the process of establishing immunity for the first time. Essentially the main distinction is whether you have period of elevated infectiousness.
If you don’t, then you are just part of the background group of spreaders who move it about on the skin, etc, and you are simply added to the already immune proportion in the model.
So you just start with an immunity count near the immunity ceiling.
It does then mean the peak height can’t be as high and the potential size of the integral of herd immunity overshoot is lower.
It’s quite instructive to read about the IFR for Swine Flu including looking at archived web pages from when it first started. It was initially over-estimated as you would expect, but even today, the range of estimates for the “true” IFR spans at least an order of magnitude because nobody’s really sure how many mild or asymptomatic cases there were. I also read somewhere that an estimated 20% of the world had been exposed, which seems to have been enough.
I think the practical definition has to be “exposed for the first time to the actual virus”, where exposed means “some viral replication taking place in your body”– obviously it doesn’t count if someone sneezes on your gloves which you then burn but only after having touched a few door-handles.
Thanks, sounds sensible. But the very fact we’re having to debate and cannot find a definitive answer to one of the key terms in understanding this virus seems to me a big problem.
It is part of a bigger problem, and the complexities here point to some of the reasons modelling a new disease was always likely to be highly speculative, and should never have been taken seriously as a basis for policymaking. The following extract from a couple of tweets linked here the other day by swedenborg seems to highlight the scope of the problem quite well:
“we don’t have a universe of naive susceptibles, currently infected & recovered (SIR). We have a continuum of people with varying degrees of susceptibility due to variance in innate immunity, cross-reactive and specific immunity.”
I believe that Professor Dolores Cahill of University College Dublin has stated that once you have had covid-19 in any way, shape, or form (that is either the innate or the adaptive immune system fought off the disease and you either knew it or didn’t know it), you are immune. And you will not shed any further viruses in the future. One of the points of natural herd immunity is that those who have immunity themselves also do not harbor the virus. The problem with the innate immune system clearing the virus is that this does not leave traces that so far can be identified. Unlike if the adaptive immune system is called in and creates antibodies to defeat the virus. On the innate vs. the adaptive immune systems see
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK279364/
I am not 100% sure I have it right on Cahill’s info on immunity after exposure. Check out her interview here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9ti6isM-NY
It seems like the jury is also still out on whether asymptomatic actually shed the virus or not.
My understanding was that it is still not clear whether a non-adaptive immune response without an adaptive one reacting to develop anti-bodies might be a function of viral load.
As in a low viral load (not quite getting a big enough cough in the face) might be cleared by a non-adaptive response, but that a larger viral load exposure might then lead to a proper infection and the need for an adaptive response with the possibility still of death.
Which is what led to my initial observation.
I’d be very keen to gain better understanding of this from either of you, as it is a big part of the puzzle.
I don’t think anybody knows. What actually happens is you have some virus in your body, you deal with it somehow, and you shed some of it. How much depends on your innate immunity, acquired immunity (possibly also from similar pathogens), vaccination, the general health of your immune system and quite likely also viral load. In something like a SIR model you just simulate this as a transition from susceptible to recovered via infected, which is good enough to see the overall dynamics.
If you read about the ChAdOx1 vaccine they gave the monkeys huge amounts of the vaccine but their response was still “Th1-dominated” (which is the “innate immunity”). They did make some antibodies, but not very many. And then when challenged with the actual virus they got sick, but less so than the controls. Lots of shades of grey. This Th1-dominated response seems to be a characteristic of ChAdOx1 not of load. Is it also an inherent characteristic of SARS2 to have a Th1-dominated response in some/many individuals? After all ChAdOx1 is designed to mimic SARS2.
The worst part is that the complications from Covid-19 that can be fatal are to do with immune system imbalance. The SARS-1 version of ChAdOx1 did something similar in monkeys but skewed the balance somehow meaning they got the actual disease much worse when challenged. This didn’t happen with ChAdOx1 but then they only tried it on 6 monkeys. Basically there’s a lot that’s poorly understood about the Th1/Th2 balance with both the virus and the vaccine, but this balance is also at the heart of why it’s fatal.
Isn’t it the innate immune system response that can cause a lethal cytokine storm? I wonder if that’s why people are dying quite quickly from it. In the UK the average period between infection and death seems to be around 14 days – 5 days incubation, then the report on patients showed 4 days between symptoms and hospitalisation, and the death curve lags the admission curve by 5 days, giving 14 days average.
I think you’re right that the cytokines are part of the innate immune response. But the immune system is very complicated and it’s all to do with how it’s regulated and turned on and off. This is where vitamin D is thought to come in.
Not sure why that process should be faster in the UK. Some people, not sure what percentage, do actually recover from the ARDS but then die of heart failure, possibly precipitated by the overall stress to the system of having just gone through intubation which is pretty traumatic. These may be the cases that are taking longer to die and perhaps there are more of them in some places than others.
“Isn’t it the innate immune system response that can cause a lethal cytokine storm?”
I don’t think so. I *think* the cytokine storm occurs when antibodies are created in response to a vaccine, and then a similar but not identical virus comes along. The vaccine-created antibodies react to the new similar virus, but cannot kill it. Then the immune system kicks into high gear. It might be at this point that the innate immune system tries to get rid of the invader.
I think this is about it, but not sure I have all the details right. There is a term for this reaction by the immune system, called “original antigenic sin.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_antigenic_sin
That’s interesting thanks! It may be cross immunity from something similar that actually makes Covid worse in some cases and is perhaps related to the “enhancement” issues they had with the SARS1 version of the chadox vaccine.
Ok if it occurs due to cross immunity as well that could explain it. Apparently it was the main cause of death in the Spanish flu.
I think that’s a separate phenomenon as not all who suffer a cytokine storm have been vaccinated.
wikipedia is not a very reliable source of information (can be changed by anyone over and over again). Start there, get the terminology and then get answers from other reputable websites.
On comparing with flu, too many people, including Toby on his ‘Latest News’ for the 22nd May, wrongly compare CFR estimates for flu with IFR estimates for Covid.
CDC do not give an estimate of IFR for flu; their much quoted mortality rate of 0.1% is the CFR, and makes no account of asymptomatic cases.
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/past-seasons.html
It is only accurate, therefore, to compare CDC’s CFR estimate for Covid, which is 0.4%.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scenarios.html
Thanks that’s very interesting. We do need to make sure we’re comparing like for like. The excess deaths are in some places up there with the worst flu seasons so while Covid is not the world ending plague it’s being treated as it is no doubt nasty especially for older people.
IFR = Infection FATALITY Rate
You can hardlly have been asymptomatic!
Haha no it’s the definition of infection that’s at issue not fatality.
IFR is the ratio of deaths to the number of actual infections, per the journal Virology. Number of deaths is the numerator, number of infections is the denominator. It is the latter number that researchers such a Ioannides, Bhattacharya, Hendrik Streeck, Wittkowksi, and others have been trying to establish or at least have been talking about the need to establish. Bhattacharya, of Stanford, is on the record as being incredulous that research to establish this basic number has not been undertaken by WHO, the CDC, etc. So researchers are now playing catchup to get a reliable denominator for IFR. A lot of death etc. rates that have been thrown around majorly inflate the danger of the virus because the denominator (# of infections) has been unknown, too low, IOW underestimated by factors of anywhere from 10 to 50.
See the above discussion for the questions around what counts as an infection.
I visited my parents today. It was a good day.
Went to see mine last weekend for my birthday, going to see them again on Monday for my dad’s. I deem it essential.
How could anyone ever think it was non-essential?
Hi all, Thanks Toby for this fantastic site. It has replaced reading of newspapers which are now total torture and as for TV news….well.
The comment section is fantastic, Thanks to all that post, I cannot believe we are still in this utter madness. I am a blue collar worker In food processing have been at work all the way through this, doing plenty of overtime to keep up with all the hoarders. I have faith that many working class people are skeptical but are to polite to rock the boat or at least are apaphetic, is it possible there is a silent majority of skeptics yet?
A MESSAGE FROM FIFE – FINALLY THE SO CALLED SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT WILL BE HELD TO ACCOUNT
On behalf of the workers, it has been sad to hear that seven well known scottish hotels have just gone into administration costing 2,500 jobs, including the hotel landmark at the tarbet junction on the banks of loch lomond. A significant pointer for what is to come.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-52779276
As per a previous post of mine, scotland is now almost certainly in an even more vulnerable situation than england due to its heavier reliance on tourism / hospitality, greater volume of public sector workers and the recent localised recession in aberdeen (oil and gas). So, as the new mini-dictator sturgeon is fully supportive of this lockdown (even more so than boris), its finally time to hold the scottish government to account. What is its point?
The scottish government (formerly executive) has been on the go now for over 20 years without having to deal with a genuine crisis. A highly divisive independence vote has come and gone with a large volume of minor / immaterial legislation inbetween, much of which is reflected in the agenda of the uk government anyway. Scots have however had a few more ‘state freebies’ to keep the local population happy – free personal care, free bus travel for over 60s across scotland and of course free university tuition fees. This however had been offset by now higher taxes in scotland for those above the average wage who want to get on in life. Was the last 20 years really worth it for this?
Well in next year this question will finally be answered. There are enough devolved powers now for the scottish government to come up with its own so called strategy for managing the huge economic crisis to come. So how will it deal with mass unemployment, a care home and university fee payment crisis, mammoth public debt alongside a higher public sector spend / level of workers, etc? Again, as stated in an earlier post of mine, sturgeon’s solution so far is to have a ‘national conversation’ (try not to yawn) about universal basic income. Moving from the current situation of a guaranteed income for staying at home and essentially doing nothing (a popular vote winner) to a guaranteed income for saying at home and essentially doing nothing. 20 years for this moronity?
The next scottish government election is a mere year away in may 2021. By then, as we all know here, the true crisis and folly of the last 9 weeks and counting will be clear to all even if you chose to ignore it and keep clapping the nhs (you will have blisters by then). So lets see how the scottish electorate react to a scottish government then. No more freebies, etc.
RIP THE KRANKIES. I knew you well, but alas you were not funny.
Sadly Tony I suspect the Nat sheep will vote her in regardless. The imbecile in East Lothian who wanted to organise a clap for Nicola event is indicative of the mind set. I hope I’m wrong, for if they get in again it will be a permanent move over the border for me.
I am sure the hospitality sector in Scotland will be hit much harder before this is over. I love Scotland and when we visit the Highlands, many visitors are from overseas. If overseas visitors have to isolate, I doubt they will be able to visit. Combined with the collapse of the oil industry. Renegotiate the Barnett Formula Nicola?
I used to live in Edinburgh and apart from the high volume of tourists that the city receives every year, in the last few years there has been a building spree of luxury flats which has been snapped up by wealthy foreigners. As I told my father-in-law, I can see Edinburgh’s tourism and hospitality sectors really hit badly and won’t be surprised if there’s a rush of these rich foreigners rushing to offload their properties.
And Edinburgh University going in the red as rich foreign students stay away.
For god’s sake get someone to check your numbers before you publish Toby… the ONS provides population numbers on their portal along with the mortality data… London is NOT the greater metropolitan area and the deaths come from a population of 8.96m.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/populationestimates/bulletins/annualmidyearpopulationestimates/mid2019
… so up to week 19 (which matches the survey timing) for the 7405 deaths recorded in London, this would make the IFR 0.48%, about the same as NY. BUT, given it has twice the population density of London this is no great victory.
As to taking a dig at the reliability of blood donor serology surveys, particularly the dutch study, this was one of 4 blood donor/test studies of the 12 studies in Stanford’s (Ioannidis) paper estimating IFRs that you tweeted about. Half these 4 were of a similar or smaller size.
So you’re not really selling the believability of this?!
More so, the bigger problem is underestimating NOT overestimating IFR. As with most of the studies in the Stanford paper (including his Santa Clara study) they are for surveys that had a different death sample and infection sample groups.
Given IFR = deaths / all infections, if the infections sample is for a much more active and mobile group (fit people who give blood), even if you age adjust it, your deaths sample (especially if you use the whole population rather than deaths just experienced by the same types as those in the infections sample) will end up with the numerator being relatively too small and the denominator relatively too big.
So the IFR will be an underestimate.
Hence why Gangelt 0.37%, NY 0.5%, Robbio 0.7%, France 0.7%, Spain 1.15% – as either much bigger surveys, or surveys where the deaths sample and infection sample came from the same group – are much more reliable.
https://medium.com/pragmapolitic/its-all-about-the-ifr-isn-t-it-ioannidis-b7181e1f6e88
My understanding of the point about the blood donors is that this is a group who believe themselves to be free of any infection or symptoms that might indicate infection and therefore will be under-representative of infection rates in the general population.
I don’t think that is quite right.
They are only asked to be free from infection in the last 14 days. This will introduce bias as it take 14-21 days for antibodies to develop, on the day you take the sample people who would test negative will not present, but those that have waited to test positive will.
OR
You’ll just be getting people who are more likely to get it asymptomtically who are likely to be fitter strong types.
These along with the fact that blood donors tend to be younger, fitter, more active members of society just means they will have had more chance of having it.
Where do you get 14-21 days from? This suggests 7-14. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/covid-19-coronavirus-what-antibody-tests-tell-us
If true only strengthens my point.
Your article says 70% presence within 10 days… my understanding was based on this page and the linked sutdies…
https://www.aruplab.com/news/4-21-2020/How-Accurate-Are-COVID-19-Tests
… links this trial…
https://europepmc.org/article/med/32221519
… which has it at <40% accurate by 7 days, with the median timebeing 11-14 days, hence the recommendation of waiting 14-21 days to make the test certain.
Thanks. I wasn’t arguing with you I’m interested in the average time so the timing of the antibody test can be related to the infection curve. Those are helpful links and all the sources basically say the same thing.
Ioannidis does discuss these issues in his paper (which I assume you’ve read) along with reasons why some places like New York and Spain might have higher IFR, especially not protecting care homes.
How do you get 0.48 for NYC? I get population 8.4m, deaths 16,149 (confirmed, though I understand there is dispute about how many are really Covid), antibodies 20%. Thus: 16,149/(8,400,000×0.2) x 100 = 0.96%.
In the limitations section on page 7 he discusses demographic issues, and says he has tried to address these numerically. He does mention that the infections sample might have a higher prevalence relative to the population, but he does not discuss the other half of the point I make which is that the deaths sample will likely under represent prevalence. He also makes no attempt to correct for either of these.
As to you second part I think you’ve just misread what I wrote, the 0.485 is a correction of Toby’s estimate fro London, 7405 / (8.96m x 0.17) = 0.486%.
I was working off the Cuomo’s estimate of 0.5% that was in the news at the time it published…
https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2020/04/23/governor-cuomo-daily-coronavirus-update-with-first-antibody-test-results
… but, you’re right they have revised it since to 0.836%…
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3590771
It’s the other way around. The young healthy active people are getting infected less (as well as dying less, in fact probably not dying at all) than the vulnerable in the care homes and hospitals.
So to spell this out. Suppose you find 15% of people outside have antibodies. So you divide your number of deaths by 15% of the total population to get an IFR estimate. But if the sub-population that contained all the deaths (hospitals and care homes) had a 60% infection rate, then the number of deaths divided by 60% of the total population will be a more accurate estimate of the true IFR. In other words your original estimate will be 4x too high. If you went and infected the extra 45% of the people outside to match the rate in the hospitals and care homes you would get almost no more deaths.
In reality population level IFRs are a bit of a red herring anyway because of the extreme age preference in the death rate. But the fact that the estimates arrived at are so much higher in badly affected areas than in places like Gangelt (where there were 7 deaths only 3 of which could be considered “excess”) does give us a hint as to the extent of the nosocomial infection problem.
Younger people don’t get infected less, they just die less. In fact studies have shown they are more infected…
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/20/young-adults-likely-age-group-infected-coronavirus-new-data/
… demostrating the effect that I’m talking about, they are infected more because they have a higher number of contacts so form a sub population with a higher r0.
A population IFR is not a red herring, they work them out from age banded IFRs making sure they adjust for population specific demographics. Having a more heavily infected area will not affect the numbers in the way you describe.
Here are the age banded IFRs from Italy that I’ve been using:
0-39 0.007%
40-49 0.030%
50-59 0.140%
60-69 0.570%
70-79 2.290%
80-89 5.940%
90+ 12.900%
… applied to UK ONS data recorded up to wk 19 data you get…
Band | IFR | Spread | Deaths | Infected | Pop in M
0-14 | 0.007% | 0.36% | 3 | 42,857 | 11.9
15-44 | 0.011% | 15.80% | 422 | 3,980,476 | 25.2
45-64 | 0.136% | 16.42% | 3,842 | 2,814,912 | 17.14
65-74 | 1.064% | 8.16% | 5,772 | 542,475 | 6.65
75-84 | 3.568% | 8.75% | 12,207 | 342,086 | 3.91
85+ | 8.175% | 11.51% | 15,049 | 184,083 | 1.6
All | 0.472% | 11.91% | 37,295 | 7,906,888 | 66.4
… I don’t believe the 0-39 IFR from Italy is granular enough to make sensible numbers for the 0-14 band, so I’m on the hunt for better more granular age banded IFRs.
… but, this does show that the 15-44 age group has more spread.
Surely “years taken from humans” is highly relevant. IMHO opinion the flu IFR of about 0.2% would equate to an IFR for Covid of 0.8% as the average age of Covid deaths is in the late 70’s but for the flu it is much lower.
Can you provide a numerical argument?
For sure the median age is in the late 60s for flu and late 70s for Covid, so death for death it might be taking fewer years, but the average IFR is about 2.5x (0.56% vs 0.21%) higher for Covid, BUT crucially the r0 means the spread has the potential to take 4x as many people, so in total years lost it is way more, and even for 15-44 year olds you are about 2.2x more likely to die.
More than half the deaths in many countries are in care homes. Yes I know that’s mainly because they die more, but there’s no reason to think the infection rate in those homes is the same as in the population outside and every reason to think it’s quite a bit higher.
These are people who are trapped indoors together at a fairly high density who need a lot of people close to them to look after them. R0 will be a lot higher in a care home than in normal life outside, where most of us only share our house with a few other people.
I’m sure this explains why 85+ group has seen 11.51% spread set against 8.75% for 75-84.
However, if you actually look at the UK data above the spread estimates for all 65+ age groups are all still BELOW the population average – e.g. 8.16, 8.75, 11.51 < 11.91. Further, for the 15-64 group they are all nearly TWICE these – e.g. 15.8 and 16.42.
So your theory sounds great, but just does not present itself in the data.
The Santa Clara study was for only 94 deaths in California, a state that has seen 94 deaths/1m to the UK's 541, they have had no care home epidemic, so the spread in their 85+ group is likely to have been more like their 75-84 group. Ioannidis states in his paper that his infections sample was 19-64 year old facebook users who could drive to a test centre.
If the spread pattern in the UK data plays out similarly in California, for his Santa Clara IFR of 0.18%, simplying double that estimate to 0.36% would make the correction needed. Which would just make his estimate the same as Gangelt.
Given I can correct it on an envelope, why didn't Ioannidis do so himself? I don't want to be left raising questions about people's motives, BUT I'm not going to be caught believing false prophets, even if they are saying things that sound good.
“More so, the bigger problem is underestimating NOT overestimating IFR.” Why is this the bigger problem? If overestimating it and other key inputs into a model leads you to put an entire population under house arrest, indefinitely, and wreck the economy and compromise the health and happiness of a generation, wouldn’t that be possibly worse than underestimating it?
… because the only way out of Groundhog Day (as I keep trying to convince people to deaf ears) is to sound more credible than SAGE, not less, and this involves being objective about the numbers. If Toby is able to use his fame to get the ear of people with influence, he needs to be talking bullet proof numbers when those opportunities come up.
So if SAGE members have looked at Ioannidis numbers and think they are underestimates NOT overestimates, and Toby says the opposite all that reenforces in their eyes is that they should listen to him even less, and this site stands less chance of influencing policy.
Yes indeed
Agree it is important to be as accurate as possible
Thank you, but you are in the minority.
Whenever I present anything on here that tries to correct or create shades of grey in our understanding, I just get flamed and told to get lost because I’m not being militant enough…
There is a general scepticism about the available data, for good reason.
That makes any modelling, calculations, at least somewhat moot.
It is also clear to most that this matter moved from the medical to the political a while ago, maybe even before lockdown.
As the German assessment linked to in yesterday’s post by Toby stated:
‘…..there is falsification and manipulation of the figures. The persistent problems were acknowledged by the Robert-Koch Institute as early as the beginning of March 2020. A comparison of deaths from the virus and deaths from the counter-measures is prevented.’
‘It is not possible simply to terminate the panic at a certain point in time and re-open normality. Normal life cannot be re-instated as simply as measures can be decreed. The fears, and especially the irrational fears and the consequent changes in behaviour, will not disappear automatically when the measures are relaxed.’
‘The most difficult task will be to restore lost trust. Trust in a state that is reliably protective and therefore can on occasion legitimately enforce interventions and restrictions. This state has failed grotesquely. In order to restore trust, it must admit its errors and work these through. Otherwise, the state and its political system may not be forgiven its systemic errors.’
http://www.klasseverantwortung.de/english/Corona.html
Good luck with the number crunching but I doubt that I am alone in thinking that no-one in government will ever pay any attention, because their agenda/narrative is political; their minds, faces, set against fact or reason.
I agree that accuracy is vital too.
No. Back on the mouse wheel you go with that approach to ending this, dog chasing tail. Chasing some magic number which is what? Blinkered to the wider world.
The issue is now psychological, the issue is now economics, and that has a million other factors and consequences that are not your area of expertise.
But to be absolutely clear, a lockdown or any ‘new normal’ will cost an exponentially higher number of lives than this virus ever will.
Oh, but sounding off in this echo chamber, insulting people and strengthening the outside world’s perception that this is not a credible alternative, is really productive.
If you have evidence of these “exponential deaths” share them, these are exactly what I want to see more of. If credible then they make a very strong case for the lesser of two evils argument being wrong and this will have far more traction at influencing policy than you think.
Ask yourself the question, why aren’t the ERG quote this website?
Neil…. Are you ok?
You know looking at your posts I’ve yet to come across one that adds anything material to any of the threads you join… and you appear in pretty much all the discussions…
… are you lonely?
Yes. I’m locked in my house against my will.
Plus, it doesn’t matter whether I add anything ‘material’ or not seeing as you just ignore everyone who does and carry on making yourself look like a tit.
Disagreeing with poorly argued responses is not “ignoring”.
As per Will’s correction my knowledge of a recent revision to the NY IFR on this thread, I’m pretty quick to acknowledge when people are correct.
Insulting me because you don’t want the results of data analysis I present to be true, because you don’t like the sound of them, rather than engaging in civil debate trying to make sure I haven’t made a mistake, or to aid your understanding, is hardly mature.
If you feel me trying to make this debate more credible by making it more facts based, rather than rhetoric based, makes me look like a tit, then I feel that says more about you and you capacity to welcome more varied view points, than it does about me.
You do realise you spend quite a lot of time in quite a few of your posts insulting other people, right?
Cite one example where I’ve:
– insulted someone?
– joined a discussion in an aggressive or insulting manner?
For sure I’ve defended my arguments robustly against some pretty aggressive and hostile comments, but when you guys create the environment you do for open reasoned debate, what else do you expect?
I’m mean just look at how you circled like sharks around my post of the 21st, with not one actually discussing the content, and whether it might contain anything worth considering… just venom.
You weren’t on this site 5-6 week ago when I joined as one of the first members, and we had far more productive and open debates about facts and made far more progress. I’ve just moved to other sites and blogs because this one is now just so closed to reasoned debate it is pointless.
From what I can see there are plenty of people willing to still ‘reasonably’ debate you. It’s happening up there. I’m just that arsehole who likes to poke bears.
Let’s not be vulgar.This has been a civilised debating chamber up to now.
I’m a bit disappointed with your support for Cummings.
There are two problems with your defence.
First Cummings holds a huge amount of responsibility for lockdown in the first place. He nudged the SAGE group into tailor making “the science” into the extreme measures we are in rather than what the scientists originally advised: the Swedish model. So, along with Ferguson and Boris, he owns this. Is this not what we are resisting against on this great site of yours?
Second you suggest that he abided by “the guidelines “. You know and most of us do, that these guidelines are the epitome of arbitrary powers. They are not clear and as such they don’t pass the requirement of laws that clearly delineate what is proscribed and everything else, which is the preview of free people. So saying he was ok by rules which are the result of his nudging merely exonerates him for laying waste to our liberties.
I’m surprised you let him off that easily. He’s become part of the problem.
That should be the story, he should fall upon the arbitrary nature of the regime he created, not waffle about if he avoided the rules.
I’m going to take this a step further and state that even the numbers you are using here vastly over exaggerate the “Covid fatalities.” I also wish to see the precise information on those two 14 year olds who supposedly died “of” Covid. Forgive the length of my comment here but having studied this in great detail over the last two months I think it is fair to question any and all deaths attributed to “Covid.” Consider the following: Guidelines recently released by the Centers for Disease Control bolster concerns that the death toll is being rigged to show a higher fatality rate. From the CDC: “In cases where a definite diagnosis of COVID–19 cannot be made, but it is suspected or likely (e.g., the circumstances are compelling within a reasonable degree of certainty), it is acceptable to report COVID–19 on a death certificate as ‘probable’ or ‘presumed’,” the agency advises. “In these instances, certifiers should use their best clinical judgment in determining if a COVID–19 infection was likely.” That clinical judgment, alarmingly, does not require administering a test to confirm the presence of the virus. “Ideally, testing for COVID–19 should be conducted, but it is acceptable to report COVID–19 on a death certificate without this confirmation if the circumstances are compelling within a reasonable degree of certainty,” the guidelines state. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvss/vsrg/vsrg03-508.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/misc/hb_me.pdf In order to measure anything you need a standard. One of the problems in counting the number of COVID-19 deaths is the standard varies. Different countries, different states, different hospitals and even different doctors are using different criteria—in many cases their best judgment—to determine a COVID-19 death. And there’s an added complication- the government in the US pays hospitals 20 percent more than traditional Medicare rates for a Medicare patient with COVID-19. Take a look at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s “Provisional Death Counts for Coronavirus Disease.” As of May 4, the CDC lists 38,576 deaths—about half the number we see being reported in the media. The CDC also lists 17,122 “deaths with pneumonia and COVID-19,” and 66,094 pneumonia deaths. The director of the Illinois Department of Public Health, Dr. Ngozi Ezike, admitted to the over counting outright- she explained that in her state, anyone who dies with COVID-19 will be listed as a coronavirus death, even if the person was in hospice and COVID-19 played little or no role in the immediate cause of death. Essentially, Dr. Ezike explained that anyone who passes away after testing positive for the virus is included in that category. Her quote: “If you were in hospice and had already been given a few weeks to live, and then you also were found to have COVID, that would be counted as a COVID death. It means technically even if you died of a clear alternate cause, but you had COVID at the same time, it’s still listed as a COVID death. So, everyone who’s listed as a COVID death doesn’t mean that that was the cause of the death, but they had COVID at the time of the death.” Dr. Ezike outlined. https://week.com/2020/04/20/idph-director-explains-how-covid-deaths-are-classified/ A doctor can label anyone who dies with the symptoms of COVID-19 – which are very hard to distinguish from the common cold, flu, or even pneumonia – without actually testing them. And again the tests are a diagnostic fraud as admitted by the FDA. And as we already know, COVID-19 can cause all kinds of symptoms similar to that of many other diseases. Via the Government of Canada: “Those who are infected with COVID-19 may have little to no symptoms. You may not know you have symptoms of COVID-19 because they are similar to a cold or flu.” Symptoms have included: “Cough; fever; difficulty breathing; pneumonia in both lungs; In severe cases, infection can lead to death.” In other words, it’s actually very difficult for doctors to distinguish COVID-19 symptoms from other causes without actually testing for it. Not only that, those affected with COVID-19 might not have even died from the disease itself. Via National Post: “…different countries are also reporting cases and deaths in different ways: in Italy, Covid-19 is listed as the cause of death even if a patient was already ill and died from a combination of illnesses. “Only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus,” said the scientific adviser to Italy’s minister of health. Spain’s national government simply lists how many people with confirmed cases of coronavirus have died and provides no extra information on any other medical conditions. So these “Covid deaths” are not only being diagnosed by doctors as COVID-19 deaths without being tested, but people who supposedly died of COVID-19 might not have died from it at all. Consider also that the data on pneumonia deaths shows that either a) there’s been a miraculous drop in the number of such deaths or b) the same number of deaths is occurring but is being attributed to different causes (Covid-19?). According to the CDC website, 2020 was experiencing a rough flu season with a very high number of cases and deaths…..but this suddenly and dramatically reversed to coincide with the arrival of Covid19. Miraculously this decrease occurred only among older adults! How is this possible? How did a terrible flu season disappear — but not for young adults and kids? Maybe all those flu cases and deaths among the older population in fact continued but got moved into the Covid19 column? If you close down hospitals to all but Covid19 and trauma admissions you can expect large increases in preventable deaths from CVD, stroke, untreated cancers, kidney patients, and those with viral diseases too fearful to go to a hospital. The percentage of those excess dead who are alleged Covid19 victims also needs to be viewed from the perspective that any respiratory complaint is being diagnosed as Covid19, with or without a positive test, and that all positive tests (not even going to get into the problems with false positives on the PCR tests) are also being listed as Covid19 deaths even when the decedent died of another cause and exhibited no symptoms of Covid19 . An elderly patient comes into the hospital with severe shortness of breath. He is a lifelong smoker, and tests reveal he has the virus. It is decided, due to his respiratory distress and low oxygen count, to intubate and put him on a ventilator. However, during the intubation the patient suffers a massive heart attack and dies on the table. How would you label the death certificate? The correct and legal way to label the death certificate would be to label the cause of death as Myocardial infarction. or, a massive heart attack. Now let’s go to NYC where everyone is hearing of the horrid deaths “due to Covid” in NYC but first keep in mind that in NYC alone there is a death every 9.1 minutes in the “best” of times. During a two week stretch in April , the city’s fire officials said more than 2,192 New York City residents died in their homes, compared to 453 during the same time period last year. On average there are 25 deaths in home per week in NYC- last Tuesday, April 7th, for example there was 256. The reason? People are afraid to go to the hospitals, cardiologists are confirming this, lest they get infected with the “killer virus.” This means when they are in the early stages of cardiac arrest, for example, they stay at home and some don’t make it. NYC officials stated that they WILL NOT be conducting tests on these at home deaths nor will they be doing any diagnostics on the cadavers. NYC officials also confirmed that they will begin to count these as “suspected” COVID-19 deaths in addition to cases confirmed by a laboratory. Stephanie Buhle, a spokeswoman for the New York City’s Health Department, confirmed the change in protocol. Her quote: “The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME) and the NYC Health Department are working together to include into their reports deaths that may be linked to COVID but not lab confirmed that occur at home.” NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio in his infinite wisdom acknowledged that the vast majority of deaths taking place at home were likely also due to COVID-19. No tests, no diagnosis but the mayor with his crystal ball stated: “We do want to know the truth about every death at home, but it’s safe to assume that the vast majority are coronavirus related.” What will this do to the COVID death count? What will this also do to the excess mortality rate as people are fearful of getting immediate treatment for very serious life or death conditions? Now let’s go to Italy- why have so many died of Covid 19 in Italy? The country’s high death toll (from whatever) is due to, air pollution (N Italy has worst air quality in Europe) an ageing population, overstretched health system and the way fatalities are reported. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/have-many-coronavirus-patients-died-italy/ “The way in which we code deaths in our country is very generous in the sense that all the people who die in hospitals with the coronavirus are deemed to be dying of the coronavirus.” – Prof Walter Ricciardi, scientific adviser to Italy’s minister of health “On re-evaluation by the National Institute of Health, only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus, while 88 per cent of patients who have died have at least one pre-morbidity – many had two or three,” he says. That 50 percent of the “COVID deaths” in Europe are in nursing homes is an obvious giveaway that this is decidedly NOT an issue of “COVID deaths” per se but IS an issue of the conditions in which these people live. That’s critical thinking 101. A flu could, and does, sweep through any squalid nursing home and wipe out a significant number of the frail. Cursory research shows that in Italy and Spain this has been happening every year for the last decade due to those very squalid and toxic conditions. Remember for example the 16/17 season when there were 25,000 excess deaths in Italy attributed to the “seasonal influenza?” Of course you don’t and couldn’t as there was no wall to wall fear mongering. That was not an outlier season BTW. This is what has been happening in Italy (and China BTW) for the last decade every single year. 1.4 million excess deaths EVERY YEAR in China due to air pollution. ============= The stats are false. The base assumptions on “COVID death rates” is that those deaths are being reported accurately- they are not. There are at least 6 areas where these “COVID death” stats are being falsely reported: 1) There is little to no distinction made between those “COVID deaths” that occur from or with COVID- in fact it is now official policy for many governments and national health agencies to avoid that distinction and overemphasize COVID as the causal agent; 2) Extraordinary numbers of in home deaths- which have reached record numbers in NYC somewhere between 500 to 1000% increase- are being categorically listed as “COVID deaths” without testing or diagnosis- this is outright fraud; 3) The conditions where people are living are going completely ignored- the causal agent of the deaths- “COVID deaths” sweeping through squalid nursing homes and killing off the vulnerable is decidedly not new- they just attached a name to the virus this year and pushed the fear button- a normal flu virus does exactly this and has almost every year for the past decade- no media coverage though and no lockdown; 4) The distinction between “infection” and “disease” are ignored and lead to stories like this: In Heinsberg, for example, a 78-year-old man with previous illnesses died of heart failure, and that was without Sars-2 lung involvement. Since he was infected, he naturally appears in the Covid 19 statistics. 5) In cases where a definite diagnosis of COVID–19 cannot be made,… Read more »
Great stuff (if long!)
Considering the high prevalence of covid in hospitals and care homes it is entirely plausible that many people dying of something else catch covid in their last days and are added to the statistics.
Same for trying to calculate things like IFR and R, they will be significantly different in hospital/care home populations and small villages in the middle of nowhere.
Convincing and cogent. But it isn’t us you need to convince, it’s the rat-arsed stringg-pullers in government and their zombie followers.
Spot on. The numbers are all over the place……and we know why:
‘…..there is falsification and manipulation of the figures. The persistent problems were acknowledged by the Robert-Koch Institute as early as the beginning of March 2020. A comparison of deaths from the virus and deaths from the counter-measures is prevented.’
http://www.klasseverantwortung.de/english/Corona.html
Are these numbers more representative of reality? Who knows?
‘Population 17,425,445 adults. Time period 1st Feb 2020 to 25th April 2020. Primary outcome Death in hospital among people with confirmed COVID-19.’
‘Results There were 5683 deaths attributed to COVID-19.’
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.06.20092999v1
Because:
‘In an emergency period of the COVID-19 pandemic there is a relaxation of previous
legislation concerning completion of the medical certificate cause of death (MCCD) by
medical practitioners’
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/877302/guidance-for-doctors-completing-medical-certificates-of-cause-of-death-covid-19.pdf
All we can know is that the longer the government persist with this medical fiction, the more devastating the eventual reckoning will be for them and, more worryingly, the country:
‘It is not possible simply to terminate the panic at a certain point in time and re-open normality. Normal life cannot be re-instated as simply as measures can be decreed. The fears, and especially the irrational fears and the consequent changes in behaviour, will not disappear automatically when the measures are relaxed.’
‘The most difficult task will be to restore lost trust. Trust in a state that is reliably protective and therefore can on occasion legitimately enforce interventions and restrictions. This state has failed grotesquely. In order to restore trust, it must admit its errors and work these through. Otherwise, the state and its political system may not be forgiven its systemic errors.’
http://www.klasseverantwortung.de/english/Corona.html
“Children More Likely to be Struck by Lightening Than Die of COVID-19”
Is this a whitewash??
Lightning quick to spot the error, mjr!
I suspect that in the younger age brackets, people in New York are more likely to die of murder than the virus. Has anybody crunched those numbers?
Shhh, if this becomes common knowledge children will never be allowed out if there’s even the slightest chance of rain.
You can get lightning from a clear sky. Therefore children should never be allowed out at all.
Zombies’ children probably won’t be, ever again.
hahaha!
Regarding the graph for Sweden vs Modelling. I read with interest the Twitter comments linked to it. There were a few claiming that models are merely tools to aid in decision making. Whilst technically true it is surely important that they be reasonably accurate.
Let’s suppose that the modelling was accurate and that the models predicted exactly the result in Sweden. It would be highly unlikely that any country in the world would trash their economy on those numbers. It is irrelevant that Sweden has higher deaths than her neighbours or any other country in the World. The numbers do not justify the actions taken, ever.
This has given me an idea for a survey. Give people the projected graph from modelling and a separate graph for the actual result for Sweden and ask people if they would lockdown the country for each without giving them any more info than the numbers on the graphs.
Excellent idea
EXACTLY I just wrote that up there, but with far less eloquence
There seems to be some confusion here. Obviously it’s perfectly OK to drive however many miles you like to visit your parents even if you have a raging Covid infection. It’s your decision. What’s not OK is to make it illegal for people to do that.
It was wrong to make a wrong rule, not wrong to break it. But if all we can throw him out for is breaking it we should take the chance. I don’t care if he technically did or didn’t break the law– the lockdown is about intimidation and of very dubious legality anyway.
It was sounding from comments on yesterday’s post that Cummings is the “brains” behind the lockdown. This is very believable as it fits with the kind of scientific and technological hubris that wannabe nerds like him go in for– suckered by Fergie’s model because it’s overcomplicated and thinking he can make TTT work. People like him love that kind of shit.
The missing piece of this puzzle is the ridiculous 14-day quarantine rule. If, as I though at first, the “roadmap” is all just politics and theatre to de-escalate the fear instilled into the plebs, why this completely unnecessary piece of self-harm? I think Cummings actually believes it’s a good idea and that TTT will work. That’s also why he’s refusing to release the country until the stupid app is ready.
I’d suspect that with Cummings the quarantine is more about what sells well with his demented focus groups / facebook algorithms rather than any solid science.
If Neil Ferguson was a racing driver,in his eyes,he’d be Lewis Hamilton. In reality he’s the guy stuck in formula 4 that crashes every time he races but has such a massive ego that he persists anyway in the belief that he’s the best in his field.
Trouble is, other trolls believe it too.
Though I wonder how many of them would bet enormous amounts of money on a horse that had fallen at the first fence in every previous race it had been entered for.
OI FERGIE! SHUT IT YOU MUPPET
(can you tell I was watching a re-run of The Sweeney?)
He is the Jeremy Clarkson of epidemiology.
So a hugely successful if controversial figure who has established a track record of huge success?
Shurely shome mishtake…?
I always forget people actually like Jeremy Clarkson.
Hello Fellow Lockdown Sceptics,
Greetings from the SNPeople’s Republic, where ‘lockdown’ will continue until our Dear Leader, Kim Jong-Nik, the Mammy of the State, decides that it is safe for us to leave our hovels and resume our weary toil on the collective farms of ‘the best wee country in the world’.
In the meantime, allow me to say ‘Thank You’ to Toby and all of the contributors to ‘Lockdown Sceptics’ – an oasis of sanity in a world of collective madness. I don’t normally comment on websites, but I’m making an exception in this case because knowing that I am not alone in regarding the ‘lockdown’ as a colossal error has helped keep me sane for the last few weeks.
You may recall the mythical Cassandra, blessed with the gift of prophesy, but cursed that no-one would believe her. On the first day of the ‘lockdown’ I wrote to the PM, expressing my view that Government policy was being dictated by the media and that the ‘lockdown’ was a hysterical over-reaction to the actual threat posed by the virus. I am still awaiting a reply.
I am not blessed with the gift of prophesy, but I do possess a very particular set of skills (as Liam Neeson might say). These skills are: the ability to read and a memory. The ability to read showed me that COVID-19 was not as deadly as the daily death tolls (printed in Hammer Horror red, without any context) in the newspapers might suggest. My memory rang alarm bells when I heard the name of Professor Neil Ferguson, whose track record of gloomy and inaccurate predictions I recalled from previous events. It followed (or so I thought) that shutting the entire country down might be a little rash.
Since then I have experienced what I can only assume to be an approximation of life in the DDR. Trapped within the borders of the state, the mainstream media relentlessly pumping out nauseating and sentimental propaganda on behalf of the regime, and fear of speaking openly to friends and neighbours who might be ready to report dissent to the Stasi.
Now we face the surreal situation of the Government dragging out the end of the ‘lockdown’ in order to maintain the illusion that it was necessary in the first place. And we still have the recession to look forward to…
It’s all thoroughly depressing, but at least we have our health!
… and we have our mental health, while all around are losing theirs.That counts for a lot. We may still be a minority, but sanity is not statistical. Stay with it.
I get the anger and indignation about Cummings, Ferguson, Calderwood, but it really is just a sideshow.
It’s either a period of managed no-profile for them, or resignation, then pop back up after the media frenzy settles – into the next well-paid sinecure. We all know turds have a tendency float back up to the surface.
But really this is a side show – distracting from the reality that we are now 9 weeks into an act of national self-harm of biblical proportion, with little sign of a realization by the majority, of the economic shit-storm heading down the track towards us.
I attend daily briefings of (50+) medical personnel, in which the Party Line is trotted out daily: ‘Lockdown is Working’.
They clearly don’t see what I see, and this is despite a tsunami of data every day questioning the ‘wisdom’ of lockdown.
Orwell said – ‘freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows’.
But according to the Government, and too many health care professionals who don’t choose to question the orthodoxy – two plus two doesn’t equal four at all.
The really worrying thing us that they don’t care whether it does or it doesn’t.
Do you challenge them?
Anyone know how Belarus is getting on with business as normal? There haven’t been any outraged MSM articles on it for a few weeks now.
Cup Final tomorrow. They’ve got a lower death rate than Russia and Lithuania
Theres a youtuber who lives in Belarus so strange to see him just walking around like everything is normal they have a very low death rate and hospitals arent overwhelmed so I ve taken their president stance of vodka and saunas seems as sane as what any other politician is currently saying!
If there’s ever another World Cup, I will bet good money on Belarus to win.
I’d take you up on that bet…
Why Dominic Cummings must go
‘Perception is sometimes more important and here the perception is that there is one set of rules for government insiders and another, quite different, set of rules for everyone else.’
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-dominic-cummings-must-go
Continues
‘Again, and above all, this is a moral matter not a legal one and, by virtue of that, a much bigger and more profound affair. The Prime Minister has a simple choice: cut Dominic Cummings loose or be dragged down with him. This ought to be a pretty easy decision.’
First up I’d like to say thanks to Toby and all you wonderful sceptics for keeping me sane in all this. However I’m in disagreement with Toby on this one. I guess its yet another case of ‘do as I say and not as I do’ and the fact that all the cabinet have dived in to rescue him shows their attitude too. I appreciate it is a slightly more essential than Neil Ferguson’s shag but how many other people have been in the same situation but have stayed put for fear of the police/fines etc. Second – my 3 kids have now been off school since 17th March (like the rest of the country) and are unlikely to return for another 3+ months as it is still ‘not proven’ that children don’t transfer the disease (something which is hard to prove otherwise). Yet he took his possibly infected child up to his elderly parents at the end of March when we were being bombarded with news that this was the new Ebola. So he either knew it was all bollocks or was very negligent. Lastly, what has made me really start to wonder is that I thought the government had been bullied by the media to lockdown and continue to do so. However the press have sat on this for nearly two months – presumably as everyone would have ignored the lockdown – so did the government influence the media to bury the story? Maybe I’m going slightly mad but just getting so sick of it all now. Went to the supermarket yesterday – loads of masked idiots, no music, no Davinia yabbering on about Comic Relief or whatever, just a constant message saying that because we are such a great company and you’ve been good boys and girls you can now buy extra items (ok that might not have been verbatim but you get the gist). And then Priti Patel telling us with her smirk that we can’t go on holiday. To be honest, who wants to go now anyway? I like the whole experience – breakfast at the airport, buying tat I don’t need in the duty free, prosecco on the plane etc..Now the whole thing will be an utterly joyless masked experience with the constant fear that one of your family has a slight temperature and your holiday is about to go in the bin. That’s before you get to the destination and are treated like some leper and eating out in perspex boxes.
Sorry for the long post. My husband is sceptical too but keeps thinking there must be more to it – but what? I’m starting to wondering if it’s just like that bit in Trading Places where those two old blokes reveal they have totally fucked up Dan Ackroyd’s life for a dollar bet!
Thanks again to everyone for keeping me smiling through this. Love you all (more than my current friends at the moment!)
Don’t apologise, everyone needs a rant to let off steam and get their thoughts in order now and again.
“My husband is sceptical too but keeps thinking there must be more to it – but what?”
Gates total control vaccine program, billions for Big Pharma, that’s what.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-52783936
Thanks for making sure that I know this was organised by a far-right group BBC
Message BBC thinks it’s sending: anti-lockdowners are evil bad-thinkers or dupes for same.
Message BBC is actually sending: the “far right” are wiser and more honest and in touch with reality than the lying mainstream politicians and their media propagandists .
Truthfully, the far-right are all for lockdown, what a wonderful way for them to control and oppress everyone who is “different”. Not to mention how the far-right love closing borders, what better for them than to put guarded borders around every city, every suburd, every house. People who are against the lockdown are libertarians, left or right, and could scarcely be less similar to far right fascist groups.
You say that, but where’s your evidence? In truth, I have no idea what position far right groups are adopting in general, I was just referring to the BBC’s (and mainstream media’s in general) messaging, which actively seeks to conflate coronapanic dissent with far right politics.
Two groups for which I have seen indications of active sympathy with coronapanic dissent are the AfD in Germany, which is routinely smeared as crypto-Nazi, and Vox in Spain, which is also often described as far right, and “Franco-supporting”.
Getting any real idea of what taboo dissident groups on the right actually believe is almost impossible in practice in our societies, because the systematic suppression and misrepresentation of their opinions is too pervasive amongst our media classes, who hate and seek to suppress and delegitimise even moderate right-wing opinions.
One of the problems with censorship that actual honest libertarians (as opposed to the far more common hypocritical pseudo-libertarian poseurs) often draw attention to.
Whilst on the BBC – just saw Fergus Walsh (BBC medical bloke) on the telly. He said he had had a batch of antibody tests all returning as positive. He said he couldn’t have had it as he had bacterial pneumonia in January (despite 2 rounds of antibiotics not curing it) and coronavirus wasn’t around in January- first case was February. No Fergus, you had coronavirus in January along with the french bloke in December and how many hundreds of others who reported similar symptoms but that information would turn this whole thing on its head surely? To be fair he did continue to say it raised questions etc but the presenter just glossed over it. BTW – anyone remember when a plane crash, especially one into a residential area with a few survivors, would have been front page news? One mention on the BBC news then reduced to the red ticket tape thingy underneath. I guess it would seem nothing can derail the panic porn!
Never forget that we were required to fund the propagandists for our own enslavement.
I know several people who, with hindsight, had it in January.
It is no coincident that every publicly funded broadcaster across the spectrum finds anything remotely “conservative” to be far right. BBC, CBC, etc all these corps founded on the back of the taxpayer are the greatest tit suckers of them all, and all are farther left than Marx.
Not just publicly funded
I complained to Reuters about their use of the term and they basically said it was a matter of opinion
So much for reporting the facts
Sod off with compliments
Also, does anyone have a link to Scottish data for current percentage of ICU beds occupied?
Did a 30 minute spot survey outside my local supermarket this morning. 119 customers, including a few staff, of which 12 wore mask and gloves, 14 just mask, 17 just gloves and 76 none of either. That makes around 64% mask and glove free and 22% with a mask either alone or in combo. Make of this what you will. I might try and repeat same time next week and beyond and see if there is any trend…..
About the same ratio as I noticed today whilst shopping today. I counted 10 in masks, all customers, no staff, out of about 100-120 people. Some had gloves but I didn’t try to count them, probably about 15-20, including some of the masked ones. The 6′ social distancing thing was not being followed very closely, nowhere near as much as a few weeks ago, which was a relief.
Yes in town this morning not many masks and less attention to distancing
Last week or so more little groups appearing out and about not from same household
Hopefully nature will take its course
The Covid Bible made me laugh. I’m sure it will run and run…the Book of Revelation can provide inspiration for these insane times where we are in a disaster of biblical proportions.
I wish Neil Ferguson would just go away. He reminds me of these fortune tellers in my home country who never get it right but still keeps going and still have enough gullible fools believing in everything he says.
I was actually looking at some mediaeval illuminated manuscripts of Revelation today, for various reasons…
Ferguson = The false prophet
BoJo clown = the demonic many headed beast creature (one of the heads with mortal wound healed)
Hancock – the Image of the Beast
Nadine Dorries (or maybe Priti Patel?) – Whore of Babylon
Gove – the fallen star
The two witnesses – Peter Hitchens / Hector Drummond
Any other/better ideas?
Starmer: Brian
Seven angels blowing the trumpets resulting in destruction – Piers Morgan, Emily Maitlis, Adam Boulton, Robert Peston, Kay Burley, Beth Rigby, Jon Snow
The Lamb and the seven seals – The Guardian, Daily Mail. The Times, The Daily Telegraph, Daily Express, The Sun, The Independent
Maybe Ferguson is angling for a job on the papers doing the horoscopes? I can see it now: Mystic Ferg, in his data turban and digitally modelled crystal ball.
Thanks for your comment Scotty, best wishes to you and your family too. You are right that the worst is yet to come, but it just doesn’t feel real yet because it hasn’t happened; it’s like seeing a tsunami in the very far distance which hasn’t hit yet, and it doesn’t look like it’s moving any closer right now, but one day it will happen very suddenly and we’ll all be completely flattened.
Whoops, this was meant to be a reply, not sure why it posted as a main comment! There nerds to be a delete button on here
Tonight’s Triggernometry livestream was a corker… Francis’ analysis on the Cummings thing was spot on, I think…
They cover it at the top of the show.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUCHpYC_wSM
Apparently, Cummings did it again, recently: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/may/23/new-witnesses-cast-doubt-on-dominic-cummingss-lockdown-claims
I find it surprising that everyone who defends Cummings, came up with a list of excuses why it was ok for him to break the rules before he had a chance to speak.
Also, if I were infected, driving to my family, especially my parents, would be the last thing I would think of.
I wouldn’t care if it was anyone else, but this guy? One of the people directly responsible for this whole lockdown fiasco?
Sweden’s Covid-19 policy is a model for the right. It’s also a deadly folly
The Truth according to the Guardian.
“No one, however, would have predicted this news item from last week: “Covid-19 deaths in Sweden were the highest in Europe per capita in a rolling seven-day average between 12 and 19 May.” It confirmed that Sweden’s state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell’s “mitigation” strategy of allowing shops, restaurants, gyms, schools and workplaces to remain open was a deadly folly. It does not even seem to have produced herd immunity. Just 7.3% of Stockholm’s inhabitants had developed Covid-19 antibodies by the end of April.
All those deaths for so little point……Sweden’s position may be graver than the weekly figure implies, Lena Einhorn, a Swedish virologist and author, told me. Recorded cases of Covid-19 follow a bell curve. All severely infected countries, including the UK, are seeing infections fall as they move down the far side of the curve, apart from Trump’s America and Sweden. In both instances, they have declined slightly then hit a plateau.
The Swedish sickness is a political as well as a medical disaster. Professor Johan Giesecke, an adviser to the Swedish government alongside Tegnell, became a star of the rightwing web as he lectured other governments on the futility of their tough measures. British Conservative commentators have boomed out claims that Sweden showed there was no need to close the UK economy. Sweden had “held its nerve”, they gushed, in much the same way communists once gushed about the Soviet Union. They praised Johnson for holding his nerve for a few weeks while he let the virus run amok, but damned him as a “scaredy cat” and “pant-wetter” as he U-turned and locked Britain down. Don’t be too quick to scoff at pundits who never made it out of the prep-school playground. They may talk like prepubescents but their readers are running and wrecking the country
……..
Put like this, Sweden sounds like an authoritarian technocracy intolerant of opinions and individuals that don’t fit in. But at the start of the pandemic, most countries were as trusting. In South Korea, Germany, Taiwan and New Zealand that trust has been justified. Britain saw a wave of support for a government that frittered it away with its repeated displays of tardiness and ineptitude. If Britain shows the dangers of a weak state and incapable politicians, Sweden shows what happens when you place too much trust in a handful of administrators, without first protecting yourself with a robustly argumentative culture that allows you to question whether they are right.
Sweden’s loss belongs to the world. If and when the virus returns, no one, not even the Brexit right, will be able to say that Sweden has proved we don’t need to wreck the economy and risk mass employment because it has shown a better way. We will just have to endure it. Again.“
OMG, they are BATSHIT CRAZY
Innumerate or dishonest?
Probably both
Considering the writer, the second for certain.
Both. Or neither. The best word is ‘Disgusting’.
These poisonous goons jump for joy every time somebody in Sweden dies, thinking it proves their point.
Come to that, they jump for joy every tome somebody in Britain dies, because that justifies their beloved gulag.
Right at the start the doommongers were predicting 100k deaths in Sweden for taking the path they did. The predicted catastrophe never came.
Note the claim in the UK is that lockdown saved of thousands of lives based on the modelling. If that is the case then Sweden must also have saved thousands of lives without a lockdown based on similar modelling. If you say the UK saved lives based on modelling then you must also say Sweden saved lives based on modelling.
Now consider the point I was making in my earlier post. If the modelling had predicted perfectly the death toll in Sweden would that have been justification for wrecking their economy?
It’s not hard to think it through is it?
Exactly. Like people say “But more people died in Sweden because they didn’t lock down!” I think this is bullshit. But even if it wasn’t. – So what?
As long as MILLIONS more people didn’t die because of no lockdown, more people dying is still actually justified. – Because let’s be cutthroat here, more people dying of the Corona is more old people dying. Lockdowns mean more people across the age spectrum die of…… everything. Other health conditions. Poverty. Suicide. Fat assery. Boredom. A LOT more. Young people and kids included. So. Yeah.
Sweden has had 4000 deaths. Suppose they’d had a lockdown and saved ALL of those, would it have been worth it to suspend liberty and wreck the economy? Absolutely not!
For some people saving just one life would be worth it. Those people are a danger to the human race imo.
Absolutely insane.
Lol yeah there it is again — “But what if that was YOUR life?”
Then I’d be bloody happy I’d died and left a free world behind me.
That’s probably the most damaging idea that has dominated discourse in this country in the last 20-25 years. The sooner it is consigned to the dustbin of history the better.
Scotland with half the Swedish population has also had almost 4000 deaths.
Totally agree. Just had someone on WhatsApp crowing to me about this article with its cherry picked data. Referred them to worldometers which shows death rate in the UK at way more than Sweden without a completely trashed economy. Also said even if their death rate was more they at least coming out the other side and we are still hiding under the stairs. No response. Guess that’s another friendship down the drain……their loss lol….
And, to be fair, they did admit they’d cocked-up with the old folks. Like to see our lot doing that!
Would it be wrong of me to say that this person would have been a witch burner in olden times?
That is exactly how they sound to me. Like religious fundamentalist. Always hysterical, high pitched, and thoroughly lacking in any proportion or sense.
It actually makes me think that the situation we’re in is just like the Spanish Inquisition. The virus is heresy and everyone is being protected from it’s deadly spread. Logic and reason are the work of the devil and sceptics are heretics who must be punished.
And The Bible is replaced by The Science. Do not look through the telescope, Mr Galileo
What an intemperate, inflammatory, ridiculous article. Apparently, because Sweden’s death figures have plateau’d briefly (for a week) that proves their policy was a deadly folly. And that crazy statement is about the most sensible thing he says!! Most of it is pure mouth-frothing gobbledegook. How can this garbage be printed in a national paper? How can he be so unequivocally in love with the lockdown? DO NOT GET IT!!!!!
This is absolutely disgraceful journalism. They have completely twisted the facts to fit their agenda which presumably is to feebly defend their support of the UK lockdown.
Here is the effin reality. Throughout the last few months, Swedish deaths from/with covid, adjusted for population size have been way, way lower than the UK. True, right now, the daily figures match the UK but they have ignored the fact that the virus has now run its course and the UK daily deaths are now 20% of what they were on the 8th April peak so they are comparing apples with oranges. Trouble is many people believe this shit and the damage they are doing is outrageous.
There are models, graphs, conjecture, guessing, political or other agendas all mixed in with this to create complete confusion of what is really happening.
I would ask everyone, press, politicians, pundits, junk scientists to just study one metric to clear up this confusion which is ‘excess deaths’. Excess deaths i.e deaths above or below the long term average from all causes (of which Covid-19 is a part) which have been recorded and published for years. These are REAL statistics generated from actual recorded deaths, no predictions, no twisting or playing with numbers, just straight forward history.
Please, everyone, go to
https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps
You can see the graph for Sweden and the UK along with most other European countries.
It cannot be clearer that Sweden has fared way way better than UK.
It drives me crazy that nobody can see the wood for the trees. Its not complicated.
You fool, do you seriously expect facts in the Guardian???
But this is where we are. In the US they now have ‘alternative facts’
At the most Sweden have less than I more death per million per week than us at the moment.
The MSM just want to justify their stupidity and complicity in spreading fear.
I would not believe ‘Good morning’ off Nick Cohen! We have not read the Graun for years or listened to BBC news either as it bad for our blood pressure. Sadly, many of our allegedly educated friends still do which is why they still believe all the coronaphobia crap.
The media’s mostly disgraceful performance throughout can be easily explained: http://www.newsmediauk.org/Latest/government-partners-with-newspaper-industry-on-covid-19-ad-campaign but what would you expect? We have not had a free press for many years now. From its early beginnings, the BBC has always been at the service of the Government.
Have I got this right? Government ministers seem to be saying this evening that if we truly loved our families we should have broken the law – a la Cummings – and it would have been alright. Oh my!
I’m just thinking about all those people who held off being there for those singular wonderful and awful human experiences, all those people who didn’t get to express their joy and sorrow when it most mattered…
Its small stuff compared to the sacrifices of others, but I didn’t visit my daughter and grandchildren when my son in law left them at the beginning of the house arrest. We have managed but it would have been better to be there – to cook the odd meal, chat with the kids, dispense hugs etc. I didn’t go the 60+ miles to her house because I was worried about getting stopped and ending up in a fracas with PC Plod – which might have happened and wouldn’t have helped anyone.
Now to be told we needn’t have worried, we could have just done whatever, that we should have loved better doesn’t sit well with me. I shudder to think what it might feel like to others given the sorrows they have endured.
I guess that’s the end of the social isolation policy then. We can just say we are doing whatever we are doing for love, or that we are Dominic Cummings…
Honetly, I find it hard to believe they’re not intentionally trying to make people angry and intentionally break lockdown now.
Because they are totally incompetent. It’s hard to be that shit. Imagine being in government and coming up with a policy about how close people should stand to each other and when it’s ok to hug someone. Just fuck off
It is like we are actually living in a comedy sketch about the end times.
Except it isn’t funny!
I did think the timing was a bit suspect, given that the police have been bleating all week about how they were going to manage the crowds over the bank holiday.
So I think we can all just come out of lockdown now. Maybe this is the plan? Cummings does nothing without planning, from what I’ve seen.
Time for the government to change its slogan again. New propaganda is needed to get the British people out of their armchairs and back to work. We need to make people realise that the lockdown might seem like an extended holiday with pay, but it has to be paid back. Last I heard, the lockdown had cost an average of £14K per household. Assuming it stops there (which it won’t), and assuming it’s paid back at zero interest over 10 years, each household will have to be taxed an extra £1,400 for each of the next 10 years. So effectively you will be paying your own furlough. If that doesn’t sound fair, then consider all the “essential workers” who have worked throughout this crisis. They too will have to find £14K to pay for your extended holiday. And if we can’t raise enough through tax then we’ll cut public services. Like the NHS. So people who are ill in the coming years will be paying for your extended holiday. Some of them with their lives. I could go on, but why should I? This is the government’s job.
Go to work.
Rescue the economy.
Be part of the solution.
THIS
That.
‘about eight children aged 14 or under are struck by lightening each year’.
I think this rational argument by Toby misses the point which the virus has highlighted about the problem we now have in Britain regarding the concept of risk.
The above statement is sufficient justification for most of our fellow citizens to have an uncontrolled sphincter release and refuse to allow their offspring out if doors ever again.
Couple of new song suggestions for things to come hopefully:
The Times they are A-Changin’ – Bob Dylan
Back To Life – Soul to Soul
Back To Life is going ON my stereo as soon as we’re out of jail.
Idiot Wind and Desolation Row would be my picks. ‘Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves / We’re idiots, babe / It’s a wonder we can even feed ourselves’
Just a few thoughts on this mandatory U.K. quarantine they’re bringing in on 8th June. Firstly, talk about closing the stable door after it’s bolted. It is the stupidest, most ill-conceived policy ever. It has numerous loopholes. For example:
– if you come home via Ireland, you are exempt
– if you apply for a fruit picking job you are exempt. You don’t even have to turn up to work, just need a job offer.
– why are they starting it on 8th June? Is the virus currently on sabbatical?
– thousands upon thousands have been entering the U.K. (and continue to do so) ever since we were aware of this virus so why bring that policy in, in two weeks’ time?
– Once you arrive at the airport, you can use public transport to get to your destination. Think how many people you will be in contact with on packed coaches, trains, buses, tubes, a visit to the shops on the way home etc.
It will decimate the airline industry, tourism and travel sectors. It will cause yet more completely avoidable economic damage to our country and destroy yet more lives. It’s beyond any comprehensible level of stupidity, how the U.K. government has managed this disease.
My girlfriend lives in Russia. I have not seen he since 22nd February. God knows when or if I will ever see her again.
A very angry and sad R Dawg
With the 14 day rule in place most ordinary people would not be able to travel, good news for climate Change, maybe even UK tourism, not so good for anyone involved in the travel industry, although maybe airport parking people could get into fruit growing and offer a package deal, we look after your car for two weeks, you nip into our farm on the way home & we employ you to pick fruit for the afternoon, no need to self isolate as you picked a punnet of strawberry and are now magically clean of CV19.
Is this quarantine business a means of slowing down/stopping the obvious mad rush there will be to book holidays once this is all over? Imagine the numbers with second homes abroad just itching to get out there, or others desperate to see relatives.
Or am I crediting the government with too much sense?
I think it’s about completely trashing our tourist industry.
Incoming tourists and businessmen, make sure you pack a car in your luggage because apparently you have to make your way to your place of quarantine using your own transport. Or if you’re on Ryanair with their mean luggage allowance, you’ll have to pack your folding bike and cycle up the M1.
We just need someone like Willie Walsh to just say bollocks to it all (like he did with ash cloud) and fly all his planes via Ireland…..
Bizarre article here by the BBCs Fergus Walsh who they claim is their ‘medical correspondent’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52762939
To summarise, he took multiple antibody tests all of which were positive, expresses his great surprise as he hasn’t had any symptoms recently apart from a bout of pneumonia, fever and dry coughing in early January, completely discounts that this might have been Covid as against the government orthodoxy that the first UK case was the end of January, then proceeds to patronisingly lecture that having antibodies doesn’t mean you should no longer wash your hands for two minutes whilst singing Happy Birthday.
Bizarre indeed
Another case of “does not compute” when presented with facts that don’t fit orthodoxy
This is from the Wikipedia entry about him
When describing how he approached stories on sometimes sensitive topics, Walsh argued that ‘To avoid scaring people, the script is crucial – it has to be balanced. I want to look back, six months from now, and not cringe at our stories’. He has also said that in general, ‘You have to keep a certain emotional distance from the events in front of you; otherwise it would be impossible to report objectively. You can care deeply about whom or what you are covering, but you must not let your feelings cloud your judgement or prevent you from being an independent observer. On controversial topics, you have to play devil’s advocate and ask people direct and often difficult questions’
They will look back and not cringe???
Balanced?????
Walsh says “…but I did have a bout of pneumonia in early January”. As you do.
It’s almost comical the way he drops it in, as though it’s not unusual at all.
I think I’ve said it before on here – how can intelligent people be so dumb? He’s so blinded by the narrative that even when faced with objective evidence to the contrary and his own experience he won’t admit that he had it in January and is still paranoid about being infected or infecting someone else. How very, very sad!
I saw it too. Couldn’t believe what I was watching. The presenter just glossed over it as well!
If he doesn’t think he has had it is he saying the tests are inaccurate? Doesn’t make sense!
I’m amazed what’s going on on twitter… everyone saying Cummings has ‘unlocked lockdown’. Perhaps Poppy was spot on yesterday with her comment about this being planned to some extent. I’m not a fan of conspiracy theories but could this have been a risky stunt?
How has he unlocked lockdown when we’re all still locked down??
So many people saying they are planning to break rules tomorrow. I doubt they will, or they might break them by meeting 3 friends at a 3m distance I suppose. Piers Morgan saying if Cummings isn’t sacked he will too. It’s an interesting reaction.
It is an interesting and very useful reaction. Anything and everything that helps to discredit the lockdown is good. But I don’t for a moment believe those speculating that it might have been a hidden purpose behind the revelations.
Cant wait to see Piers confirming that he visited his family that he hasn’t seen in 12 weeks. Will only be effective is he does that today or tomorrow.
Aaah so the making people angry so they break their chains thing. It is viable.
The worse, the better.
But there’s no way Cummings did this to try to achieve that. Why should we even believe he has the slightest problem with the lockdown anyway (for the little people,obviously)?
It’s not Cummings doing it that matters – or why he did it. (Imo he did because he wanted to and doesn’t give a f about the rules, probably knowing full well the rules are ridiculous).
It’s when they released the story about him doing it.
So I suppose the Twitterati’s convulsions about him ‘unlocking the lockdown’ should really be aimed at the press (via a disgruntled Tory insider… David Davis? ;p) inadvertently or very deliberately giving people the ammo to unlock the lockdown themselves.
I certainly think so.
“Well, both Cummings and his wife were suffering from COVID-19 at the time and as a result felt unable to care for their three year-old child. ”
Sorry, that is BS.
If they were that ill that they couldn’t care for their 3-year-old (get dinner? play? bathe? put to bed?), they should have been in hospital, not out on the M-whatever driving up to Durham for a nice holy in which they also potentially infect their aged parents.
I suggest phone records and texts be subpoena’d.
Unfair- if they thought they were going to be ill then they needed to put their child’s needs first. Why do we have to go down this awful ‘phone records etc’. And being ill with Covid is probably not a nice holiday.
This just gives us a reason to get out of our chairs and get out there and meet friends and carry on. Lockdown is only going to end when people start breaking it.
If they were ill with symptoms, they wouldn’t have been up to driving nearly 270 miles. Besides, how many pee breaks would that have entailed?
Agree.
What about all the other ‘normal’ people with the same childcare issues. They would have been turned away by the police and fined.
More linking of ‘anti-vaxxers’ with the far right and antisemitism.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/23/europes-covid-predicament-how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-the-anti-vaxxers
Compulsory vaccination is possible:
“…national leaders face a dilemma: should they aim to immunise as large a part of the population as possible as quickly as possible, or does compulsory vaccination risk boosting a street movement already prone to conspiracy theories about “big pharma” and its government’s authoritarian tendencies?”
They’re suggesting it’ll all be over by October:
“In Switzerland, where immunologists have proposed that mass vaccinations could take place as early as October…”
Our own government has mentioned September.
There’s more about the Swiss vaccine here:
https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/sci-tech/bern-research_swift-covid-19-vaccine-within-reach–say-swiss-scientists/45704796
I just don’t understand the rush to roll out a new vaccine for a disease for which there is already significant immunity, for the vast majority is little more then a cold and lets face it the government and NHS have already killed of most of the vulnerable population with their ejecting everybody from hospitals policy and the so called care home scandal.
These people are insane !
Two words. Money and control.
According to the Guardian “Millions of readers around the world are flocking to the Guardian in search of honest, authoritative, fact-based reporting that can help them understand the biggest challenge we have faced in our lifetime.” They can’t seriously believe that’s true any more?
Nothing new. It is a tried and tested method of MSM (funded by big corp organisations via advertisements) to label people into groups and then link them in an effort to smear them. The same goes for so-called fake news and these self appointed fact checking websites – just because they label something as fake news does not mean its fake news. There is huge money and vested interests behind this, guiding people to buy products and services of these huge organisations.
I can just hope that people on this site are starting to get wise of all of this.
The Government has just updated its latest slogan:
STAY ALERT (to government fear-porn)
CONTROL THE VIRUS (this toxic government)
SAVE LIVES (before we completely f**k you, your job and the economy)
Much better.
(Much) too little, (much) too late. Alas!
It’s not clear that Cummings observed the social distancing rules whilst in Durham: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/may/23/new-witnesses-cast-doubt-on-dominic-cummingss-lockdown-claims
Further to Poppy’s magnificent comment below, I’ve just found this on the covid tracker site:
https://covid.joinzoe.com/post/covid-kindness
This, to me, is patronising ,decidedly creepy, propaganda. It reads like one of the awful ‘lifestyle’ pronouncements beloved by celebs and their gurus: ‘all you need is love’ when your livelihood has gone, your kids are bored and you have no money and no hope?
How is being kind and referring to the BBC News site going to aid those who have lost everything? No work, no money, no prospects, no hope.
Secondly. She Who Must Be Obeyed has declared that Sturgeon land is :
https://www.glasgowlive.co.uk/news/glasgow-news/nicola-sturgeon-scotland-quarantine-rules-18300191
Last week she inferred that persons crossing the UK border might be breaking the law, until the cops said no; now she’s offering open welcoming Scotland.
Song for the lockdown lovers: ‘ All you need is love’.
Reminds me of a discussion with my mother-in-law: when I pointed out that many people would lose businesses and livelihoods that had been their life’s work, she said, yes but they won’t be alone, as if that compensated in the slightest. Some people just feel that they have to justify any damage to support their religiously held views. I’m not sure I can interact with such people ever again.
More or less exactly what my lockdown supporting friend opined, when I attempted to draw her attention to all the lives which have, and are, being ruined because of this.
She just repeated that lives must be saved and that the rules must be followed.
And on the mental health 5 guidelines, my niece,who works for a large City institution, described this as ‘corporate, woke box ticking’; essentially meaningless and merely cosmetic to satisfy the increasingly stringent wokeisms with which most institutions now comply.
If anything I have lost respect for our mental health charities because for some reason or the other they have been silenced and are not addressing the elephant in the room.
I can excuse Heads Together as being the initiative of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge they are treading a fine line given they cannot be seen to be taking a political stance.
But there is no excuse for the likes of The Samaritans and Mind, what are they doing? Then they’ll only stick their heads out as soon as the suicide numbers go up.
Yeah, I’ve lost respect for my family as well. When I mentioned that the lockdown will and has resulted into disastrous results for people’s mental health, all my mum could say was that people should just remain “patient”. I should think that patience will not be what people will be thinking as they lose their jobs and homes then go bananas and finally take matters into their own hands.
Me too.
In an earlier post I compared this situation to the Spanish Inquisition with heresy as the virus. A bit of further reading has led me to the Salem Witch Trials. I thought this paragraph in Wikipedia was particularly apt:
—
The episode is one of Colonial America’s most notorious cases of mass hysteria. It has been used in political rhetoric and popular literature as a vivid cautionary tale about the dangers of isolationism, religious extremism, false accusations, and lapses in due process. It was not unique, but a Colonial American example of the much broader phenomenon of witch trials in the early modern period, which took place also in Europe. Many historians consider the lasting effects of the trials to have been highly influential in subsequent United States history. According to historian George Lincoln Burr, “the Salem witchcraft was the rock on which the theocracy shattered.”
—
What we have is mass hysteria propagated by extremist values (the one death is one too many type), false accusations that anybody breaking lockdown rules is essentially a witch who could kill another person. Due process has also been side stepped by not allowing any reasonable discussion on the subject.
Sweden is a country full of witches for spreading death and allowing it to take 4000 souls. Countries that locked down are righteous and pure because they took action against the devil and deprived him of many more souls.
Maybe the best measures to stop the “Worst Panic of All Time” happening again are these?
1. Regulate tech giants media bias;
2. Teach kids (better) statistics;
3. Pass a, “No Lockdown for Chest Viruses Act”;
4. Pass a, “Tortious Liability for Inciting Panic, Media Act”;
5. A full parliamentary enquiry with terms of reference set by Toby…
Well, it is certainly tortious all the way down!
How can we prevent future governments from enacting these policies?
Surely we must make it unconstitutional, beyond the scope of any government to do.
Turns out that a lockdown and similar restrictions on liberty were NOT among the recommendations of the Danish health authorities to the Danish government:
https://www.thelocal.dk/20200522/danish-pm-falsely-claimed-health-agencies-backed-lockdown/amp
It will be interesting to see in due course whether other governments have adopted measures that go against or beyond what public health agencies advised.
Wasn’t part of the WHO recommendations either in their 2019 publication.
CORONAVIRUS BILL
COSTS
HEALTH
Anxiety, depression, suicide, unnecessary deaths of thousands of citizens as a result of the NHS being effectively closed to them.
SOCIAL
Child abuse, domestic abuse, social isolation, family breakdown, loss of community cohesion, infantilization of the population, spiritual decline, erosion in public services.
LEGAL
Terrrorisation of the population, loss of civil liberties, abuse of the law, loss of freedom of speech, distrust of parliament, the police and judiciary, civil unrest.
ECONOMIC
Unemployment, loss of businesses, loss of income and savings, loss of homes, poverty.
Over one trillion pounds (£1,000,000,000,000) in government debt.
BENEFITS
NONE
A great summary of the madness.
Under “legal” could also add “loss of freedom of religion”. Various human rights charters (including ECHR) define the right to practice or not practice a religion. This is the first Easter in 800 years that all churches have been closed by the government.
“Was” I mean not “is”.
That’s why I included spiritual decline James.
I don’t think the churches will be forgiven and also they must be losing a great deal of money yet no-one from any of the churches has spoken out.
They are only paper Christians and have walked by on the other side.
This appeal was launched in early May by sseveral international Catholic leaders. It is now hard to find online and, unsurprisingly, several other religious high-ups have distanced themselves from it. I’m not a Catholic and don’t go in for ‘God-y language’ but it’s hard not to admire their style as they cover most of the L.S. issues: https://www.thestationofthecross.com/appeal-to-the-church-and-the-world/
The govt didn’t close them – at least, not to their own clergy. The spineless, heartless, brainless, gutless bishops closed down their own church. Correction: OUR national church.
Jesus Christ is not recorded as saying that his disciples ought to save themselves, run away, hide, and desert God’s people.
He didn’t say ‘Stay safe.’
He didn’t put his own personal safety before everything else.
That’s why, until ten weeks ago, we had a Church.
Annie,
Your words about Jesus are very powerful indeed!
Jesus did not go in for social distancing.
What a disappointment the church leadership are.
Right. Wasn’t there a story about Jesus and the leper?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_cleansing_a_leper
Worth a read.
Something which only confirmed my own longstanding opinion that the CoE hierarchy (and a significant faction within the Catholic Church as well) are basically post-Christian. They don’t believe in anything that’s meaningfully Christian, just in a kind of adaptation of Christian forms to suit modern broadly “politically correct” agendas and dogmas that are what they really regard as important.
I take it that the phenomenon of ‘Antigenic Original Sin’ is well known to those who are politically or philosophically pro-vaccine..?
“The original antigenic sin: When the body first encounters an infection it produces effective antibodies against its dominant antigens and thus eliminates the infection. But when it encounters the same infection, at a later evolved stage, with a new dominant antigen, with the original antigen now being recessive, the immune system will still produce the former antibodies against this old “now recessive antigen” and not develop new antibodies against the new dominant one, this results in the production of ineffective antibodies and thus a weak immunity.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_antigenic_sin
There’s more about it here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK27158/
There’s a cautionary tale here, concerning a disease called Respiratory Syncytial Virus:
“…the main setback in RSV vaccine development occurred in the 1960s, when a formalin-inactivated alum-precipitated RSV vaccine (FI-RSV) was injected intramuscularly in RSV-naïve infants, and following natural RSV infection of vaccinees, a large proportion developed enhanced respiratory disease (ERD). The ERD manifested itself clinically as pneumonia, bronchiolitis, rhinitis, or bronchitis. Postmortem examination of two vaccinees who died following RSV infection revealed bronchopneumonia with emphysema and pneumothorax, and histological examination of their lung tissues demonstrated a massive infiltration of monocytes, neutrophils, and, to a lesser extent, eosinophils. … The RSV-naïve children who received the FI-RSV vaccine may have developed OAS with consequences related to RSV pathogenicity. This contrasted starkly with older FI-RSV vaccinees who were infected with RSV prior to FI-RSV vaccination and in whom no ERD was reported. As such, the RSV-specific OAS for these older children was natural RSV infection. Therefore, the type and perhaps administration route of the original RSV antigen influence the immune responses to and clinical outcomes of subsequent RSV infections. This FI-RSV-induced ERD phenomenon resulted in a de facto moratorium on the subsequent development of inactivated or subunit RSV vaccines for RSV-naïve infants….
…Our current understanding dictates that the types of RSV vaccine candidates to be used will be dependent upon age, health, and immune status of the recipient, as no universal vaccine approach is currently being considered for RSV. Thus, the type of vaccine used will depend upon the level of reactogenicity, and, in the case of live-attenuated candidates, the level of attenuation. As all vaccine responses are shaped by immune experience and imprinting, and as all adults have experienced multiple RSV infections with many different RSV strains, evaluating [vaccine effectiveness] in such populations will be difficult as antibody responses will reflect established memory and may not be predictive of [vaccine effectiveness] and protective immunity….
…How OAS affects the original response to the infecting strain and subsequent infections needs to be better understood, particularly in RSV vaccine development.”
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-393X/7/3/107/htm
This is from 2019, so it’s still a current issue that hasn’t simply been solved by the experts.
It sounds like something you don’t want to rush, and more importantly, that vaccination should not become a political football – a symbol of governmental competence, a sop to the press, gesture of enforced obedience or compliance. Reading a Guardian article earlier, it seems to me that it is becoming exactly that.
Given the unknowns, the logical approach would be to vaccinate only when you have to. If possible, only vaccinate those people who are vulnerable to a serious illness. But if it is necessary to go for herd immunity via a vaccine, then don’t vaccinate more people than are necessary for herd immunity. Don’t universally vaccinate for a disease that isn’t all that serious for most people. Keep your options open as much as possible, because vaccination cannot be reversed. Once vaccinated, your immune system can be suppressed to future, different-but-similar infections. Evolution created this mechanism for a reason, and it’s based on statistical odds; it may only make sense as a survival mechanism for the species as a whole if it is assumed that not everyone is infected with every illness, and not in the same order.
This is where Neil Feguson can do even more damage than he already has, it seems to me. You’ve got immunologists who have expertise in vaccines, and you’ve got Neil Ferguson who is a rather strange person with expertise in cobbled-together mathematical models. As far as I can tell, there is little knowledge transfer between the two. Yet the decisions of when, how and who to vaccinate will depend on what Neil Ferguson says! His simplistic notions of how immunity works (it’s the ‘R’ in ‘SIR’, duh) will end up driving the vaccination strategy, turbocharged by the press and politics. In the meantime, the immunologists haven’t a clue about modelling. They are aware of how individuals react to pathogens, but they leave the population-level stuff to the mathematicians. Their acquiescence in this will be influenced by the horror stories that Neil Ferguson produces. They may be thinking “This is really risky. But Neil says that without it millions will die, so we’d better just take a deep breath and get on with it…”
We are watching it happening like a slow motion car crash.
And isn’t it the case that such viruses mutate rapidly, thereby leading to an endless and possibly futile, vaccination race?
What puzzles me is if the vaccine actually protects people, why can the vaccinated still catch the virus? Most outbreaks of polio and measles are now from the vaccine mutation of the original virus and not the original wild virus. It’s been proven that people can ‘shed’ the virus when vaccinated with it. How do we know the same thing won’t happen with a C 19 jab?
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/06/28/534403083/mutant-strains-of-polio-vaccine-now-cause-more-paralysis-than-wild-polio
It is a well known fact that vaccines shed from the recently vaccinated and then infect others; it will also happen with a C19 jab.
The scary thing of any rushed vaccine is that it would not have been tested long enough for adverse effects short, medium and long term. This include auto immune diseases, disability and death as a result of such a vaccine. This time they manipulate RNA which will permanently affect your body. Governments also provide legal protection to these vaccine producers as you will not be able to take them to court if you suffer any adverse effects. Be VERY afraid.
Victoria – have you seen these 60 studies obtained through FOI from the CDC that show neurological damage, allergies, narcolepsy etc in vaccinated vs unvaccinated populations? Hundreds of thousands in the studies. https://childrenshealthdefense.org/wp-content/uploads/Vaxxed-Unvaxxed-Parts-I-IX-1.pdf
Great link. So true
If you listen to the politicians they talk as if the virus needs to be eradicated hence the need for everyone to be vaccinated. Matt Hancock said as much when asked if vaccination would be mandatory.
It was at this point that Chris Witty stepped in to say one way to use a vaccine is to give it only to those at highest risk. People who don’t get the vaccine will be no danger to those who are vaccinated they just won’t have the protection that a vaccine can give them.
I think I’ve become a Corrupter of Youth like one of the ancient philosophers Aristotle or Plato, can’t remember my classics history properly after all these years. Anyone out their in sceptic land know?
Out and about and taking the wife’s pride and joy for some fresh air – not me, it’s bright red, loud exhausts and shiny – a young lad and his grandfather came across to speak to us as the lad is car mad.
He must have been about 13 or 14 as he had hit that lanky zitty growth spurt but not filled out the muscles yet.
Grandfather came over and chatted at the “old normal” strangers in a car park distance, the lad was standing well back but joining in.
Said he was welcome to come closer. Lad said no, he was obeying social distancing.
I asked him why and he said it was the law. Explained it wasn’t and why. He said that all his social media pages and friends push it so I had a chat with him and the grandfather, explained how safe he was from the “coronavirus”, how few under 60 and died, about what was going on psychologically wise against the population and recommended the lad start questioning things and not believe outright without any reservations what the government or social media says. He has to break out of his bubble and away from non-thinking conformists.
He did come across closer for a good look at the car eventually with a bewildered look on his face but his grandfather said he would point him in the right direction.
Scary thing is how those least in danger are the most scared through conditioning.
Add-in stirring up shops and takeaways against the bullying and misrepresenting of their powers by EHOs it was a successful day I think.
It was Socrates who was accused, condemned, and executed as a corrupter of youth. He was teaching young people how to think for themselves. Can’t be having that.
Thanks, now I remember. Not much changes in 2000 years then?!
Nope.
Going to have to disagree with you on Cummings Toby, not because I agree with lockdown, or because I agree the government has any business knowing where I go or who I see, but because it proves he knows it’s all bullsh*t, and him having a hand in this means people didn’t get to sit with their elderly mum when she died, or had to forgo their cancer treatment, or have not seen their elderly parents for months, or have been separated from partners, have lost their livelihood, have been thrown into ruin. He was instrumental in this policy, and he cynically disregarded it because it’s nonsense (it was just popular).
And at the risk of irking the ire of my fellow sceptics that support Brexit, ‘save the NHS’ was as cynically done as the Red Bus, both dishonest, the NHS did not need saving, our old folks did.
Personally, I hope he becomes a pariah, some fringe loony sociopath who had his 15 mins, and falls into obscurity.
Classic case of someone who is above the rules. The CEO who clamps down on expenses but uses the company to kit out his flat. It now seems Dominic was running around a fair bit and with Coivd. This is unforgivable. The lockdown might not be the best idea but quarantine for those with it makes a lot of sense.
According to Sage’s own published minutes and papers, quarantining the sick and washing your hands are the only things worth doing (the other things we did are useless, they just had a 90% approval rating). I’m waiting for Sage to start leaking stuff and briefing against the government, I’m sure they’d be as glad to see the back of Cummings as I would.
Do you have citations?
Read quiet a few over the months but deleted them from my e-mails as I’ve had big clear out.
It was the original recommended actions from our illustrious leaders until they went into full idiocy panic mode.
The WHO report is good reading, it’s available to download from the WHO official website for free:
Non-pharmaceutical public health measures for mitigating the risk and impact of epidemic and pandemic influenza – ISBN 978-92-4-151683-9
Plus this one, there is a link on the internet somewhere as I downloaded it:
BIOSECURITY AND BIOTERRORISM: BIODEFENSE STRATEGY, PRACTICE, AND SCIENCE
Volume 4, Number 4, 2006
© Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.
Disease Mitigation Measures in the Control
of Pandemic Influenza
THOMAS V. INGLESBY, JENNIFER B. NUZZO, TARA O’TOOLE, and D. A. HENDERSON
Plenty of others including lectures by our own Dr Whitty saying you cannot stop a virus jus deal with it.
Thanks
After reading lots the best way to deal with a virus or similar is the same as it has been for 2000+ years – good hand hygiene, cover a sneeze or cough, if ill stay at home for a couple of days until better, good nutrition, sunshine. That’s it.
Why are curse ships so unhealthy – the amount of people who use the toilet, don’t wash their hands, go to the public areas and buffets, try to pick up food, without thongs, touch door handles, handrails etc with many infested hands. Then the same people complain norovirus has broken out. Idiots.
Why did hospitals and ships have brass fittings, handles etc in the past? Because copper is a natural killer of infections and is anti-bacterial but pure copper was expensive, brass worked just as well as long as the copper content was correct and was cheaper. Stainless steel doesn’t cut it at all.
Sometimes a good typo lifts the spirits:
“curse ships”
“try to pick up food, without thongs”
Thanks!
Should wear my glasses more but hate them I don’t feel that old.
I know that feeling!
Found the WHO link:
https://www.who.int/influenza/publications/public_health_measures/publication/en/
It’s the sage papers on non medical interventions on the Gov covid pages, nestled in the ‘evidence’ for lockdown. Their ‘assumptions’ are also interesting and now entirely rubbished by the data.
I disagree with you about the Brexit Bus. What was written on the side of the bus as a fact was precisely correct. Maybe it misled some people into imagining that the net figure was £350 million as opposed to a ‘fuzzy’ £250 million (fuzzy because the £100 million rebate came with conditions), but for people above a certain IQ it was precisely true. Even for those below that IQ level, would any of them have changed their vote as a result of being told the distinction between £350m and £250m? Not a single one, I would suggest.
At first glance, the Brexiteers should have put £250 million and they could have saved themselves the grief, without losing a single vote. But I do understand their desire to be precise, otherwise the lack of precision would cast doubt on their other claims.
The trouble with the Covid-19 debacle is that there isn’t even any information that might be considered misleading to people below a certain IQ but precise for the rest of us. It’s all basically wrong, incomplete, a lie. This is different from the Brexit bus.
You misunderstand me, my point is Cummings and Johnson don’t believe in Brexit, anymore than they believe in Lockdown, it was just popular.
Yes, I agree with you there. But where I disagree, is that while the Brexit bus’s message had some factual content and ‘merit’, the Covid ‘Save the NHS’ message is basically misleading, pure propaganda, a lie.
That’s probably true, my point was not a leave or remain point, I think Johnson would have backed remain if it’d have won him power, and I think he would have gladly used Satan himself to do it if expedient, I think Cummings was just part of achieving that (if you have ever read Cumming’s blog, the man is clearly a sociopath, with a God complex, v dangerous man imho).
I think Neil Ferguson may be on the same continuum.
Totally agree with you there.
There is an interesting presentation by Cummings on YouTube about how the referendum was won. He explains how they used the £350m to infuriate the remain camp, and deliberately create an argument around how much does the EU cost us. Is it a big number or an even bigger number?
I agree with your main point. This government is hollow. They dont really believe in anything except power and popularity.
I also agree – sadly that seems to be the case for virtually all the governments we have had since Thatcher. Similarly so in the USA since Reagan – possibly Trump also genuinely cares about his country, though it is always hard to know with Trump. Obama of course was one of the hollowest of presidents ever.
I’m reading Dominic Sandbrooks history of her from 79 – 82, I never liked her, I largely don’t agree with with a lot of her policy positions, although do now accept they were grossly misrepresented, and what actually happened, and what’s gone into folklore as happening, are not the same, but I think there’s no argument she had conviction, and a moral compass (even if we can disagree it was pointing in the right direction)
“. He explains how they used the £350m to infuriate the remain camp, and deliberately create an argument around how much does the EU cost us. Is it a big number or an even bigger number?”
For me that’s pointedly similar to the disastrous 2m separation nonsense. I would bet money that Cummings pushed for that one as well, though unless we get some useful leaks we won’t know until the Inquiry, should it ever appear in any useful form.
What’s the betting somewhere there was a conversation in which Cummings explained to some politician that the idea was to “create an argument over how big the separation should be – 1m or 2m?”
It actually makes more sense (in an evil, manipulative and grossly counterproductive sense, that is) than the so far reported justification which was basically that: “we thought the British people were too stupid to understand 1m so we doubled it”)
I hope sage start leaking, hard to see how they won’t, if he stays and Ferguson had to go. Jennie Harries didn’t exactly back him up. She said ‘the guidance was stay put’ if you had symptoms.
I voted for Brexit but spoilt my ballot paper in Dec 19 as I also saw through Tories ‘we’re the true saviours of the NHS’ BS to get them elected. Johnson and Cummings are clearly able to read the mood of the nation and win elections. However, what’s clear from this fiasco is that they are unable to provide leadership. They just need to be liked and win elections, whatever the consequences. Amongst other things, leadership is about being respected not being liked. As Johnson’s ratings continue to fall, he’s not respected or liked from either side of the debate. What a bloody mess.
I should clarify I’ve gone from passionately remain to agnostic on Brexit for many reasons, which we’ve discussed at length, so I won’t rehash. But I do draw a distinction between the genuine frustration and complaints held by the people who voted for it, and the utter contempt people like Cummings and Johnson hold those people in (as much contempt as the snobbish remain camp). Cummings and Johnson no more believe in Brexit than they believe in Father Christmas, it was just useful to them.
I spoiled my ballot too, for many reasons. I am however surprised by the ‘scales fallen from my eyes’ views about Johnson people seem to be expressing, it was always clear to me he was a mendacious narcissist who had charm but no substance, for all the reasons you say.
Can’t speak for others, but I certainly never had any doubt that he was a dishonest, posturing buffoon. But the same is true of Trump, and he was still the best available candidate for US President by some distance. Politicians, especially in a demcracy, are all dishonest, it is necessary and the system actively selects for the ability to lie. They are also all posturers, they just do it in different ways, according to the particular image they choose to present.
Where Johnson has failed us, was in his failure at the crucial moment to follow through on his own posturing, in the right direction. Had he realised that mid-March was actually the perfect moment for a Churchillian stand against the dictatorial, profoundly unBritish panickers, he would have been truly great.
He failed at that, perhaps in part due to his poor judgement in selecting advisers like Cummings who clearly pushed strongly in the wrong direction for bad reasons (misplaced obsession with short term popularity). But there’s no reason to suppose that any of the available alternatives would have been any less disastrous.
Being entirely pragmatic, I agree with you, I only spoiled my ballot as I’m in the safest of safe Tory seats and have been shouting into the wind when I vote anyway, our MP is actually very sensible, one nation of the old school, and he actually increased his majority by 11k votes! He was pro brexit, but anti no deal, all things considered, not the worst option.
I think it’s the lack of integrity for a long time that has really bothered me, we all know how the real world works, but they’ve taken taking the mickey out of the social contract to whole new levels, and here is the result.
I too absolutely loathe momentum, and those posh idiots are why the working classes voted Tory, and in the circumstances, looking at the alternative, quite right too.
I’m reading a very good book at the moment called ‘The Blunders of our Governments’, it was written in 2013, reviewing up to 2010, and it stresses that overall British politics is largely dominated by a genuine instinct for public service, that our governments largely are astonishingly efficient, that our institutions largely work, that we have more successful policy implementations for the greater good than failures, that our politicians might cheat their expenses but we don’t have large scale financial fraud (like, say, Greece and Italy) etc etc etc. However, I do wonder what they would make of the current situation. I see no public service in any of it. Just self serving. On all sides of the house.
“I am however surprised by the ‘scales fallen from my eyes’ views about Johnson people seem to be expressing”
I guess I am one of those people. I was willing to ‘go along for the ride’. I was sick of politics being a game of triangulation, social media, nudging, Overton windows, grids, optics, burying bad news and so on. I thought that Boris might be playing along with those tricks to get himself into power, but once there, the inner Churchill might come out – or at least the inner ‘interesting person’. And maybe we could put some of the colour back into life that had been slowly draining away. (This is possibly similar to the disillusionment felt by people who voted for Blair, thinking he was just bluffing to get into power and then his true socialist colours would show through).
I was scared stiff of Momentum-based Labour, thinking that under them we would be heading for soft, or not-so-soft, totalitarianism. When the Tories won the election I was very relieved, thinking that at least we had a few years grace before we’d have to worry about that again. Wrong!
I concur they were the least worst option, Momentum are militant tendency all over again, and in my women’s circles are called ‘Bromentum’, they care not a jot for women and kids, hence their ridiculous posturing over schools and ‘refuse to work’ right now, lack of childcare hammers poor women, they don’t care.
I abstained from voting but did take comfort from the fact that one nation Tories still exist, and I still have hope they may rein this shower in before we are all in a mad max movie.
As I’ve noted before here, this is less governance, more ‘make-it-up-as-you-go-along-and hope-the-plebs-will-believe-it’ game.
Tory MPs are breaking ranks. Looks like Cummings will be out, despite what Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson wants.
https://thecritic.co.uk/boris-must-take-back-control/
Thanks for the post. Steve Baker is one of the very few politicians that I respect. Let’s hope he’s now given other MPs ‘permission to speak’.
And combine this with the DT headline just now ‘Cummings must go – Tories on brink of civil war amid claims PM’s advisor broke lockdown twice’.
Don’t like the bloke, but Baker seems to be one of the very few Tory MP’s prepared to put his head above the parapet and say the lockdown should end now.
Why don’t you like him?
That’s quite a horrifying glimpse behind scenes, I find these people repugnant, but concur it’s interesting that Cummings clearly felt he could continue to flout accountability with no consequences. And here they come.
I am with you all the way on this, even though I don’t think we have the same stance on Brexit. The NHS does not need saving as an institution per se. In fact, I think it would work better with the same, or even smaller budget as was in 2016. Starting at the top, layer after layer of the bureaucracy should be removed, until we reach the clinician level. Medicines and prescriptions budget slashed. 24/7 usage of expensive scanners etc. The incompetence that has been shown up by this crisis is the consequence of too much money chasing too little efficiency.
100%. It’s not a question of how much money is poured in but how it’s spent. James Bartholemew’s book The Welfare of Nations (link below) compares health care systems from across the world. There are many different ideas across the world for how to deliver health care. Singapore, The Netherlands and Switzerland have got some great ideas and enjoy better outcomes than we do.
What infuriates me about the whole NHS debate is that it only ever gets presented as there’s a binary choice between the UK and US systems. Both systems are outliers that no other country has copied in entirety. If either is so good, then why would that be the case?
https://tinyurl.com/ydeocnph
Good point.
We need to realise that the US is not the only alternative healthcare system. There are other countries that seem to beat us in patient outcomes, providing universal access for all – without having a massive ever expanding national organisation. Every election our system seems to require more and more money.
Somehow the NHS needs to be less sensitive as a political issue. We somehow need to accept that it is not the envey of the western world.
I think the NHS is overall an incredible thing, but having tangled with it for ten years with a very serious chronic health condition and then again with gynaecology (another two years to be taken seriously), I have serious doubts that it can continue in this huge unwieldly way, it’s extremely inefficient, our trauma care is excellent, everything else is largely sub par, and I’ve been treated both wonderfully (eventually) by medics and staff, and more frequently with barely disguised contempt as have thousands of other patients like me. It’s an institution, not the Holy Catholic Church, I’ve found this whole health panto about it rather distasteful, particularly now it’s emerged what the NHS did to the old (and, if you talk to anyone in social care, have been doing for a really long time). Yes they do some brilliant things, but they also devised the liverpool care pathway, so … any respect I have is not unqualified.
Bec, I have been through more of what you describe than you might think – I’m even a Catholic! Sadly, it is a system where you have to fight for pretty much everything in what is a zero sum game. I always quite enjoy a fight, but that is not the point. A system is only ever as good as the basic treatment for it poorest and least able to fight (the elderly, those with limited resources including their own ability to challenge advice, women having babies without partners to support them .. the list goes on). I cannot, have not, and will not stand outside and clap.
agree
Peter Hitchens out with another must read column today – perhaps his best, and most scary to date.
https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/
An observation: if I go to the Mail on Sunday web site, my PC practically grinds to a halt with all the adverts, pop-up videos etc. The fan of my PC starts to whine. It makes you wonder how much energy it costs; how much CO2 it produces…
But when I click on the link above, there’s nothing; no proper adverts. If I didn’t know better, it would be that someone, somewhere has decided that while Hitchens attracts a lot of readers to the paper, he is too controversial to risk associating adverts with. Maybe the advertisers have requested this; maybe the paper is just being cautious.
I’m not certain, but I believe Hitchens puts this up separately to the same article in the main part of the Mail-on-sunday. I just always use this link to save seeing all the rubbish.
I think you’re right, his pieces are usually put up on the main DM website and also on some sort of hosted blog which is cleaner to load and you can actually comment.
Yes. The site is his blog. Hitchensblog hence the simplicity.
Well thanks for providing the link. I can’t bear the Mail’s website.
I think he gets flamed a lot too. He’s a bit like marmite I guess. Some people really hate him. I personally like people who speak their mind.
He is an independent thinker and provokes thought. “Enjoy” isn’t the right word, much of his work is depressing. I read “The Abolition of Britain” a while back. Having only been politically aware since Major vs. Blair, I hadn’t realized how radically the country changed over the decades since the war, and not all for the good. Just ordered the controversial “phoney victory” about our role in ww2.
Completely delusional. Is this what people mean by purple prose. The poor man seems to be having some sort of fit. I do agree that lockdown is the wrong term. We are not in any way locked down in the sense it is used in prison. Apparently this is the start of a global imprisonment – oh!
A very good morning to all you lovely people. Massive protests yesterday against the Spanish goverment. Where I live, the protest took more than 2 hours to cross the centre of a city of 180,000 people. All along the route people joined in from their balconies and on the streets. Meanwhile, the delusional PM announced “tourists, Spain awaits you”, as do making appointments to get on the beach, drones spying on you if you manage to get on it, queues to get into bars and restaurants operating at 50% of their capacity. The holiday of a lifetime.
What’s the feeling towards the British in Spain? I know a few Brits who live in Greece, they are a bit worried as this crushes tourism that resentment towards foreigners will increase (you know, coming over here, taking our jobs etc etc ). Good for the Spanish though, they’ve had such a draconian lockdown, it’s awful.
They should have protested at the start as should we.
Absolutely Hugs.
I think the British are generally well recieved in Spain. There’s lots of banter about their funny ways – wearing socks with sandals is a particular source of amusement and their affection for alcohol. They are, however, keenly aware of the importance to the economy tourism from Britain represents and would open tourists from anywhere with open arms.
They were very nice to us on 1st June last year (apart from a few Madrid plod at the stadium).
Would welcome tourists with open arms.
The Press over here are all busy highlighting Spain will be open for UK tourists in July The impression they give is it will be just like before lockdown. You are saying the opposite e.g. entrance to the hotel restaurant for breakfast and an evening meal will be strictly controlled to limit numbers, with queuing everywhere for everything being the new normal, basically.
If this is the case, we, along many other folk, will not bother with Spain this year. I get the impression Greece is a better alternative this year – they seem more relaxed about enforcing regs.
I think masks are compulsory in Spain too. We’ll be heading to Greece I think
I’m going to Sweden 100%. Was meant to be taking the kids to Copenhagen for Easter, so I’ll be doing that too. Only countries who have been sensible will be getting my money. The precedent we have set is the most scary thing about all of this.
agree
Indeed Beefy, compulsory in enclosed spaces and outdoors where 2 metre distancing is not possible.
A friend in Majorca confirms this. Gloves, too. Should be great fun when sea-bathing.
Nothing healthier than an unwashed glove!
They are lying as usual. As things stand, tourism, accordingt o the PM just yesterday, will have to be “safe”. Just read that anti-social distancing will be enforced on beaches by placing beach umbrellas 4 metres apart. All bars restaurants will be operating at 50% capacity, not just hotels, and will have to respect 2 metre distancing. Shopping will also be restricted. There is growing resistance to this from business organisation, so some of these measures may be eased before July, but that is how it stands for now. I wouldn’t come near the place personally.
Just to put all of this nonsense in perspective in the last 24 hours, alleged Covid deaths in Spain have reached the grand total of 48.
it seems the spanish govt is prolonging lockdown simply to avoid the inevitable backlash from the public when restrictions are lifted. Same as here, then!
That’s my feeling as well. Many figures in the PM’s own party (PSOE) have described his “obsession” with maintaining the state of alarm as “inexplicable”.
thanks very much for this – will spread the word
Anyone can get it. Anyone can spread it.
Here’s an interesting read from the FT. It’s not behind the paywall. It states very clearly that Neil Ferguson is not singlehandedly directing global hysteria from his bedroom using some BASIC code on a Sinclair Z80.
‘Politicised nature’ of lockdown debate delays Imperial report
https://www.ft.com/content/41e98ccb-a39c-4f88-b444-74d50a76c383
No, I am sure Ferguson is not making government policy – that was decided well before they chose who to put on SAGE as cover!
Never thought he was ‘singlehandedly’ anything, but his vanity and arrogance makes him a useful idiot.
He is certainly vainglorious, but he is also a political tool, something which is not that usual for genuinely gifted academics.
I cancelled my subscription to the FT when Lionel Barber came out so forcefully against Brexit, shortly after which he was awarded the Legion D’Honneur by the French!
So was my father, but he got his for something he did on the morning of 6 June 1944.
I found the comments in there interesting (a few sceptics making their presence known).
One thing that kept propping up was that the Lockdown was necessary to avoid 500k deaths and Sweden is not a success story because of their high per capita death toll.
The metric for the UK’s apparent success is based on the model. The lockdown prevented far more deaths. On that basis they must also accept that Sweden prevented far more deaths by not locking down.
The objective of flattening the curve was achieved without the stricter lockdown measures imposed by most countries.
In a YouGov survey yesterday mainly about finances in relation to the China Virus situation there was one very chilling question, it went something like this –
Q: Would you be prepared to accept limitations such as those imposed by lockdown in order to tackle the Climate Emergency?
Answer options being –
Yes
No
Don’t know
I do these surveys partly to raise a tiny amount of cash, partly as I have time spare to do them and partly to see what the powers that be (or those that want to be) are thinking of.
This is certainly a useful ‘trial run’ for an Extinction Rebellion style New World Order. We even had the child genius with no qualifications, but parents who are gifted actors and film-makers, giving her expert opinion to CNN a week ago or so!
Scary. Incidentally the cost of actually scrubbing all the human-generated CO2 out of the atmosphere is probably a few trillion $$$. Not sure why anyone would want to do that but I’m just quoting a price here. Covinsanity is going to cost at least that.
Why have your journalist friends gone?
Time for some banning on the forum Toby before it becomes infested by reruns of the Brexit arguement.
It would be a good idea to stop this falling on Brexit lines
Seems like that would be a classic case of a sledgehammer to crack a nut. I don’t see a big problem with the few discussions of Brexit there are here, and the fact that this is a “broad church” group is hugely valuable.
Generally, I don’t see Brexit being a really hot topic issue again unless there is another credible attempt to delay or overturn it – which can’t be ruled out, but it’s not currently imminent as far as I can see.
Hopefully the EU will soon collapse into another of its periodic economic crises over how much the north is willing to subsidise the south to get the markets and to sustain the Project, and how submissive the south is willing to be to get those subsidies, anyway.
Conspiracy theory or not:
https://unnwo.org
Just trying to piece together the reasons for the worldwide totalitarian lockdown.
Is this a joke? A sendup? I honestly cannot tell. Help!!
Me neither. Happitalism?
Tony Heller on top form:
‘Lockdowns were sold months ago on the idea of “flattening the curve.” In most places, there never was much of a curve to flatten, yet the lockdowns are still in place. Tens of millions are now having their lives destroyed – for the crime of breathing.’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sjNQ4YTUM4
Off topic? Possibly or another reason for the lockdown. It makes just as much sense as the world’s politicians and experts do.
I was reading last night a book on UFOs I bought back in the early eighties. Got to the chapter on the theories that serious scientists have for UFOs which are even more bizarre than the amateur researchers, zealots and nutters that come forward with their ideas.
One scientist, John Keel, had a theory about “The Eighth Tower” and reckoned it had gone out of control. He says “The human race has always been aware that it was serving as a pawn in some cosmic game…We have been programmed well, but the Eighth Tower is dying of old age. The manifestations around us are not the work of the gods, but of a smile machine playing out the end game.”
I thought it made as much sense as anything in the world does at the moment.
Not smile – senile.
Forgot my glasses again.
Good post, although I’m quite sure John Keel was a reporter or self appointed ‘UFOlogist’. I don’t think he received any scientific training or ever called himself a scientist.
It is an old book and he was lumped in with all the scientific researcher’s theories. Enjoyable reading for an evening anyway.
There have been so many bad decisions made you have to ask is Boris the Master or the Puppet? Is this mess due to Cummings?
I suspect he has been driving everything.
I feel something sinister is going on. Boris had better ditch the brave new world idea or face a Mussolini type ending!
The puppet and yes.
If you have a reason based on facts, ideas and rational thinking then please share it?
Maybe Toby ‘lets it go’ because that’s what he believes based on the evidence as he sees it? Please don’t automatically assume his opinion is based on bad faith.
I disagree with Toby on this but respect that he’s able to have his own view. I like hearing alternative opinions/ideas from others. Its called free speech.
Just setting up this site will not have scored him any brownie points with many in the government and has probably damaged work prospects. As you may be alluding to, the idea that he now sides with Johnson to gain favour, has no rational foundation.
One very basic problem that we have, and I am not disputing what you say about Cummings wanting lockdown or not, Ferguson is not Uber clever – he is pretty ordinary in the context of Oxford scientists. He is, however, a political animal who few, if any, in his wider sphere are prepared to challenge – yet. Sadly, I suspect Mr Cummings is not as clever as he thinks – and we should be careful in attributing exceptional intellectual skills to him.
That makes sense now concrete68. My apologies for the misunderstanding. Thank you very much for answering my question.
Not a fan of Cummings and think he should resign.
BUT!
Just read the Grauniad article about the supposed second visit.
“Robin Lees, 70, a retired chemistry teacher from the town, says he saw Cummings and his family walking by the Tees before getting into a car at lunchtime on 12th April.”
“Lees said, I was a bit gobsmacked to see him, because I know what he looks like. And the rest of the family seemed to match-a wife and child. I was pretty convinced it was him and it didn’t seem right because I assumed he would be in London”
He added “I went home………. I searched up the number plate later that day and my computer history shows that.”
So,
1. He was only pretty convinced that it was him.
2. How many men with bald heads in Durham have a wife and child?
3. What did his search of the car number on the internet tell him-he fails to share that with us.
4. This apparently took place over a month ago. Why wait till now to come out with his story?
The second “eyewitness” declined to be named.
Shocking “investigative” journalism!
Mary Wakefield, wife of Dominic Cummings, was born on 12 April 1975 (according to Wikipedia). So Easter Sunday was her 45th birthday. If the family went (as admitted) to Durham on or around 27 March, and he wasn’t back in Downing Street at work, presumably recovered, until 14th April, the chances are they were still in Durham for Easter Sunday/her birthday on 12 April but both feeling well but frustrated after a period of self-isolation. So a trip to picturesque Barnard Castle, presumably with picnic lunch and a stroll, on her birthday would seem the sort of thing any “normal” person might relish. Cummings has already demonstrated that he bends the rules to suit himself.
Bit of a coincidence all that. I mean her birthday ‘an all.
What were they expecting to find by searching the number plate? Full name and address of the owner?
He would not have been able to get those details unless was plod – or a parking enforcement officer.
Steve Baker on Sky this am says Dominic Cummings ‘should go’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMMkE6KP4zM
A positive thought: the lockdown…..less economic activity….a lower tax take….. a greatly reduced public sector payroll……….including many fewer politicians………
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHPOzQzk9Qo
…..including many fewer politicians ? Nah, in your dreams ….. more mayors, regional (county) assemblies, police commissioners etc etc- the only job creation area left in the future!
In other news, a team of experts has advised that every football team and every pub in the country should close down permanently. An expert said, “There’s no point in playing football. You’re bound to lose. And as for going to the pub. Well, that’s not a good idea. Something might happen.”
The same experts have also advised against crossing the road. An official statement included the advice, “Even if you get across safely, which we strongly doubt, then what? Who knows what you might find on the other side?”
Quality!
“An expert said, “There’s no point in playing football. You’re bound to lose.”.
Never trust experts ! This one obviously hasn’t seen Jurgen’s Mighty Reds over the last year or two.
Just putting this out there but I am sensing a divide between the elite Lockdown sceptics and we the people.
They are happy to engage with each other on Twitter ect but not with Joe public as if our opinions do not matter.
They also dismiss people who have turned up to protests as anti vaxers and 5G conspiritists when the main point is that people are being brave and standing up for their freedom.
I’m feeling that we are not all in this together.
Don’t know what others think.
I am of course very thankful that Toby has started this website.
I meant so called elite obviously.
Can somebody help me?
On Toby’s Thursday newsletter, under the heading:
‘Fewer People have Died in 2019-20 than in 2017-18’, he stated: ‘Interesting post on the COVID-19 In Proportion blog pointing out that the total number of deaths in England and Wales between November 29th and May 8th (275,044) was lower than the total number in the same period in 2017-18 (281,566), when there was an above-average number of deaths from seasonal flu.’
However when I clicked through to the blog, it said: ‘From the end of November to the second week in May, in 2019/2020 there were 312,339 deaths . For the same period in 2017/2018 there were 281,566 deaths.’, and the graph appeared to support these numbers.
Having used the former figures in a couple of debates with lockdown enthusiasts, who wished to see the core data, I’m a little bit stuffed if I send them the link to the blog.
Help, please…..
Hi JBW,
I think that Toby published a correction to that statement the following day to the effect that in the past week the figures for 2020 had just gone above 2017-2018. You can still use the data since even if the figures for 2020 are now slightly above, the reason for that difference is not necessarily attributable to Covid19 and equally, and I would argue even more so, is due to the lockdown measures causing excess deaths. In other words, even if there is a spike in mortalities for the period of March-May, for example, it categorically cannot be argued that Covid19 was the sole cause.
Hello Kevin,
Thanks very much indeed for taking the time to reply. Personally, I don’t need to be convinced that the lockdown should have been lifted weeks ago, if ever imposed in the first place, but many others require a lot more convincing. The 21st May numbers posted were black and white, and extremely favourable to the ‘it’s all a massive over-reaction’ argument. Unfortunately I could not find any correction in the subsequent posts, unless buried in the hundreds of comments. The corrected ‘Covid-19 In Proportion’ blog is rather strange. It has also been dated as the 19th May, but it would appear that ‘19-‘20 deaths overtook ‘17-‘18 deaths on/around 10th April. At the very least, there have been some horrible processing errors in the C19IP blog which is very worrying. To have any chance of convincing the enthusiasts that they’re on the wrong tack, the arguments we use have to be unimpeachable.
I note your point about lockdown causing excess deaths from other causes (with which I whole-heartedly agree), but that is a fuzzy argument which is only going to be properly established many months down the line, if ever, given the curious relaxation of death certificate requirements which have been introduced. Furthermore, from being 6,500 less to over 30,000 more, is not really a ‘slight increase’. It’s over 10% in excess, and is right in the range of what have been deemed as Covid deaths. In fact, the fact that it is several thousand short of the current government tally, opens the door for the enthusiasts to argue that Covid deaths are being under-recorded, rather than over-recorded (my personal belief).
‘Less deaths than the same months a couple of years ago, according to ONS and PHE’ was, to use an unfortunate phrase, a killer argument. Unfortunately, as I now discover to my cost, it’s not true.
There is no killer argument regarding Covid 19 mortality rates since the data is all over the place, no international standard for attribution/certification of cause of death.
Most of the arguments are very simple:
Two of the main architects of lockdown chose to ignore it themselves.
Norway moves towards Sweden’s policies rather than vice versa.
There are some helpful papers:
‘Population 17,425,445 adults. Time period 1st Feb 2020 to 25th April 2020. Primary outcome Death in hospital among people with confirmed COVID-19.’
‘Results There were 5683 deaths attributed to COVID-19.’
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.06.20092999v1
”Despite the figures for Corona deaths being exaggerated, it can be seen how low the danger is compared with everyday risks to health.’
http://www.klasseverantwortung.de/english/Corona.html
The inproportion2 website makes a good point that, adjusted for population increase, the worst week’s all cause mortality this century was in January 2000
But, as you say, the best measure would have been monthly all cause mortality rates.
Those are dropping like a stone in England, a great cause for celebration, but we will have to wait for a few weeks for that to be abundantly clear.
The tragedy is that we do seem to have been the authors of our own misfortune:
‘Only a third of the excess deaths seen in the community in England and Wales can be explained by covid-19, new data have shown.’
https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m1931
Thank you Tim, for your response. Perhaps I was not being clear enough re ‘killer argument’. I have found, when dealing with the enthusiasts, that the simpler the point, the better. They are happy to digest a daily diet of TV News and some headlines from the usual suspects, and, given the tone is almost universally consistent, and aligned, with what the Government so efficiently told them in March and April – that a Biblical plague stalks the land – they need enquire no further. Hence the short-lived beauty of ‘no more people are dying than in 2017-2018.’ It would have been an unarguable fact, given the genesis of the data, and create the necessary crack in the dam of their conviction. I, I suspect like you, and most of the readers of this site, spend an awful lot more time than them seeking out the evidence the numbers present, in order to obtain these short and punchy arguments which can be delivered (and understood) as simply as if raised during a pub conversation.
I appreciate your arguments above, but by the reluctant enthusiast they might be dismissed as, firstly, mere hubris by the actors involved. The second is ‘something going on abroad in countries which aren’t really the same as us’, and your subsequent ones would not be so easily delivered in the aforementioned pub debate.
We know our, and most western, government(s), are merely reactive to the pressures of social and traditional media, whichever happens to come first. They merely follow whatever the frenzied masses demand. I was away at the time, but from what I understand, the masses were already demanding, in a Father Ted-esque manner, ‘Something needs to be done!’ several days before the Government changed tack into lockdown mode. How, therefore, to find the simple fact to prove to the most recalcitrant simpleton, that this statement: ‘It’s not the Great Mortality out there, it’s the equivalent of a bad flu season, but without kids dying either’ is, I think, the key to changing public perception, and with that, Government action.
Entirely agree. And no doubt that is why the official numbers are so unhelpful, death registrations relaxed, as you say; the same thing happening in any number of different countries, simple political covering of backsides via the state bureaucracy.
Latest available ONS figures for deaths in Britain involving Covid 19 state that 95% had Covid 19 assigned as the underlying cause.
In Italy, Covid 19 deaths were investigated and revised downwards, only 12% being finally assigned to Covid 19 as the underlying cause.
So this is never going to be an argument that we can win on official numbers.
Gradually it will become clear from the continent that people are getting back to life as normal without ill effects, the coronavirus having retreated in the sunshine, and then, eventually, Britain itself will come out from behind the sofa, greatly impoverished by a common cold coronavirus. A public enquiry into this lunacy will be scant consolation.
What the actual Dickens?
Not hard to understand I don’t think. There’s clearly a personal connection there, at least as people moving in similar political circles and campaigners on the same side of many of the same hot topic issues. I wouldn’t be at all surprised either if they have direct social connections and are even actual friends.
It’s entirely understandable if Toby finds it difficult to condemn such a friend, and I wouldn’t hold such loyalty against him, up to a point. I could certainly understand it if Toby were to simply decide to stay silent on the topic, for instance. I think trying to actively defend Cummings is unwise, partly because Cummings is likely to go down anyway, and partly because it’s clear Cummings has been a strong part of the political force within the government that pushed for this disastrous lockdown and still seeks to defend it.
The more of the prime movers like (apparently) Cummings we can get out of power and out of office, the less political resistance there will be to a rethink that will involve admitting the basic error. It doesn’t have to be personal, it can be just business.
It is a slightly awkward issue. Loyalty is important and tends to be underrated these days, but clearly it has to have limits.
I should say as well that my impression at the moment is that Cummings has been a driving force behind the worst lockdown and related policy decisions. I don’t actually know that for certain. I probably let it seem as though I was more certain on that than I am, in my previous comment.
Agree with this 100% Mark – ‘The more of the prime movers like (apparently) Cummings we can get out of power and out of office, the less political resistance there will be to a rethink that will involve admitting the basic error.’
By defending Cummings Toby obviously weakens his site and his own critique of the lockdown policy. So, if he is friends with Cummings and it is loyalty that informs Toby’s benign view of Cummings’s violation of his own policy—of Cummings’s spitting in the eye of the British people, of whom Toby himself is one—it’s up to Toby to decide whether misplaced loyalty to Cummings is more important than his and this blog’s credibility as a critic of the disastrous lockdown and also a rallying point for people who are looking for an island of sanity and also possible allies in some future scenario. Little things are stand-ins for bigger things (broken windows philosophy). So, Toby will have to choose. It is to be hoped that the clear consensus expressed by commenters here and their articulate observations will help Toby to understand the actual stakes. He cannot really afford to make light of Cummings’s very poor decision and it is demoralizing if he continues to do so.
I’ve been fretting somewhat overnight. I mean the government and its advisors have access to all the data we have on this forum and more and yet they are still acting in an unbelievable inept way. Despite the lifting of lockdowns in other countries with no discernible negative effects they are still talking as if a ‘second wave’ (ha bloody ha) is inevitable. (When has there been a second wave of flu? Who coined that term?) This constant talk of ‘social distancing’ (have come to loathe that term) until a vaccine is available has almost become a mantra. I know the predominant feeling in this forum is that they just panicked (as did countries across the world) but I’m not so sure anymore. What they should be doing now is taking measures to ensure the least possible damage, but they’re not. I do not think any government is that inept, that stupid. Yes, there are elements of stupidity (I can’t see Matt Hancock joining MENSA anytime soon and Pretty Useless Patel is beyond the ‘s’ word) but this lockdown and the ensuing m.o. is probably the most disastrous decision ever made in the history of our country. They could mitigate some effects and fast to limit the appalling destruction of the fabric of our society and they’re not doing so. Why not? Why are the Knut Wittkowkis and the John Ioannidises of this world being censored? Why do we insist on adhering to the ICL model when the Oxford one is so contradictory? More and more this feels like an experiment in social control. I don’t know who’s orchestrating it and I don’t know why but it doesn’t feel like a SNAFU anymore to me.
You are right Nigel,the way the government is continuing with the rapid destruction of the society and economy of this country is beyond comprehension.I don’t know what it was about yesterday,but like you I have been more disturbed by what is going on since then than ever before,the same goes for my family and friends,perhaps coincidentally we have all reached our breaking point ?.
Paul, this video posted below by ‘AN other lockdown sceptic’ would back that up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sjNQ4YTUM4 At about the eight minute mark he talks about face masks and how you can get fined up to $5000 and/or sentenced to a year in jail in Colorado U.S. for going outside without a face mask even as it’s demonstrated that face masks don’r work. We are being coerced (even forced) into behaviours that are completely alien to common sense. The politicians are not listening to scientists and are executing unbelievable draconian measures, almost for the fun of demonstrating their power. As the video says, it is reminiscent of the old Soviet Union. What’s next:; psychiatric wards or the gulag for dissenters?
I understand your concern here, it looks pretty grim.
For myself, I’m still resisting the big plan model though. We had all the same arguments over Iraq, remember, and indeed pretty much all the stupid, costly and counterproductive wars we’ve been manipulated into from Yugoslavia through Iraq and Libya to Syria. And we will have them in future when the groups with an interest in confrontation and war manage to get the war with Iran they’ve been pushing for for decades. (Probably not if they get us into a war with China, because that will quite possibly be endex for all of us, at least as far as luxury concerns like foreign policy are concerned).
When you get a convergence of interests amongst a bunch of powerful interest groups, and they all push in the same direction, it’s almost impossible to resist and it looks like a big conspiracy. In reality, it’s just a lot of small everyday conspiracies and power lobbies all pushing in the same direction. In the case of Iraq, it was a war that suited some oil interests, Israeli lobbies, US-uber-alles types, British groups with an interest in sucking up to Washington, and a whole host of others.
In the case of this disease, I’d still say it’s a matter of a panic response followed by all kinds of interest groups and agenda pushers climbing on the fear bandwagon to push their own particular concerns and policy preferences, including the people who just like to exercise petty power.
The ‘predominant feeling on the board’ is, imho, simply incorrect. 140 countries simultaneously panicked into imprisoning the world ? Tish and piffle.
The virus was only the causus belli. Though well-managed, with lots of diversions and distractions. If you’re fussing over R/IFR/numbers/symptoms/cures/whatever, you’re not thinking about the removal of our freedom enough.
The real problem is possibly the world’s economy. I dunno, they must have forgotten to consult me on that one … Or maybe it just NWOs when it comes to NWO time ?
The intended solution is clearly house arrest, travel restrictions, cashless society, vaccinations/tracking, reducing the world’s population, and reshaping society.
If one wants to implement that lot, having people think it all started as a good-faith panicked overreaction must help a lot.
!
great post
JohnB
With regards to reducing population there is a video on YouTube by Vernon Coleman. He argued population control is behind the measures introduced by governments which make perfect sense. If you are in a relationship with someone you don’t live with, you can’t meet them which may end relationships if this restriction continues. Pubs and nightclubs where people often meet partners are closed. If you are in touch with someone through a dating website, you can’t meet them in Wales as they are outside your household and in England I understand you can only meet them outdoors and you can’t visit each other’s homes and you can’t visit theatres, nightclubs, restaurants, pubs which means building a relationship is very difficult. Coronavirus restrictions are an excellent way of preventing people forming relationships and having children.
If couples do live together they may not want children due being worried about jobs and who would want to bring children into a dystopian world.
I agree Nigel, But having come to this realisation, we still have time to stop it if we act now. This is not. and never has been, about controlling a virus.
If enough people come to their senses in time we may be able to stop it. If the polls in the MSM are accurate there is no hope but if there is one thing we all have learnt by now its that the MSM are never to be trusted in any way.
if there is an agenda (and that it what I ‘feel’ not what I ‘know’ then the MSM would be the front man/woman for that agenda so they are duty bound to lie to you.)
I agree. I was talking with my son about the anomalies earlier today and have come to the conclusion that “They” are playing with us. Nothing else makes any sense but I’m extremely worried about where it’s taking us.
Don’t ask me who “They” are. Bumbling Boris & Co are no-doubt their puppets. Following the money will eventually reveal some (but never all), however that’s very difficult at the moment.
The Government virus ad on radio this morning is very watered down. Lots of ‘if possible’ do this – reading between the lines, you can basically do what you want, meet up with people, get close to them (no mention of distance), go about your normal business.
But we can’t go about our normal business because most businesses are closed: dentists, hairdressers, pubs, cafes, restaurants, small shops and of course, to all intents and purposes, GP surgeries (but, after all, when were they truly open? Often almost impossible to make an appointment). And of course, we are not free to travel because of the ridiculous quarantine rules not to mention all the hotels being closed. Normal business? No. My daughter lives I. Paris with a new baby, I despair of seeing either of them for months. I cry most days and that is truly not normal business for me.
Commiserations, Marion, and we hope you get to see them soon. What we think is a miracle is how no child’s feet can have grown at all in the last 2+ months. We don’t think online shoe-buying makes any sense if you care about your/your child’s feet. It’s obviously still not essential to have properly-fitting shoes yet the bike shops, hardware shops etc were allowed to stay open. What a message and how can the small independents hope to survive this?
Thank you Miriam, I try to be positive and my husband thinks I shouldn’t be crying over this situation the government has got us into.
An old friend telephoned me out of the blue yesterday, she is a nurse and has worked for the nhs since 1983, lately a diabetic nurse working the district. She knows how I feel about the nhs mostly because of the terrible, terrible advice they give to diabetics regarding diet – eat what you like, take insulin to cover all the lovely carbs we know you don’t have the will power to do without. We will cut off your toes for ‘free’ of course, if needs be, just keep eating all those so essential carbs until you are as fat and sick as can be, just like many of the nhs nurses. I’m afraid I ranted at her about how the government is ruining the country for a flu virus, but she still thinks young people die of this, that even if you are sick or very old everyone deserves not to die….and what else could government do? I told her (ranted) that everyone should turn off their tv and do a bit of research – read about it! She asked me what I was reading as though I surfed the web for the most outlandish conspiracy theories. I am still angry, some friendships will be broken by all this, I find it hard to forgive those who think it’s all for the best in the best possible world.
Marion, the advice given to diabetics is yet another example of the absolute uselessness of “our” N.H.S. A condition caused by carb intolerance is treated by advice to eat more carbs. And, of course, and increasing use of metformin and insulin. “Our” NHS is wholly owned by drug companies.
Yes it s one of the many reasons I loathe the nhs and wouldn’t clap for them in a million years.
I think the one thing preventing people from travelling far or staying out any length of time… toilets. Whilst public toilets, cafes, pubs, toilets all seem to remain closed even when shops open. This is a very effective way to keep people away.
EXACTLY. I was in my local shopping centre (only half open because there’s a morrisons and a superdrug) and found myself fling about needing a widdle. Had to ditch half my planned trip so I could drive home.
Just imagine if you were relying on public transport – or had to bikeride.
Oddly, they are still open in Southwold and Aldeburgh, my local resorts!
IanE are you referring to local authority public toilets, if so that is excellent.
I’ve been impressed (and rather surprised) that the loos have been open in my local park throughout all this nonsense.
What’s wrong with the hedgerow?
Not many hedgerows in Tesco….
Headline from today’s Telegraph:
“Diabetics may be forced to self-isolate at home after lockdown is lifted, government review suggests”
AFTER the lockdown is lifted, notice.
And forced to? FORCED? Elderly, unwell people, who probably don’t see enough of their families as it is, being forced into a state of permanent isolation, apart from professional carers. That is how we expect them to live?
I will be voting for the Reform Party at any opportunity I get. The rest of the country can do what it likes. If we get Starmer, don’t blame me. If you want better people you have to vote for them.
Why don’t we merge with the Monster Raving Looney Party, form the Monster Anti-Lockdown Party, and field some candidates for parliament?
I nominate Toby, for starters.
I suspect that Screaming Lord Sutch would have made a better Prime Minister than any of the last five.
Anyone remember the Natural Law Party? Big fans of yogic flying.
Protecting people for their own good is what they say when they lock people up in an asylum.
And who’s going to know, as you trot down the street, whether you are diabetic or not?
The way this is going, they will have a database linked to car number plates, facial recognition, credit card usage, etc. To the extent that we still have a democracy, it is rapidly going down the plug-hole.
It will be on your chip!
Yes, I’m with you – should I get the chance. At the GE, Farage stood down most candidates, including the one I could have ticked. But I haven’t yet seen that there is going to be a Reform Party. Have I missed an announcement?
Nope, no announcement. Just that there was talk along these lines some time ago and I live in hope.
Many of them aren’t elderly. Many are middle-aged, and fat. The 35-year old studen nurse who’d been on a ventilator for 3 weeks with covid asked how could she have been so ill because she was young. She was built like the proverbial outhouse.
Diabetics have become a very serious drain on the health and care budget …………
Honestly. folks, you couldn’t make this one up.
Representative of AstraZeneca, now developing a vaccine, quoted in the DT:
‘We have to run as fast as possible before the disease disappears, so that we can demonstrate the vaccine is effective.’
Stop the Covihorse, it’s bolting!
Time is money!
This is exactly what happened with SARS 1 – it died out in its own natural lifecycle before a vaccine could/needed to be developed. Sadly, just adds to the entire questionability of the lockdown in the first place
indeed.
Read an interview with Bill gates a few weeks ago in, I think, Salon magazine. I’ve looked for it since but couldn’t find it. He was asked why we’re holding out for a vaccine when we still haven’t found a vaccine for SARS. His reply; we did have a virus for SARS but it went away before we could use it.
Suggest this, or something like it, was the source of SARS 2 – a third-world country, with third world science (not to mention food hygiene and eating habits) was playing around with things its ought not to have been!
Bingo. And for SARS, we actually did get a vaccine. Then the disease was gone. And so we never did a phase three trial. We even have an antiviral for Ebola.https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-covid19/2020/4/27/21236270/bill-gates-coronavirus-covid-19-plan-vaccines-conspiracies-podcast
The CEO of AstraZeneca has also been quoted DT 22nd May) ‘This pandemic is a global tragedy, and it is a challenge for all of humanity. We need to defeat the virus together or it will continue to inflict huge personal suffering….’
Surely, a man in his position must know off the top of his head the rough numbers who die every year of TB, Malaria, AIDS, influenza, dysentery etc etc? Disingenuous, opportunistic or deliberately exaggerating?
You’re too kind to him, GLT.
Evil, mind-controlled, or psychologically damaged to fuck are more apposite designations.
GLT, of course he knows. He is a criminal.
On the Marr interview, he repeated it several times, despite the fact that Marr steadfastly refused to pick him up on it. Like I said, “They” are taking the pi$$.
Stands to make a lot of money!
I think the Covihorse has already bolted
Professor Karol Sikora tweeted yesterday that the Oxford University vaccine project leader, Professor Hill, is feeling that their vaccine trials may not be able to go ahead because there simply isn’t enough of the virus left in the community any more for volunteers to get infected! The virus is on the wane now for sure.
Yes, but it also a great excuse for a failing vaccine attempt!
Great Annie, thank you.
I always think company spokespeople should have their own name attached to all such pronouncements, just so we can laugh and point at them for the rest of their lives.
What he is really saying: “If we don’t move fast we risk losing the billions that governments have committed to produce the vaccine, like the one we tried to develop for SARS and Ebola.”
I saw it in ES and couldn’t believe my eyes when I read “We’re in the bizarre position of wanting Covid to stay, at least for a little while.”
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/coronavirus-transmission-rate-jeopardise-vaccine-trial-a4449526.html
If people are right about all this being an evil plot to make the vaccinators trillions, then surely they’d be unlocking us RIGHT NOW in order to infect us all, so they could have their trials and get us all drugged ASAP?
It isn’t quite working out right, is it…
Watch this space. There will be a second wave and that’s when the vax will come in.
I saw the interview on Marr. It would have been hilarious if the situation weren’t so unfunny.
Pleased to hear you have more customers Kh and sensible ones as well !.I also would like to know just what exactly the goons in the market thought they were able to do to anyone they disapprove of,they weren’t wearing brown shirts and swastika arm-bands were they ?!.
The thing about the dog and the water is sad,it is something I have noticed when walking our dog,a few months ago when meeting another dog walker it was usual to stop,pass the time of day,fuss each others dogs and let the dogs socialise a bit,but now they always yank their poor dog away and move as far away from me as possible,and most of the time don’t even return my good morning or hello.I find this very dis-heartening and I have taken to going on our long walk at 5am because it is fairly certain I won’t encounter any of these people !.
The way some people are not letting dogs greet and socialise with each other is having an effect,our dog is getting more and more over excited every time he sees a fellow canine and he seems quite bemused when his potential new friend is quickly dragged away and as he loves people and the fuss he used to get it must seem strange to him that no-one wants to know him anymore.It doesn’t take a big leap in imagination to believe a similar thing must be happening to children
I’ve always walked our dogs at about 6 a.m. and generally go to the same woods/parkland. So generally see the same set of dog walkers. I’ve been very lucky that since lockdown I see another lady (whom I’ve known for a while) every morning and we walk along together and our dogs interact for about half an hour. She was, initially, very much in favour of lockdown and apart from talking to me on our walk, she said that she observed all the regulations. I’m pleased to say that lately she seems much more sceptical and indeed, looked after her two young grandchildren last week!
Another heartening encounter with others on the dog walk this morning: two older people cycling who stopped to chat because they have a Dalmatian too (we have two) and the chap was about 2ft away from me! Then later on I met an older couple who had a Dalmatian with them so we stopped for a chat too and all the dogs played. They didn’t come quite so close, but certainly didn’t run away! I did then meet a younger couple who had a couple of dogs and didn’t seem very keen on their dogs interacting with me and the people noticeably stayed well away from me.
Dogs against lockdown! You have nothing to lose but your retractable leads!
Actually, I found it amusing that the retractable leads made social distancing very difficult for the dogless in the park!
Just go back from a shopping trip to our nearest large Morrison’s store (it’s 20 miles away – we live in the sticks, so we don’t get down that way very often). Had to get provisions that we can’t in our local, smallish Tesco as my brother and his wife are coming to stay for a few days (!) in the country after months cooped up in a 2-bed terraced house.
Shopping was an absolute delight! No one-way system – people milling around as normal! No one seemingly bothered about distancing. Only spotted one mask and a few pairs of gloves. No queuing to get in, and a couple of minutes wait for a till.
On the way back, saw a young couple with a small child in a pram out for a walk – both wearing masks!
I’ve been impressed by Morrisons too. Whilst I haven’t been in a store – I refuse to follow one way distancing systems & I presumed they were using them – I have had a delivery from them every week without fail. It sounds like I can go to the store itself now if they aren’t doing the stupid distancing.
Much the same now at my local Tesco.
I heard Tesco was one of the worst, so that’s an encouraging sign.
How the hell have you managed to get a delivery from ANY of the stores? I can’t even get a delivery for my 96 year old mother. Are you classed as ‘vulnerable’? I don’t mean to be personal but I’d dearly love to know how I can get deliveries for my mother. I don’t have a car so can’t do shopping for her. Been relying on volunteers so far – very hit and miss.
I just came back from some grocery shopping. There was a woman coming out with a facemask on her chin not covering anything. There was a line outside another shop reminiscent of the dole queue in The Full Monty. Was a sad sight tbh, people seem to have just accepted their fate.
Yes,Morrisons is the best of the lot,an oasis of near normality,well as near as supermarket can be anyway !.It appears that the Third Reich has been resurrected and is now running our local Sainsbury’s.
https://off-guardian.org/2020/05/23/coronavirus-fact-check-5-infection-fatality-ratio-update/
Dean & Deluca? Noooooo!!
Neil Ferguson didn’t leave his home.
Haha, good point. Maybe his lover forced entry and he is innocent?
He resigned from Sage, but kept his job at Imperial, right? Where is justice?
I have just been called a putinbot and blocked by someone on twitter.
I would like to report however that there are loads of Lockdown sceptics out there and the message is starting to get accross.
“called a putinbot”
LOL! This fantasy about nefarious Russian influence has certainly been very useful for those who want to delegitimise and silence dissent. It gives them another variant on the usual “conspiracy theorist” smear.
And they don’t need to engage their brains.
I get called that a lot on the Times comments, and when I articulate my way through, I just get called a ‘liar’ repeatedly, and with increasing aggression. Finally in capitals: YOU ARE A FILTHY LIAR!!! It’s fascinating on one level. It’s just projection, they’re so well defended now, ad hom is the only way to not have to face what they’ve done.
A bit off topic maybe but just received this from a friend – are the lockdown’s related to this by any chance?
https://www.globalgoals.org/partners
Same old names cropping up yet again.
Problem is on the surface it look commendable. Don’t we all want those goals? No poverty. clean water, zero hunger etc. What’s not to like? I emphasise ‘on the surface.’
And a free unicorn for every household…
It has exactly the same flavour as the UN Happitalism site, mentioned earlier.
Excellent piece from Camilla Long about the hypocrisy during this crisis:
Aha! Quick as a flash, Steve Coogan makes us foot the bill for his household staff
Camilla Long
Sunday May 24 2020, 12.01am, The Sunday Times
Who actually furloughs themselves? The answer appears to be a Lib Dem called Lord Fox. In case you haven’t heard of him, he is a member of the House of Lords who signed himself up to the government’s furlough scheme in spite of having two homes worth more than £2m, and a “strategic communications” firm with £100,000 sitting in the bank.
He tried to defend the “greedy” move by saying this was simply what “many companies” were doing and the authorities would have said if he was “ineligible” for the cash. But Fox isn’t a regular citizen and his company isn’t “many companies” — he is literally paid by us to be the voice of reason and set standards. For a member of the Lords, the bar is even higher, as he cannot be ousted at the ballot box. It is difficult to see how anyone in his position could logically arrive at thinking they were entitled to yet more free money, when he already claims £162 a day to do essentially nothing as a member of the Lords, unless they were duck-house level greedy, or stupid. It is disgusting.
It’s amazing how many rich and powerful people choose not to grasp the serious moral issue at the heart of this government scheme. Does the comedian Steve Coogan, who is worth £10m, really need to furlough his gardener and housekeeper at his £4m pile in the country? Does the star of Greed really need to claim what must be a piffling sum to him of maybe £8,000, when he could easily pay out of his own pocket? Or should he see furloughing for what it really is, which is a benefit, and misusing it for what it really is, which is on a par with benefit fraud? For wealthy people to take government money when they could do without is, in my view, a crime, at a time of national crisis, on a level with illegally claiming any other relief.
Perhaps, as a socialist, Coogan would argue that he is entitled to receive the same benefits as a warehouse owner or a company boss; but he isn’t a warehouse owner, or a beleaguered hairdressing exec who needs his business. Every penny of furlough money from the government comes out of the pot that pays vital public-sector workers; if there are cuts to public-sector pay or services, Coogan has no right to complain when he could have footed the bill himself. I suppose that, in paying for his gardener, we might at least be grateful we have bought ourselves a nano-break from his snitty moral grandstanding, but I doubt it. People like Coogan and Emma Thompson, who flew back from her home in Venice for lockdown, will never admit wrongdoing because they see whatever they do as morally pure.
If I were to sum up the mood of lockdown, it would be denying oneself air, light, freedom and happiness, only to wake up and find that your sanctimonious NHS-clapping neighbour has been flying around the globe and having non-socially distanced sex parties with Covid-positive Brazilian prostitutes, while billing his yoga teacher and art curator to the government. There is something extraordinary about spending nine weeks wiping down every last shop-bought carrot in semi-darkness, only to find out that some people among us are, as the Tory MP Robert Halfon said of Fox on Thursday, trying to “milk the taxpayer at both ends”.
If you want to know what I’ve felt like, it’s being milked at both ends, not only by the government and its random, made-up, self-serving impositions, which I don’t even agree with, but by the people who then flout the made-up government impositions, including government people themselves, or the clowns who view the lockdown as an opportunity for self-promotion, like the Beckhams. They only paused from posting endless pictures of themselves clapping in full hair and make-up to apply for government cash for furloughing her fashion-label staff. It makes you feel jealous of a country like Sweden, where the rate of death may be sky-high but at least they haven’t had to subsidise Alan Partridge’s peonies.
The most worrying thing is our lack of anger at a new world in which this kind of behaviour is possible, where police visit homes to check foreign travellers haven’t flouted quarantine, while turning a blind eye to widespread semi-naked cavorting in parks. It is almost as if our spirit of protest, nose for injustice or national sense of indignation has been slowly broken by weeks of having to deal with unfiltered Joe Wicks and emails that begin “in these strange and unprecedented times”. Even the weekly clap seems pointlessly hollow — it’s like confession for Catholics. People feel they can do what they like, as long as they turn up to atone on Thursdays with their pans and vuvuzelas.
Great article. So glad Camilla questions the weekly clap.
“It makes you feel jealous of a country like Sweden, where the rate of death may be sky-high but at least”
Seriously, how did the zealots manage to establish this nonsense as a “received opinion” meme? It seems to be popping up everywhere at the moment!
Unbelievable, isn’t it?
One of the comments below today’s Daily Fail article https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8351649/Lockdown-waste-time-kill-saved-claims-Nobel-laureate.html
“If we had stayed out of lockdown, we could have had the devastating results of 392 per million deaths , like Sweden. Figs for UK are 541 instead.”
It got 34 likes
Really?You aren’t having us on? Promise?
Poster wasn’t being sarcastic?
Honestly, I have no idea. It was one of the many comments that got all the numbers wrong.
Don’t go there or you will lose your sanity.
This was one of my favourites:
“We haven’t lost our liberty. We are very fortunate to have Boris in charge: those who bother to read up on his background will be amazed at the wealth of experiences he has had which make him ultra-liberal (small L), he is not the Posh Etonian he is portrayed as (for start he was there for free, based on his intellect, unlike Cameron and Osborn). Our lock-down was voluntary and we did a fantastic job of it….”
O.M.G Nobody is that stupid surely? We suspended trial by jury and consent over your own body for starters. What a dimwit.
Not that stupid? We’re talking DM commenters.
Mostly good but she has fallen for the lie that Sweden’s death rate is sky high when it is half that of Scotland.
What’s wrong with “widespread semi-naked cavorting in parks” ?
Just listened to the podcast with Michael Levitt and Ivor Cummins (link under Roundup above). Well worth it if you have an hour to spare. Surprise, surprise there is no evidence that lockdowns work! The numbers still say Prof Levitt was right back in March when he wrote to Ferguson saying the 510,000 death was 10-12 times too many. He says that the number of deaths in the UK will be about 1 months worth (remember we have 610,000 deaths per annum). He says it looks like the worst death rates in Europe will be 0.7 per thousand population (n.b. he is not talking about IFR because not everyone will catch the virus). Sweden appears to have plateaued but if they were to reach the 0.7 per thousand they would end up with 7,000 deaths. Cummins makes the point that no scientist who is still arguing for the lockdown has crunched the numbers, they are relying on their models-possibly OK when you don’t have any data, but when you have lots of it who needs models! When will our Dear Leaders wake up and start listening to real rather than modelled science?
Ivor Cummins has been a hero through this. All of his videos about the Corona flu have been fantastic. All of the low carb advocates have been sceptical of the corona panic from the start. Another good channel is Paul Saladino MD.
Well I have a sword for Cummings to fall on and that’s all I’m gonna say.
Stick it through Ferguson first. Like a kebab.
Annie, a greater punishment would be to place him in solitary confinement for the rest of his miserable life. His only human contact should be with his jailers, his only contact with the outside world, a half hour stroll round the prison courtyard.
Shoul’ve been only contact with the world outside his cell.
With respect, I have to disagree.
He and his wife put their small child first, as they should.
It’s entirely different from making an unnecessary social visit, as with Kinnock Jnr, who was at least maintaining a reasonable distance from his parents, or Neil Ferguson who deserved to be outed if only because he’s done more than anyone to destroy the country and was a clear hypocrite.
Cunningham’s circumstances were within government advice:
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/coronavirus-symptoms-parents-children-childcare-dominic-cummings-a9529481.html
“At the government’s daily press conference on 24 March, England’s deputy chief medical officer Dr Jenny Harries spoke of the “exceptional circumstance” of an adult unable to care for a young child during the pandemic.
“A small child clearly is a vulnerable individual, so in this case, although we are encouraging everybody to stay in their own households – that’s the unit with the same risk of exposure – clearly if you have adults who are unable to look after a small child, that is an exceptional circumstance,” Dr Harries said.”
Yes ‘a small child clearly is a vulnerable individual’ …. tell that to thousands of other parents who were instructed by Government to stay put irrespective of dire circumstances with their small children or the thousands of children that no longer have access to sponsored school meals or are attacked in their own homes during this lockdown.
According to Sky News, The Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) has suggested firms arrange “A teams” and “B teams”, typically working Monday to Wednesday or Thursday to Saturday.
Please, no more experts!
Maybe we should ask what ’The Bingo Association’ thinks about lifting lockdown, also consult ’National Council for Metal Detecting’? and then check if Greta Thunberg approves it?
I notice a change afoot. Dr John Campbell’s daily broadcast on YouTube has been a source of fear and panic about the global “pandemic” since January, under a guise of good old-fashioned “give ’em the facts”. Today he is covering developments in the search for a vaccine. The comments section, normally adoring of the good doctor and his ponderous warnings of plague and pestilence, are disclosing great wariness of an early vaccine, and some even “anti vac”. The tide is turning.
He is a retired nurse with a doctorate in something or other, not a “Doctor” doctor. Still, he must have earned himself a few quid on YouTube, so that’s all right then.
To be fair to Dr Campbell, he’s clearly familiar with the experience of losing a patient in ICU and dealing with the grieving family. That’s where he’s coming from. His YouTube channel is entirely focussed on preventing any deaths at all. He comes across as a decent man, and if I was critically ill I would trust him to do all he could to go the extra mile and save my life. But on the other hand I wouldn’t trust him to run the economy.
Possible, but many people are dying from non-covid reasons in care homes (alone and without access to doctors or hospitals), future deaths due to a lack of access to medical care now, suicides etc
Yes I like Campbell although don’t watch him that often. The same info is usually also covered in a more “techy” way on MedCram which is a great channel.
Decent maybe. Dangerous definitely if he’s spreading misinformation that perpetuates the panic.
I saw a couple of his vids early on and he seemed to be talking sense. Then he did one where he was bandying about such obviously ridiculous numbers that, even at the stage of the plandemic where I hadn’t discovered info sources like this site and was still believing the MSM, I realised he was was a dodgy source of info.
Fun game:
Post an anti-lockdown comment into one of The Guardians’s opinion pieces. See how long you can make it last before it’s removed by a moderator.
My record’s 4min and 25s. Beat that if you can.
They’re always closed for comments by the time I read them.
The Guardian will have closed down before I read it!
As a former Grauniad reader,I’d love to see the propagandist rag go bust.
Me too!
Me too!
My excuse? I can get the headlines free without a paywall.
Facts are sacred.
Apart from facts that are politically inconvenient such as:
Sweden’s covid death rate is far lower than the UK’s
The evidence already strongly suggests lockdowns had no advantage over distancing plus normal hygiene etc
Overall covid is broadly comparable to flu (or a bad cold)
4 minutes! What took them so long? Were they all making sourdough bread at the same time
Previous contributors to this blog have produce lists of heroes, villains and those they have lost respect for. Here’s my take which is inspired by Emil Zola’s J’Accuse which appeared in 1898 in a newspaper L’Aurore accusing the French government of anti-Semitism due to the Dreyfus Affair:
I accuse the Prime Minister Boris Johnson of cowardice and for caving in to the hysterical ramblings of the media and the flawed advice of the scientists. For not showing true leadership to lead us out of this crisis.
I accuse the mainstream media both print and television for the barrage of apocalyptic headiness and scare stories that have cowed the populace into submission and pushed us in to this disastrous situation that we are now in.
I accuse Neil Ferguson for his flawed model which has caused misery and untold damage to this country. Not only once but twice, even thrice.
I accuse our elected and unelected representatives also of cowardice like the Prime Minister for allowing our civil liberties to be restricted all in the name of health.
I accuse the police and judiciary for their abuse of power and trampling on the rights of innocent people who are unable to fight back and stand for their rights out of fear.
I accuse Matt Hancock and SAGE for not considering the voices of other scientists and economists and through this lockdown allowed this country to enter a recession and encumbering us with debt that will be paid for by future generations.
I accuse the opposition, the devolved administrations and the likes of Sadiq Khan for using this crisis to unleash their inner authoritarianism and for political point scoring.
I accuse the NHS and its apologists for their dereliction of duty to those who are suffering from cancer, stroke, heart disease, dental problems and other ailments that have been ignored due to this virus.
I accuse the unions of aiding and abetting child abuse by refusing to open schools and their absurd insistence on social distancing that will accelerate the retardation of the development of our young that will take years to undo.
I accuse the mental health charities of being silent and not addressing the impact of the lockdown which has led to increase in anxiety, psychosis and suicide.
Finally I accuse members of the public who have bought into this unthinkingly and refusing to see with their own eyes how this situation is rapidly destroying our country and society.
To those I accuse, I do not know you or have met you. I have neither resentment for you nor hatred. All I ask is that our country needs to reclaim the life it has lost before it’s too late.
This country and its people have suffered long enough. End the lockdown and social distancing now.
You can’t see me, but I’m standing and applauding….
Me too!
And me! Very well put!
Spot on!
Spot on.
This is brilliant! Send it to Toby.
Yes!
True
What a post! I thought about whether “child abuse” was too strong.
We heard from a couple of friends who have found that every day their 3 year old boy gets his preschool bag out of the cupboard, he packs it and stands by the front door and waits for them. When they try to move him and get him to do something else he has a meltdown and cries.
So I concluded you were right.
The negative effect on our kids’ psycho-social development will be a huge price to have paid. Depriving the young from playing with their friends is definitely child abuse.
https://twitter.com/plaforscience/status/1264177989757087747
“If accurate reconstruction of deadly infections date fits on a Gompertz, and linear regression from daily death data follows Gompertz’ expected decreasing straight line, it’s Gompertz NATURAL decreasing by constant increasing Herd Immunity. Hard to believe? Deads can’t lie.”
What does this mean? As the deaths in Spain of Covid-19 follow a Gompertz curve, the author has reconstructed the peak of infection about 20 days earlier than the peak of deaths. That means an explosive infection in Feb reaching a peak early March. Most cases asymptomatic, some cases with symptoms never diagnosed as Covid-19 as not tested. All categorized otherwise if ever investigated. The infection reaches a peak very early on. We start to test for Covid-19 when the infection already has peaked. Afterwards a steady decline whatever measures we do, whether social distancing, lockdown (In Spain coloured by red in the graph) or other measures. The natural Gompertz decreasing by constant increasing herd immunity.
The argument is that if the epidemic declines, we have achieved herd immunity. This holds even if antibody tests just give low numbers as everybody now understand that immunity to corona virus is much more complex with T cells immunity as essential part in the whole immune response to infection. The lockdown zealots naturally want us to believe that their methods have left us all vulnerable to the next attack very soon of this virus, due to their highly successful social distancing.
This is a “new” common cold virus and more deadly than usual and no reason to believe that the IFR 0.30% is a good estimate. But having a division of IFR for those lower than 65 and over 65 should convince everybody what a folly our response has been to this new common cold virus.
It has been the biggest hubris ever to think that we can stop this virus spreading. Impossible. Thinking of an effective vaccine is daydreaming. There has never been a vaccine against common cold virus. The human mankind can not stop a common cold virus to spread. It is a completely futile task. Can we really realistically stop spread from asymptomatic to next asymptomatic?
Not much has been changed since first reading in an old Infectious Disease Book many, many years ago that after several years study, the only certain thing of not getting a common cold virus was to have 3 metres (or was it 6 feet?) distance with everyone.
Found this website, some interesting stuff on it:
https://questioningcovid.com
Hilarious! From the first paragraph on the site:
“To that end, we orient ourselves around the foundational premises that the body is inherently wise, that symptoms are meaningful, and that radical healing is eminently possible when we align with the earth and honor our place in the natural world.”
Sally Morell has a fascinatingly deluded piece that tells us it’s all down to sunspots:
“Sunspot activities became more violent until they peaked in1738 when physicians reported flu in both man and animals, including dogs, horses and birds, especially sparrows.”
A new low I think.
Definitely interesting though, or I thought so anyway.
I like reading thinks outside of my normal as it leads me to strange places and challenges my thinking, keeps me questioning and I never get into a bubble like all those movies in the media from Islington or wherever it is.
If the Government had followed some of the stuff on here would we be worse off than now?
Doubt it, we’d be walking on a beach in the sunshine grounding ourselves to health. Might not work but a lot better mentally and physically than locked away at home with no social contact I think.
luvvies not movies, didn’t notice the autocorrect.
We have a system called science that will test these theories and see if they have any validity. A quick Google search will bring them up. So here is the paper you need. To save you the trouble I can summarise it’s conclusion on sunspots causing flu epidemics, “It’s bollocks.”
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-infection/article/sunspot-activity-and-influenza-pandemics-a-statistical-assessment-of-the-purported-association/06DDEE622D8ACFD42B3E1564278BD3FC/core-reader#
The sunspots – possibly. Other electrical interference, maybe.
“Science” also used to tell us the world was flat and the sun went round the earth.
The theory behind the lack of sunspots and flu is to do with more cosmic radiation reaching the Earth and penetrating the atmosphere, thereby causing more virus mutations and infections.
I have no idea if it’s true or not, but that’s the theory.
Good find, thank you. I have been in the field of complementary medicine for nearly 30 years and I am always interested in new ideas and theories. We are not just physical machines . . . in fact, we are anything but.
After 10 years research as the normal medical industry was bloody hopeless to say the least found out my wife has electro-magnetic hypersensitivity so I know we are very highly tuned to electrical frequencies and as a hard bitten supervisor of engineers I know it all sounds drippy hippy but it’s true.
Unfortunately more people suffer than you know but they just put ti down to modern life as feeling like shit is normal.
Interesting fact – if you draw a line from stonehenge back to stonehenge around the earth it intersects the last amount of land?
‘Incalculable loss’: New York Times covers front page with 1,000 Covid-19 death notices
Presumably we can look forward to a similar front page in a month’s time to pay tribute to next month’s likely toll of 200-250,000 deaths, the numbers that occur in the US on average each and every month?
Or could it be that the NYT is cynically exploiting these particular deaths to serve an agenda?
Dead right Mark, and how many of those deaths were due to NY governor Cuomo’s homocidal policy of sending older vulnerable people to care homes to die. Revolting hypocrisy
There will be a roll of honour for all the “war heroes” and every year we will have a remembrance day for the fallen.
Indeed, there is something increasingly dark bout New York as a region. Of the nearly 74,000 COVID19 labeled death certificates reported to the US CDC as of Friday, 47% come from just 2 states out of 50, New York and its neighbor New Jersey. It is increasingly clear that something other than just a respiratory virus killed a awful lot of mostly elderly people in those two states from the middle of March through April. The New York Times celebration of this murderous fact is, frankly, beyond the pale.
Prof Sakora is a beacon of hope and a jeffing hero.
‘Here are the latest daily infection figures for the four European countries that eased their lockdowns back in mid-April (accelerating since).
Denmark – 59
Norway – 14
Czech Republic – 77
Austria – 50
No second wave, not even a tiny ripple.’
https://twitter.com/ProfKarolSikora/status/1264500520313634817
When I was at the gathering on Glasgow Green yesterday I was remembering the wonderful Commonwealth Games in 2014 and the joy and camaraderie.
It makes me weep to see what we have done to dear old Glasgow.
The Geordies will always be with you. Last time I was there was almost exactly two years ago – a beautiful Saturday morning, had to transfer between the stations on my way ‘south’ via Buchanan Street – and Patisserie Valerie was still with us. Magic!
funny how you saw the camaraderie in the Commonwealth Games and i saw it as a bunch of jacked up dullards playing school sports at the tax payers expense.
Well I for one loved it and it brought a lot of money into the city.
I hated the whole charade of the Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2014. Shamelessly used by the Scottish Nazi Party to push their suicidal independence agenda on the populace ahead of indyref. Flavour of Berlin Games 1936. I speak as a Glaswegian. Ashamed of the locals who bought into the whole nonsense of those games and that awful summer of 2014. May we never, ever, have a repeat.
i’m 6’3 and when i go to Glasgow everyone calls me ‘Big Man’ because everyone is so small and malnourished. Gotta love how there are junkies everywhere on account of how the Scottish Nazi Party hand out free drugs and needles to these wasters. We really are a piss poor nation of losers, wasters and imbeciles. Still i’m in Fife and we’re er……….much…….pretty much the same.
‘cording to this cummings was within his rights and police had no right to complain: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/parenting/health-bosses-advice-single-parents-17973790
Just listening to the BBC. Needless to say there were going on about Cummings, rather than why this whole lockdown farce is continuing. One question partially annoyed me: “What would you say to a nurse who has just come off a 12 hour shift.” This really sums up the quality of reporting – everything comes back to the saintly NHS and our need to protect it. The NHS is there to protect us – not the other way round.
Not all that surprising that employees of one bloated establishment state-funded institution are very keen to encourage the worship of another.
What’s disappointing is that all the other mainstream media outlets have caved in to outright, blind NHS worship.
i’d say to a nurse that just came off a 12 hour shift hey fatso stop eating cakes and making tiki tok videos and oh if i had my way i’d shut down your piss poor organisation and have a totally private system and then we’ll maybe get some decent health care instead of some kind of carry on matron bollocks that the braindead seem to think is the best in the world
Maybe point out they’re lucky to have a job?
It’s just emoting – ‘What would you say to a nurse who has just come off a 12 hour shift’ is not an argument that deals with the facts and statistics.
It’s very stressful making YouTube videos while allowing cáncer patients to die.
What would I say to a nurse coming off a 12-hour shift?
Should have fought to keep the old 8-hour shift pattern, and try not to infect any of your patients.
“Up to 20% of hospital patients with Covid-19 caught it at hospital
NHS England figures reveal some infections were passed on by hospital staff unaware they had virus”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/17/hospital-patients-england-coronavirus-covid-19
Lord Hall: People have turned to BBC ‘in their droves’ during pandemic
And they have been betrayed, with their supposedly impartial and honest source of information used instead to disseminate state propaganda and scare them into supporting a disastrous policy of lockdown.
Long term, the future of the BBC depends on suppressing any honest discussion of the panic that enabled the lockdown, the disastrous costs and probably zero benefits of that policy, and the BBC’s role in enabling it through active propaganda.
Exactly why I’m not renewing my TV licence next Monday. Pity they won’t bother to ask me why!
Just watched some daft interview on Sky News with a medical ethics specialist and it was about the lack of virus naturally occurring in the community to expose vaccine volunteer testers to, in order to see if the vaccine works. The suggestion put to the guy was that the volunteers could be selected as young and fit and deliberately exposed to the virus under laboratory conditions. This would be against medical ethics, says the guy, as it could artificially expose the volunteers to risk of serious illness or death, as the virus can prove fatal even to young and fit folk. Even if the volunteers agreed to take the risk “for the greater good”. Instead of being relieved and hopeful about the lack of virus floating about in the community to infect these young and fit volunteers, the daft interviewer turned the interview into a fear and panic-fest about the difficulty, even impossibility, of a vaccine being developed which can be proved to be protective. When she put this to the interviewee he said that he was only a medical ethics man, not a vaccine expert. MSM is brain washing the audience into the belief that vaccine is the only way out.
They could try the vaccine out on nursing and medical staff. They’re still in contact with CV19 patients I assume, so it can be determined if it gives them immunity, and it might stop them passing it on to other vulnerable patients, as they did to an ex-NHS fire officer, who died from CV19 infection last week.
I have signed up on https://www.covid19vaccinetrial.co.uk/participate-trial to take part in the Oxford trials.
If selected, I will regard it as my duty to the greater good to maximise my own chances of exposure to the virus. With a 50/50 chance of getting the placebo and being only 2 years younger than Boris.
And I may get the chance to visit hospitals in Wales through my job.
A very annoying article in the Spectator:
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/was-dominic-cummings-acting-legally-
A barrister tries to assess whether Cummings acted illegally. Did he have a “reasonable excuse”? He looks at the government’s guidelines.
“The fact it was reasonable to leave to access paid childcare facilities is also a useful pointer – why would paid childcare be reasonable but unpaid unreasonable?”
“Ultimately, if pursued, the question would be one for a judge. I would be very surprised if a judge concluded that two parents leaving their home with a vulnerable young child, in order to guarantee childcare in the foreseeable likelihood of both parents being ill with the virus (which went on to hospitalise the boss of the man in question) acted unreasonably.”
(a) Obviously, the reason why the guidelines stipulate “paid childcare” is to prevent people from saying “I went round to my sister’s because I was feeling unwell and thought she could look after Timmy”. It would never occur to most of us that this was just an optional example – I would assume it meant: paid = legal; unpaid = illegal.
(b) Ordinary people are not in the business of “letting a judge decide”. For us, it’s unthinkable. The cost, the stress, possibility of a criminal record. How are we to know whether it leads to a criminal record or not? Ordinary people can’t take the chance.
This makes me fuming mad. The government has clearly created a set of ‘rules’ (or are they the ‘law’..?) that are perfectly flexible for people with legal minds to work around as they see fit, but for ordinary people they are clearly designed to be rigid and draconian, knowing that most people won’t even try to work around them.
Cummings must go.
Indeed, and most people, with access to just a single property (their home!), would have managed where they were based. Why should this have been impossible for Cummings?
As you say, he must (or at least should) go.
Absolutely. But I change my mind about Cummings remaining in place just further down the page. I now want him to stay, in order to symbolically undermine every government attempt to extend or strengthen the lockdown from now on.
What law did he break?
“At the government’s daily press conference on 24 March, England’s deputy chief medical officer Dr Jenny Harries spoke of the “exceptional circumstance” of an adult unable to care for a young child during the pandemic.
“A small child clearly is a vulnerable individual, so in this case, although we are encouraging everybody to stay in their own households – that’s the unit with the same risk of exposure – clearly if you have adults who are unable to look after a small child, that is an exceptional circumstance,” Dr Harries said.”
Was just using the children killed compared to lightning argument with someone and went and checked the ONS figures. Which show that 6 children under 15 have died with CV-19 on the death certificate. I know it’s still a very small number but think it’s important that the figures/arguments are correct.
My data from the ONS statistics up to the 8th May for England and Wales upto the 8th May ‘Covid-19 Weekly Occurrences’
The chart he linked to still shows two aged 1-14, although it does also show one under 1 year old.
I’m going to assume Toby was cunningly setting up a Cummings-esque “make them argue over whether it’s comparable to a minuscule number or a very minuscule number” trap here.
One of the youngsters was reported to have had leukemia. The baby was born with non virus related problems.
Die from or died with CV19?
Not only has the Dear Leader endorsed fully the actions of Dominic Cummings, he has also de facto run away from the battle with the teaching unions. Looks like September for schools. Jesus wept!
A while ago I said Boris’s balls had been sucked back up into his body following his brush with covid.
I think now we can all assume they’ve fully fallen off.
I think this is now bordering on very dangerous. Cabinet have to resign from him if he won’t go. I don’t like many of these journos with their ‘gotcha’ questions, but they are reflecting the mood of the ordinary citizen now.
Not quite following why it is dangerous..? True danger is the country being in lockdown, the public being behind the lockdown and the government free to lie, cheat and follow its authoritarian instincts. If Cummings remaining in post undermines all that, I’m 100% supportive of Cummings.
And the mood of the ordinary citizen is being dictated to them by a dishonest press.
“At the government’s daily press conference on 24 March, England’s deputy chief medical officer Dr Jenny Harries spoke of the “exceptional circumstance” of an adult unable to care for a young child during the pandemic.
“A small child clearly is a vulnerable individual, so in this case, although we are encouraging everybody to stay in their own households – that’s the unit with the same risk of exposure – clearly if you have adults who are unable to look after a small child, that is an exceptional circumstance,” Dr Harries said.”
If you had a 3-year-old child to look after and you knew you probably had the virus, what would you do?
I wouldn’t have driven 260 miles! All “normal” people would have managed at home with the child – just like my parents did during the 1960s flu epidemic. Besides, you can’t tell me that Dom and wife don’t have some kind of nanny.
No, his sinful balls are fully intact and operational in violation of Exodus 20:14.
I accept what someone said above. Leaving Cummings in place is actually good news. It turns the press and public against the lockdown rules, and it prevents the government from ever strengthening or re-introducing such sneaky, slimey, disingenuous ‘guidelines’ in future. In fact, it couldn’t be better. I withdraw my earlier call for Cummings to go.
I hear what you say, but in these times, this is surely, even if true, a very risky if not outright reckless strategy?
No, we’re still set to open on 1st, to be confirmed this Thursday, which was always the case.
Daily Mail is all over the Cummings story. Banner on News front page is: “CUMMINGS’ DEFENCE UNRAVELS”
While somebody who has really got it in for the chief lockdown hypocrite has parked a van outside his house playing pro-lockdown speeches at him. Great stunt.
Protesters set up camp outside Dominic Cummings’s home and blast Boris Johnson’s ‘stay at home’ speech on a huge screen
That’s really pushing the knife in….
Protesters set up camp outside Dominic Cummings’s home and blast Boris Johnson’s ‘stay at home’ speech on a huge screen
Oops left a space in the link. See if this one works.
If this isn’t all ten-dimensional chess orchestrated by the government, I really hope the papers have got something else on Cummings that can be brought out after the PM has defended him. I want to see the whole lot of them go down in ignominy and the country rise up against the ridiculous lockdown.
The thing with the PM defending him is to see off the next move which would be to point out that he knew about it. Maybe (fingers crossed) they’ve negotiated that Cummings will resign “honourably”. Doubt it though.
Yes, very good. He can’t not defend him if he already knew about it.
Having seen the latest polling as mentioned by Toby, the chances of the country rising up against the lockdown are exceedingly slim. The government and media have successfully managed to scare the living daylights out of a majority of the population, and who are happier under lockdown (being paid to stay at home) than going to work.
They’ll be the same people who will be screaming blue murder when the financial depression well and truly hits home .
I still think the whole Cummings business is an irrelevance compared to the bigger picture, but am glad the PM and others are defending him, and doing it so clumsily. I can only hope it highlights to at least some waverers that the laws we have and the whole policy is unworkable, unenforceable nonsense.
The PM really got his digger out, all that business about following your instincts. I think it’s referred to as “doubling down”. Maybe the PM has started to think he is Trump – the difference being I suspect Trump genuinely doesn’t give a toss about what some people think of him.
Out and about today saw a good few little clandestine playdates with adults and kids from different households – hopefully not the same households saying schools are not safe. Hoping human nature overcomes this madness, for now, though worry about our long term future.
Excellent piece by Nick Triggle – about the only journalist they have that doesn’t make me want to smash the television: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52758024
I complained to the BBC about not covering the Simon Dolan legal challenge and got a boilerplate reply listing the criteria they use to decide whether to cover a story, which was useful as I was then able to point out in my reply that the story fits all the criteria in spades. Maybe others would like to do the same.
Resist the “new normal”. Social distancing is against nature.
You have probably mostly seen it, but, for anyone else, Hannan discusses the dreadful economic future we face with some suggestions for trying to aid recovery. A pretty good attempt at least to spell out the nature of the disaster which so many sheeple clearly fail to see.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/23/radical-free-market-plan-can-lift-britain-economic-doldrums/
Another good website here
https://unlockthelockdown.com/the-top-twelve-lies-about-covid19/
set up by a retired Science teacher I think it deserves more traction.
I think clappers should be forced to carry on every Thursday as a mark of shame.
Haha, replied to the wrong post. Please ignore
He states that the IFR is 0.1% for Covid. I can find no study that puts it that low. More so, to make a convincing argument, you do not pick the lowest estimate, but rather the consensus.
He also claims the IFR rate for Covid is comparable to the 0.1% mortality rate for flu. This ignores the fact that the mortality rate for flu is based on suspected symptomatic cases of flu. It makes no account of asymptomatic cases as the IFR for Covid does.
Must be good – is blocked by my company’s webfilter.
So Boris has backed Cummings. |No surprise there. The so called elites will always stand up for each other as they feel they are so much better than the plebs.
[…] under-65 you’re more likely to die in a road traffic accident than from COVID-19 and, as I pointed out yesterday, if you’re under-15 you’re more likely to be struck by lightning – four times […]
I’ve been impressed by the spine shown by key Tories over the Dominic Cummings incident. It’s just that these same people have caved in to every far left offensive for their entire lives. Which raises the suspicion that this is not any kind of working resistance to the creeping socialist/globalist agenda at all, but merely naked self-interest; looking out for him because I could be next. Probably will be since I suspect none of them have any respect for the laws they impose on the rest of the people. Like the butcher knows exactly what’s in the sausage, and eats the steak instead.
And of course with this fake resistance comes fake arguments about the outrage of the public over Cummings’ hypocrisy. Oh, it’s just the media ginning up a twitter storm. Oh, the problem’s not Cummings, the problem is the lockdown. Oh, he did what any Dad would do to protect his child.
Worst of all is the last one: Oh, he did what he believed was lawful and reasonable.
Yeah, Boris, so did thousands of Britons who’ve been persecuted under the lockdown laws during the last 2 months.
And in what universe is the opinion of the perp the deciding factor in whether an offense has been committed?
(When he’s not a government agent, I mean?)
Don’t let anyone bamboozle you with their lies and distractions: this is about rank hypocrisy at the highest levels, about the active application of an outrageous legal double standard, one law for the masses, no law for the ruling classes.
Don’t misunderstand me – the lockdown laws are wrong, immoral, and probably illegal as well – they need to go, and the sooner the better.
Gunning for Cummings is not supporting the lockdown laws. Defending Cummings is not a protest against the lockdown laws.
But if those laws are going to be retained and applied, they must apply to everyone equally, without fear or favour. Otherwise it becomes very obvious that you don’t live in a democracy at all, but merely a neo-feudalism with a thin veneer of democratic process.
[…] much about this story on the Telegraph‘s front page except to say: You read it here first. I pointed out that children under the age of 15 were more likely to be struck by lightning than die of COVID-19 […]
[…] and concluded that the chances of a child under the age of 15 being struck by lightning are four times than of dying from the covid […]